17 Games Like The Forest
Our assembled list of games like The Forest offers other first person horror games where you’ll have to fight for survival in an open world environment.
The Forest joined the ranks of other open world survival games in early 2014 through Steam Early Access. Set within a dense forest players will take on the role of plane crash survivor as they explore the sandbox gameplay, empowering you to make the best decisions for your survival. From chopping down trees to scavenging for food and exploring the cave networks you create your adventure, ensuring each game is always different.
In addition to exploring the open world environment for resources players will need to craft their own tools, shelter and weapons to survive. It’s not only the environment that challenges players but also the tribe of nocturnal cannibals who inhabit the various underground cave networks.
The games similar to The Forest here will also push your survival skills to the limit as you gather resources, craft items and fight off enemies. This list includes both single player and multiplayer options allowing you to team up with friends or test yourself against other humans as opposed to AI.
Life is Feudal: Your Own
Step into a massive medieval world in Life is Feudal: Your Own that blends combat, crafting, building, sandbox, realistic directional combat and many other mechanics to create an adventure set far into the past. Alternatively explore the much larger world in Life is Feudal: MMO, the MMO variant of the title with different f...[Read Review]
Left 4 Dead 2
Left 4 Dead 2 continues the co-operative zombie adventure with all new characters, locations, enemies and weapons to change up the popular gameplay introduced in the original Left 4 Dead. The popular AI director also makes a return with plenty of tweaks to ensure players are always challenged. Just like the original game pl...[Read Review]
State of Decay
State of Decay combines the open world genre with a zombie outbreak to create one of the largest and most impressive games in the genre to date. The game started out as a title on the Xbox Marketplace and eventually made its way to Windows. The game plays out in an open world environment with players taking control of their...[Read Review]
Dead Island: Riptide
Dead Island: Riptide is the second game in the Dead Island series and continues on from your previous adventure but takes place on a whole new island. The game launched in 2013 for PC, PS3 and Xbox 360, delivering a very similar experience to the first game. The events in Dead Island: Riptide occur right after those of the ...[Read Review]
ZombiU
ZombiU (Zombi on non Wii U platforms) brings the zombie genre onto Nintendo’s platform with an amazing and horrifying experience that shows off some unique mechanics and potential of the Wii U. On non Wii-U platforms some of these features are taken out or redesigned while still retaining the impressive fundamental design o...[Read Review]
Don’t Starve
Don’t Starve is a single player survival game that has many unique features and a dark art direction that makes it a stand out open world survival experience. The game was released in April 2013 by Klei Entertainment with a standalone expansion pack released in 2016 under the name Don’t Starve Together which introduce...[Read Review]
CastleMiner Z
CastleMiner Z is a sequel to the popular Xbox Live Indie Game of CastleMiner while also bringing the series to the computer environment via Steam. While the original CastleMiner was a creatively focused experience the sequel pushes the game into survival orientated gameplay instead aligning it with other games in the genre ...[Read Review]
Z1 Battle Royale
H1Z1 began its life as H1Z1 on Steam (Early Access) but soon split off into a separate game alongside the more sandbox survival title (Just Survive) as the King of the Kill game mode thrived in the growing genre of battle royale titles. After being briefly called H1Z1: King of the Kill, the battle royale mode was renamed to...[Read Review]
Left 4 Dead
Left 4 Dead (L4D) is a zombie survival experience that focuses on co-operative gameplay against a varied and randomised zombie infection. Left 4 Dead separates itself from similar co-operative shooters by promising a different experience each time you load up a game map thanks to the AI director that alters aspects of the m...[Read Review]
Sir, You Are Being Hunted
Sir, You Are Being Hunted is one of the more unique games to be released in recent years offering a free roaming sandbox adventure focused on stealth gameplay. As the name might suggest players spend their time in the game being hunted in a procedurally generated game world. In the game you won’t be chased by zombies, mutan...[Read Review]
Dead Island
In Dead Island you’ll have to explore an open world environment and try to prevent being eaten by using whatever weapons you can find around the place. Dead Island is a great role playing experience for fans of survival horror and is available on Windows, Xbox 360, and PlayStation 3. Dead Island features a fictional island ...[Read Review]
Wurm Online
Wurm Online is a sandbox style MMORPG that has a creative focus allowing you to create your own adventure. You can play Wurm Online with a basic account for free but to remove some restrictions you will have to commit to a subscription based premium account. The game also has a stand alone version released on Steam in 2015 ...[Read Review]
Fallen Earth
Fallen Earth is set in a post-apocalyptic game world and offers it to players with a free to play MMO experience. The game is a mixture of FPS and role playing features making it akin to the later games in the Fallout series. The game is centred around the Grand Canyon area which is now a wasteland after a series of events ...[Read Review]
Rust
Rust is a survival game that comes from the same brains that brought you Garry’s Mod. Drawing inspiration from a wide range of games and genres you’ll find plenty of depth to explore while struggling to survive. The game is best described as a mixture of Minecraft and DayZ. In Rust players will spawn with nothing (other tha...[Read Review]
Miasmata
Miasmata is a unique survival adventure that has you attempting to cure yourself from a deadly disease. The only thing you have at your disposal is your scientific knowledge and the plant life around the island. Miasmata is one of the most unique and impressive adventure games released in recent years and is even more impre...[Read Review]
Stranded 2
Stranded 2 is a free to play 3D game that challenges you to survive by yourself on an island. Building on the original game by offering improved graphics, larger islands, additional items and better randomisation you’ll get plenty of more hours of Stranded gameplay. Allowing players to play either through the story mode tha...[Read Review]
Infestation: The New Z
Infestation: The New Z offers another iteration of The War Z and Infestation: Survivor Stories with a free to play open world shooter made for PvP play across various game modes. Ignoring the rocky history that this franchise has had with countless development issues and decisions that have been less than well received by t...[Read Review]