Plenty More Potential in the Tank
Let’s address the elephant in the room here. While Grounded is oozing with charm, has a compelling gameplay loop, and the mysteries of its garden are enticing enough to keep players pushing through the ‘main story content,’ it’s still a little rough around the edges in places.
For starters, its multiplayer system’s a little basic and temperamental, with players unable to invite their friends into their party (at the time of writing, at least) and sometimes unable to join the host’s game due to connection issues.
Then you’ve got the fairly light offering of story content on its initial release, with players not really needing much longer than a handful of hours to push reach the end of what’s currently available.
Oh, and the thirst and hunger system really didn’t resonate with us and felt a little too invasive on the rest of the gameplay. Though you can change the ‘mode’ so these are less of an issue, it also tweaks other gameplay settings that you may not want to.
But that’s the beauty of early access. Obsidian Entertainment has already stated its addressing the multiplayer issues, more story content will follow up to the official version 1.0 release, and tweaks and adjustments can be made to all of the gameplay.
Given the high quality of the developer’s previous titles and the promise that’s shown in what is here at the start of Grounded’s Early Access, we’re confident the game will go from strength to strength over the coming months.
