Deep Rock Galactic: Survivor is a delicious slice of mad science: What if you combined the beer-soaked DNA of Deep Rock Galactic’s dwarven miners with tissue samples from an automatic rifle similar to the one in Vampire Survivors?
This definitely shouldn’t work. I would do it’s uncomplicated to look at this spin-off and wonder why it’s removing co-op from one of the best co-op games on PC, or dismiss it as a cynical attempt to capitalize on the popularity of autoshooters/survivors/bullet skies (remove if you prefer). But you’d be a polished leaf lover, my friend, because not only does DRG’s combination of horde shooting and rock-smashing translate wonderfully to the format, even this Early Access version is a ton of underground fun.
Much like Deep Rock Galactic, you’re a space dwarf, sent into the alien mines of Hoxxes IV to steal minerals and purge the insectoid Glyphids, wielding an exotic weaponry you definitely wouldn’t have seen in Blaenavon in the ’70s. Plus a pickaxe, because again like in the OG DRG, most of the terrain can be split open, opening up modern routes or carving a path to deeply buried gems.
This ability to transform the arena gives DRG: Survivor a distinct flavor that rivals autoshooters, and is key to why it’s so engaging from moment to moment. While it’s still crucial to avoid swarms, grab XP gadgets, and upgrade your arsenal, each stage is a finite space, so your little legs can’t run forever. Instead, survival is about mastering your environment: opening escape tunnels, creating checkpoints to utilize area-of-effect attacks, clearing the space before the boss appears so you have room to dodge its attacks. But rock is a cruel mistress, and messing up your mining can mean doom as quickly as salvation, whether you waste precious seconds at the coalface or unknowingly give the worms a modern angle of attack. You’ll have to think—plan, even—when it comes to mining. And in a genre that’s almost entirely about reacting to the appearance of enemies or randomly generated items, it’s incredibly refreshing to have the chance to show off your ingenuity.

You’re not completely alone – the AI support drone, Bosco, is nearby to occasionally snipe the enemy. I usually forgot it was there, trust me. Image Source: Rock Paper Shotgun/Ghost Ship Publishing
The focus on objectives, as opposed to pure survival, creates an even more compelling risk/reward animated. Minerals act as currency for both lasting and per-run upgrades, so ideally you’d be grabbing them off walls at every opportunity – but this slows you down, even as an excavation specialist, the Driller class, giving the Glyphids time to close the gap. Each stage also features a supply beacon that can be mined for a tasty boost, and can even take out a few worms when a delivery pod crashes, but it requires you to stay in one place long enough to clear the landing zone. Want that +70 health sandwich? You better be ready to put your ass on the line.
Just running around, these little opportunities keep popping up and you’re forced to decide whether you can afford them. They’re miniature but steady bursts of tension that come with a game where you’re a few wrong steps away from death under a barrage of crushing jaws. Pulling off such emotional peaks of “Oh God, God, God” from hitting ore with a metal stick is, quite frankly, impressive work.



That said, the strangely addictive stress of stashing gems in the middle of an alien extermination has long been a micro-highlight of the original Deep Rock Galactic. And DRG: Survivor borrowed a lot more than that: classes, biomes, most weapons, music, sound effects, and even voice lines are either redesigned or duplicated 1:1. That’s a lot of recycling, though for a low-priced spin-off, I can’t say I have a problem with it.

My RTX 3090 system was unaffected by DRG;Survivor, though it was able to run smoothly on Steam Deck as well. Disabling anti-aliasing helped keep performance well below 60fps, even with a screen full of Glyphids, so lower-end desktops should be able to handle it as well. Image Source: Rock Paper Shotgun/Ghost Ship Publishing
If anything, it’s striking how well certain elements of DRG lend themselves to a Survivors-style game. The sound effects in particular: mining for minerals sounds both shimmering and broad, and Glyphids fizz out with a satisfying crackle. When the game’s input requirements are so elementary, the senses need to be stimulated in every way possible, and DRG: Survivor’s more busy moments are a symphony of refreshing bangs, crackles, and clangs.
The four playable dwarves also fill similar roles to the original game, though their loadouts have been slightly changed to allow for both additional weapon sharing and a few modern class-specific tools. The agile Scout is all about ranged shooting and quick escapes, the Gunner specializes in projectile spam, the Engineer can hold his ground with turrets and immobile pylons, and the Driller chews through rocks while carrying short-range beam cannons. They all feel distinct enough, especially after you’ve shoved a few upgrades into their bearded maws, and while you don’t get as many playable characters as the phonebook offerings of some auto-shooters, each class has unlockable variations on their weapon pool and bonus abilities. They’re also great for exploration – I thought I couldn’t live without the Engineer’s massive sentry guns from the get-go, but starting with his shotgun gave me more time to upgrade it to a much more devastating bug-sweeper.

Overall, there’s a lot of meat to this Early Access build. Especially since progression follows the familiar autoshooter loop of unlocking modern stuff, reproducing stuff, powering up stuff. More Glyphid variety and a few more biomes could be nice additions down the road, but the current three map types are already pretty diverse, with a mix of rock wall density and environmental hazards that give each one its own feel, atmosphere, and difficulty.
Everything is pretty solidly built, too. I only saw a few notable bugs (aside from the really annoying ones), and one of them was fixed as I was writing this review. The second, an audio bug where certain sounds play over the pause menu and update screens, will hopefully make its way into this world soon.
Other than that, DRG: Survivor is in good shape for an unfinished game. More importantly, it’s a great game in its own right, where fears of lack of cooperation melt away in the mines amidst intense, satisfying, precisely crafted bullet rolls. I don’t know if I’ll put the same hundreds of hours into it as I did the parent game, but I’m elated to spend more time alone in the depths, stealing shiny stones from the locals.
This review is based on the version of the game provided by the publisher Ghost Ship Publishing.