Those with arachnophobia has the option to battle out spiders as cute blobs instead of its actual form in Grounded.
Obsidian Entertainment’s Grounded has been topping Steam’s charts since it launched on Early Access this Tuesday. Interested gamers have also been watching streamers play the survival game live on Twitch.
Early reviews of the game mention about the scary-looking spiders that will likely bring out any fear a player has about spiders. Not to fret though, as Obisidian made sure they’d have the alternative option in place, just in case.
Grounded from Obsidian Entertainment released in early access today on Xbox and PC
The game currently is in the Top 3 most watched games on Twitch with 220k concurrent viewers
Encouraging early sign pic.twitter.com/0nApMoSwxL
— Benji-Sales (@BenjiSales) July 28, 2020
The Arachnophobia safe mode
While all the other new games are busy with morphing whatever sort of villains to fight against with next, Grounded is making players fight all kinds of bugs and insects, that players already deal with in their daily normal life.
The plot twist is, these creatures are twice your size—every other person’s greatest nightmare. There are also those life-like looking spiders to watch out for. PC Gamer describes them as “fearsome.”
I understand Grounded has an arachnophobia filter and everything but I didn't turn it on for contents sake. I'd said it paid off nicely pic.twitter.com/rISVm6gmrM
— Bmore (@Bmoretimore12) July 28, 2020
There are quite a few varieties. If players spot baby spiders, without a doubt, the mommy spider will be close by. Think of Harry Potter and Ron Weasely following the trail of spiders that led them to Aragog.
Those who are not fond of the sight of big hairy spiders, or any spiders, there’s an option that players can toggle at any time and it will automatically morph spiders in cute blobs.
There are five levels that players can choose from under the Accessibility setting, labeled the Arachnophobia Safe Mode. The very last one is what turns this creepy creature into a blob.
Each level, the game removes parts of the spiders’ body parts, such as legs and fangs, until they look like nothing like a spider and more of a blob you’d like to squish.
Grounded has 5 tier setting slider that removes more spider-like features for arachnophones here is Maximum Arachnophobia-avoidant mode pic.twitter.com/ssozVjLILr
— Lizzy (@Ice_Cream_Jones) July 28, 2020
Although, players should note that this does not make the battle against the spiders any easier. As of the moment, spiders are the most difficult to defeat.
Other Grounded reviews
Kotaku mentions that “Grounded is a pretty lighthearted game at its core,” despite the giant bugs and spiders. The publication goes on to applaud Obisidian for the arachnophobia feature, assuring more people can play the game.
Meanwhile, PC Gamer hopes that players will someday be able to saddle and ride the bugs. The known PC gaming publication has commended the bugs in Grounded to be “very wonderfully done.”
Catch the Early Access of Grounded on Steam, as a Game Preview on Xbox, and the Xbox Game Pass. There’s been no confirmation as to how long this Early Access will last.
For its official release, players are looking at sometime in 2021.
Featured image courtesy of Grounded/Steam