The Long Dark

Most survival games offer survival on a tropical island or in a more or less temperate climate. And there is a simple explanation for that. They make survival so easy.

Indeed, it is not difficult to survive on a tropical island. Even if aggressive mutants are hanging around like in The Forest or no less aggressive players like in The Rust. You build a shelter, collect a bow from planks and ropes, and then set off to hunt local animals.

There's definitely no such pleasure in The Long Dark. Here, the main character is immediately thrown into a very aggressive environment of northern Canada, where it is always very, very cold, there is always a chance to freeze completely, and from living creatures there are only extremely aggressive wolves. And try to survive in such conditions for at least a couple of weeks.

The Long Polar Night

The Long Dark setup is pretty standard for survival. The main character, a pilot, suffers a plane crash, but, fortunately (or unfortunately, it already depends on the ending), does not die. He wakes up in the middle of a Canadian forest with some minimal set of various useful gizmos. And - go ahead, survive.

It should be noted right away that there will be no good ending. The world of The Long Dark survived the apocalypse, so even a few found buildings are dilapidated and abandoned, there is also a minimum of things in them, and they are not suitable for long-term finding.

The main character needs a bunch of different things. He constantly suffers from a terrible cold, so it will no longer be possible to move far from the found dwelling. He also needs something to eat, and the reserves of canned beans are also not unlimited, sooner or later he will have to go out on the trail of hunting local deer. The hero gets tired, he can get injured and just suffer in every possible way. So the player's task is to survive for the longest possible period of time.

And then night will come.

Night is the most dangerous time of the day. Not only does the temperature drop significantly and wolves get out of the shelters, but the process of survival becomes many times more complicated. All that remains is to go to bed - and it is better not to do this on an empty stomach, there is a great risk of not waking up.

But the night is really beautiful. I would like to get out of the shelter just to admire the local landscapes - the snow begins to reflect the light of the moon and therefore becomes bluish, the trees, on the contrary, darken and seem to approach the player, and the glow of the northern lights is dancing in the sky. And it is really very beautiful.

The Long Dark Two Modes - Survival and Story Campaign

Basically, The Long Dark features two game modes - storyline campaign and survival. And if everything is very good with the survival here, then with the history it is not very good.

The storyline campaign consists of several episodes that mainly teach the player the basics of survival. Here is an old woman telling how exactly to brew tea and sew mittens from rabbit fur, which turned up so well on the way through the clearing (more precisely, there was nothing good for the animal in this meeting). Here, bearded Jeremy shares his background a little more, and then sends the main character to hunt a huge man-eating bear. At the same time, the plot narration is offensively linear and corridor - an attempt to leave the path is, in principle, impossible, not even punishable by the failure of the mission.

But in survival mode, The Long Dark reveals its full potential. A huge open world with a number of interesting locations, really complex survival mechanics, the need to keep track of an impressive number of indicators, fix wearing things and try to catch a rabbit, because how much can you eat tomato soup?

Is that the storyline campaign will help you get acquainted with the mechanics of survival. This will help players who are new to the survival genre, and therefore do not really understand that making a fire will require matches, dry twigs and some firewood.

Realistic Survival in The Long Dark

The main advantage of The Long Dark is the incredible realism of survival. And it's not even about the absence of monsters, zombies and zombie monsters. It's just that survival mechanics capture a wide variety of aspects of existence:

• After wolf bites, you can get infected with some poorly curable inflammation, and you will have to look for antibiotics with the last effort;
• The main character is just a pilot, not an engineer or a material scientist, so it will not work to quickly build a fortified base immediately after crafting a Kalashnikov assault rifle;
• Crafting is not too much, but at the same time things wear out and need to be repaired;
• It's constantly cold outside the window, so you need to warm up;
• Foods vary in calories, and a quick snack in canned tomato soup is less beneficial than a fried rabbit (and you can make mittens from it too).

These "little things" make up realistic survival in The Long Dark.