Do or do not, there is no try. Unfortunately Spacepunk Survival tries — and does not.
Nejcraft and Tavern Tale Studio’s Spacepunk Survival is built on an idea: “what if we made a multiplayer horde-based shooter in space with retro visuals and controls and feel?”
I mean, yeah, what if?
The reality is that’s not a new idea. There are hundreds if not thousands of games released with a similar conceptual direction, and a few here and there manage to succeed with something fresh. Spacepunk Surival does not. It brings nothing new to the FPS genre, and feels like an early game development project. Is that what it is? I don’t know. I’m not sure that aspect matters.
Because, this game is very barebones when it comes to what we can do: shoot pixelated aliens that are coming out of portals in the wall. And that’s it. We have access to a few rooms on our space station and our goal is, as the title surmises, to survive the waves as long as possible. Multiplayer is one of the cores, although on the Switch there aren’t many people playing it, so I find myself alone almost 100% of the time — except for the same aliens over and over again.
There aren’t any surprising or unique weapons, and the rooms all essentially look the same. It’s just a lot of the same stuff, slightly rearranged. Even when I’ve fully explored areas and managed to battle SOMEONE else, it doesn’t do much but reset me once I’ve kicked the pixel bucket.
It doesn’t especially feel great, either. The movement isn’t all that smooth, and the framerate suffers. Whether that is a problem with the aging Switch or not, I’m not sure, although a cursory check across the web seems to indicate that it’s an issue on other platforms as well. It’s also really easy, as a few of the rooms let me camp in a corner and just put holes through aliens as they come around a wall.
And that’s it, really. Spacepunk Survival is begging for something to spark it, because the retro FPS genre could find some more life in multiplayer space, but there’s not much here. It works, mostly. It’s not horrible, but it’s not interesting either.
This Review is based on a Nintendo Switch eShop code sent to SideQuesting by the publisher. It originally appeared on The SideQuest for April 28, 2025. Images and video courtesy publisher.
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