DinoSystem

(Follow [url=https://store.steampowered.com/curator/42150626-Jarl%27s-Game-Treasury/]my curator[/url] for more reviews like this) DinoSystem is a standout among survival games. At first, it appeared like yet another half-finished early access title as there's not a lot in the way of content. Only a handful of animal and plant species, and a crafting menu so small it only fills 1/4th of the screen. But once I engaged with the game and learned how it worked, it quickly became my favorite of this genre. What it lacks in quantity, it makes up for in depth. Unlike the average survival game, everything here is simulated. Nothing spawns out of nowhere, every single plant and animal must reproduce naturally. Dinosaurs lay eggs from which young ones hatch, mammals have a funny mating animation as they copulate and make young, plants drop seeds which grow into new trees, etc. Plants require water and sunlight. Animals require water, food, and sleep. After they've eaten, they poop, which fertilizes the ground for plants to grow better. Everything interacts with everything else at all times. You are dropped into this ecosystem and have to survive as best you can. The various animals will treat you as just another part of the ecosystem. Herbivores usually ignore you, unless you threaten their nests or attack first. T-rexes, the apex predator of this game, will hunt you when hungry and are almost impossible to defeat unless you're really prepared. Little scavenger dinos and mammals will approach you when you carry food and try to snatch it out of your hands, but are easily scared off. The fact that everything is simulated means no event is random. Everything happens for a reason. You might come across the carcass of a triceratops that died of old age, and eagerly cut away as much meat as you can carry back to your shelter. When you return to get more, you find a flock of troodons (small scavenger dinos) eating the corpse, and there's barely anything left for you now! My favorite part of the survival gameplay are the changing seasons and how they challenge you in different ways. Spring is easy, as rainfall gives abundant water, trees start bearing fruit, and dinosaurs lay eggs. You can steal dino eggs for food, gather fruit and nuts from trees, or isolate young dinos from their herd to get easy hunting kills. Then summer comes with hot and dry days, drying up watering holes and making it hard to stay hydrated. Some dinos will likely die from dehydration and you can harvest their corpses. Autumn brings relief with rain, but the dinos that hatched in spring are now grown enough to be not so easy prey. You should make sure to have a proper shelter before winter comes, for the freezing cold will bring your body temperature down. Most dinosaurs hibernate in winter, so they're easy to isolate from the herd and kill if you find their sleeping spots. Water won't be a problem as you can drink snow, but trees bear no fruit in winter so you may lack vitamin C! Every species of dinosaur acts differently across the seasons. Triceratops tend to be docile most of the time but become aggressive in spring when they fight over who gets to be the herd's alpha male. They live in herds and will defend their nests if you steal their eggs. Tyrannosauruses are solitary hunters, but in spring they will try to mate with females, and fight each other if two of them want to mate with the same female! Once hatched, t-rex mothers guard their young, but occasionally the young will move away from their mothers to hunt small prey on their own... which gives you the opportunity to hunt them down! The living ecosystem is the best part of this game. Every season feels different, every animal behaves different. Overpopulations will usually self-correct as some animals die off from lack of food, but theoretically an entire species can go extinct if things go bad for them. All males or females were killed and only one sex remains? That means no more offspring. Large herds may drink up all watering holes in a dry summer, and when they find no more water, a lot of them will die of dehydration. They may also eat up all ferns in an area and turn it into a wasteland. Once no more food is found in their current area, animals will migrate elsewhere. I could keep going on about how awesome the simulated ecosystem is, but the examples above should suffice. If you like survival games for the survival aspect rather than the crafting, you will love this. If you like simulated systems, you will love this. Oh, one last thing: your character is subject to some detailed simulation levels, too. Your skin color changes based on sunlight exposure, tanning under the sun and getting pale when you remain in the shade. Your hair grows slowly, and you can cut/shave it down with a sharp stone. Long hair keeps you warmer, which is good in winter but bad in summer. Food does not fill your hunger meter immediately but is slowly digested. The types of food you consume matter, too, as different foods contain different vitamins. Consuming a lot of protein promotes muscle growth. Physical activity makes your muscles sore, but also promotes their growth. The level of detail in every aspect of simulation is amazing. This has become probably my favorite survival game of them all. Dealing with the different challenges of each season is fun, and watching the ecosystem live around you never gets boring. The landscape around you keeps changing based on what the wildlife is doing! Nothing is random, everything has a directly observable reason. Easily one of the best survival games on the market.