Deep Rock Galactic

Deep Rock Galactic is a cooperative first-person shooter video game developed by Danish studio Ghost Ship Games and published by Coffee Stain Publishing. Deep Rock Galactic was fully released on May 13, 2020 for Microsoft Windows and Xbox One after spending two years in early access.[1] The game was later released for PlayStation 4 and PlayStation 5 in January 2022,[2] and for Xbox Series X/S in September 2022.[3]

Deep Rock Galactic
Developer(s)Ghost Ship Games
Publisher(s)Coffee Stain Publishing
EngineUnreal Engine 4
Platform(s)
Release
  • Windows, Xbox One
  • May 13, 2020
  • PS4, PS5
  • January 4, 2022
  • Xbox Series X/S
  • September 9, 2022
Genre(s)First-person shooter
Mode(s)Multiplayer, single-player

Deep Rock Galactic is set on the alien planet of Hoxxes IV, whose caves are rich in minerals but filled with hostile wildlife and hazardous environments. The player controls a dwarf miner employed by Deep Rock Galactic, an intergalactic mining corporation that sends employees into the caves of Hoxxes IV to extract resources. Players can team up with up to three other dwarfs on missions into the planet, where they must navigate procedurally generated caves and complete objectives while fighting alien swarms.

The game received positive reviews from critics, who praised its class-based gameplay and atmosphere. The game has sold over five million units as of January 2023 and has been part of the Xbox Game Pass subscription service since November 2020. It was also available to PlayStation Plus subscribers during the month of its release.[4]

Gameplay

Deep Rock Galactic is a cooperative first-person shooter. Gameplay primarily centers around missions that take place in fully destructible, procedurally generated cave systems; each has varying terrain generation, objectives, hazards, and enemies depending on the selected biome and mission type.[5] Upon landing in a cave via an orbital drop pod, players must complete a mission objective such as mining resources or repairing abandoned equipment. While doing so, they must fight hostile aliens, manage a limited supply of ammunition, and navigate the cave. Once the objective is completed, players can start an extraction sequence, where players must backtrack through the cave to an escape pod in order to safely exit along with all collected resources.[6]

The Gunner shooting at an enemy.

Players can play missions solo or with up to three other players. Before starting each mission, players choose one of four playable classes: Scout, Engineer, Gunner, and Driller. Each class has a unique loadout of weapons and tools, giving them varied capabilities in combat and navigation.[7] By working together to take advantage of how these different capabilities interact, teams can more efficiently navigate a cave, complete objectives, and fight enemies.[8][9] As an example, the Engineer class can place platforms on walls, while the Scout class has a personal grappling hook. In order to mine a difficult-to-reach mineral deposit high up on a wall, an Engineer could place a platform beneath the deposit and a Scout could then grapple on top of it to safely mine the deposit.[7] When playing solo, players can choose to be accompanied by a drone, Bosco, which assists with objectives and combat.[8]

The game features various progression systems, such as new weapons, equipment upgrades, and cosmetics, that can be purchased using credits and crafting minerals obtained from missions.[6] By completing challenges, players can also acquire perks; these give dwarves additional abilities, such as increased run speed.[8][10] Since 2021, there have been seasonal events in which players can unlock items via a free battle pass-like system.[11]

Game modes

Deep Rock Galactic has a total of 8 game modes, also referred to in game as "missions":

  • Mining Expedition: the first mission type unlocked, players are tasked with mining a certain quantity of the mineral Morkite and extracting.
  • Egg Hunt: pockets of organic alien matter spawn around the cave, housing eggs you must collect and deposit while waves of enemies spawn after mining certain eggs.
  • On-site Refining: veins of liquid Morkite must be connected with pipes to a central refinery and pumped until the refinery is full, while players maintain the pipes throughout the mission duration.
  • Salvage Operation: dropped into a previously explored cave, players must repair mini-MULE storage robots and an abandoned drop pod left behind from a previous mining crew in order to extract.
  • Point Extraction: a large platform is dropped into the cave the players spawn in, where they must collect and deposit bright blue gems embedded in the cave walls.
  • Escort Duty: an Ommoran Hearthstone lies at the end of a cave, where a large autonomous drill robot must be protected and guided to the Hearthstone. This is proceeded by a survival sequence where players must protect the drill once more as it extracts the core of the Hearthstone, which they must deposit to extract.
  • Elimination: players must seek and eliminate Glyphid Dreadnaughts, which are boss variants of the common Glyphid enemy.
  • Industrial Sabotage: added in the Season 1 update, this mission sees players disable the shield to a large robot guardian known as the Caretaker by hacking auxiliary power generators. This prompts a multi-stage fight with the Caretaker, and upon death reveals the rival data rack that must be deposited for extraction.[12]

Each of the mission types can be played in five different difficulties, called hazard levels. Each level increases enemy health and damage, as well as spawning more enemies. Missions can also have one of three mission lengths and cave complexity modifiers, which gives the player(s) a longer objective, and makes the cave bigger and more complex respectively. There are also randomly assigned modifiers, both good and bad, that a mission can have up to two of. These modifiers are broken into two categories, being Anomalies and Warnings, with anomalies typically having good or neutral effects, and warnings having negative effects but offering more experience to compensate.

In addition to the standard missions, there are two special mission types, referred to as Deep Dives and Elite Deep Dives. In these, a randomly generated list of three missions is created, with the biome, mission type, modifiers, and layouts being almost entirely random. Both of these special mission types play all three missions consecutively and in an ascending difficulty without leaving the match, although resources are carried over between each of the three missions. In addition to the reward of credits and experience, players receive special items called Matrix Cores, which are used to unlock weapon modifications and cosmetic items. However, these can only be collected once per mission per weekly reset, giving a total of six cores if the full Deep Dive and Elite Deep Dive are completed.

Development

Deep Rock Galactic is the first game developed by Ghost Ship Games. The team has stated that they took inspiration from both Minecraft and Left 4 Dead,[13] and felt that a problem with Left 4 Dead was that it was unbalanced for new players who wanted to play with veterans, and wanted to design a game where all teammates would be on even footing regardless of experience.[14]

Deep Rock Galactic entered early access on February 28, 2018, where it stayed for two years prior to its full release in 2020.[9][15][16][17] Ghost Ship Games used the early access model to get community feedback in order to determine which features to prioritize. The low-poly art style was chosen for its efficiency in adding content.[18] The most difficult part of development was creating the procedural world generator. Deep Rock Galactic used Unreal Engine for development and was made with the engine's Blueprint scripting for quick iteration.[19]

The full version of the game was released on May 13, 2020.[20] Post-launch the game continues to be developed, with intermittent updates adding new biomes, equipment, and accessories. Since November 4, 2021, Ghost Ship Games has begun releasing content in themed season updates. These center around new enemy types and add new equipment, missions, and cosmetics.[11][21]

Reception

The Early Access version of Deep Rock Galactic was received positively by critics, who praised the game's atmosphere and challenging levels. Multiple reviewers compared parts of the experience to Left 4 Dead.[9][5] Following Early Access, the full version of Deep Rock Galactic received "generally favorable reviews" according to review aggregator Metacritic.[28][29]

Nic Reuben of Rock, Paper, Shotgun liked how the game's classes meshed together, saying that "each class is both viable and enjoyable".[30] Matt Miller of Game Informer appreciated how the unique secondary objectives gave the game a risk/reward dynamic.[31] Phil Iwaniuk, writing for PC Gamer, enjoyed the tension that the exfiltration phase brought to each mission, and the persistent upgrades that let the player customize their dwarf.[32] Leana Hafer of IGN praised the distinct abilities of each of the dwarves and the low-poly visual style, but criticized the game for its connection issues, saying "About one in every five missions, I’d run into connection issues that could cause other players to lag severely and disconnect."[8]

Ghost Ship Games had stated that Deep Rock Galactic had sold over 2 million units by January 2021,[33] 3 million sales by November 2021,[34] 4 million copies by June 2022,[35] and 5.5 million copies by January 2023.[36] In March 2021, Ghost Ship Games and Coffee Stain Publishing won Indie Game of the Year and Excellence in Multiplayer awards at South by Southwest.[37]

Spin-offs

A Kickstarter for Deep Rock Galactic: The Board Game was successfully funded in early 2022.[38]

A spin-off video game, Deep Rock Galactic: Survivor, was announced in March 2023. In contrast to the original, the title is a Vampire Survivors-inspired top-down shooter developed by Funday Games. It is set to be released in early access during 2023.[39]

Another spin-off video game, Deep Rock Galactic: Rogue Core, was announced in October 2023. This title features single and multiplayer roguelike first-person shooter gameplay.

References
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