Take charge of a band of space castaways as Stranded: Alien Dawn enters early access today Rock Paper Shotgun Support us Join our newsletter Visit our store Sign in / Create account If you click on a link and make a purchase we may receive a small commission. Read our editorial policy. Take charge of a band of space castaways as Stranded: Alien Dawn enters early access today Start a new life in the off-world colonies News by CJ Wheeler News Reporter Published on Oct. 12, 2022 6 comments Imagine making all the incredible effort to get a spacecraft to another star system, only to crash it into a wild and unexplored world. That's the gist of Stranded: Alien Dawn, a futuristic survival sim from the devs behind Surviving Mars that launches into early access today. The game puts you in charge of four survivors who'll be up against the basic demands of continuing to exist, and facing dangerous alien creatures. Stranded: Alien Dawn restarts human life on a new world far from Earth. Stranded: Alien Dawn revolves around base management and gathering resources from your new home planet. Your bunch of survivors all have different skills, such as varying levels of combat experience, so you'll have to draw on those to make it. Watch out for survivors getting fed up or tired out, although building separate rooms for each and keeping them fed and warm will help. Attacks will come from the planet's indigenous animals too, so you'll need to fortify your base with turrets or traps. Unless you have enough badass survivors in your group to fend them off. The idea of running a colony on an alien planet kind of intrigues me, largely because it reminds me of the campy old TV show Earth 2 or, shudder, Raised By Wolves. Alien Dawn is a bit different from those, because if you don't like where your survivors start out then you can just restart the game to crash them again. They'll end up in a different spot on the planet. Does that make it a reusable spacecraft? Devs Haemimont Games are planning to keep Alien Dawn in early access for at least six months, adding to the game and fiddling with it based on player feedback. James previewed Alien Dawn at Gamescom, and felt it seemed familiar enough to need a bit more polish. "I'd actually be quite happy if Haemimont focused the early access period on fleshing out the world," he said. "I think there's already good enough strategic depth here, between all the survivor needs and tech trees." Stranded: Alien Dawn plummets into early access today on Steam. More News Jack King-Spooner's next handcrafted game has a teaser demo out Judero brings chat and action in the Scottish Borders Alice O'Connor 17 hours ago 1 If you were hoping for any Overwatch 2 balance changes then you'll have to wait until season two The next season begins in December CJ Wheeler 18 hours ago 3 The Dead Space remake will chuck random Necromorphs at you as you wander the Ishimura In space, no one can hear you proper bricking it CJ Wheeler 18 hours ago 8 Valve register mysterious new Neon Prime trademark in the US It doesn’t seem to be for a particularly colourful Steam Deck CJ Wheeler 20 hours ago 11 Latest Articles What are we all playing this weekend? Well? Alice O'Connor an hour ago 22 Past Wordle answers Here's an archive of previous Wordle words Ollie Toms 2 hours ago 1 Wordle answer today (Saturday 15 October) Hints and the answer to today's Wordle word Rebecca Jones 9 hours ago Overwatch 2 hero tier list Which are the best heroes in Overwatch 2? Ollie Toms 16 hours ago Supporters Only You're probably better than me at One Many Nobody You go on without… uh, you? Sin Vega 17 hours ago Supporter podcast - The Nate Files episode 13: dry bones Bad science is also FUN science! Alice Bell 18 hours ago Japanese dating show Love Wagon has surprising parallels with Yakuza and Persona My new obsession Ed Thorn 2 days ago If you're hankering after Bayonetta 3, Valkyrie Elysium might be a good substitute It's not out on PC until next month, but the console demo has been a surprise charmer Katharine Castle 1 week ago 4 We've been talking, and we think that you should wear clothes Total coincidence, but we sell some clothes Buy RPS stuff here