I slept on Grounded for years, and now I’m having spider nightmares

When I first heard about Grounded, I loved the concept. As a kid who grew up watching Honey, I Shrunk the Kids, the idea of being shrunken down to survive in a backyard was incredibly appealing. Yet, somehow, I never actually played it. As the 2020s rolled on, we were flooded with survival crafting games, and I eventually reached a point where I was perfectly content never seeing another one again.

That changed when PlayStation Plus decided to add Grounded to its lineup for free this month. With a few days off, I finally decided to jump in. If you have been on the fence due to genre fatigue, it is worth giving a look—provided you are prepared for the game's most terrifying inhabitants.

The spiders are no joke

I thought I had moved past my arachnophobia. When the game’s spider warning popped up, I scoffed; I consider spiders friends because they catch dangerous bugs. I felt prepared. Then, I found an action hero head while exploring, turned around, and came face-to-face with a massive spider. It turned and left before my partner could see it, so I went back to the mound to find it. That is when I realized exactly how large these creatures are.

I tried to be clever by looking up YouTube guides on how to hunt Wolf Spiders. The guide suggested using the AI's limitations by standing on an oak tree branch and picking them off with arrows. It looked easy enough, but I quickly learned that the spiders in Grounded are not that simple. The spider I was targeting didn't just stand there; it charged straight at me along the branch like a freight train.

I eventually managed to kill my first Wolf Spider by shooting it and running into a nearby lab for safety. That lab became my "spider farm." However, the game still managed to catch me off guard. While farming for Spider Venom Sacks, I shot a spider, ducked into the lab, and waited for it to lose aggro. When I left the lab to check the oak tree, I found one spider, but there were originally two. I turned around, and the second spider was walking right up to me from the other side. My heart didn't stop racing for thirty minutes.

Beyond the nightmares

Despite the jump scares and the return of my arachnophobia, the game is genuinely excellent. Now that I have better armor, the Wolf Spiders are less of a constant threat, though a bad day of timing can still lead to a quick death. I have spent my time exploring the depths of the pond, navigating the Haze with its infected Larvae and Ladybugs, and dodging the massive, overpowered Koi fish.

I am currently gearing up to enter the sandbox, and I am enjoying every minute of it. I’m bummed that I missed out on this experience for so long, but I am certainly looking forward to Grounded 2. If you have played it extensively, I would love to hear your own survival stories in the comments—and if you have any recommendations for other games I might have missed, let me know.