Un survivor tout ce qu'il y'a de plus classique.
DRG is awesome and I will love anything done in this universe. It looks really cool as a survivor game, and having several things happening in the stages makes them really interesting. For now it is only in early access but it feels more like a completed, if small, game.
Good mix up for the auto shooter. I really enjoy the optional objectives and pickups that mix make this unique from competitors.
Fun, relaxing game thats mindless.
The game is currently in early access on Steam and I didn't feel like it was all that fun honestly. I'm going to backlog it for now and return later but for now, I have other games to play.
é divertido mas n é um dos melhores do genero
O jogo ja ta bem divertido mas precisa de mais conteudo e o Driller precisa ser bufado, eh bem ruim e chato jogar com ele aqui, diferente do game base
“PROFOUNDLY UNSATISFYING”
In my last review, I briefly mentioned that I’d put 92 hours into FFVII Rebirth and that I’d started feeling both “physically and mentally unwell”. Much like Cloud Strife who suffers from severe Mako poisoning, induced via prolonged exposure to an element that is normally beneficial in smaller amounts, I had unintentionally poisoned myself from overexposure to Final Fantasy VII.
I needed a break. A detox. Between 12+ hour long play sessions (quite literally, before or after) I’d play a round or two of Deep Rock Galactic: Survivor.
I’d played the DRG:S playtest last year and walked away feeling generally positive. I thought it was an interesting foundation for a Survivors-like game. Now that it’s been in Early Access for over a month, I’ve racked up well over 20 hours. I think I’m now qualified to say this might be the most unsatisfying Survivors-like game I’ve ever played.
It really is that simple. Done and dusted. I could have easily chosen not to write a review for this game after all. But it’s the HOW and WHY this game is so unsatisfying that compels me to type this now.
At launch, there are four characters to choose from (one unlocked from the jump, three you need to progress to unlock) with three discrete classes for each character. These classes also need to be unlocked (each character’s first class is unlocked by default). Each character/class has access to different weapons, although there is noticeable overlap in terms of weapon availability between characters.
There are currently three biomes (a fourth biome was just added, more on this towards the end) and five hazard (difficulty) levels for each biome, each with unique objectives that contribute to the game’s meta-progression (i.e. new weapons, characters, classes, artifacts, etc.).
So, don’t worry about all this too much, let’s just focus on an average run in DRG:S. You pick a character, pick a class, and drop into a level.
The first thing you’ll notice in how DRG:S differs from other Survivors-like games is that its levels are procedurally generated, and rather cramped. DRG:S puts a big focus on mining for resources, the two most common being Gold and Nitra, although players can also mine rock (and stone!) to open new pathways, circumvent enemies, etc. On paper, this rules; in practice… it’s fine, but in a general sense, it works. There’s nothing egregious in what it attempts.
All right, so you’re playing the game now. Your character shoots some bugs, mines some minerals, and eventually levels up. You can only pick a new weapon at Levels 5, 15, and 25. It’s an interesting idea but one that makes the rhythm of progression noticeably lopsided.
Survivors-like games are not intended as longform endurance tests. They’re very simple arcadey games by design. DRG:S understand this but almost overcompensates by adding extraction game elements? Every run or “dive” is separated into five randomly generated levels, each around five-ish minutes long. As players explore and collect minerals, they’re also being attacked by bugs, and after players kill a certain amount of bugs (I believe the level progress meter is determined by bugs killed and not just a timer), a boss enemy called an “Elite” appears, at which point a countdown begins – if players don’t kill the Elite enemy in about 30 seconds (give or take), the bugs “grow stronger” for every tick (15 seconds or so) until the player is completely overwhelmed. If the player manages to defeat the Elite, the drop pod arrives to deliver them to the next area – but will leave without the player if they don’t enter the pod within 30 seconds, thereby ending their run.
DRG:S really, really wants players to manage their time wisely, but this feels like too much. On the first two hazard levels, this isn’t a major issue, I think it’s only when attempting Hazards 3 and 4 that it feels like almost too much RNG is happening.
It’s especially annoying as Elite enemies also gain ridiculous amounts of HP on higher Hazard levels, to the point where “Sudden Death” feels more like a promise instead of a punishment.
I also can’t overstate how many runs end during this “Sudden Death” phase, either. If the ridiculous amount of onscreen enemies doesn’t kill you, it’s definitely the drop pod timer. Again, on its own, the drop pod timer is fine. It’s only after entering Sudden Death and having the amount of bugs + enemy damage grow exponentially that both of these elements feel like being trapped between a rock and a hard place. I’m not stupid. I know this is by design. I’m just saying that it feels bad.
When Helldivers 2 released to glowing praise from critics and players alike last month, I remember reading a Twitter thread (that I cannot locate for the life of me) which wanted to explain why that game’s core gameplay loop was so satisfying. One particular phrase that stuck with me was the fodder enemies were described as being, “popcorn enemies”. After hearing that phrase, I started to realize how important these enemies were: they’re not meant just as cannon fodder, but as a collective unit – like bubble wrap for the bigger, beefier enemies that you’re meant to “pop” around the real big targets. Popcorn.
DRG:S’s popcorn enemies are not popcorn. On Hazards 1-2 maybe, but Hazards 3-4? They’re not popcorn. They’re small, inordinate, and deal way too much damage. Not only do they deal considerable damage, but because of the game’s isometric perspective, they’ll often disappear behind rock/stone. At present, the game offers no shadow/outline or anything to make these enemies visible, and the result is players taking constant, oftentimes avoidable damage.
After entering Sudden Death, these enemies can often hit for 30-40 damage apiece (keep in mind, this is with the regular armor/HP upgrades almost maxed out) which is a good 15-20% of the average character’s health bar (before acquiring armor/HP upgrades during a run, that is). Additionally, there are no i-frames between taking damage, meaning if you decide to run through a horde of fodder enemies, you’re sacrificing most of your health bar for every second you’re in physical contact with an enemy.
Beyond all this, however, there’s also no recompense in death. If you die, that’s it. No extra lives. No revivals. Miss your drop pod and it’s game over.
The game grants some leniency in the “dodge” mechanic, although its functionality seems limited to one class, and one artifact. It gives players a small chance to negate incoming damage, but it’s not a stat that can be upgraded.
Besides all this though, the weapons aren’t good. Although it is mechanically similar to Vampire Survivors’ preset weapon patterns, the most useful weapons are those that lock onto enemies automatically – in a sense, I would argue these are the only viable weapons.
Weapons either target the closet enemy, the enemy with the most HP, random enemies, or have a preset pattern. Avoid weapons that shoot in four directions or only shoot in front of your character, as these are often unwieldy at best and almost useless at worst.
Obviously you want weapons that target the closest enemy, although targeting the enemy with the most HP (as in Elites) is also very useful. The implementation of these weapons reminds me of another Survivors-like game I’ve played previously, “Yet Another Zombie Survivors” where the developers knew that the game was mechanically very simple, yet a little too chaotic with the amount of enemies onscreen, so all weapons automatically lock onto enemies. Seems like a no-brainer.
Both games have AoE weapons and throwables, too, but how DRG:S handles weapon upgrades is objectively (imo) worse. “Yet Another Zombie Survivors” gives players a variety of weapons to choose from, although only after upgrading your character’s main weapon to max level are you allowed to choose an “upgrade path”. Each weapon/ability can only be upgraded 4-5 times max. That means eventually players will upgrade each of their weapons/abilities, and move onto incremental stat upgrades (damage, reload speed, armor, HP, etc.). Vampire Survivors also does this, with weapons and items having specific synergies and upgrade paths, which later rewards players with incremental stat upgrades once each is maxed out.
DRG:S only has incremental stat upgrades. That’s it.
I hope you can understand why this might be boring. There are “Overclock” abilities that weapons unlock every six levels, but most of these are (frankly) underwhelming. Some choice Overclock upgrades include stuff like +25% damage and +25% fire rate (essentially two epic upgrades for one weapon rolled into one, which is a waste of an Overclock), or -25% Damage for the one weapon and +25% Damage for every other weapon. There are good Overclocks, but the best Overclocks are usually at Level 18 – and upgrading any weapon to Level 18 is a hassle, and there’s also no guarantee you’ll even get the Overclock you want. You also can’t reroll Overclocks.
The Overclock system also creates two problems: 1) before you can Overclock a weapon, you need to upgrade it to Level 12 in a regular run first, which means dedicating a significant amount of one run to upgrading a weapon so that it will be slightly better in later dives, and 2) there will be certain upgrades called Paint Jobs which are only meant to increase weapon level by 2/3/4 and offer no incremental stat increases otherwise, existing only so that players can obtain each Overclock slightly faster.
I think you could fix these problems in two ways: 1) remove the Level 12 requirement for Overclocking, it’s unnecessary padding; 2) have rare/epic/legendary upgrades raise weapon levels by 2/3/4 by default, so players obtain more Overclocks faster, thereby eliminating some tedium in Paint Job upgrades.
Additionally, I’m not sure if this is the RNG, but I feel like the game gives you a lot of weapon upgrades but hardly any HP/armor/critical/speed/mining upgrades. There’s also no easy way to view the weapon/stats increase when selecting an upgrade, you have to switch between the upgrade screen and the screen which shows your current weapons upgrades/stats. The game should realistically have both of these on the same screen just to improve overall UI/UX.
To tell you the truth, although I originally played DRG:S using the keyboard, I genuinely liked using the Gamepad much more. I wish that there was a mechanic to aim certain weapons with the right analog stick or mouse, because it feels like weapons with preset patterns are wildly ineffective without player input.
Really though, after 20 hours and one content update (the Salt Pits), I’ve reached a wall. Hazard 4 is too much. I’ve maxed out almost every persistent upgrade and the difficulty curve is still much, much too steep. There’s a person who has sunk 90 hours into this game and has not progressed Hazard 4. And honestly, as much as I acknowledge that all critique/criticism should be constructive, I can confidently say that I will not be committing 70 more hours to this game to unlock or attempt Hazard 5.
Also, with this latest update, even loading into the Salt Pits causes my entire OS to literally freeze and crash, and apparently this is a common bug that a lot of people have been experiencing?? I’ve never had a game cause my entire system to crash before. Anyways I’ll probably be retiring from this game for now.
tl;dr difficulty needs to be fine-tuned, game freezes/crashes my OS now so I probably won’t be playing for a while. I’d probably wait on buying this if I were you.
In my last review, I briefly mentioned that I’d put 92 hours into FFVII Rebirth and that I’d started feeling both “physically and mentally unwell”. Much like Cloud Strife who suffers from severe Mako poisoning, induced via prolonged exposure to an element that is normally beneficial in smaller amounts, I had unintentionally poisoned myself from overexposure to Final Fantasy VII.
I needed a break. A detox. Between 12+ hour long play sessions (quite literally, before or after) I’d play a round or two of Deep Rock Galactic: Survivor.
I’d played the DRG:S playtest last year and walked away feeling generally positive. I thought it was an interesting foundation for a Survivors-like game. Now that it’s been in Early Access for over a month, I’ve racked up well over 20 hours. I think I’m now qualified to say this might be the most unsatisfying Survivors-like game I’ve ever played.
It really is that simple. Done and dusted. I could have easily chosen not to write a review for this game after all. But it’s the HOW and WHY this game is so unsatisfying that compels me to type this now.
At launch, there are four characters to choose from (one unlocked from the jump, three you need to progress to unlock) with three discrete classes for each character. These classes also need to be unlocked (each character’s first class is unlocked by default). Each character/class has access to different weapons, although there is noticeable overlap in terms of weapon availability between characters.
There are currently three biomes (a fourth biome was just added, more on this towards the end) and five hazard (difficulty) levels for each biome, each with unique objectives that contribute to the game’s meta-progression (i.e. new weapons, characters, classes, artifacts, etc.).
So, don’t worry about all this too much, let’s just focus on an average run in DRG:S. You pick a character, pick a class, and drop into a level.
The first thing you’ll notice in how DRG:S differs from other Survivors-like games is that its levels are procedurally generated, and rather cramped. DRG:S puts a big focus on mining for resources, the two most common being Gold and Nitra, although players can also mine rock (and stone!) to open new pathways, circumvent enemies, etc. On paper, this rules; in practice… it’s fine, but in a general sense, it works. There’s nothing egregious in what it attempts.
All right, so you’re playing the game now. Your character shoots some bugs, mines some minerals, and eventually levels up. You can only pick a new weapon at Levels 5, 15, and 25. It’s an interesting idea but one that makes the rhythm of progression noticeably lopsided.
Survivors-like games are not intended as longform endurance tests. They’re very simple arcadey games by design. DRG:S understand this but almost overcompensates by adding extraction game elements? Every run or “dive” is separated into five randomly generated levels, each around five-ish minutes long. As players explore and collect minerals, they’re also being attacked by bugs, and after players kill a certain amount of bugs (I believe the level progress meter is determined by bugs killed and not just a timer), a boss enemy called an “Elite” appears, at which point a countdown begins – if players don’t kill the Elite enemy in about 30 seconds (give or take), the bugs “grow stronger” for every tick (15 seconds or so) until the player is completely overwhelmed. If the player manages to defeat the Elite, the drop pod arrives to deliver them to the next area – but will leave without the player if they don’t enter the pod within 30 seconds, thereby ending their run.
DRG:S really, really wants players to manage their time wisely, but this feels like too much. On the first two hazard levels, this isn’t a major issue, I think it’s only when attempting Hazards 3 and 4 that it feels like almost too much RNG is happening.
It’s especially annoying as Elite enemies also gain ridiculous amounts of HP on higher Hazard levels, to the point where “Sudden Death” feels more like a promise instead of a punishment.
I also can’t overstate how many runs end during this “Sudden Death” phase, either. If the ridiculous amount of onscreen enemies doesn’t kill you, it’s definitely the drop pod timer. Again, on its own, the drop pod timer is fine. It’s only after entering Sudden Death and having the amount of bugs + enemy damage grow exponentially that both of these elements feel like being trapped between a rock and a hard place. I’m not stupid. I know this is by design. I’m just saying that it feels bad.
When Helldivers 2 released to glowing praise from critics and players alike last month, I remember reading a Twitter thread (that I cannot locate for the life of me) which wanted to explain why that game’s core gameplay loop was so satisfying. One particular phrase that stuck with me was the fodder enemies were described as being, “popcorn enemies”. After hearing that phrase, I started to realize how important these enemies were: they’re not meant just as cannon fodder, but as a collective unit – like bubble wrap for the bigger, beefier enemies that you’re meant to “pop” around the real big targets. Popcorn.
DRG:S’s popcorn enemies are not popcorn. On Hazards 1-2 maybe, but Hazards 3-4? They’re not popcorn. They’re small, inordinate, and deal way too much damage. Not only do they deal considerable damage, but because of the game’s isometric perspective, they’ll often disappear behind rock/stone. At present, the game offers no shadow/outline or anything to make these enemies visible, and the result is players taking constant, oftentimes avoidable damage.
After entering Sudden Death, these enemies can often hit for 30-40 damage apiece (keep in mind, this is with the regular armor/HP upgrades almost maxed out) which is a good 15-20% of the average character’s health bar (before acquiring armor/HP upgrades during a run, that is). Additionally, there are no i-frames between taking damage, meaning if you decide to run through a horde of fodder enemies, you’re sacrificing most of your health bar for every second you’re in physical contact with an enemy.
Beyond all this, however, there’s also no recompense in death. If you die, that’s it. No extra lives. No revivals. Miss your drop pod and it’s game over.
The game grants some leniency in the “dodge” mechanic, although its functionality seems limited to one class, and one artifact. It gives players a small chance to negate incoming damage, but it’s not a stat that can be upgraded.
Besides all this though, the weapons aren’t good. Although it is mechanically similar to Vampire Survivors’ preset weapon patterns, the most useful weapons are those that lock onto enemies automatically – in a sense, I would argue these are the only viable weapons.
Weapons either target the closet enemy, the enemy with the most HP, random enemies, or have a preset pattern. Avoid weapons that shoot in four directions or only shoot in front of your character, as these are often unwieldy at best and almost useless at worst.
Obviously you want weapons that target the closest enemy, although targeting the enemy with the most HP (as in Elites) is also very useful. The implementation of these weapons reminds me of another Survivors-like game I’ve played previously, “Yet Another Zombie Survivors” where the developers knew that the game was mechanically very simple, yet a little too chaotic with the amount of enemies onscreen, so all weapons automatically lock onto enemies. Seems like a no-brainer.
Both games have AoE weapons and throwables, too, but how DRG:S handles weapon upgrades is objectively (imo) worse. “Yet Another Zombie Survivors” gives players a variety of weapons to choose from, although only after upgrading your character’s main weapon to max level are you allowed to choose an “upgrade path”. Each weapon/ability can only be upgraded 4-5 times max. That means eventually players will upgrade each of their weapons/abilities, and move onto incremental stat upgrades (damage, reload speed, armor, HP, etc.). Vampire Survivors also does this, with weapons and items having specific synergies and upgrade paths, which later rewards players with incremental stat upgrades once each is maxed out.
DRG:S only has incremental stat upgrades. That’s it.
I hope you can understand why this might be boring. There are “Overclock” abilities that weapons unlock every six levels, but most of these are (frankly) underwhelming. Some choice Overclock upgrades include stuff like +25% damage and +25% fire rate (essentially two epic upgrades for one weapon rolled into one, which is a waste of an Overclock), or -25% Damage for the one weapon and +25% Damage for every other weapon. There are good Overclocks, but the best Overclocks are usually at Level 18 – and upgrading any weapon to Level 18 is a hassle, and there’s also no guarantee you’ll even get the Overclock you want. You also can’t reroll Overclocks.
The Overclock system also creates two problems: 1) before you can Overclock a weapon, you need to upgrade it to Level 12 in a regular run first, which means dedicating a significant amount of one run to upgrading a weapon so that it will be slightly better in later dives, and 2) there will be certain upgrades called Paint Jobs which are only meant to increase weapon level by 2/3/4 and offer no incremental stat increases otherwise, existing only so that players can obtain each Overclock slightly faster.
I think you could fix these problems in two ways: 1) remove the Level 12 requirement for Overclocking, it’s unnecessary padding; 2) have rare/epic/legendary upgrades raise weapon levels by 2/3/4 by default, so players obtain more Overclocks faster, thereby eliminating some tedium in Paint Job upgrades.
Additionally, I’m not sure if this is the RNG, but I feel like the game gives you a lot of weapon upgrades but hardly any HP/armor/critical/speed/mining upgrades. There’s also no easy way to view the weapon/stats increase when selecting an upgrade, you have to switch between the upgrade screen and the screen which shows your current weapons upgrades/stats. The game should realistically have both of these on the same screen just to improve overall UI/UX.
To tell you the truth, although I originally played DRG:S using the keyboard, I genuinely liked using the Gamepad much more. I wish that there was a mechanic to aim certain weapons with the right analog stick or mouse, because it feels like weapons with preset patterns are wildly ineffective without player input.
Really though, after 20 hours and one content update (the Salt Pits), I’ve reached a wall. Hazard 4 is too much. I’ve maxed out almost every persistent upgrade and the difficulty curve is still much, much too steep. There’s a person who has sunk 90 hours into this game and has not progressed Hazard 4. And honestly, as much as I acknowledge that all critique/criticism should be constructive, I can confidently say that I will not be committing 70 more hours to this game to unlock or attempt Hazard 5.
Also, with this latest update, even loading into the Salt Pits causes my entire OS to literally freeze and crash, and apparently this is a common bug that a lot of people have been experiencing?? I’ve never had a game cause my entire system to crash before. Anyways I’ll probably be retiring from this game for now.
tl;dr difficulty needs to be fine-tuned, game freezes/crashes my OS now so I probably won’t be playing for a while. I’d probably wait on buying this if I were you.
Very interesting mining mechanic but I wish the weapons were just as interesting.
Dopamine simulator dressed up like Deep Rock Galactic. Perfection.
xp goes plim plim, brain goes cum cum
jogo survivor like, gostosinho, porém ainda tem pouca coisa, apesar de ser bom
jogo survivor like, gostosinho, porém ainda tem pouca coisa, apesar de ser bom
A game that shows potential in it's mechanics and gameplay yet is lacking in the replayability department. The upgrades are all just stat increases. I played for 30 minutes and the best upgrades were 25% stat increases of damage, or a 15% increase in health. It can be fun for a bit but it definitely doesn't have the essence of the roguelike genre. I'd say just wait until the game gets more content as it doesn't seem worth at the moment.
This happened to my buddy Karl once.
Pretty bare bones at the moment, but a VERY solid foundation for what should be a great game. DRG Survivors adds onto the new "Survivor" genre through the addition of base DRG's core mechanics, most prominently digging, which adds a new level of setpiece based mechanics and strategy that works great.
I'm not sure if this was worth the $13.50 I paid for it, as I will keep playing it as it gets developed, enjoying new content and mechanics as they get added. I expect I will get my money's worth. This early version already got me more than halfway there with over 8 hours of enjoyment before it started to feel same-y.
Pretty bare bones at the moment, but a VERY solid foundation for what should be a great game. DRG Survivors adds onto the new "Survivor" genre through the addition of base DRG's core mechanics, most prominently digging, which adds a new level of setpiece based mechanics and strategy that works great.
I'm not sure if this was worth the $13.50 I paid for it, as I will keep playing it as it gets developed, enjoying new content and mechanics as they get added. I expect I will get my money's worth. This early version already got me more than halfway there with over 8 hours of enjoyment before it started to feel same-y.
The digging is why you are here
The digging is why you will stay
Does nowt else to shake up what is, as title states, unapologetically a Survivors game
Music and voice direction both uninspiring and immediately grating, respectively
Light routing strategy and mob control from the good part (digging) means you might miss the odd bit of chatter on that podcast you've got on
The digging is why you will stay
Does nowt else to shake up what is, as title states, unapologetically a Survivors game
Music and voice direction both uninspiring and immediately grating, respectively
Light routing strategy and mob control from the good part (digging) means you might miss the odd bit of chatter on that podcast you've got on
Turns out im just not that big of a fan of survivor games. It's fun, and it has a nice flavor of DRG as well as what I felt were unique mechanics in mining and secondary objectives but it just didn't hold my attention.
I enjoyed this game well enough. I played Vampire Survivors and this game does a good job of expanding upon the genre. The addition of mining to dodge enemies creates and interesting twist. The maps with different environmental features also adds intrigue. The auto-shooter genre makes for a good 30 minute filler for me, especially because I can play it on my Steam Deck on the couch. For now, I think I will pick this one up now and then while I wait for the full release.
There are so many 2D games like this with a 10-dollar budget that this feels different. I like the mining part of it too.
WE ARE GONA BE RICH!!!!!!!
A very fun and easy to play survivor like. The mining aspect and the cramped maps help from the game feeling more monotonous. The different classes play and feel unique enough even though some builds clearly do not perform as well as others, my personal favorite to play was the driller for extra mining speed since I liked to get all the materials from each drop. The loop is fun and addictive, it is in need of much more variety in missions, supply drops, and enemies, hopefully that's coming down the road.
Played around 30-40 hours and made it up to hazard level 4/5. Eventually the grind becomes a little too much for xp and resources to stand any chance in the higher hazard levels.
Played entirely on steam deck with no issues besides a few framerate drops when the screen got really busy with bugs/explosions.
Played around 30-40 hours and made it up to hazard level 4/5. Eventually the grind becomes a little too much for xp and resources to stand any chance in the higher hazard levels.
Played entirely on steam deck with no issues besides a few framerate drops when the screen got really busy with bugs/explosions.
I mean it's alright
Has good bones, hopefully with some balance changes and more content it will be more satisfying to play. So many builds feel underpowered making even basic enemies feel like a challenge to kill.
Achievements are straight forward, a little grindy but easy.
Achievements are straight forward, a little grindy but easy.
pretty enjoyable time killer
perfect to play at my lessons while the teacher is fvcking yapping
perfect to play at my lessons while the teacher is fvcking yapping
viciante
It just felt like a like a poorly made vampire survivor-esque spin off, the game starts extremely slow with practically no weapon variety and only a single character, the upgrades feel boring as all of them are purely stat upgrades with the exceptions of overclocks which from what I've played felt like I was only getting 1 per run and just not much replayability in general.
early access i już teraz sie super gra
Lacking a bit to be worth the money at the moment, 100% worth checking out if you enjoy DRG and Roguelikes
Pretty fun Survivor type game that lets its brand recognition do the heavy lifting. Aside from the usual "Dwarf does mining, Rock and Stone" it stands out with really good progression system using the ore you collect to get incremental starting stats, though that does get a bit tedious the further along you get. Unlocking gear and hazard levels are fine, usually getting you to go out of the way to get side objectives done that can usually be done on a first try. And with it being early access you can expect core changes and content drops before 1.0 comes out
falta bastante conteúdo ainda, mas tá legalzinho