I feel like I've asked this question before, and I've seen plenty of others looking for the same thing, yet there are surprisingly few games that actually fit this niche.

Green Hell is probably the closest thing to what I'm looking for. Considering how popular survival games are, and how much real-world survival content like Alone revolves around this exact concept, you'd think there would be more games like it.

Here's all I want:

Drop me in the middle of a massive, remote forest. I'm lost. Maybe I need to find my missing friend, escape the wilderness, or simply survive for a certain amount of time.

But I want it to be a long-term survival experience. Seasons change. I spend spring and summer building a shelter, gathering supplies, hunting, fishing, and preparing for winter. When winter arrives, all that preparation actually matters.

What I'm looking for:

• Realistic survival mechanics: Hunger, thirst, weather, temperature, injuries, hunting, gathering, etc.
• Good base building: Let me build a proper shelter or cabin and gradually improve it.
• Changing seasons: I want to experience the full cycle and actually need to prepare for harsh winters.
• An actual overarching goal: Escape, survive 100 days, find someone, reach civilization, whatever. It doesn't need an amazing story, but I want something to work toward beyond simply surviving forever. And I don't mean disconnected missions like Icarus.
• Decent modern graphics: Doesn't need to be AAA, but I'm not looking for pixel art or retro-style graphics.
• Isolation: I want to feel genuinely alone in a huge wilderness.
• Meaningful progression: Better tools, weapons, armor, shelter upgrades, and equipment that allow me to explore increasingly dangerous areas.

What about combat?

I'm actually fine with combat, and I think it could add a lot to a game like this, as long as it fits the setting.

Imagine discovering a cave, an abandoned campsite, or a valuable resource deep in the forest, but there's a massive mother bear or an aggressive alpha wolf guarding the area.

Maybe I'm nowhere near equipped to handle it yet. So I retreat, spend several days crafting better weapons, improving my armor, setting traps, and gathering supplies before attempting to take it on.

That's the kind of combat and progression I'd love to see. Something that feels earned and makes surviving and preparing worthwhile.

Wildlife should be genuinely dangerous, and certain encounters should require planning rather than just running in and swinging an axe. I wouldn't even mind occasional animal attacks on my camp that force me to build defenses.

What I DON'T want:

No zombies. No mutants. No supernatural monsters. No town management. No colonies full of NPCs.

I could maybe get behind something like Sons of the Forest, where you have a single AI companion you can direct to help with tasks. But ideally, it's just me and the wilderness.

I don't need constant combat, supernatural threats, or endless hordes attacking my base to make survival interesting. The environment itself should be the primary challenge, with dangerous wildlife adding some excitement and meaningful progression.

Give me a giant forest, realistic survival mechanics, meaningful base building, changing seasons, dangerous wildlife, and a reason to survive.

Basically, I want to play Alone as a video game, with some meaningful progression and an actual long-term objective.

Why is this such a rare combination? And are there any games out there that actually deliver it?

I’m a solo dev making a survival game called EvoX (UE5, ~50 players, small map where players meet often). I’m adding POIs and I want to hear what you actually enjoy finding in other games.

Here's my first one, a small abandoned camp. It looks like another player left it: an A-frame stick shelter, a fire ring, a log to sit on, and a small wooden crate with supplies.

Loot is simple. Each camp has one food item (mostly berries, sometimes cooked mushrooms, cooked meat is rare) and one weapon or tool (a primitive bow or a torch is common, a pickaxe or a crossbow is rare). There is also a 50% chance of a cooking pot.

The rule for new POIs: no zombies, no ancient ruins, no military bunkers. Everything should feel like players or nature made it. Natural places count too, like lakes, swamps or caves.

So tell me:

1. What are your favorite POIs from any survival game, and why?
2. What would you want to find in the next one for EvoX, and what would the loot be?

If you like where this is going, EvoX is on Steam. Wishlists help a lot with a solo project.

Hey guys!

It's been a while since I posted something so I figured I'd share what I'm currently working on. The giant spiders are meant to be primary predators in the first world you explore in Dusklander. Their venom makes each encounter risky so I wanted to add means to protect against them. Luckily they're affraid of fire and can't easily breach spike walls... well, eventually they can but each hit hurts the spider. They have self preservation instinct that makes them retreat if they decide that trying to get you isn't worth the risk.

Let me know what you think!

Hi everyone! I'm creating a colony sim game which will hopefully take care of all the problems that are currently in colony sim games. And i would like to hear your opinion on what you like and dislike. And what would you want to see in such a game.

https://forms.gle/otTzhMCTLG3tjX8M9

Thank you all who participate. Also i will read every comment here.

Hey guys

I'm after a survival/crafting/rpg game where the gathering/cooking life skill type stuff has lots of depth. Not grind necessarily but the vibe of gathering ingredients and materials and making meals before adventuring, chilling out with some fishing etc. Camp fires and huts and fire wood. I just want to exist in a world but have it engaging enough it doesn't get boring fast.

Ive played Valheim, enshrouded, medieval dynasty, outward, the long dark. Nothing has quite got me hooked with this vibe. Outward is cool in that you have to prep for adventuring and you have the back pack etc but it's not quite chill vibe. Medieval dynasty is amazing but lacks any reason really to explore/adventure. Enshrouded and Valheim feel a bit lonely and empty after a while.

Maybe there is nothing that quite fits what I'm hoping for

I'd prefer open world 3d graphics more than pixel or minecraft style if there is anything.

Maybe the world hasn't noticed this little game yet. Or maybe it's simply not as good as I think it is.
But I'm still here, building it, one day at a time.
And next week, Map 4 arrives.

Hey everyone!

Steam Next Fest starts today and I've just uploaded an updated demo of INTERZONE!

For those who don't know the game, INTERZONE is a top-down post-apocalyptic survival sandbox, basically a mix of S.T.A.L.K.E.R., Project Zomboid and Fallout, with some weird stuff going on.

You play as a drifter who was taken from his normal life and sent into a quarantined territory known as the Interzone, where a mysterious detonation changed everything. Nobody really tells you what's happening, and the only orders you receive come from artillery shells falling from the sky.

The idea is pretty simple: survive, explore and try to figure out what the hell is going on.

You can explore abandoned towns, forests, military areas and underground locations, loot whatever you can find, craft items, build shelters, fight infected and other survivors, and deal with hunger, thirst, radiation and anomalies.

The game also has a proper story behind it, with missions, mysteries to uncover and different paths to follow. I want players to have a real reason to explore the Interzone beyond just trying to stay alive.

It's still an open-world sandbox, so you can follow the story or just go around exploring and see what you find. And if things go well, I'd also love to add a separate hardcore sandbox mode, focused more on pure survival, with tougher conditions and fewer restrictions.

I've been working on several improvements, bug fixes and updates for the demo, and the latest version is now available for Steam Next Fest.

If you have some time to try it, I'd really appreciate any feedback or suggestions. There's still a lot I want to add and improve, so hearing what people think really helps!

Here's the Steam page:
https://store.steampowered.com/app/4673370/Interzone/

Thanks everyone, and hope you enjoy it!

With Frostpunk coming to Nintendo Switch, someone decided to take the whole survival experience a little too seriously. Playing right next to a real generator is honestly the most Frostpunk thing I've seen in a while.

The city must survive, even in handheld mode.

Hey everyone, I’m the developer of Evolution of the Ancients, a survival game where dinosaurs never went extinct. You play as a dinosaur yourself and can build a herd.

I’m looking for 20 PC players to try the current alpha through Steam and give me some honest feedback. Ideally, you enjoy dinosaur or survival games and have time to play over the next week.

One of the newer features is recruiting other dinosaurs by earning their trust. You need to approach carefully, watch their reactions, and give them space before offering food. Once recruited, you can name them and give them commands.

This is an unfinished alpha, so expect bugs and systems that still need work. I’m interested in how the overall experience feels:

• Is it clear what to do when you start?
• What feels enjoyable, frustrating, or confusing?
• Where did you stop playing, and why?
• Does it leave you wanting to play again?

Around 30–60 minutes would be helpful, but if you stop earlier, I’d still like to hear why. You can send feedback through Reddit messages no need to write a detailed report.

If you’re interested, leave a comment with the dinosaur or survival games you enjoy, and whether you could try it this week. I’ll send alpha keys privately.

You can see more about the game here:
https://store.steampowered.com/app/3606840/Evolution_Of_The_Ancients/

Do you have what it takes to survive a real zombie apocalypse? You spawn where you live, drive your roads, loot actual supermarkets, police stations or hospitals.

No download, free, and your friends join you in one click.

Try it now: openz.fr (desktop browser; the alpha runs for 7 days)

The build supports basebuilding, cars, interiors you can enter and loot, hordes, NPC survivors, weapon attachments, dogs, and the full real map of France.
It is in alpha, spawns are restricted to a single region for testing, but there are no area restrictions (you can technically drive to china). Home spawn comes very soon.

See you out there, survivors! And looking forward for your feedback.

YouTube : https://youtu.be/2htdtj2nkBY

TikTok : OpenZ (@openzofficial) | TikTok

Hey everyone! In our game MOVILLIA, a meteorite struck Earth back in 2047, bringing alien flora, fauna, and radiation that mutated the underground ecosystem. Fifty years later, an expedition goes down to check, and a sudden cave-in traps you miles below the surface.
Traverse territying biomes-from
bioluminescent tunnels to toxic sulfur zones-using echolocation and a scanner to study mutated creatures.
Check out the free demo on Steam and consider adding it to your wishlist!
https://store.steampowered.com/app/4519070/MOVILLIA/

Can anyone tell me how to build a makeshift smelter. I am standing on a wooden foundation and there is no build option under utilities or anywhere else for the smelter. Going round in internet circles!

I am enjoying the game but it really needs a lot of work - especially in quest design and dialogue. I am currently waiting for Anna to progress the main quest line - she has the main quest marker but no option to progress.

Ca

I'm making Rotor Rescue, a first-person survival game. The streets are flooded with toxic gas and you're stuck on a rooftop, so a small battered drone is how you get everything: fly down streets and through windows, grab food, water and parts, and get home before the battery dies.

Survival systems: hunger, thirst and cold, gas tides that rise and fall through the day (low tide opens up the lower floors), and a signal that fades the deeper you fly into the gas. Alien scrap drones latch onto yours or steal your haul, and every 7th night they come for your roof.

It's an early prototype and free on Windows. I'm looking for survival players to tell me honestly where it's fun and where it drags: https://allarakik.itch.io/rotor-rescue

Disclosure: I built it with heavy AI assistance (code, in-game text and the cover art). The trailer is real gameplay, and the sounds are CC0 recordings.

Hi! We’re Connor & Tiffany, a two-person family studio in Melbourne, and this is Mithril. It’s a cave mining survival game with advanced cave collapsing physics, thermodynamics, and automation.

You design pipelines to process and deliver ore, all within a cave where every stone actually carries weight. Structural stress spreads through the rock in real time and collapses if you mine too recklessly. You have to support the stone using struts. The first clip is an example of what happens when you don’t.

You're also not alone in in these caves. Spiders, wasps and more are lurking in the dark. Use unique combat abilities to take advantage of cave ins and squash your enemies like the creepy bugs they are.

And behind all of the gameplay is the real geology it was based on. Caves are procedurally generated based on strata layers and the natural ways that ore deposits through rock.

To really emphasise the geological force behind Mithril, we designed a mechanic we’ve called Dormancy. Place and manipulate the flows of lava and water, and then trigger a million years of simulated geology. In moments, a live cinematic in game lets you watch the transformation unfold, and where lava and water once flowed, new ores and minerals crystallise. Your factory has to adapt to a world that changed around it.

The demo, featuring a hand sculpted onboarding tutorial level, is free on Steam right now, and it’s in Next Fest next week:
https://store.steampowered.com/app/5063090/Mithril_Demo/

The full game with procedural caves and multiplayer is coming very soon to Steam.

I reworked the fishing mechanism in my survival horror game after playtester feedback, just in time for Steam Next Fest! The demo is updated too! Wishlists are greatly appreciated 🙏
https://store.steampowered.com/app/5150980/Baitcore/

Next Fest is starting today that's why I decided to re-do my steam page for the 4th time..
I made a new description, capsule, gifs and a brand new trailer you just saw.|
The game is called Foul and it's an adventure survival game coming soon to early access.

I was watching to a video (1 Year in Alaska in Ultrarrealist Minecraft) and it was so entertaining. I love bushcraft content like Bear Grills and OutdoorBoys and I was an active boy scout for 8 years, so I'd love some game indications that would fit in the activities I did back in the day.

I prefer a more realistic approach but I also would like to play with friends that don't know much about wilderness survival necessarily.

I'm looking for:

- Shelter building,

- Campfires,

- Hunting/Gathering,

- First aid treatment,

- Bushcraft,

- Land navigation,

- Fishing.

I DO NOT WANT:

- Monsters (but hostile animals like bears, wolves, mooses, etc, are ok)

- Horror (I'm a coward)

- Magical stuff.

Thanks for your attention.

Looking for any suggestions that meet as many of the following criteria as possible. Probably won’t be all of them.

Single player

Exploration

Option to use all ranged combat ie magic, bows, guns, …

Base building and base defence

Some survival mechanics

Fairly open rather than heavily linear, story driven.

Decent graphics

Any suggestions appreciated.

Hi everyone! 👋

After a couple years of dev, I just launched the first open playtest for my game Silicium! It's a harsh survival game where you play a disposable mining robot sent to a hostile planet. Export your quota for corporate or die trying!

What you’ll find in the playtest:

• About 1-2 hours of polished gameplay, in solo and co-op, with two difficulty levels.
• A limited slice of the world with several biomes, enemies and abandoned mining outposts to scavenge.
• A day-night cycle with corrupted mining drones that attack you at night.
• Classic survival systems: crafting, base building, exploration.
• A light skill tree progression with blueprints to unlock as you level up.
• A quest system with the first 30 objectives.
• No PvP servers yet, that will be for another playtest

You can sign up directly on Steam by clicking 'Join the Playtest'

https://store.steampowered.com/app/3048990/Silicium/

I also opened a Discord where you can share feedback, report bugs, and follow development (Link is in the Steam page).

Let me know what you think!

Hey survivors!

With our first closed playtest coming up, I’ve been spending a lot of time polishing and testing the game. I’ve added quite a few realistic survival details to the game, and I keep asking myself: How far should these details go to make survival more interesting without becoming a chore?

Hmm… here are a few examples from the game:

1. Rain and snow gradually soak your clothes, making you colder over time. A fire can warm you up and dry your clothes, but rain can also put it out. Remember to find some shelter first, or craft a raincoat ahead of time.

2. It’s best to boil water from ponds before drinking it, or you could end up with a stomachache. Water dispensers, sinks, and bathtubs can also provide drinking water. Even toilets can… though drinking toilet water has a small chance of making you vomit. Even if there’s no “you know what” in there, not everyone can stomach it.

3. Physical ailments affect your mood, and different conditions can interact with one another. A small problem left untreated can gradually become something much harder to manage.

4. The more spoiled food is, the less hunger it restores and the more likely it is to make you vomit. Eating raw meat or a few specific vegetables raw can also make you throw up.

5. Even in the apocalypse, people need to unwind sometimes. Cigarettes, books, game consoles, and other items you scavenge can help your character relax during their downtime.

I hope these details give players more things to consider while surviving, but I also worry that too much upkeep could get in the way of the fun of exploring and staying alive.

What realistic details have you come across in survival games that you found especially interesting? I’d love to hear some specific examples.

We’re getting ready for our first small-scale closed alpha playtest soon. If you’re interested in the game, feel free to join our community through the Discord link on my profile. We’ll randomly select some community members to receive playtest access, and we’d love to hear your honest feedback!

Wishlisting the game on Steam would also help us a lot. Thanks for your support! :)

I understand that not all items should last forever, as it would choke progress if you could make an axe and have it forever. But there are different ways of doing this, and I am curious what you think. The standard durability bar and durability bar works, but a main focus of mine would be immersion, and numbers can break immersion, or atleast create a whole different kind of immersion. Right now im leaning towards just visually, in your hand but also in the inventory, so you sort of have to gauge how broken an item is until its broken and overtime learn the icons/patterns.

Thank you

I want nights in The Silent Wild to feel genuinely dangerous.

Imagine hearing footsteps around your house. First one enemy, then a few more. They attack the walls, move around obstacles, and look for a way inside.

And you have no idea which side they’ll break through first.

I’m the developer of The Silent Wild, and this is a look at the enemy AI I’ve been working on.

What scares you more in survival games: not knowing what’s lurking outside your base, or enemies that can actually find a way inside?

Steam link

Hi everyone! 👋

I'm one-person indie developer working on SUBLEVEL: Seven Days Below, a first-person zombie survival game set in the basement of a fitness club in Budapest.

I'm looking for players to try the free alpha and help me make it better!

🌐 Languages: English, Hungarian, Russian

💻 Platform: Windows 10/11, 64-bit

🎮 Download (free): https://vengstudio.itch.io/sublevel

The alpha is a complete 7-day story (2–3 hours):

- barricading the stairs with benches, lockers and plates

- covering the glass with towels before they notice you

- taping gym gear into weapons (kettlebell + resistance band = flail)

- wiring spin bikes to the power panel, or strapping one of *them* to the treadmill

- keeping eight strangers alive while they argue, panic, leave or turn

- earning the right to lead before the personal trainer takes half the group upstairs

🎁 Everyone who sends feedback gets their name in the game's credits (if they want it there)!

How to take part:

1. Download the game from the link above and play as far as you like.
2. Leave a comment on the itch.io page: what happened to *your* group, where you got stuck, and what made you laugh or annoyed you.
3. Optional: send the `playtests` and `logs` folders from `%APPDATA%\Godot\app_userdata\SUBLEVEL`. They're short session logs with no personal data, and they help me find bugs.

No NDA: share, stream and screenshot anything you like.

Thanks for playing! 🧟🏋️