The Forest

The Forest is a survival horror video game developed and published by Endnight Games. Its core gameplay loop consists of a non-linear open-world survival experience built around traditional video game survival mechanics extended by the game's signature threat management system in which players must survive against the Cannibals and Mutants that inhabit the environment by gathering resources, crafting weapons and traps, constructing defensive fortifications, and engaging in or avoiding combat. Alongside the core survival gameplay, the game features an optional, gradually unfolding mystery-adventure. The otherwise open-ended structure increasingly gives way to a more linear narrative. Having survived a plane crash at the start of the game, stranded player-protagonist Eric LeBlanc explores the peninsula and investigate its caves and sinister hidden facilities in search of his abducted son Timmy. The narrative is revealed primarily through environmental storytelling and exploration, allowing players to either pursue Eric's search to its conclusion or remain indefinitely within the open-world survival sandbox. Whereas enemies in many contemporary survival games simply attacked on sight, The Forest's enemies engage in seemingly unexplainable and unpredictable behaviour. They observe, stalk, surround, intimidate, and probe the player before committing to open combat, creating prolonged tension. Combined with the game's dense forests, dark cave systems, limited visibility, and sparse use of music, this unpredictability reinforces an atmosphere in which psychological horror arises as much as the body horror from the grotesque enemies, macabre buildings, decaying corpses, and heads impaled on sticks. Following a four-year long early access beta phase releasing in 2014, the finished game was released for Windows in April 2018, and for the PlayStation 4 in November 2018. The game was a commercial success, selling over five million copies by the end of 2018. In 2020, Rock Paper Shotgun placed the game 9th on their "The best survival games on PC" list.