IndiExploring #2 – Above Snakes

Let’s explore a new Survival, Base Builder, Post-Apocalyptic Game called Above Snakes.

Now, I know, you may be thinking – another base builder, survival game with zombies? – Well, not really, this one is a little bit special and may have a lot of potential.

Above Snakes is an upcoming Survival Game developed by Square Glade Games and published by Crytivo. It has a Wild Wild West theme attached to it and you will be playing a protagonist named Aiyana.

At a first look, Above Snakes looks like the typical Post-Apocalyptic Survival Game, but that’s not really the case. Yes, the game has elements like with base building, crafting, cooking, hunting, fishing, tool crafting, skill leveling and so on, but it introduces a new way of manipulating the world around us, by giving us the chance to decide and place isometric tiles which contain biomes, thus we are enabled to create the world as we wish.

Before I jump into why I think this game deserves a shot and why it may have a lot of potential, let’s see when will be released in full.

Above Snakes Game Release Date

Above Snakes will release on 25th May 2023 on Steam for PC. Also, a Prologue Demo version of the game is available for play.

I’ve played the Prologue and it was short and sweet. The game is very user friendly when it comes to quests, building houses, crafting materials and tools, placing new biome tiles, using weapons etc. and the number one thing that makes it so smooth and easy is the using of one single key to do stuff.

As an example, if you would want to cut a tree, you would just approach it, a pop-up with the relevant key would appear, and you would just long press it.

Long Key pressing system

Same for crafting, you would access the crafting tab or the Workbench and, if you have the necessary resources illustrated for that particular tool or item, you would just long press the highlighted key from your keyboard.

Nice and easy.

Now, I’m not usually a fan of making things in the game too easy. For example, I’m not a fan of the fact that I can build or destroy houses so easily – by just using the hammer and being one or several clicks away of demolishing a cabin.

Also, the mechanic of battling zombies didn’t seem that harsh, it was pretty easy to beat down zeds in this demo.

Hopefully, this will change and some of the easy to action elements that are present in the Prologue will be reduced and the level of complexity will increase in the 1.0 version of the game. Let’s wait and see!

World Biome tiles – You create the game’s map

Now, let’s get into why I think Above Snakes has a lot of potential! The placing of World Biome Tiles.

First, it is worth mentioning that we will have 2 main types of tiles – Unique and Common. The Dev informed us that, once Above Snakes will be released, we will be able to access and use dozens of biome tiles. Common tiles would be our usual Forest, Plains, Desert, Prairie, Lake tiles which we will progressively place them for our own benefit.

Unique ones would be tiles in which we could encounter other NPCs, friendly or hostile, Quest givers, Towns, different objects, trains, buildings or stashes of items.

Now here is where I think Above Snakes could shine. The fact that you can craft the world around you opens the door to so many possibilities like:

• Unique quests that could affect the character’s progression in the game
• Challenging and fun Events happening on those tiles or due to those quests
• Factions. E.g. you could have tiles in which you can encounter members from a certain faction and do quests for them for reputation
• Unique tiles could also incorporate unique weapons and gear or unique NPCs
• A ‘Choices Matter’ system in which the story ark changes significantly based on the decisions made in that particular tile, via quest or dialogue

The dev also has a Kickstarter page, so feel free to grab more info about Above Snakes from there – how many backed up the game, the roadmap, additional information about the game, risks and challenges etc.

As a final note, the game looks very interesting for me and I’m looking forward to playing it in May. I’ll be coming back with Above Snakes articles this spring, until then, see you in the next post.