Peaceful Pokémon-like 'Creatures of Ava' from 11 bit studios is available now on Xbox and PC Game Pass

What you need to know

• Creatures of Ava is developed by Inverge Studios and published by 11 bit studios.
• The game launched today for Xbox and PC and is a day-one addition to Xbox Game Pass.
• Creatures of Ava is a "wholesome and cozy creature-saver" without combat, and players must help cure Ava's planet from 'The Withering' to save wildlife and local inhabitants.
• 11 bit studios and Inverge have partnered with WDC—Whale and Dolphin Conservation, and proceeds from a $2.99 cosmetic DLC pack for Creatures of Ava will benefit the charity.

2024 has been a banner year for Pokémon-likes. Creature collecting and taming games like Palworld have shown that the genre has a much wider audience outside of Nintendo's platform. Today, Inverge and 11 bit studios have released their own take on the genre with the all-new "creature saving" game, Creatures of Ava. Creatures of Ava is available now on PC and Xbox and is a day-one addition to the Xbox Game Pass subscription service.

Creatures of Ava was a labor of love over five years by a small team of roughly a dozen developers at Inverge, who partnered with the prolific Polish publisher 11 Bit Studios to bring the game to life. 11 bit studios is most widely known for Frostpunk, though the studio has also made a name for itself with more recent titles like The Thaumaturge, Indika, and the upcoming sci-fi adventure The Alters .

The Creatures of Ava story, co-created by renowned author Rhianna Pratchett, centers on the story of a young adventurer, Vic, who is on an expedition to the planet Ava. Despite teeming with wildlife and unique inhabitants known as the Naam, Ava is in danger of succumbing to a powerful infection. 'The withering' infection is taking over the densely populated world's four distinct biomes, each packed with unique wildlife for players to cure and save. To do so, Vic and the player must understand the roots of the withering and come to terms with the balance of nature.

To celebrate the launch of Creatures of Ava, Inverge and 11 bit have partnered with WDC - Whale and Dolphin Conservation. The Steam and Xbox versions of Creatures of Ava will feature a $2.99 DLC that includes 4 WDC-inspired cosmetic backpack trinkets. Owners of the Digital Deluxe Edition of Creatures of Ava will find the DLC content is included. All net proceeds from the sale of the DLC cosmetics will go to protecting whales and dolphins. 11 bit studios defines supporting deserving charities that share common themes with the publisher's games as a core value.

Creatures of Ava is available now on PC via the Windows Store and Steam and on Xbox consoles for $24.99. It's also available for Xbox Cloud Gaming via Xbox Game Pass and is a Day One addition to the subscription service. In 2023, 11 bit studios signed a deal with Microsoft to launch more games from its portfolio into Game Pass. In addition to Creatures of Ava, 11 Bit's The Alters, and Frostpunk 2 are expected to be day-one additions with their respective launches.