The survival genre has expanded outwards exponentially over the last decade, with many different locations being the set of the challenging survival management systems that players have to take control of with a variety of characters. From the early days of survival games to the grand and sweeping open-world games that even indie companies have been able to begin creating all the way to some of the very biggest releases in the last decade, the survival genre has taken over.

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Survival games have moved all across Earth in incredibly immersive ways, and now there are a number that have even set themselves on other planets across the universe. Some of these impressive locations have produced beautiful survival games that have surpassed any expectations players have of the genre.

6 Subnautica

Subnautica is one of the most unusual survival games to date, being set almost entirely underwater. However, it wasn’t on the oceans of Earth that players found themselves stranded. Instead, the game began with the player character crashing from a spaceship onto a hostile planet, almost entirely covered by oceans that contained a number of unfriendly creatures.

The beautiful planet of Subnautica was harsh to survive on, the oceans challenging players not just to find enough food and water to sustain themselves, but also forcing them back into their base, vehicles, or the surface of the water in order to get enough oxygen. While there are plenty of materials to discover via exploration around the map, there are also plenty of unfamiliar species of fauna and flora that have to be scanned, so the player can learn more about this alien planet and its inhabitants.

5 Starbound

There are a number of survival games that have decided to use space itself as the backdrop, providing all sorts of new challenges as the very idea of trying to thrive or even survive in space is a fairly terrifying one to most players. Starbound has achieved this on a great level, tasking players with exploring the boundless universe in a 2D environment.

While many have compared Starbound and its play style to Terraria, there are some distinct differences that make Starbound feel all-new even to veterans of the survival genre. A variety of wonderful bosses and missions, as well as the open-ended crafting and survival aspects, have kept players playing and enjoying this entry in the survival genre for years, and the modding community has been a fantastic help.

4 Ark Survival Evolved

The world of Ark: Survival Evolved is referred to as “The Ark” and is a world populated by nearly 200 unique types of creatures, many of which are real species of dinosaurs from Earth’s past. However, it has been noted in the past that the Ark is not Earth, meaning that Ark: Survival Evolved is set on another planet somewhere out in the universe.

Related:Best Dinosaur GamesOther creatures that have been included in the game include mythical ones such as the Phoenix or the Golem, and additional robotic creatures are available as well. Players of Ark are tasked with surviving, which often involves taming different creatures from around the Ark, as well as the amazing crafting system. Multiplayer options are available in the game, although many prefer the isolation of the single-player survival struggle instead of being joined by friendly or combative human players.

3 Astroneer

Astroneer is very much built in a sandbox adventure style, where players can work either individually or in a cooperative manner with others to build bases across different planets in the universe. The variety of planets that can be explored and which can create challenging environments makes it one of the most exploration-based survival games available today.

Astroneer is set in the 25th century, during the “Intergalactic Age of Discovery” which focuses on exploration and imagination, allowing players to create all sorts of items as they continue to push the boundaries of outer space. A beautifully fun game that sets itself apart from others in the survival genre in a number of ways, Astroneer is a great game to play while turning brains off or while focusing intently, depending on individual playstyles.

2 Minecraft

Minecraft is the most famous survival game, and potentially the most famous game, in the world. Having become the best-selling game of all time and reaching out to various other forms of media, Minecraft is now a cultural phenomenon on a shockingly high level. However, it is also a great survival sandbox game where players are on a planet that has been confirmed as separate from Earth, all created with amazing procedural generation.

What’s more, the world in which Minecraft is set is actually bigger than Earth, with the Java version of the game letting players travel over so much ground that it most definitely translates to a larger overall surface area than that of our own planet. While much of what appears in Minecraft looks familiar to the real world, including many of the different biomes and animals available, the setting is most definitely different from planet Earth.

1 No Man’s Sky

The best example to date of a survival and exploration-based game set away from planet Earth, No Man’s Sky is set in a universe filled with so many planets that a single player could never visit them all. This incredible design and enormous universe surpasses anything a game has done to date with the concept of an open world. Survival is one of the major focuses of the game, which involves players choosing their own path from a variety of ways that they can progress.

There is a main plot to No Man’s Sky, but many players prefer the open-ended survival style of mining, trading, documenting plants and animals and even building planetary bases. The reach of No Man’s Sky is incredible, proving that a survival game definitely doesn’t have to be set on Earth, or even on a single planet at all, in order to become hugely successful, even if it started with a difficult launch.

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