Stranded: Alien Dawn is Haemimont Games’ second sci-fi sim on the trot, and despite being set on a planet that actually has air this time, it could well make Surviving Mars’ well-funded colony building feel like an afternoon playing with Lego. In Stranded, as I saw from a hands-off preview at Gamescom 2022, you’re certainly not planetside by choice, having crash-landed on an uncharted world with just four surviving astronauts left to scavenge, hunt and build their way towards something resembling a life.
“Like RimWorld”, I thought to myself upon hearing the pre-demo pitch, and subsequently wrote in my notes four separate times before ceasing to bother. If only mere words could convey just how much “like RimWorld” Stranded: Alien Dawn is – other 3D-ified clones exist, like last year’s Going Medieval, but here, even the exact spaceship-wrecking premise matches that of Ludeon Studios' seminal survival sim.