It's been a whole year since my Early Access review of Sons of the Forest, in which I found a deeply creepy – and deeply compelling – survival game that improved in just about every way on its predecessor. The 1.0 release isn't completely transformative – this is still mostly the same, already impressive survival adventure I've been on before. But it comes with an armload of welcome touch-ups and little additions, bringing it up to a higher standard of polish that lets it really shine.
Set several years after The Forest, Sons of the Forest challenges you to survive and uncover new mysteries on a lush, temperate island that reminded me of hiking in the American Pacific Northwest. It's about four times the size of the original's map, and it is downright gorgeous. The amount and variety of vegetation, some of which can be used as a food source or to make medicines, adds a richness to the landscape that we rarely see in this type of game. The lighting is also incredible; Clouds that partially block out the sun on a warm day completely change the mood of my exploration. It's one of those small details that most games ignore, but when one of them gets it right, I really notice.
It's also now possible to see it all from the air with a hang glider, which is simply a wonderful experience.
The thing that stood out immediately compared to when I played in Early Access is how much more optimized this island has become on the technical side. The animations that hide the loading times between the exterior world and caves, which could previously hitch for several seconds, now feel mostly seamless. The pop-in with ground clutter is significantly less distracting. My frame rates, across the board, are much better. In fact, I reviewed the Early Access version on a 1080p monitor. I'm now playing at 4K on my same, trusty RTX 3080, and the only setting I needed to change was bumping DLSS down from "Quality" to "Balanced." This has allowed me to maintain a very comfortable 30+ fps in the outdoor world most of the time, and averages even higher in caves.
Further adding to the believability and hostility of the environment in Sons of the Forest is a full cycle of seasons, including snowy winters that kill off most of the edible vegetation and require you to keep track of your body temperature. These systems were a bit toothless in the Early Access version, but you now have the ability to tweak settings for how harshly conditions like starvation, dehydration, and hypothermia affect you independent of other difficulty factors. As someone who enjoys more hardocre and realistic survival mechanics, this was a great touch. I highly enjoyed both the visual variety and shift in difficulty seasons provided.
The heart-pounding cave delves are similarly excellent. I really came to enjoy the stronger focus on combat compared to The Forest, as it's used very effectively to build tension rather than just to check a box or provide cheap thrills. Every fight with a powerful opponent or a large group of enemies is a tense resource management puzzle that reminded me of some of the best parts of Resident Evil or The Last of Us.
Ranged weapons keep you out of danger, but ammo can be very difficult to come by. In melee, it's almost impossible to win without taking some amount of damage, which depletes your breakable armor pieces and healing items. And without batteries for your flashlight, you're as good as dead. I'd rather run out of bullets and food nine times out of 10 than lose my light source deep into a cavern run.
There's quite a bit more weight and context to the story.
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There's also quite a bit more weight and context to the story than in Early Access, beginning with trying to find a billionaire and his family who went missing in the wilderness. It expands on the supernatural elements established in the first game – not always in ways that I enjoyed, but it certainly never got boring. More characters have voice acting now, there are additional documents to be found explaining what's going on with the island, some new boss fights, and a massive new story cave with a fascinating reveal. This cave is also, unfortunately, where I ran into a progress-blocking bug that required me to use console commands to progress, however. That was the only major technical issue I came across, but it was definitely a frustrating one.
Aside from that, the presentation of the story has come a long way. One of my primary criticisms of the Early Access version of Sons of the Forest was that the ending felt rushed and unfinished (which it was, to be fair), and that's been mostly addressed, too. Shawn Ashmore was brought on to voice the previously voiceless Timmy (your son from the first game), and he definitely helps the character feel more fully realized – although I think he has something like 20 lines across the entire story and doesn't sound like he was given a ton of context for the situations his character is in when he delivers them. Regardless, I felt like I fully understood the plot and the motivations of the various characters this time around, whereas in Early Access, it was a bit confusing to piece all of that together from incomplete information.
Even if you played The Forest, and you know how far some of the later chapters stray from a stroll in the woods, I can fairly confidently say you still would never guess where Sons of the Forest is going to take you before the credits roll. And if you didn't play the first one, well… buckle up, I guess.
There's also a new ending cutscene that rewards you for keeping all of your friends alive with a wink and a nod toward one of the community's favorite music tracks.
There's a bunch of new endgame content compared to Early Access as well if you choose to stay on the island after the final confrontation, most of which I would hesitate to spoil. But it involves the ability to upgrade weapons, armor, and even furniture items both visually and mechanically. The building system has been greatly expanded in general, too, with the ability to build stone shelters, add wiring, light bulbs, and solar panels for illumination, and tons of over-the-top new traps that kept me interested in searching optional caves for more blueprints.
Cannibals cleverly subvert what we've been taught about game enemies.
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Much like in the first game, Sons of the Forests' disturbing cannibals cleverly subvert everything we've been taught about video game enemies, prioritizing self-preservation over aggression. Every run-in with these bone-clad baddies begins with a tense stand-off, and many will choose not to fight, especially if they're alone and you don't act afraid of them. They can climb trees to get away or pounce on you from above, and even set ambushes, disguising themselves in piles of leaves. It's terrifying, particularly if you're caught outside at night and you can hear that they're nearby, but you don't know where. Every time I thought they were out of surprises, they surprised me again.
They've even gotten tougher since Early Access, as well. They're more dangerous than before on default difficulty settings, with more intelligent combat tactics and better teamwork. They also started appearing in larger groups much earlier in my playthrough than I had come to expect. It feels like defensive walls and traps are actually a necessity now if you want to have a successful base, whereas in Early Access I felt like they were mostly optional. There's still not a ton of incentive to spend a lot of time setting up a permanent base if you're mostly interested in the main story. It's more something you can do if you enjoy it, and I personally prefer more of a nomad playstyle. But it's nice that they've fleshed it out for everyone who mainly plays Sons of the Forest to build cool stuff.
Len's Top 10 Survival Crafting Games
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Kelvin, your deaf and mute companion, is… still Kelvin. But for all his tendencies to run away at the first sign of danger or scare the shit out of me by popping up in my peripheral vision when we're out hiking through the woods at night, it's now easier to issue him commands. And there are more of them, too, like asking him to automatically finish a blueprint you've laid out, which makes him even more helpful in keeping up with day-to-day base chores.
