This is probably my favorite genre so figured it'd be worth bunching the games together for discussion, since no single game seems to have much going on post 1.0 release.
I'd like to think Subnautica pioneered the conclusive story-focused survival game in which the story is in focus, whereas The Forest and Green Hell rather focused on survival as the main concept and the story serving as a backdrop or motivation to keep struggling against 'le not zombies'. Eventually you'd see Raft embodying the norm for the genre; a stylized survival game based on a single unique (and novel) concept, releasing in Early Access, and then dropping chapter updates leading towards the 1.0 release at which point the game is dropped like an ugly baby.
Grounded by Obsidian Entertainment is the most recent superstar of the genre and merges the cartoony and child-friendly stylization of games like Subnautica and Raft with the difficulty and 'realistic' way of building structures piece by piece of Green Hell/The Forest in a relatively high-budget game that nonetheless managed to actually conclude its story.
Come the rise of streamer-friendly slapstick comedy games like Lethal Company and Phasmophobia, you got the newest banger Abiotic Factor which is 'the funny science guys from Half-Life 1' brought into a survival crafting game bordering on horror, if not for the absurdity of its enemies and the general concept of a bunch of pencil pushers running around a lab full of SCP-like monsters and mechs.
A staple of the genre is taking forever to be developed, often being dropped halfway through development due to dishonest developers, a failing studio, or even then despite managing to quietly release into 1.0, fading into obscurity because the game's only claim to fame was mimicking the success of another. I think the biggest appeal of these games other than the creative building outlet is the goal of them being a conclusive story. No live service bullshit or indefinite development, but rather releasing a game with a Steam banner, being reviewed and streamed en masse, and then dying out until the next big game drops.
Except Sons of the Forest. We don't talk about that one.
I can say that Abiotic Factor is pretty damn fun. I've been playing it 2 player coop and the survival aspects are fun without being tedious and obnoxious, and blasting aliens in the face with a crossbow is just a joy. The enemies have patterns you can learn so if you know what to do you can annihilate them with strategy, but they are still dangerous if you aren't being diligent. The crafting is easy and it's fun setting up a table and hooking it up to a wall outlet. Overall I'd say it's a very fun game, though I haven't played it alone really.
Few were the games that gave me such an intense feeling of loneliness and desolation in a world with giant sea creatures. And when you form your own underwater base, it gives a very fulfilling feeling, not to mention the underwater exploration which is very cool.
Sorry friend, but Sons of the Forest > all others. No other game has given me that feeling of being Prey as much as SotF. Stopping at a river to fish, hearing a noise off in the wilderness, and freezing to scan the treeline for movement. Nothing like it.
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Sorry friend, but Sons of the Forest > all others. No other game has given me that feeling of being Prey as much as SotF. Stopping at a river to fish, hearing a noise off in the wilderness, and freezing to scan the treeline for movement. Nothing like it.
I recognize its appeal in being a modern game with quality of life type additions as opposed to "broo it gets so good 8 hours in! please bro keep going!", but I fucking hate the non-stop assault and raids. Literally just spawning enemies on top of you. I remember making a camp in a corner under a waterfall in green hell and seeing natives walk past. I felt safe yet just barely.
Speaking of Green Hell; hell of a game in terms of story and game design. The game itself is post-discovery of this cure-all herb in the amazon which led the civilized world to invade and farm the natives to near extinction which is why they're hostile. The DLC uses the same map but takes place during the first trip there when the natives were friendly. It's night and day, a dead desolate map with lunatic cannibals and jaguars to "oh look a friendly native needing a bandage". Instead of story beats gating the map, it's all unlocked and you basically gotta raid hostile tribe camps, free prisoners, unlock reputation type shit. It's more of a freeplay survival game than the heavy narrative of the first one.
Also on SotF: The lore itself is really cool. I listened to this like and it's honestly a great theme for a game:
Subnaughty 2 teased. Was leaked ages ago that it'd be co-op so seems to hold true. Question is whether it'll hold up since the reason people wanted co-op was the time it was released in, youtube collabs and minecraft videos aplenty.
Imo teethers a bit too hard on 'realistic' animal designs as opposed to stylized but we'll see. Subnutty 1 was redesigned in major ways so many times that I don't trust them having a single vision and sticking to it.
