Grounded Switch Review
The late 80s delivered some amazing movies, and one of them was the classic “Honey, I Shrunk the Kids” a classic adventure movie that’s right up there with “The Goonies” and “Indiana Jones” with its sense of adventure. Obsidian Entertainment, known for titles like Fallout New Vegas, Knights of the Old Republic II, and the recent Switch Addition Pentiment (an essential purchase) have proven time and time again that they can weave a narrative in an epic adventure, so the news that Microsoft was porting Grounded was met with anticipation and excitement. What’s It Like? Let’s go back to the 90s, bring some ant repellant, and start planning your base build as we review Grounded on Nintendo Switch.
Grounded is a survival/crafting game in the vein of Ark Survival Evolved and tells the story of a group of children who go missing in the town. You are one of these kids, and it turns out you have been shrunk to the size of an ant with no recollection of how they got there or why. You can choose from 1 of 4 characters which all play the same but offer different dialogue in the game. These characters play it a bit safe and stick to nerd, jock, rebel, and shy Breakfast Club stereotypes. Each character has certain banter that can reveal a little about the world, but most of it boils down to the player’s interpretation of their personalities. Regardless of who you choose, the game will play out the same and you will spend a lot of your time following a main quest uncovering the secrets of why you were shrunk, and who’s behind it. The story is both interesting and well-paced, and in the interest of keeping this review spoiler-free, I won’t delve deeper into the narrative and leave some minor gameplay elements for you to discover.
The gameplay revolves around surviving in the harsh environment of the backyard. To start, you will simply scrounge for food and water, before mastering tools and hunting down specific items for recipes, to then building a base to try to keep you safe from the various critters that mean you harm. You will eventually unlock new building plans and move from having a flimsy grass base to a fully-fledged stone castle. To unlock these recipes you need “Raw Science” which can be earned by completing mini objectives such as defeating X amount of enemies, building a matching set of armour, as well as discovering orbs of raw science in the wild. You also unlock “Brain Power” which acts as your level to receive new recipes which are mainly earned by analysing loot you pick up from enemies. While it may sound tedious on paper, there was something exciting about discovering a new item, finding a field lab to analyze it, and unlocking new crafting items.
Base building is similarly exciting, and you can build storage spots for blades of grass and stems which act as planks and supports for building structures. It’s also handy that you can build and craft from storage in the immediate area, saving you from shuffling through chests and manually hauling items to your build site. It’s these little touches that remove tedium and frustrations, making core elements of the gameplay fun instead of frustrating. Looting and inventory systems are also well implemented, with a single button press harvesting resources from fallen enemies.
If base building isn’t your style, you can fight and explore, which, while being a base builder myself, I found exploration a far more rewarding experience in this case. There’s a sense of childlike wonder I had while exploring the game’s many biomes. I was genuinely excited and entertained when finding items discarded in the backyard like soda cans and assorted nick-nacks. I really enjoyed some nice cameo appearances too like accidentally stumbling upon a Battletoads Zits figurine firmly lodged waist-deep in the mud. Combat handles well and most times resorts to using melee attacks to clobber a creature. They have different stats and abilities like an ant club that can stun opponents which comes in handy early on in the game. How you play will also go towards unlocking special “mutations” which might be a Barbarian perk that heals you while you frantically swing your club around, or even one dubbed “Ant Killer” which unsurprisingly is unlocked by killing ants.
The game will take around 25 hours to complete the story missions, but like most survival games, there are hundreds of hours of discovery and gameplay for the patient player. I spend my first 10 or so hours in only 2 of the many biomes without base building, simply gathering resources to build armour and exploring. It’s just a really well done adventure.
Graphically, Grounded does have the upscaled blur we are now used to seeing on more graphic-intensive games. It does an amazing job of world-building with clever map design, multiple paths, and secrets to find. There are a lot of nice touches like how sunlight penetrates the grass, creating a warm atmosphere as well as building tension in a spider-filled hedge where the sun fails to reach due to the dense foliage. Creatures are well-designed and range from being cute to downright menacing, and the spiders in particular, will make you think twice about tangling with them. Aracnaphobics need not worry though, as there are accessibility options to sort that out too… but more on that later.
Performance-wise, there are minor hitches and framerate drops that don’t detract from the experience. These are mainly noticeable for the first 15 seconds loading in, and when fighting excessive numbers of creatures like raiding an ant hill. Another bugbear is the loading time when initially jumping in, but much like No Man’s Sky, once you’re in the game there are no loading screens as you traverse the expansive open world of Grounded. This port was handed by Double 11 Studios, who, despite the backlash on pricing which was out of their control, did an amazing job of bringing Red Dead Redemption to the Nintendo Switch.
There is also multiplayer, allowing you to host or join a friend’s game online, as well as the ability to play cross-play with friends on Xbox as well if you link your Microsoft account. Unfortunately, I was unable to test the multiplayer out, but I will update this review once I get some more time to test both standard multiplayer and cross-play functionality.
For my vision-impaired backyard adventurers, I’m pleased to say there are a plethora of accessibility options like increasing HUD size, colour blind mode, text-to-speech, text sizing options, and the ability to highlight items. There are also arachnophobia options too, and since I have a friend who is unable to play games that feature large spiders like Skyrim, this is a very thoughtful addition to the game. This mode has several tiers of options, ranging from removing legs to making them a floating torso, to making them a nondescript floating cloud with eyes.
All in all, Grounded is yet another fantastic open-world game that is sure to immerse players in. To me, Grounded is on par with No Man’s Sky and Ark in terms of port quality and performance. Despite having the upscale blur, Grounded looks amazing and does a fantastic job of world-building through and interesting mystery narrative and exciting gameplay elements. While it’s not without its issues when it comes to initial loading time and minor performance issues, it’s a solid port that is an essential purchase for fans of the survival genre, and even gamers looking for the next epic adventure. Much like the core themes of the game, both Obsidian and Double 11 Studios have managed to shrink down Grounded, into Nintendo gamers hands.
So, What’s It Like? Grounded is Like Ark Survival Evolved, crossed with Minecraft.
