Alright, so--Saurian is a very relaxed single-player experience. If you want a game that's geared towards combat and fast-paced action, do not buy this title. You'll find something like The Isle much more exciting, which is totally valid. I definitely don't play this game for the thrill of it. I'm just autistic as ♥♥♥♥ about dinosaurs.

Saurian is still in pre-alpha after nearly a decade. It lags, it freezes while loading, and the AI is pretty goofy. You may or may not encounter bugs that will contribute to your death. It can be ridiculously hard to survive in the beginning, even annoying at times. The game begins feeling hollow and repetitive after a while. The devs could provide much better communication with what's going on behind the scenes, especially concerning new dinosaurs.
Although I agree with a lot of these negative reviews, I enjoy this game a lot for what it is. There's a pretty decent soundtrack, the graphics are passable, and I get to see scientifically accurate dinosaur models (aside from the feathered rex). The mechanics are interesting and have a lot of potential. The dinosaurs don't roar, as they likely wouldn't have in real life. They actually close their mouths instead of having all their teeth on display. Tyrannosaurus's tongue doesn't even flex while it threatens you because there's evidence to suggest their tongues were quite rigid. Urvogel Games does such extensive research into every aspect of these creature's lives, trying to piece together everything as smoothly as possible, which is incredibly admirable. The long development time becomes more understandable once you consider that they are working with actual paeleontologists to create something as close to reality as it can be.

Simply put, I don't think Saurian is meant to match up with games like The Isle or Path of Titans, and there's no reason it should. I paid, like, 20 bucks for this game ~4 years ago, and I don't regret it in the slightest--mostly because I wasn't expecting anything more than what was shown. Actually, I think calling Saurian a game is a little bit insincere. It's more of an experience; a love letter to paeleontology itself, maybe. Saurian sparked my special interest, though, so this review is probably more than a little biased. I definitely don't sit here all day every day playing this game, frothing at the mouth. I just like to check in every once in a while and have fun messing around with the new mechanics. Regardless, I'm hopeful for Saurian's future, and I hope early supporters receive their anky and anzu.

TLDR
Play if you like science and have autism. Will probably get boring after a while, so try to get a discounted price. Have fun! :D

It's a small dev team and they're prioritizing progress over communication, which is fine with me. They're going for as realistic an experience as they can, and that's a big draw for me.

Unfinished game with incredibly slow update schedule that has been languishing in development for almost a decade. Took people's money during the Kickstarter promising a Mac version that never came. This game had a lot of interesting promise but it has left me with a sour taste after seeing how they treated Mac users and have failed to follow through on the project.

8 years now and it seems like nothing has changed.

Nothing to really do, still no feathered rex or improvements. Poorer experience than most popular dinosaur games currently and incredibly slow development vs even the smallest teams working faster on these said other dinosaur games.
I had hopes for this game... but now I just do not after 8 years of waiting.

Saurian is an experience first and foremost. The developers wanted you to feel as if you were in Hell Creek and succeeded in almost every regard, except one. The game is poorly optimized with outdated graphics and high render-distance combine to make what should be a beautiful game with a good challenge into one that feels clunky and looks strange at times. I would recommend if you're a fan of survival games, but only if you have a Computer capable of handling the games poor optimization.

abandonware

After trying two other dinosaur games, today I played 'Saurian' again after a break of a few weeks. My Dakatoraptor juvenile (me) was shepherded to the riverside by the mother, another sibling in tow. At the river, she attacked an Ornithomimoid dinosaur, and with my help, killed and ate it. We then went to the river to drink, and as a family sat down to rest as other non-avian dinosaurs wandered and watched at a safe distance, insects hovering and sunlight dappling the forest floor. I mention this in detail only because it delighted me - I had been wandering around in the other games for long periods with nothing happening, and no other dinosaurs appearing! Saurian is far superior to these other games, and is clearly a labour of love by its creators. I'd also recommend that fellow dinosaur enthusiasts get the Saurian book, it is beautifully illustrated and informative, and a great accompaniment to this great game.

I would recommend if it wasn't abandoned by the developers =(.

disapointed i couldn't figuire out the controls. many of the keys were not assigned and there was no tutorial that i could find. i understand this game is early acess but it's been litteral years since this game was released. I struggled though the time i played it just trying to learn how to eat and drink.

my health lowers to 2 percent from a damn animal as an adult