Survival games have stayed very popular in the last several years with the gaming community, letting players can craft items, maintain their thirst and hunger, and try to stay alive in harsh environments. Beam Team Games' Stranded Deep fits perfectly in this genre, finally releasing on PlayStation 4 and Xbox One after an early access run on PC. Stranded Deep is very difficult and stressful at times, and fans of the genre will have a lot of fun trying to make it off their island alive.
Stranded Deep begins with the player sitting on a plane, minding their own business, when all of a sudden the plane begins plummeting out of the sky. After falling unconscious, players come to just to realize that they are trapped on the airplane as it descends underwater. The very first challenge of Stranded Deep is to swim through the carcass of the sinking plane and discover a way to the surface. Once completing this task, players will find a lifeboat nearby that transports them to a nearby island with only a few rations and a compass to keep them alive. The opening of Stranded Deep is an incredible action oriented set piece that really sets the stage for something exciting.
Stranded Deep is a beautiful game and features an island environment that looks like something out of a travel brochure. If Stranded Deep wasn't a survival game, this island would feel more like a paradise than the prison it becomes. The world is also populated by a vast assortment of animals and plant life that are varied in design and easy to distinguish at a glance.
Stranded Deep plays in a similar manner to most other first-person survival games, reminiscent of playing Rust or The Forest while exploring their small island. This isn't necessarily a bad thing as it rewarding to craft and collect food, but Stranded Deep doesn't have as many in-depth systems as its predecessors. Stranded Deep makes up for it by allowing aquatic traversal and exploration.
Players are going to spend the majority of their time with Stranded Deep crafting items and collecting food and water. This is difficult to do at first, but Stranded Deep has a short tutorial to help players get started. In the beginning players will only be able to craft simple things like a rudimentary knife and a small campfire. As they find more materials and continue crafting, more recipes are unlocked for use, including stronger gear and items that enable players to more efficiently collect food and water.
Stranded Deep's game mechanics are relatively simple but there are some interesting things that players will discover while playing. Coconuts, for example, are a great early game method of having food and water. Players can drink coconut water and break the shells open for food, but if too many are eaten in quick succession the player will get sick and become dehydrated. This small touch of realism makes the game more difficult, but also an overall more enjoyable experience. Another realistic situation is encountered with Stranded Deep's snakes. If bitten, players will become poisoned and sick, which means that they will have to track down certain plants to heal themselves.
Exploration is a rewarding aspect of Stranded Deep that players will be tempted to partake in almost immediately after the game begins. It is possible to do so right at the beginning, but players may want to hold off until they are comfortable with their surroundings and have enough supplies to survive away from the starting island. There are many things worth exploring in the immediate area around the island though. Usually players will find a few shipwrecks nearby that can be plundered for rations and more advanced crafting components like scrap metal and engine pieces. This is a great way to get ahead early on in the game without going too far from a player's home base.
Once players have a steady supply of food and water coming in, and they feel more comfortable with the game's mechanics, Stranded Deep opens up considerably. Players can then begin exploring other nearby islands to find more resources. More experienced players can even set up bases on other islands to ensure that they have plenty of food and water to keep themselves alive while stranded by themselves.
There are a few bugs that make Stranded Deep slightly frustrating at times. Since players have limited inventory space, they are able to craft new objects with resources that are on the ground around them as well, but this mechanic is difficult to use if the game fails to correctly register what items are available. Another issue can be found with the game's wild pigs and other large animals. Players who bring them down will have access to useful resources like meat and leather, but they should avoid trying to drag the dead animals around too much since it can frequently glitch and fly off yards away. This is amusing at first, but if players are unable to discover where the creature went they will lose out on the resources and any spears or arrows used to bring the animal down.
Stranded Deep is a lot of fun to play, but it grows stale as time progresses. Almost all of the islands and shipwrecks are similar and it struggles by not having a lot of quality of life mechanics that would make surviving more enjoyable. For example, if players need to craft several of the same item they must do so one at a time with no way to craft several simultaneously.
At the end of the day Stranded Deep is a beautifully crafted and engaging experience for anyone who is a fan of survival games. It may not provide the same amount of replayability that games like Rust have, but the crafting and exploring mechanics are solid and fun to use. The first time that players climb out of their raft to step onto their new island home or fight off a group of hungry sharks, they will be shown how intense and rewarding Stranded Deep truly is.
Stranded Deep can be played on PC, PlayStation 4, and Xbox One. A PS4 code was provided for the purposes of this review.