Ultimate Open World Crafting Survival Game

[OgreLXXV]

I feel like I've been searching for this holy grail of games for years, and am starting to think it may never exist. Here is what I think this ultimate game should have:

Story
Give me a reason to do what I'm doing. Not a game on rails, but a purpose to go on, with a beginning, middle, and end game. So many open world survival games completely ignore this, and the late game just bogs down into a "well, now what" feeling.

Who does it well:
Skyrim. Although I'm not sure I'd call it an open world survival crafting game, at least all those elements are present. And no one can say Skyrim doesn't have a story. So many quests and side quests. Follow them or not at your leisure, but there is plenty of story if you want it.

Freedom
Still needs to be a true Open World game. Even with a story/questline, if I want to venture off and spends hundreds of hours doing my own thing...let me. And this very much means I could accidentally walk into a dragon an get one-shot, or fly over an enemy base and get shot down. Just give me the freedom to do so.

Who does it well:
Most all. Honestly this is rarely an issue in Open World games in the first place. My personal preference is that I want the option for a story and questline, but not be forced to follow it. I also don't like when games automatically scale the opposition. Let me wander into the wrong zone and have my ass handed to me. Makes it that much sweeter when I come back later and return the favor.

Crafting and Tech
Lots of crafting. Let me say again, LOTS of crafting. This goes hand in hand with whatever the tech tree is. Start with a stick and a rock and end with faster than light capital vessels. I want to feel like there is significant progress being made. I should have to work a bit, and that's ok as it adds to the sense of accomplishment. But for the love of all that is holy, don't put required material behind an RNG gate. Everything should have a known path to find or create. If I have to grind a specific creature until the RNG gods allow the right item to drop in order for me to continue on to the next whatever...then you've lost me. At the same time, there should be decisions that have to be made. Choose what tech path/skill tree you want to go down. You can't do them all, so build to your style. Are you a dagger from the shadows, or do you kick down the door and blast away with a shotgun?

Who does it well:
Empyrion/Space Engineers/7 Days to Die. I'm not sure there is a single game that does it all well, but each of these three does at least some of it well. 7 Days to Die does a nice job with the skills/attributes/class structure. Or at least it has in one of it's alpha versions. It changes to much I honestly don't know where they are currently. Really liked the "use it to improve it" skill model, with the ability to unlock perks that improve certain skills. Empyrion does an excellent job with giving you basic resources for basic gear, and then making you expand your horizons to get better resources for better gear. Space Engineers does the mining/smelting better than anyone, but there isn't really much of a tech tree or skills.

Physics and Connected Systems
I expect to survive early game by throwing rocks at rats that I cook on a stick over a campfire. But eventually I want my iron ore to be pulled into the smelter so the assembler can turn the ingots into steel plates for my next fighter ship. If I've grown from sticks and stones to lasers and rockets, surely I've learned to automate much of the process and don't need to spend my day carrying rocks from one place to the next. But if I DO carry rocks, I sure as hell shouldn't be able to carry 16 tons at a time. And that fighter ship? Make sure the thrust to weight ratio is adequate to escape the current planet's gravitational pull...and don't forget to account for the added mass of cargo! Humans can't fly, but humans with a jetpack can. And both should go splat when falling from 10,000 ft.

Who does it well:
Space Engineers. A year or two ago, this was an easy decision. Space Engineers allows you to connect machines via conveyor tubes with logical sorting. The result can be some pretty awesome automation, particularly when you combine it with automated ship programming. But Satisfactory is all about the complex interconnectivity of machines in 3D, and it is sweet. Even Empyrion has come a long way (though I think the wireless system is a bit unrealistic). I still give the nod to Space Engineers though because of the actual physics of the universe. Nothing is as satisfying as your first jalopy of a hydrogen fueled craft breaking atmo. And there is no way I'm the only one that's experienced the slow (then rapid) decent back to earth when running out of fuel and still within the gravitational tug of home. Apparently hydrogen is flammable, too.

So...anyone know of an Elder 7 Days to Engineer Galactic Survival game?

[wuddih]

an open world survival game with actual depth and actual freedom with a perfectly immersive experience.

so, you want a dream within a dream *inception horn*

this will stay a holy grail. someone could develop his entire life on a game you ask for and even their great-great-great-grandchildren will not be able to finish it.
Star Citizen f.e. ... 10 years development it is now.

[Fake]

Dreamworld

[Froggy]

Minecraft ofc, nothing comes close.

[d4vd]

xd

[Zekiran]

Minecraft. Fallout 4 (minus the 'surviving with rocks' stuff... I mean, you CAN dl mods for that).

Try Ancestors, I have yet to play it personally but I watched an entire playthrough on a stream with someone whose opinions and actions I trust, and it seems like a good survivalish 'story yea there is kinda' though it might not hit all your buttons. Plus you're a proto-human in it so there's not as much modern anything, lol.

[Le Chucks Revenge]

One word.

Factorio.

That game will steal your life faster than staring into the dark crystel.