Back in 2020,Deep Rock Galacticgot a full release after two years of Early Access. This fun, silly, and extensively entertaining cooperative game follows Tolkien-esque dwarves working for a mining company in space. The squad-based extraction game was very much needed at the height of lockdowns and social isolation, bringing you and up to three others straight into the action on various missions within alien caves.
I remember loving the gameplay loop of dropping into a game with strangers or friends, and trying out the different class’ tools and abilities as I held back waves of bugs and attempted to clear out sections so that my mining expeditions could go relatively smoothly.
In something of a spin-off sequel into a new genre,Deep Rock Galactic: Survivorfeatures all of the classes, abilities, and plenty of waves of alien bugs, but leaves the friends behind.
If you’ve played Vampire Survivors, you’ll quickly recognise the gameplay loop of this game. It’s part of the same single-player, roguelike genre with passive-casual combat that requires you to walk around and stay alive, while the game handles the combat automatically. It’s a compelling form of gameplay because you don’t have to put in as much effort to play, but it still allows you to commit mental effort to the strategy of your movement and the abilities you want to unlock and upgrade as you go.
Deep Rock Galactic: Survivor lets you pick one of the four dwarf classes, which you unlock as you progress in the game, each with different base stats, abilities, and styles of gameplay. The starting class Scout, for example, is a great all-rounder, while the Gunner is intended as more of a heavy hitter but requires a direct approach to waves of enemies. This will come as no surprise to players of the first game, and if you had a preference for a class in that one, then chances are that preference will carry over.
Survivor is a super enjoyable and refreshing step into a new genre.
As you drop into the action, Deep Rock Galactic: Survivor puts you into a small map, where you may start running around and mining. Bugs will start showing up, and each level has a progression bar for events; swarms will arrive, areas will need to be cleared for a drop pod, and finally bosses will turn up. You have to be quick to grab XP and keep on top of things, however, as even after the boss turns up, the level progress will continue, and stronger enemies will continue to spawn in. If you don’t strategize your movements, use mining to filter swarms and control the crowds, and defeat the boss quickly enough, you’ll soon find yourself overpowered.
It has less of an endless nature, and instead sees you take on a level, kill bugs for XP to level up and get new abilities and weapons, defeat the elite boss when it arrives, reach the extraction pod in time, and then move down to the next level. After that, you can unlock more hazardous runs, and eventually more worlds. It’s just as replayable when considering the genre, but perhaps a fair bit faster in pace and easier to fall victim to a screen absolutely jam-packed with enemies.
Each run, victory or not, will net you materials - which you’ll want to gather as much as you can while holding off the swarms - and you’ll also get some shiny credits. Then, between runs, you can head over to the upgrade menu, which allows you to use these materials and credits to unlock permanent upgrades. You can also take advantage of the resource marketplace on this screen, which lets you sell and buy the different materials, just in case there’s an upgrade you want but you don’t have enough credits or the right material, but you have an abundance of a different material. It’s the perfect incentive to keep up the low-effort gathering, as you don’t always need to think about collecting a specific resource and can instead just mine and pick up everything you can. One way or another, it’ll be of good use.
Survivor is a super enjoyable and refreshing step into a new genre. That switch helps the spin-off to not overshadow the original game, meaning both can continue to stand as viable options for whichever mood you’re in. The only thing I find myself missing, however, is the cooperative aspect. Deep Rock Galactic prides itself on its squad-based nature, and its charm was built on that community element, seeing fellow dwarves drinking, mining, and shouting “rock and stone” to each other between and on missions. In that sense, Survivor is a lot lonelier, and I feel like it would hit all the marks if it had an option for cooperation.
Perhaps it’s because it would be too chaotic on screen, would be too easy to crowd control, or just generally was not considered as the intended direction, but I feel like a good part of the Deep Rock Galactic soul is absent, and though the game keeps the charm, I can’t help but wish multiplayer was an option. I’m still all for the solo gameplay, and in the first game I would sometimes go it alone if I felt like it, but I still knew other dwarves would have my back should I run into some difficulty or just want the extra hand. Here, there is no option, so you’re left to your own devices. Maybe adapted maps, loot drops, and spawn rates would have to all be considered to balance the difficulty per player added, but for what the game is going for, I feel like that would be a worthwhile effort to implement in the future.
Still, the game will be in Early Access for an intended 6-12 months, and while I miss the community cooperation that is so prominent in the first game, I can’t give it too much fault here. The game is, as listed, intended as a “single player survivor-like, auto-shooter”, and it does exactly that with an impressive level of polish already. The graphical style is intact and shining, the number of enemies on screen is daunting but doesn’t tank performance on my PC even slightly, and there is a strong foundation for growth in its progression, balance, and future content per the development cycle and community feedback. For an Early Access state, Deep Rock Galactic: Survivor is ready to rock and stone from the get-go, and I can only see it delving deeper with each future update.
