It perfects a formula laid out by Subnautica and Subnautica: Below Zero – albeit in a more suburban, macro setting. Tully leads you and your friends to become scientists yourselves – chopping down strange pieces of wood, harvesting flowers, taking them back to your Research Station to analyse them you become innately immersed into Grounded’s world out of this active desire to understand, rather than conquer. Its mantra to the player feeds back into its own core narrative: ‘Discover, Investigate, Analyze.’ Your investigation in the disappearance of the scientist Dr. TBy comprison, Grounded feels more innovative. Their mission statement is simple: ‘Build, Survive, Dominate.’ That is a successful and lucrative model for some as seen with Rust’s immense community, but for many others, it leads to a stagnation. Going.Īn issue I’ve found with a lot of survival games like Rust, DayZ, Ark: Survival Evolved is that they have a limited time frame of enjoyment before you hit the peak of your potential within the game, and there’s nowhere left to go but down.

Even three months in, I’m still discovering new dungeons to plunder and areas to excavate, which surprises me considering how many hours I’ve already sunk into the game. The garden is a gigantic landscape, and it takes hours to even begin reaching its outer edges, demonstrating the processing power that shows next-gen can meet the lofty ambitions of survival games better than ever. Much like The Forest, Grounded’s initial opening leads you to believe you understand the environment you’re in, before pulling the rug out from under to reveal a sprawling cornucopia of mysteries, questions and challenges. And for a long time, I hadn’t found another game that had me glued to my sofa, playing into the early hours.

What first appears as a simple survival game soon unravels into this complex web of intelligent AI, Lovecraftian storytelling and environmental mystery. I’m a huge survival games fan – I grew up on Minecraft (who didn’t, really?) and Endnight Games’ The Forest is undoubtedly one of my favourites of the last generation. The perfect place to play Grounded, and without emptying your wallet.

Download the last of us grounded