Death and Survival

Death and Survival is an open world game developed and published by Blackaxe Studios. It is released in 2020 for PS4, Xbox One, and PC. It was announced at E3 2019 and its open beta's announcement came several months afterwards. Set in a world filled with prehistoric creatures, the game features a plethora of dinosaurs and ancient beasts before time fighting for their survival. It takes cues from ARK: Survival Evolved, World of Warcraft, and several third-person action games to form a large open-world game where players can play as beasts of old in a battle for supremacy.

Plot
In another universe in the far future, Earth has been destroyed but humanity's legacy throughout the stars brought attention to their planet's rich history. Seeking to study what came before the humans, an unknown race of aliens constructed a multitude of small yet hazardous planets filled with creatures from prehistoric times. In these planets do the creatures fight for survival as they are keenly studied by ever-interfering extraterrestrials...

General and Survival
The game is played in a third-person perspective so the players could truly see their creatures in action. As a multiplayer game centered around the freedom of exploration, players can enter a variety of servers which in this game refer to as planets lore-wise. Each server can support at most 300 players with future updates allowing even more players to play simultaneously in a single server. This section will cover both the basics of the game and its main Survival mode.

Before entering the world, players can choose which creature they like to play as. The game has a large roster of beasts players can choose from. Creatures are divided into land and water ones. They are self-explanatory but there are a few creatures from both categories that can thrive on both environments. Despite having a ridiculous gap of small and big creatures, bigger doesn't always mean better here.

When the player enters the game as a creature, the main objective is to survive no matter what. Not every creatures are terrifying, monstrous beasts that act as apex predators. Some are small creatures that thrive under different conditions and some are peaceful herbivores. The latter can be turned into something else however, as the upgrade system states.

The game's upgrade system, known as the Evolution Tree, allows players to enhance their creatures' characteristics depending on their trait. For example, a large carnivore can have its bite force increased while a grazing herbivore can have its feeding capacity and endurance enhanced to stand another day.

Players progress through the Evolution Tree by leveling up. Creatures can level themselves up to Level 100 where they attain the Apex status which signifies their survivability. Remember, not every Apexes here are angry carnivores.

As the player survives the hostile environment day after day, their experience will grow and after leveling up they will gain Evolution Points. These points are used to progress through the Tree and they number the same as the next level they progress to. For example, a T. rex that has leveled up to Level 2 will gain two Evolution Points which it can use to choose whatever option the Tree has to offer.

A player can be considered victorious if he or she is the first one to attain the Apex rank. After winning, the player will be given an option to stay on the server or move to another to start a new career. If the latter is chosen, the creature the player attained Apex with will have the Apex mark on their interface which other players can see. Do know that the Apex rank only applies to the creature the player played as in gaining it.

In the new server, the creature's progress will be reset to Level 1 but the Apex status decorating its interface provides it with a boost in stats depending on how many servers they have attained Apexes in. For example, the creature will have a 5% stat boost if it has gained the rank in one server while those that attained it in four servers will receive 20% stat boost instead. The stats include:


 * Health: The amount of hits a creature can take.


 * Defense: The amount of damage reduction a creature has.


 * Stamina: The creature's extent of doing activities in a period of time.


 * Speed: How fast a creature can move.


 * Attack: How hard a creature can hit a target.


 * Resistance: How resistant it the creature to disadvantages.

If the player's creature dies, their progress will be reset two levels back unless the creature happens to be in Level 1-10, or in the Beginner stage. When a creature's health goes down to 1% they will be considered mortally injured. In this state, they have an opportunity window of one minute to save themselves by eating their food sources.

If the creature managed to recover 10% of their health they have saved themselves. If they are outright killed before the window expires by their assaulter, then the player will return to the spawn screen with the option to respawn with the same creature but with two less levels or a fresh new creature with two extra levels. In other words, getting killed robs the star creature of two levels but grants those to other creatures they have yet to play. Mortally injured creatures have a brief three-second invincibility to help them out, though. If the killed creature happens to be an Apex, the killer will be branded Apex Killer and gets a 15% stat boost in that server while the Apex loses its rank. Luckily, Apexes don't lose their current level if they're dead.

In Survival, players can also make alliances known as packs (for carnivores) or herds (for herbivores). Different creatures can team-up to get the Apex ranks together as long as their diet is similar. Insectivores and omnivores can join both packs and herds. There can be ten players at most in packs and herds. The more same creatures there are in a single pack / herd, the more experience they will gain. Unique packs and herds consisting of different creatures of the same diet yield their own rewards in the form of three extra Evolution Points the moment the group grows.

Combat is quite dynamic thanks to the many forms of creatures featured in-game. From powerful bruisers with strong muscles, elegant creatures with a weaponized body, to even poisonous creatures capable of killing even the strongest of predators. Each and every creatures in-game differ from each other even by the slightest bit. They are categorized into several classes:
 * Hunter: A class consisting of primarily medium-sized predators with a balanced affinity for hunting down equally large or smaller preys. Some even specialize in killing larger prey.
 * Runner: Despite their name this class' membership does not exclusively include skittish herbivores. In fact, this category also features smaller carnivores in addition to sleeker and more slender creatures.
 * Titan: Large creatures that are both docile and vicious. Consist of tanky creatures with big bodies and great strength. Usually the most intimidating creatures to be seen.
 * Hybrid: They're not good at specializations but they sure can survive many things. Perhaps the most diverse class of all due to its composition of the rest of the dinosaurs and other non-dinosaurs.

Marine creatures are also playable in this game and they still retain their land counterparts' classes, even the Runner. Marine creatures can traverse all forms of watery bodies from seas to rivers at the cost of losing special buffs. That doesn't mean they can't contend with land animals though, as some creatures can adapt in both land and water.

In all the modes in-game, there are a variety of biomes the creatures can spawn in. From the depths of the ocean to deserts and tundras, creatures can freely travel to different biomes to explore more. Disadvantages exist however, as different creatures from different biomes move to other places that are unfamiliar with them. For example, a Mammoth from the tundra biome and colder parts of the world moves to a tropical forest. Due to its lack of tolerance to heat it will receive a debuff in stamina.

Aside from the different biomes, seasons also present challenges to the creatures. As seasons change from dry summer to biting winters, creatures must move from landmass to landmass to find a better living space and food source. Although AI-controlled creatures allow player-controlled creatures to get easy meals for carnivores, competition is still strict as the amount of those AI creatures reduce as time passes by. If creatures stay in their habitat that has changed its season, expect a few disadvantages to follow until the season passes.

Game Modes
Aside from Survival, there are other game modes to keep players entertain. These game modes obviously take place in other planets / servers and they can be set according to the host's will.
 * Battle Royale: A unique spin on the popular genre. This mode invites 100 players to play as certain dinosaurs with sizeable bodies depending on the server settings (small, medium, large) in a battle to the death. Due to the mode's nature a few herbivores are unfortunately unplayable in this mode. Unlike Survival's setting in a small planet, this one takes place in an island normally inaccessible by players in the main game. Players start at Level 10 in this mode and when they die they can respawn. The game's main objective is to get as many points as possible by killing others. After a while, fossilized beacons will spawn in advertised locations and players must race to attain it in order to get bonus points for several seconds before the mode's time expires. The player with the most points win and winning twenty Battle Royale matches will yield a secret reward. There is absolutely no team-based combat here and players have to fight for themselves. Marine version available.
 * Deathmatch: Assemble a team composed of creatures of all sizes and diets to compete against other groups to attain victory. This mode is similar to Survival but with more competition in it. The main objective of this mode is to reach the endgame by eliminating all other groups via raiding and constantly evolving. Creatures get twice the experience here and all of them are playable. Even the smallest creature can be a benefit to a group. A dead player cannot respawn but they can support their team by utilizing the observation camera. With this, dead teammates can communicate with the surviving teammates via in-game text chat or third-party voice chat to identify incoming hostiles and other tactical info. The last group standing will face the final boss of the mode down to the last man. Marine version available, and so's spectator mode.
 * Sandbox: Not exactly a mode, but players can enter this server to create their own world. Obviously it's not the size of Earth but it can be set according to the player. The server's host will be able to create and set their own worlds with different landmasses, biomes, and seasonal changes. After completing it the player can upload it to his / her own server (completely free), available for other players to play in. Only for Survival and Deathmatch.
 * Tournament: With their own unique and different game modes, tournaments offer new and old players various events that refresh and extend the game's life with a good amount of rewards and new features. More will be added to this section.

Creatures
For the complete list of creatures, see the links leading to the classes of the game:
 * /Hunters/
 * /Runners/
 * /Titans/
 * /Hybrids/

DLC Content
Periodically, extra contents that can be downloaded will be available for the game's players. Both paid and free ones will be added in the future. For more on this, click on this link.

Poll
What do you think of this game? Cool! Okay, I guess? Heh.