Sons of the Forest Preview - The Beauty and Terror of the Forest
Did you know that daily walks in the forest saturate the blood with oxygen, improve heart function, reduce stress levels and generally have a healing effect on the body? To get the most out of your time outdoors, we recommend bringing a flashlight, an axe, a pointed spear and bow, and if possible a crossbow in case you encounter a tribe of bloodthirsty cannibal mutants. Sons of the Forest - online game from the developer Friv2Online Studio
In Sons of the Forest, players as part of an armed group, and even on two helicopters, go to a mysterious island in search of a billionaire who disappeared more than thirty days ago, his wife and daughter. On the map in your laptop, there are even markers of places where it makes sense to look for some clues. Everything goes according to plan for about a few minutes, while you admire the bird's eye view of the picturesque landscape, and then the typical The Forest begins.
Someone opens fire on you and the helicopter starts to fall. Where exactly the aircraft crashes will determine the location of your starting area on the map. For example, you can crash into the sea and have to fight for life in a sinking helicopter, and you will find yourself already on the shore. Or…
The first day. Our group was attacked, the helicopter crashed into the thicket of the forest and got stuck in the branches of a huge tree. I escaped with minor bruises, the seat belts saved me. I found almost all the supplies from the damaged cargo compartment: a hatchet, a knife, consumables, medicines, and most importantly, a GPS navigator loaded with places of possible contact with targets. The firearm is lost, but I intend to continue the operation.
By the way, you can already break into the game both in single player mode and in multiplayer mode with friends or random players from the browser. For sessions, manual setting of the difficulty level is available. If you wish, you can completely disable or significantly weaken opponents, select the initial season, disable damage from hunger and thirst, so that the character receives only stamina penalties.
One of the unique features of Sons of the Forest is the companion system. Whether you're playing in multiplayer or starting in single player mode, the game will provide you with an assistant in the form of another surviving member of the Kelvin squad.
Second day. Found Kelvin. The guy lost his eardrums and can't hear anything. I communicate with him using a notepad. There is not much game here, food supplies are almost gone. Fortunately, Kelvin is an excellent fisherman. This is the second day we have been living on fish and fresh water. I saw deer and rabbits in the thicket, but we have no tools and snares to catch them.
A partner can directly give orders of various kinds - not only follow, wait or rest. He knows how to get food, collect and bring basic resources for crafting, build a tent from tarpaulin and sticks to rest and save progress, make a fire. At the moment, Kelvin is not suitable for battles, but he often detects a threat before you, points out the danger to you, and he himself is in a hurry to take cover.
The players are provided with a very comfortable folding backpack with crazy capacity, there is even a backlight in case you need to create something in the dark. In addition, external slots are available - some items, such as a hatchet, a bow with a spear, medicines or flares can be hung on the back of the backpack for quick access to items, which is very convenient in emergency situations.
Day five. The island is huge and unsafe, we often wake up hearing sounds from the forest that no living creature known to us is capable of making. We decided we needed better shelter than a makeshift canvas tent. For several days, Kelvin and I harvested logs and made something like a seasonal forest house out of them. With a roof over your head, it is much more comfortable to endure the season of sudden downpours.
The physics and crafting system in Sons of the Forest has been overhauled. No more virtual beams - you do everything manually. When cutting trees, you need to make sure that the trunk does not collapse on you or any of your structures, logs can be rafted down the river, divided with an ax into smaller parts, cut lengthwise into two halves, and waste can be used for firewood, which in the current assembly no application yet.
Again, Kelvin is very convenient, who can not only drag wood to the construction site, but also go into the forest on his own, cut down trees and bring what has been mined, while you are laying log after log, cutting through doors and windows with an ax, constructing a roof with support beams, build stairs and fences. Players can even build a rope bridge if they can find enough resources.
Day nine. Some hell of a thing is going on. Sometimes a girl approaches our camp. This is going to sound crazy, but she has three legs and three arms. She shows curiosity, but does not make contact - she runs away into the forest. Kelvin and I call her "ballerina" because of the dance moves she sometimes does when she feels safe. God alone knows where this strange creature is hiding and how it survives. One day we'll follow her.
According to the developers, the "ballerina" can also join your camp, but you need to find an approach to the girl. During one of our expeditions, when we camped in the shadow of a mountain, a stranger brought us a gift of plants for the first time, but she was frightened and fled when she noticed an approaching group of savages.
I have not seen hostile predators in the game, but there are enough dangers without them. In the initial assembly, several types of local, so to speak, residents are implemented. Some of them are completely wild, people smeared in mud. They move on all fours, skillfully climb tree trunks and can ambush hiding in the foliage.
In addition, mutant tribes inhabit the island. They camp in the forest and guard their territory. These savages react to the situation and the environment, they can just come and watch you, they can raid. They have leaders and even some kind of primitive religion of their own. And among them, sometimes there is a thug, capable of knocking the player's character down with one blow. But even this is not the worst thing that you can meet in the depths of the forest.
Day eleven. We climb further north, examining the signals and markers loaded into the navigators. Thanks to the beacons, we were able to track down a few more operatives. All of them are dead, most are killed. We managed to find several caves. In appearance, they are of natural origin, but bunkers and even entire laboratories are equipped deep inside, the purpose of which we do not know. Such places are full of supplies, and also - corpses.
Exploring the world, players can find many useful things, and not only in those places of interest that are marked on the map of the navigator. To access the closed sectors of underground structures, key cards are needed, and in one of them I found a 3D printer into which you can load the resin found on the island to print, for example, hooks, crossbow bolts, a water flask or elements of special armor.
At the moment the game is quite raw, but already well optimized. The developers promise to regularly indulge players with updates with many innovations, and even launched a timer in the main menu that counts down to the next update. By all indications, Sons of the Forest looks much more promising than the previous studio project. We will follow the updates and we will definitely summarize the impression closer to the release of the game.