In a lot of ways, The Alters is a natural progression from 11 Bit Studios' previous works. It's a high-stakes survival game, much like This War of Mine and Frostpunk, but it's also got a little extra seasoning to it: The Alters is far more narratively driven than its predecessors, with a structured plot, cinematic delivery, and stronger central concept, being far more than just another post-apocalypse nightmare.
Yes, The Alters is a unique release from the consistently unique 11 Bit Studios, proving that the Polish company has more than a few tricks up its sleeve. Interestingly, The Alters approaches replayability differently than the aforementioned survival games, which present a number of specific scenarios for players to engage in time and again, each time seeking greater efficiency and better overall performance. In the case of Frostpunk specifically—a game that represents a major slice of The Alters' creative roots—there's also an endless mode, which offers players the opportunity to play around with various in-game systems to their hearts' content. This is a great way to squeeze all the juice out of a game like Frostpunk, and hopefully, The Alters will get something similar.
The Alters Made Me Feel Like I Was Talking To Myself
The Alters is a fun game, to be sure, but it's also a deeply personal and moving one, and I'm glad that I experienced its intimate themes firsthand.
Why The Alters Ought To Get an Endless Mode
Endless Mode Would Let Alters Players Exercise Their Skill and Expertise
In the wake of The Alters' release, and as players are starting to complete the main campaign, there's been some demand for a new game plus feature. This makes sense, of course, as it's tough to spend dozens of hours grinding for new gear, researching new technologies, and setting up the perfect network of outposts, only to have all that hard work wiped away at the end of a run. With new game plus, The Alters could allow players to leverage their previous accomplishments from the start of the game, potentially offering a more rewarding, if quite easy, experience.
But whether this is truly the best option for a new Alters game mode is questionable. Unlike Frostpunk, where players build outward from a single location, or Frostpunk 2, where players control several locations simultaneously, The Alters is broken up into three acts, each precisely designed to uphold its narrative and gameplay loop. In other words, it wouldn't actually be very useful for players to start the game over with late-game technologies already researched, for instance, since there'd be no use for them early in the game. Like a traditional adventure game, progression is tied to a predetermined structure.
This is where an endless mode could come into play. Instead of giving players everything they earned at the start of the same campaign, perhaps a future Alters expansion could add an entirely different game mode, wherein players have access to only one, large location, which they must optimize for all it's worth. In this hypothetical new game mode, players could reach the fullest potential of the survival sandbox, getting several Alters together and populating a large region with outposts, farms, and the like. They could enjoy the experience of maximum optimization, pushing the game's systems to their absolute limits.
The Alters will expand with DLC next year, so perhaps some sort of endless mode will be added then.
The Alters' endless mode could also open up new opportunities for customization and personalization. Once a base starts thriving, players could decorate it with a number of cosmetics or even non-essential modules, like a bar or game room. This would allow for a new kind of philosophical fantasy within The Alters, one that is more about self-expression and long-spanning strategy than deep narrative themes.
The Alters
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OpenCritic Reviews
- Top Critic Avg: 86 /100 Critics Rec: 94%
- Released
- June 13, 2025
- ESRB
- Mature 17+ / Blood and Gore, Strong Language, Use of Drugs and Alcohol, Violence
- Developer(s)
- 11 Bit Studios
- Publisher(s)
- 11 Bit Studios
WHERE TO PLAY
- Engine
- Unreal Engine 5
- PC Release Date
- June 13, 2025
- Xbox Series X|S Release Date
- June 13, 2025
- PS5 Release Date
- June 13, 2025
- Genre(s)
- Survival, Strategy, Management
- Platform(s)
- PC, PS5, Xbox Series X, Xbox Series S
