Raft
Last updated: 2025-08-13
- Excellent cooperative multiplayer experience
- Unique survival and raft building
- Repetitive gameplay and lacks end-game
- Flawed core mechanics reported
- Constant shark threat adds challenge
- Highly recommended for co-op and building fans
Emotions
Players felt satisfied by the game's overall quality, engaging gameplay, and the sense of accomplishment derived from building, progressing, and exploring. The unique concept, immersive atmosphere, and cooperative play also contributed significantly to this positive emotion.
Frustration stemmed primarily from persistent bugs, performance issues, and multiplayer connection problems. Players also found the constant resource management, repetitive grind, and aggressive enemy behavior (especially the shark) to be significant sources of annoyance and difficulty.
Joy was frequently experienced through cooperative multiplayer, allowing friends and family to share the adventure, building, and exploration. The game's fun gameplay, progression, and creative freedom also contributed to a generally enjoyable and memorable experience.
Excitement was driven by the thrill of adventure, new discoveries, and the engaging gameplay loop, particularly in co-op. The anticipation of future updates, challenging encounters, and the addictive nature of progression also contributed to this feeling.
Players found enjoyment in the game's core survivalcraft mechanics, including building, exploration, and resource balancing, especially when playing with friends. The immersive atmosphere, interesting story, and overall fun nature of the game also contributed to a positive experience.
Verdict
Mostly positive
Summary
Positive 85% · Negative 15%. Score: 15 / 100
Positives:
- The game is highly praised for its cooperative multiplayer experience, with players consistently reporting that playing with friends significantly enhances the fun, engagement, and overall enjoyment. The social dimension, teamwork, and shared achievements are highlighted as key strengths.
- Players appreciate the game's unique take on the survival genre, particularly its open-ocean setting and blend of relaxing and tense moments. The balance between resource gathering, exploration, and managing threats creates an engaging and immersive survival experience.
- The game is praised for its accessibility, featuring simple and intuitive controls, easy-to-understand mechanics, and low system requirements. This makes it approachable for a wide range of players, while still offering enough depth.
- The game features a surprisingly engaging and well-implemented storyline that provides purpose and motivation for exploration and progression. While optional, the narrative adds depth and context to the survival and building mechanics.
- The game's atmospheric design, including its pleasant graphics, lighting, and immersive sound effects (especially ocean sounds), contributes significantly to a relaxing yet engaging experience. The visual style is often described as charming and fitting.
Negatives:
- Many players find the game's core loop, especially in single-player, becomes monotonous and repetitive after the initial hours or once the short story is completed. There's a significant lack of engaging late-game or post-story content, leading to a rapid decline in motivation and replayability.
- Several core game mechanics, including survival elements (hunger/thirst rates), combat, and tool durability, are criticized for being poorly designed or overly simplistic. The constant need for micromanagement and frequent tool replacement detracts from the fun, while combat lacks depth and variety.
- The primary enemy, the shark, and other creatures like birds and screechers, are widely perceived as annoying rather than challenging. Their constant presence, predictable AI, and frequent attacks on the raft or player become tedious, especially in the late game when they cease to be a real threat but remain a nuisance.
- Multiplayer functionality is severely hampered by persistent bugs, connection issues, and significant lag. Players frequently report long loading times, desynchronization, and inability to join friends' games, making the cooperative experience frustrating and often unplayable.
- Island exploration is often described as uninteresting and repetitive. Story islands are criticized for being poorly designed labyrinths with excessive backtracking, while regular islands lack variety and meaningful content, making exploration feel like a chore.
Gameplay:
- The core gameplay loop revolves around starting on a small raft, collecting floating debris with a hook, and gradually expanding it into a larger floating base or fortress. Players must manage survival needs like hunger and thirst, and constantly defend against shark attacks while exploring islands and uncovering a story.
- Players must manage fundamental survival mechanics such as hunger and thirst, which are constant concerns, especially in the early game. Resource gathering is primarily done by using a hook to collect floating debris and by scavenging islands for materials, which are then used for crafting essential tools and structures.
- The game offers various difficulty settings, from peaceful to hard, catering to different playstyles. While initial gameplay can be challenging, progression makes survival easier, allowing players to focus on exploration and building. The game also provides significant replayability and freedom, with an infinite playtime option after the story.
- A persistent shark, often named Bruce, is a primary antagonist that constantly circles the raft, attacking its foundations and players in the water. Players must craft weapons and develop strategies to defend against these attacks, which are a continuous threat throughout the game.
- A central aspect of the game is the extensive building and customization of the raft. Players can transform their initial small platform into multi-story floating fortresses, complete with farms, production facilities, and decorative elements, offering significant creative freedom.
Performance:
- Player feedback on performance is mixed. While many report the game runs well on low-to-mid spec PCs and even integrated graphics, others experience significant lag and FPS drops, especially on larger rafts or story islands. Some suggest optimization issues, particularly for more modest systems, and note that the game can cause PCs to run hot or even crash, though some workarounds exist.
- Most players report very few or minor bugs, with some not noticing any at all. However, specific instances of bugs include radar malfunctions, occasional game freezes, and rare visual glitches like fish floating or cloned sharks. The overall sentiment is that bugs are not a major issue.
- Feedback on loading times is contradictory, with some players experiencing long loading times and issues, while others report generally short loading times.
- Players note that the game's file size is moderate and not excessively large, considering it 'old fashioned' in a positive sense.
- The game's save system is reported to be stable by players.
Recommendations:
- The game is highly recommended by players, especially for its cooperative multiplayer experience. It's praised for its unique blend of survival, building, and exploration, offering an engaging and memorable adventure.
- The game is well-suited for fans of survival, crafting, and base-building genres, particularly those who enjoy a more relaxed pace. While primarily recommended for co-op, it can also be enjoyed solo, though some find it less engaging alone.
- Player ratings for the game are overwhelmingly positive, with many reviewers giving it high scores (e.g., 9/10, 10/10). This indicates a strong overall satisfaction with the game's quality and experience.
- A small portion of feedback suggests the game can be frustrating or better experienced passively, like watching a streamer, rather than actively playing.
Miscellaneous:
- Players express a strong desire for more content, including story updates, new chapters, and general gameplay additions. There's also significant interest in a sequel or major expansion, indicating a wish for the game's continued evolution beyond its current state.
- The game is praised for its calm, relaxing, and family-friendly atmosphere, often described as casual and not overly stressful. Its minimalistic yet beautiful graphics are appreciated, and it's noted for being well-optimized and accessible on lower-end PCs.
- While the game offers a decent lifespan, many players emphasize that the experience is significantly enhanced when played with friends. There's a clear preference for cooperative play, with some finding the solo experience less engaging or even depressing.
- The game's sound design and soundtrack are consistently praised for complementing the overall atmosphere and enhancing the sense of adventure and immersion.
- The game is frequently compared to 'Minecraft on the ocean' due to its survival and building mechanics. Players note its relatively low number of bugs, though some minor issues like getting stuck or disappearing items are mentioned.
