I've finally finished Grounded, and I've gotta say Obsidian has done a great job with this game.

Let me say one thing before I start: this game was a very unique experience for me because of my crippling fear of bugs. There were many times I felt myself cringing at the enlarged bugs, having to walk away from my computer. You might think I didn't enjoy it then, but you'd be wrong. This game was very rewarding and fun, making me want to finish it despite my fear.

Now that that's out of the way, lets talk about the game play. It has many ways to upgrade your equipment, stats, and even give you abilities depending on what you do in the world. The main upgrades, Milk Molars, are very rewarding as you find them scattered throughout the world, so your stats increase the more you explore. Then there is your equipment, which is very flexible and well balanced. I was surprised with how many builds you could make with the weapons, armor, and trinkets you receive. Finally, there is mutations, the unique skill system in this game. It has many different abilities you can use to min-max or use for utility, but they only unlock as you do things, such as harvest materials, kill bugs, or find special ones you can buy in the shop. I found myself switching out my mutations regularly later in the game, so its important to max out your equipable mutations for later. Overall, it was very fleshed out and realized.

The game play is the main allure of this game, but everything else is good too. The story is a bit simple, but that's because it leans into the style of "Honey, I Shrunk The Kids!", being more goofy than serious most of the time, complete with made up science jargon and funny evil scientists, though it can be dark when it wants to be. The crafting is very simple and easy to understand, being a simple Rust/Raft system, the progression in the game also being very natural.

This game was a great experience, with the only flaws being a janky physics system sometimes and strange structure placement rules. Definitely recommend for anyone getting that open-world itch.

TL;DR Great game with very little flaws, 9/10