As someone who’s not afraid to admit that I’ve played a good portion of survival games available on the internet, I’ve got a bone to pick with this genre.
I’ve played every major title even before I started this blog but I also had the opportunity to play games that were not so popular, made by one person, or were nothing more than a passion project. Unfortunately, not all of them have seen the light of day.
But I’ve seen far more of this genre than the average person ever does. And I can confidently say that more than 90% of survival games have some sort of crafting system implemented. It can range from weapons crafting to tools, medicine, food, armor, shelter, or any sort of upgrades. If it’s an item in the game, you’ll most likely need to collect resources, craft the separate elements needed and finally craft an object that you wanted.
What I’ve noticed that keeps happening more and more is that they’ve got a game with a great premise but it turns into a full-time job where all you do is collect mats and upgrade your base. While I do enjoy it, I strongly believe that we don’t need more crafting in survival games. Or at least not as much as we get now. Especially when it doesn’t make sense.
I think it would be best explained if I gave you a few examples. If I wanted I could list at least 15 games off the top of my head that are overdoing it or simply doing it all wrong but let’s keep it short.
Let’s talk about one of the latest survival games I played this year, Windrose. It’s a pirate survival game that I think is easily one of the best pirate games to exist. I’ve enjoyed playing it immensely. Yet I think that the crafting could have been done better. The game starts with my character (a captain) being shot, thrown in water and stranded on a deserted island. Having to survive there and build from ground zero, crafting makes absolute sense. That first experience was justifiably brutal and with every right. That’s how it should be.
The problem begins when I escape the island, get my own boat and crew. At that point, I’m the captain again, I have a gigantic crew but I’m the one doing all the collecting. There should be a system where I can send the NPCs to gather supplies, so I can focus on the big picture as a captain of a ship.
The next example is in other games when you have to craft a [random equipment] but in order to do that, you’re going to need to craft parts for it. And to do that you need to smelt your ores that you had to search for all over the map. But wait, you don’t have tools for that, you need diamond pickaxe because titanium one just won’t cut it, it’s too weak. But for that, you need a super advanced workbench that can only be made if you already reached Master Yoda level and have all prerequisite buildings made.
You get where I’m going with this. It can get overwhelming and easily overshadows the point of the game.
“Forget finding cure for zombie apocalypse, I need to craft my shiny pants so I look cooler when I get eaten by a zombie“
And something that I was extremely excited to play, turns into a chore that I dread to do. Which automatically leads to uninstall.
There should be an unspoken rule where developers aren’t allowed to make their game more than 30% crafting focused. Even with that I’m feeling generous. The rest of it should be more focused on story, exploration and actual survival. I feel that way as gamers we would get an ultimate experience with this genre. What are your thoughts on this? Do you think that there’re games that are overdoing it with their crafting system?
Make sure to let me know in the comments.
