Shelter
Developed by Might and Delight for Windows and Mac, Shelter is a survival video game where the players control a mother badger. Players have to tend and feed their badger cubs whilst travelling from burrow to burrow. Dangers exist in the wilderness with birds of prey and wildfires existing as threats. In addition, new environments are provided to give extra challenges and dangers for the players to avoid.
Impressively, Shelter combines the worlds of beautifully drawn art with the true core of a survival game. Breaking down the genre to its bare bones, Shelter illustrates the more direct physical nature of an open world and the natural threats to life.
Shelter gives animal games a unique viewpoint through its melodic soundtrack and the true merciless environment of the planet we live in. The ideology isn’t complex, the gameplay is straightforward and this results in an organic release that strips everything back in the world of survival to the basics.
It seems interesting that idea of an animal-oriented survival game can be classified as unique due to its simplistic concept and gameplay. However, Shelter excels in representing the basic nature of animals and their constant fight to remain alive and to protect their own. When birds of prey swoop to capture your small badger cubs, you feel the emotion and the fear animals have each day.
Shelter keeps players in the same world they all know, but from the eyes of something so small and apparently insignificant. Bringing this to life has been done in a beautiful and compelling way.
Shelter 2 has just been released and can be found on Steam.
Secrets of Raetikon
Released on Windows, Mac and Linux, Secrets of Raetikon stretched the boundaries of an animal-controlled game into the realms of open world and action-adventure. Secrets of Raetikon received major plaudits for its mesmerising artwork, challenging gameplay and environment.
Players play as a bird whose task is to explore and discover relics to activate an ancient device. The levels are split into different environments, providing new challenges, where shards are scattered around for the player to find. These relics may seem obvious to acquire, but the threats and danger increase the further the player explores the environment.
Secrets of Raetikon has simplistic controls, but the physics and environment can take several tries to get used to. Dangers appear in the form of other animals, environmental damage through falling rocks or trees, and even the wind itself that can detour your flight severely. Players have a few lives at a time, and too much damage will force a repeat of the last checkpoint.
There is something mystifying about Secrets of Raetikon, and from the up-tempo gameplay to the dozens of secrets, there is replayability along with a constant feeling of unsettlement. You are not safe, and although you search trying to safely bring these relics back, dangers exist and want to hurt you.
This game differs from your usual animal game due to its artwork, imagery, and constant suspense. The physics system brings out interesting dilemmas and challenges despite a linear storyline. Centering on simplistic objectives allows Broken Rules to focus on the adverse harshness of the environment and bring it forward where something menial to us is actually a lot harder as an animal.
Spore
Developed by the now defunct Maxis limb of Electronic Arts, Spore is arguably one of the most unique releases on the EA catalogue of releases. Players create their own organism/animal/creature and their design from the start of evolution to the end, increasing each growth period into something more complex. Impressively, the game takes place across different environments where the creature eventually gains intelligence and leaves earth to traverse the galaxy.
Player’s perspective and species change drastically throughout the experience with each stage of development altering the condition of the creature. Each stage comes with differing missions that edge the creature closer to the singular goal of the game = attaining the staff of life and dominating the galaxy.
Combining the worlds of The Sims and Sim City, Spore broke apart completely through its innovative design, incredible detail and perspective on evolutionary growth of an animal. Featuring a procedurally generated world, a growing aspect back in 2008 upon release, Spore sold extremely well and provided players with opportunities to share their experiences online.
Compared to the previous games on this list, Spore is a very different style of animal game with a focus on evolution and creature development. The ability to create an infinite amount of different creatures through design is a first, but builds on many popular EA game series.
Tokyo Jungle
The arcade-like sidescroller from Crispy’s and SCE Japan Studio appeared in 2012 for PlayStation 3 exclusively. Set in a post-apocalyptic Tokyo, players play as a small domesticated animal forced to survive in a world that has become savage and merciless as the fight for survival ensues. There are two main modes, Story and Survival, that come with unique aspects including the discovery of why humankind disappeared.
Tokyo Jungle has over 80 types of animals in the game, stretching from lions to hyenas, that the player can unlock by playing. The player has the ability to build a pack of animals and fight, meaning that if they die, they can continue to play as one of the other animals in the group.
The sometimes slapstick and violent nature of Tokyo Jungle sets it apart from many other animal games. The controls and gameplay techniques are simplistic along with the various tasks to complete. The depth, enjoyment and challenges of the game bring it to life whilst bringing together the open-world aspects of games like Grand Theft Auto.
The apocalyptic setting for the game brings an extremely exciting and curious story mode to Tokyo Jungle that has been well received. Despite its repetitive tasks and missions, this game stands out due to how you play as something so small in such a brutal world. There is an ‘ending’ to the game that really pushes the animals into the spotlight.
About the author
