Serum: Toxic Survival

I really wanted to recommend this game because the idea behind it is actually really good. Managing a life-saving serum while exploring a dangerous world was a unique survival mechanic that caught my attention right away. The atmosphere is great, the world looks interesting, and for the first few hours it feels like you're playing something that could become a hidden gem. Unfortunately, it never became that game. Like many Early Access titles, it was sold on potential. The game launched as a single-player survival game, but one of the biggest promises was that multiplayer would eventually be added. The developers talked about it, the community was excited for it, and many people bought the game believing it would continue to grow. Then everything just... stopped. After months of silence, the developers finally returned in May 2025 with a post called "The Serum Works!" apologizing for the lack of updates. They promised Patch #7 later that year along with the long-awaited multiplayer mode and other improvements. Patch #7 never released. Multiplayer never happened. The communication disappeared again. I understand indie development is hard. Not every small studio has millions of dollars sitting around waiting to fund years of updates. Games have to sell if developers want to keep working on them. According to estimates, Serum only generated around $120,000 in lifetime revenue, and SteamDB shows the game's all-time peak was just 241 concurrent players. That's an incredibly small player base, and it's easy to imagine the studio running into financial problems. The original developers even sold the IP to Toplitz Productions in 2024. I don't fault a small studio for struggling financially. What disappoints me is giving up on the community. Some of the best indie games today didn't become successful overnight. Project Zomboid, No Man's Sky, Valheim, and even The Planet Crafter all started much smaller than they are today. Their developers kept updating the games, communicating with players, and earning people's trust. As the games improved, more players bought them. Serum took the opposite path. Communication stopped, promised features never arrived, and the community slowly disappeared. Once players lose confidence that a game is actually being developed, they stop recommending it. Sales slow down even more, the player count drops, and eventually the game fades away. That's exactly what happened here. The saddest part is that there really was a good game underneath it all. The survival mechanics were interesting, the atmosphere was enjoyable, and the foundation was there. It simply never got the continued development it needed. If you're watching YouTube videos from 2024 or reading older reviews, remember those were written when everyone believed this game had a future. Looking at it today in 2026, it feels like an unfinished project that was left behind. I don't like leaving negative reviews for indie developers because I know how difficult making games can be. But Early Access is built on trust. Players buy into the vision, and in return they expect developers to keep working toward that vision. Sadly, that trust was broken here. Great idea. Great atmosphere. Lots of potential. But potential alone isn't worth buying. Save your money unless development actually resumes.

Studio closed with little to no telling of the player base, currently has no team under the publisher's umbrella working on it. Abandonware, avoid it as it's likely never going to be finished.

Finger weg: Das Spiel ist tot!

Absoluter Betrug , Scam.... mehr kann man dazu nicht sagen. Da wird niemals ein spielbares Game erscheinen...

Was super hyped for this game and took the chance on an early access release. What was there on release was really good! I think the Devs abandoned it, last game update was May 2025. Hate to see it, but don't buy it unless they do a full release with major updates as the last I played, even the story wasn't complete.

[h1] A big problem[/h1] Now this review is a hard one to write, The game is great, from concept to execution, However it is either too easy or very hard, no real scaling. That however is not the biggest problem. It is the developers silence and very long gaps between updates, it makes it very difficult to want to keep the game using up space waiting for an update, are we ever getting new content? No way of knowing as the dev chooses silence over communication. For what it is worth, it is a good game, with good mechanics, simple but entertaining enemy programming, cool environment. Annoying soundtrack however. appalling boss battles, and useless "Serum" abilities, The game is not fleshed correctly as you literally can do the entire game using a spear and basic Serums. Personally, I enjoyed it and only paid £7 pounds so no real ill feeling. maybe it will go into my "monitor" folder and I will check back in a few months. I guess if I was to rate it I would say a 6.5 out of 10

i dont know if its something i have to do or not but this game when you hit the play button i have to move my mouse a little ways over that button just to be able to hit play its off center and when i get into a game i just even make things because of the buttons being off center and tbh i have this this game since i think the start of this year and it still don't work for me