We discuss ten games like Raft you must play. Add these well-recommended games to your gaming library.
Raft is a 2016 open-world sandbox game developed by Redbeet Interactive and published by Axolot Games. It sees players dropped into a world flooded after an apocalypse and has them take the role of a scout, someone who goes forth into this brave new world and explores it in search of habitable land and resources.
Players explore this world on a raft, alone or with friends, and craft items to improve the raft’s size and stability while managing their hunger and thirst by fishing and purifying water. But if players want to catch a fun new survival game instead of fish, here are ten games like Raft you must play.
10 Games like Raft you must play
ARK: Survival Evolved (2017)
Starting out on a mysterious world with no resources, the player is thrust into an ancient world full of dinosaurs and other large creatures. Build items, weapons, and buildings to either tame or kill these beasts and create a huge base in this prehistoric wonder. Players can also play with or against each other, creating additional enemies to deal with.
Minecraft (2011)
Minecraft is a blocky world where the player crafts their own adventure, foraging for resources, building impressive structures, or taking on fearsome foes. The game still receives updates adding to the many areas of the world, with new items to craft and enemies to fight. There is also a creative mode for players who want to make impressive builds free from those pesky creepers.
Subnautica franchise (2018-2021)
Both games in the Subnautica franchise have the player diving deep into the depths of an alien planet to collect resources and build a cool underwater base. But they’ll have to be careful to avoid the alien terrors that stalk the deep, or else they’ll be killed.
Like Minecraft, Subnautica features different modes to play that will either make it easier by removing hunger and thirst meters or make it harder by adding permanent death.
No Man’s Sky (2016)
While the game launched in a particularly bad state with key features missing, No Man’s Sky developers Hello Games have been working on updating the game continuously, and it now surpasses their original vision, with thousands of planets to explore, the ability to use different ships and use them in space combat, and for players to make their base, either on a planet or deep in space.
Grounded (2022)
Grounded is a survival game where the player character has been shrunk down to the size of an ant and now has to contend with a host of bugs, insects, and everyone’s favorite creature, massive spiders.
To deal with these threats, players must build bases and craft weapons, all while figuring out why they’ve been shrunk down in the first place.
Valheim (2021)
Set in a world steeped in Norse mythology, Valheim takes place in a procedurally generated world with brutal exploration and survival mechanics. Players take control of a fallen Viking, where they must prove themselves to fight for Valhalla, fight bosses, and find items in each of its different biomes. The game can either be played in co-op or fighting other players.
Stranded Deep (2022)
Players are stranded in the Pacific Ocean after a mysterious plane crash, and because they’re unable to call for help, they must scavenge for supplies and build their own shelter, either in single-player or with a friend in co-op.
Subsistence (2016)
Set in the harsh wilderness, players must struggle against the elements by building a base, developing technology, foraging for resources and games, and fighting animals such as bears. There are also AI hunters that will build bases and attack the player, meaning they must always be on guard.
The Forest (2018)
With a horror-inspired take on the open-world survival genre, The Forest will make anyone avoid the woods. Players control the only survivor of a passenger jet crash, which would be bad enough, except they happen to land in the one wood with a society of cannibalistic mutants who want nothing more than to taste the player character’s flesh.
Build a base and explore if you dare in The Forest.
The Long Dark (2017)
The Long Dark is set in a frozen Canadian wasteland after a geomagnetic disaster and is a survival game pitting the player against Mother Nature. It’s meant to be a more thoughtful experience but has several aspects the player must account for, like body temperature, caloric intake, hunger, thirst, fatigue, wind-chill, wildlife, and many other environmental factors they’ll face in the game.
Do you have any other recommendations for games like Raft? Let us know in the comments below.
