On the Hearth

An occult mystery game about decoding the laws of botanical magic during the height of the witch trials.



Decrypt your mentor's grimoire, explore the wilds for mystical reagents, and experiment with arcane potions. All the while preparing your tight-knit village for an encroaching church-crusade.

Apprenticed to an elderly wise-woman, decrypt decades of eclectic magical research in her fading Grimoire. Piece together the strange histories of your predecessors by analyzing their handwriting, note-taking styles, and personal relationships. To make sense of it all, you’ll have to conduct your own experiments, write your own research, and confirm your own hypotheses.

Venture out into the world that surrounds you, trawling the rivers, forests, and hillsides for elusive and exciting reagents to experiment with. Use the potions you’ve crafted and the knowledge you’ve gleaned to uncover fading nooks and crannies, exposing the secrets deep within.

Alongside your mentor, you live on the outskirts of “The Hearth”, a home for those without. A tight-knit village built by the outcasts of turbulent times, hidden deep within an ancient glade. Like you, all of these villagers are outcasts in their own right, but here “On the Hearth” every outcast is adored. You’ll actively support, and be supported by, these eclectic villagers.

The Hearth and its history are shrouded in mysteries, each ready for you to pursue at your own pace. Piecing them together will pull from all your experiences; the magic you master, the potions you create, and the community you cultivate. Solving mysteries will reveal a wealth of new knowledge, including hidden areas, mysterious reagents, and secret research.

As you dive deeper into the mysteries of the Hearth, its origins, and its future, you’ll hear of morbid whispers on the wind. The Church is coming, and should they find The Hearth, they’ll raze it to the ground.


On the Hearth is a game about odd people from odd places, it’s about the cost of kindness in the face of flame, and a village that would burn itself to save its own.