SANABI's Second Life: A Free Prequel, a Café and a G-STAR Homecoming

Picture a retired general with a chain-hook prosthetic arm, swinging through a neon mega-city built on the bones of Joseon, Korea's last dynasty. That image made SANABI one of the best-loved Korean indie games of the decade. Three years after its full release, it is still growing.

Developed by Wonder Potion and published by Neowiz, SANABI holds an Overwhelmingly Positive rating on Steam, with 95% of more than 4,800 English reviews recommending it. Its free prequel DLC, A Haunted Day, arrived on PC on 27 November 2025 and on Nintendo Switch on 15 January 2026, and next week the game has a booth at G-STAR's Game Culture Festival in Busan.

A quick history

SANABI entered early access on Steam on 20 June 2022 and launched in full on 8 November 2023. It is a stylish, dystopian action platformer: you play a veteran on the trail of a mysterious figure known as Sanabi, using a grappling chain arm to swing, climb and fight through a cyberpunk city. Players praised its movement, its dense, twisting story and its soundtrack.

For Neowiz, SANABI was a turning point. It proved that a Korean publisher could take a small team's game to a global audience, and it opened the door for later indies such as Shape of Dreams (read that story) and Goodbye Seoul.

What A Haunted Day adds

The DLC is set 13 years before the main game. You play Major Song of Uigeumbu No. 12, the youngest person ever to pass the military exam, before she met the general. She receives an unreasonable order from a superior and finds a scrapyard outside Hanyang full of aggressive robots, a strange signalling device and unsettling events.

It plays differently from the base game:

• No grappling hook. Instead, Song has a recoverable mid-air jump and a shotgun for aerial action.
• A Burst Mode that blocks attacks and boosts your actions.
• Eight new stages and two boss fights.

Neowiz calls it SANABI's first spin-off DLC, and it is free for owners of the game. Wonder Potion CEO Yoo Seung-hyun said the team wanted to expand the universe beyond its original plans and revisit characters fans loved.

A café and a booth

In September 2026, Wonder Potion announced a SANABI collaboration café, with a teaser showing the main characters in casual clothes. Locations, dates and menus have not been announced yet.

At G-STAR (19-22 November), Neowiz's booth at the Game Culture Festival in BEXCO Hall 2 offers on-site play of A Haunted Day, a speedrun challenge with prizes, and commemorative goods. A fan signing with the CEO takes place on 21 November at the Aniplus Busan Seomyeon store. More stops are in our G-STAR indie guide.

Why it matters

Most indie games get one launch window and then fade. SANABI shows another path: keep adding meaningful content, bring the game to new platforms, and build the world outside the game with events and merchandise. WGC's take: a free, mechanically different prequel is a generous way to bring lapsed players back, and the café and G-STAR booth show a studio treating SANABI as a lasting Korean IP, not a one-off.

How to play

• PC: Steam, with A Haunted Day free for owners.
• Switch: SANABI and the free DLC (from January 2026).
• In person: G-STAR Game Culture Festival, 19-22 November.