I gave 11 Bit Studios’ The Alters a shot through PC Game Pass—a game centered around one man trapped on a hazardous planet, pushed to the brink and forced to clone himself just to survive the mission. It’s a narrative-driven experience layered with survival and base management mechanics, where time is a precious and limited resource. Once I booted it up, I found myself pulled into the mystery surrounding Jan Dolski, the game’s protagonist, and I couldn’t stop playing.
Should You Install or Uninstall The Alters on PC Game Pass?
For this series, I usually give a game five hours before deciding if it’s worth the install. With The Alters, those five hours flew by. It’s absolutely worth your time. As of writing, I’m already 20 hours in and heading into the game’s final act. I’m even planning multiple playthroughs as there are meaningful choices in what you say and how you interact with the clones you create, all of which can significantly steer the narrative.
The game has three core components: base management, exploration outside your base, and narrative choices that can shift the story in surprising ways.
Time Management Is Key
Exploration may not be the most exciting part of the game, but it’s essential. You’ll need to venture outside to establish mining nodes that fuel your base with the materials it needs to function. Since time is always ticking, every decision matters. I found myself constantly evaluating how to spend each moment by assigning tasks to the right clone, accelerating progress, and ensuring no time was wasted. Overworking the original Jan means less productivity the next day, so you’re always juggling short-term needs with long-term planning.
Clones have needs, personalities, and emotions. if you’re not careful, one minute they’re working with you, the next, they might be questioning your leadership and be on the verge of leaving. Layer that with the looming threat of the sun creeping toward your base as it was implied early on that the crew and the base wouldn’t survive direct sunlight by this planet’s sun, so each major part of the game is you working towards making sure you can move forward as the base is mobile but always hit a specific roadblock.
That pressure reminded me of the kind of addictiveness you get from games like Civilization or even 11 Bit Studios’ own Frostpunk.
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