"I lost the concept of home, until my grandmother took me into these forests" - Trollheim: Gnomes is a survival game from ex-DICE and Paradox devs that channels childhood fairytales

Swedish studio Off-leash Interactive and Denshattack publishers Fireshine Games have announced Trollheim: Gnomes, a survival-crafting fairytale in which you, a three-inch-high gnome, explore a procedurally generated forest derived from Nordic folklore. You'll be clambering up enormous trees, lighting campfires beneath mushrooms, and befriending or evading troublesome larger supernatural creatures known as "Väsen".

I caught a briefing for Trollheim: Gnomes earlier this month, and while I worry this is generic fare on some level, I'd sure like to get lost in those procgen woods. I'm also interested in the game's eight-player multiplayer, in that it seemingly creates opportunities for hide-and-seek – the game's building system affords scope to camouflage your dwellings against the litter, moss and mold of the forest floor.

Image credit: Fireshine Games

Off-leash are a new studio founded by some fairly seasoned people. Trollheim game director Jojje Dalunde spent nine years at Battlefield creators DICE, while company CEO Jakob Munthe is a former executive producer at Paradox Interactive. Munthe's most recent credits include Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines 2, which I guess isn't necessarily reassuring, but hey, that game didn't turn out too terribly in the end. Art producer Josefin Lindgren has done stints at Payday household Starbreeze and Unravel developers Coldwood Interactive. I can definitely make out a thread between Unravel's homespun countryside and Trollheim's pungent array of organic terrain and building materials.

Trollheim: Gnomes is the first project in a narrative universe founded by film-maker Björne Larson. He and other members of the Gnomes team are piping their own childhood memories of Nordic woodland lore into the game. "When my parents divorced, I lost the concept of home, until my grandmother took me into these forests we grew up in, telling me about the gnomes and trolls and fairies who lived there and thrived there," Larson told journalists during the briefing. "Ultimately the forest made me feel at home, and cared for."

As you might expect from that personal reflection, Gnomes isn't a combat-led game, though it begins with scenes of strife: the Sprýg Gnomes are driven out from Midgård by a corrupted Oden, forced to relocate to the wildwoods of Trollheim. The non-player denizens of the woods can be threatening – hungry trolls may go after your food, for example - but the Väsen are broadly characterised as "neighbours", not enemies. Your job is to find your niche alongside them.

Image credit: Fireshine Games

You might be able to placate grumpier Väsen with the help of other players. During the briefing, the developers gave the example of snaring a troll with rope trap, calming the beast with some flute music, and then offering them a tasty stew. The game's gifting system strives to make an art out of reviving downed players and NPCs: you'll need to identify and prepare an appropriate remedy, though Off-leash didn't go into detail here. As for player specialisation: there are no classes, so it's all about what you craft and wear.

The environment itself is pretty enchanting. I guess Obsidian's Grounded is the immediate comparison, but Grounded doesn't have trunks this overwhelmingly tall. A lot of work has gone into capturing both the scale of the canopy and the minutiae of twigs, berries, fungus and boulders. There are babbling brooks and moonlit lakes that are crying out for a birchleaf canoe (I'm not sure boating is a thing in the game). There are undulating mossy carpets that look like they'd wrench the ankles of any human hikers, but seem pleasant enough to scramble over when you're the size of a champagne cork.

Sadly, the inclusion of elements familiar from other open world and survival games tramples some of the charm. You can swoop with a hang-glider purloined from The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, and there's the usual survival game building system of clipped-together holographic templates, which wrecks the illusion of assembling dwellings from bits of sylvan detritus. That's an impression based on hands-off play, mind. When I told the devs I found the building system a bit of a letdown, they argued that the small scale and level of creative control add up into something distinctive.

Image credit: Fireshine Games

The gnome architectural designs look lovely in themselves, and again, I'm keen on the prospect of concealing them in amongst the roots of spruce and pine. Or constructing nests linked by ropeways, high up in the branches. I don't think there's PVP, as such, and I'm not sure the game's NPCs can be duped by camouflaged exteriors, but I like the idea of tribes of players hiding out from each other, or leaving intricate trails to their lairs. If you're an especially insular species of gnome - a proper Svirfneblin - you can play the whole thing solo and offline.

Read more about Trollheim: Gnome on Steam. There's no release date yet, but they're taking applications for a playtest. Meet you under the third toadstool on the left, eh? I'll bring my flute.