Grounded Review (PS5) | Push Square

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As we continue to see walls being torn down between platforms, more people are getting exposed to former exclusives than ever before. On the PlayStation side, we're getting our first look at Grounded, formerly only available to Xbox and PC players for the last four years. If you're not in the Xbox ecosystem, you might not know much about the game, so allow us to get you up to speed: Grounded is a highly involved cooperative survival game that will encapsulate you and your friends as you endure the horrors of being the size of a bug.

At its heart, Grounded is essentially the video game version of the movie Honey, I Shrunk the Kids. A group of kids have been shrunk down to the size of an ant and forced to fight for their survival in someone's backyard. For the regular-sized person, there’s nothing to worry about here. There’s a nice tree in the centre, a woodshed, a small pond, and other typical things you expect to see in a yard. However, in this situation, danger is everywhere. Spiders continually make their threat known. Walking alongside that pond will have you under constant assault from mosquitoes. Interfering with ants can have a colony working together to bring you down. There’s nowhere to go that feels truly safe.

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While survival is the main course in Grounded, there is a story should you want to pursue it. The backyard you are in belongs to a scientist who developed the shrinking technology that put you and your friends in this predicament. Exploring the many miniature bases hidden throughout the yard will have you picking away at the story. None of it is a truly masterful piece of storytelling, but it does keep you moving forward instead of blindly walking around the area. Hearing your characters crack jokes as they interact with various elements makes them enjoyable to be around, but the character complexity isn't what you come to this game for.

Survival in Grounded is a constantly evolving process.