GOL Cast: Surviving the harsh winter conditions in The Long Dark

In a very surprising turn of events it appears that winter has arrived in Finland and I think that calls for a very specific type of a game. Enter The Long Dark, a survival game set in the cold, dark forests of Canada.

The Long Dark is a first-person open-world survival game by Hinterland Studios in which you play as a lone wanderer who is stuck in the middle of the Canadian nowhere after a geomagnetic disaster of sorts has knocked out all electrical devices. You must use your wits and the dwindling resources of the cold world around you to stay alive.


You can imagine that I, as a Finn, absolutely had to pick this game up when it was released for Linux. These days I tend to avoid survival games because there are simply too many of them on Steam. However, this game was quite different from most of the ones I've seen. Of course, I also figured I should be a winter survival expert at this point so The Long Dark's connection to winter was naturally another reason for me to pick the game up.

The Long Dark starts off in a very familiar way. You are dumped straight into the Canadian wilderness with only some basic survival equipment that won't last you too long out in the cold, so you will immediately have to start looking for shelter from the cold winter weather. You also need to find food and water or your adventure into the winter wonderland of Canada will come to an abrupt end. There are buildings scattered around the place which contain various goods and possibly more importantly, protect you from the harsh weather. In the beginning scavenging equipment, medicine and food from the abandoned houses is a relatively simple way to survive, but those resources are eventually going to run out and you must take risks and venture further in order to find what you need.

Hunger and thirst definitely aren't the only dangers you will face. The brutal forces of nature itself are possibly your greatest (and really the only) enemies. You only have a couple of hours each day to stock on food and water each day before the darkness falls and the changing weather conditions will keep you on your toes. One day might be sunny and relatively warm but the next day might bring a snow storm that will freeze you to death and bring the visibility to zero quickly. You might also have some nasty encounters with the local fauna, namely wolves and bears. If you see a beast like that you better be prepared with a weapon or face the consequences. Oh, and before you end up in that wolf's digestive system: death is permanent in The Long Dark. Nature doesn't tolerate mistakes and it'll gladly take away all your progress if you mess up.

If I had to describe The Long Dark with a single word I would probably say in-depth. The game is built to be realistic and there is a lot of detail involved in the gameplay. For example, one way you can get water nearly everywhere is to melt snow on a fire. However, this water is impure and could make you sick if you drink it. Sometimes you might have to take that risk but there are also ways around this. You can either boil the water, which might be costly if you are very short on firewood or books (no time for casual reading when you need to survive). Alternatively you could use some of the precious water purification tablets to make the water drinkable.

Due to the limited nature of the resources, eventually you are going to come to a point where finding unspoiled food and replacing worn out clothes and broken tools will become difficult. At that point you will need to start hunting and fishing in order to get enough calories into your body and crafting clothing to keep warm. There are also local herbs and mushrooms which have healthy benefits and can make up for a lack of medical supplies. Clever usage of resources is a big part of the game and absolutely vital for long-term survival.

One quite important thing to note about the game is the lack of story mode. This is, as far as I know, the biggest feature that is currently missing from this Early Access game. The only game mode currently available is the sandbox mode which can definitely give you hours and hours of enjoyment, but it probably won't satisfy those looking for an interesting story. Don't worry too much though, a story mode is a planned feature and it will probably arrive eventually but for now The Long Dark only really offers a survival sandbox.

The Long Dark is graphically quite good. It might not be the prettiest and most realistic looking game we have ever seen but the execution is still solid. The snow-covered forests and lakes look really good and the art style is both cohesive and atmospheric. It also runs very well, which is quite surprising considering that it's made in Unity3D and it looks this good. Somehow the developers have made the engine behave well even with the open source drivers on my AMD R7 370 which has struggled with quite a few other Unity titles before. If the system requirements on the store page are to be believed, the game might work just fine even on Intel HD Graphics 4000 series though I imagine you would have to turn down the settings to get an enjoyable gaming experience out of such hardware.

Overall I have found The Long Dark to be a very nice experience. In recent times I have really not enjoyed many of the survival games that have been released but The Long Dark has caught my interest. I think this is because The Long Dark is focused on realistic day-to-day survival which many other games make very simple and easy. In The Long Dark I need to concern myself with the amount of resources available to me and if it's going to be enough to last through one more day. In my opinion The Long Dark is one of the best survival games I have played. If you don't mind the lack of a story mode and are looking for a realistic survival experience in the cold, dark winter I think The Long Dark is a game for you.

Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.