Grounded: Fully Yoked Edition PS5 Review. To all those grumpy and angsty teenagers glaring at the title of this new Obsidian game, reminding themselves what happens when they dodge their 7pm curfew can rest easy – Grounded isn’t about you gleeful lot…..well, actually, it does have something to do with teenagers but we’ll get to that, ok pumpkins?
Grounded is a survival game that crosses the classic film Honey I Shrunk The Kids with Eight-Legged Freaks, and a more forgiving and splendidly cartoony version of Green Hell, albeit one set among tall grasses where pesky critters roam about both ample and puny, looking to demolish your fortifications and ruin your ability to remain unscathed.
Once restricted to Microsoft’s grasp on Xbox and PC, Grounded has now come out of the woodwork on the PS5, courtesy of Grounded: Fully Yoked Edition, which contains a bunch of new gear, quests, bosses and New Game Plus. Is this PS5 port able to survive on its own, or will it become squished like a bug under your shoe?
Grounded: Fully Yoked Edition PS5 Review
The premise of Grounded is a refreshing change from run-of-the-mill survival set-ups. Four teenagers have vanished and as it turns out, they’ve been downsized to microscopic little people and suffering with amnesia because they don’t know what happened before they shrunk down, nor do they understand why they’re situated in a backyard. All they do know is that they need to survive and protect themselves from the pesky creepy-crawly critters they encounter on their adventure.
Nobody should blame you for thinking that Grounded’s plot is an anemic set-up masked in mystery. Somehow these four teens have incurred memory loss, and they’re buried in the tall grasses and surrounded by measly insects.
Without knowing the why and the how, there is intrigue that pulls you in and encourages you to learn more about your predicament, but with such meagre exposition to go on, it fails to let you in on why you’ve been dropped into bug-infested wilds.
Surviving The Bugs
Grounded’s take on the survival genre follows a conventional formula, whereby you’ll have to search for sustenance in the form of vegetables, locate water sources so you don’t succumb to dehydration, craft gear by collecting raw materials, and fend off the litany of bugs and other hostile anomalies you may encounter on your excursions.
While the nuts and bolts of the survival genre remain intact, Grounded is like a fresh thirst-quenching drink of life-bolstering water because of its uncanny ability to inject personality into itself in a genre that can be too sterile for its own good.
Flavoured by Obsidian’s development idiosyncrasies, Grounded emphasizes vibrancy and a spritely colourful quirkiness, which characterizes and amplifies your experience like an oasis inside the gritty and dingy desert of run-of-the-mill survival games.
From Grounded’s cartoon-laden presentation to the smattering of juice boxes you’ll find scattered around the long grass-strewn landscape, there’s a remarkably childlike energy in Grounded that collides fervently with the often depressing and downtrodden traits of survival games.
Crafty Behaviour
From the outset you’re plonked into a bug-filled expanse as a tiny teenaged person, where your primary instinct is to traipse forward, pick up natural materials such as leafy sprigs, mushrooms and plant fibers until you happen across a tented field station, where a special Resource Analyzer machine can be located that can scan your spoils, level up your resources, and bellowing out RAW S-S-SCIENCE! Just remember not to overuse this fancy machine, as it’ll need time to recharge, so don’t get greedy!
All the tat you swipe from the ground throughout your adventure is used for crafting a plethora of tools and weapons that’ll help you extract essential matter, chop down stems and swat away or splat feisty creepy crawlies both intimidatingly big and and microscopically small.
Weapons and tools are separated into tiers based on how effective they are and how many resources they take to craft. Tier 1 tools can be crafted via the in-game menu, but if you want to concoct more advanced doohickeys, you’ll need to find a workbench.
Workbenches are a cliched part of any survival-based game, but hunting for them when all you want to do is craft the stuff you want can be annoying. Sure, it seems realistic to require a workbench to forge more complex implements, but Grounded with all of its nerdy and cartoonish pleasures needn’t direct itself towards the throngs of straight-laced realism.
Tools allow you to navigate Grounded’s murky terrain and consists of torches which light your way in the foreboding dark, a pebblet hammer for chopping down tall woody structures, and an acorn shovel you can utilize to excavate clay. These primary instruments will do in a pinch, but once you’ve unlocked newer tiers, these reliable basics will fall by the wayside for more durable alternatives.
Advanced gear is a sure sign of progress and acumen in Grounded. The more time you spend collecting up scraps, analyzing creatures, and experimenting, the more Grounded rewards you by surprising you with its equipment versatility. As much as you may hate approaching a spider’s nest, you can analyze its venom to help you conjure up new arrow for your bow and a specialized dagger, showing that if you can overcome your fears you can truly rise up and be rewarded for doing so.
No Bog-Standard Weapons Here-Only Bug-Standard!
Grounded boasts an impressive array of weapons. For example, there’s are several types of nifty bow and arrow that’ll not only help you in a pinch when dangerous critters come scurrying towards you, but they’re also incredibly useful for lowering out-of-reach platforms and striking far-away dew droplets protruding out of unreachably tall strands of grass. Rudimentary forms of bow require a few easily-obtainable crafting components, but some such as the ultra-rare Bard’s Bow need you to extract matter from one of the various bug bosses you’ll run into on your journey.
Multiple assortments of staffs, blades, arrows, clubs, daggers and spears can be created out of combining all the raw elements you find in Grounded, giving you a wonderfully diverse set of weapons to use at your disposal. The more time you put into grounded, the more it’ll reward you for doing so.
Discoveries are ample in Grounded, there are many sights and creatures you’ll run into as you tread through miles of dirt, grass, caves and other tucked away locations. Peeping is an ideal way to retrieve basic information about a bug, as well as retrieving details regarding their strengths and weaknesses.
The particulars you glean from a peep will be stored inside the data tab on the menu screen, so it’s always necessary to peep. This can be accessed using triangle on the PS5 controller, but make sure you’re at a safe distance when you decide to perform this action as you don’t want any bugs to start nibbling away at your shins.
If you’d prefer to have friends join you as you navigate the suburban backyard, you can pair up with others, and that’ll make you feel far chirpier about your chances of survival and your ambitions for progress. There’s a mode specifically tailored to your creativity as well, so it’s almost like Grounded is one jolly party game, even if you decide to attend this party alone and frightened of all the scuttling along the ground.
Don’t Let The Bugs Keep Bugging You!
On the subject of creativity, there’s a difficulty option catered to exactly that, without the worry of bugs nipping at your heels because they won’t be invited. Yes, you can play Grounded with or without bugs and you can choose whether they’re harmful to you or not-and creativity isn’t the only thing Grounded caters for…
Arachnophobes rejoice! There’s an accessibility option that reduces the intimidatory size of the spiders, which goes to show not only that Obsidian cares about people’s enjoyment of Grounded, but they’re a forward-thinking developer as well. Unfortunately the hissing sounds of the spiders aren’t alleviated also, but for there to be an arachnophobia-friendly option is certainly welcome.
Another aspect that should be applauded is the sound design because it’s impeccable. Grounded’s sound design does a magnificent job of instilling you with a sense of dread and unease, especially when spiders hiss at you and bugs squawk loudly and ominously. Obsidian has made Grounded feel like a hostile bug’s playground, and every sound effect and noise from the mysterious background music, to the punchy info pop-up sounds, every jingle in Grounded is attention-grabbing.
If you have a PS5 and have always been curious by Grounded when it was shoehorned to Xbox/PC exclusivity, you’ll find Grounded: Fully Yoked Edition to be a fantastic surprise. There’s a lovely and expressive attitude and plenty of meat on its crafting and survival bones. There are many cool tools and weapons to build, bugs to discover or steer clear of, and there’s a playful aesthetic rippling straight through it.
Even those who played the Xbox version should find themselves fascinated all over again by choosing to boot it up on PS5. Obsidian proves exactly why they’re one of the only developers out there who dare to think outside of the box in the triple-A sphere, and with Grounded they’ve gone above board to deliver a gratifying backyard adventure. Oh, and it’s relatively inexpensive too, so do yourself a favour and check it out.
Grounded: Fully Yoked Edition is out now on PS5.
Review code kindly provided by publisher.