For the longest time, I’ve been on the hunt for a new survival game that really puts my skills to the test. When I came across a game called Clawed, I quickly found that its mysterious story and survival-horror centric gameplay was exactly what I was looking for and kept me on the hook for hours on end. Pair that with an experience that never made me feel truly safe from the dangers that lurk around me, I found myself digging for more of that same feeling and got lost in a prehistoric nightmare.
Life Always Finds A Way
If you grew up watching films like Jurassic Park you essentially know the loose plot of Clawed in a nutshell. Scientists have discovered a remote island in the Pacific ocean that is home to a population of what was once thought to be extinct dinosaurs. As humans do, a corporation thought it would be a brilliant idea to turn that island into a theme park by the name of Prehistoria. As you’d come to expect, that novelty didn’t last too long and the captive dinosaurs broke free from confines and the island’s workers became dinosaur food in the matter of minutes. It is now up to you to retrieve a highly sought after hard drive that contains valuable information that pertains to the park.
Admittedly replicating the plot device of a dinosaur theme park gone wrong didn’t really move the needle for me in regards to my genuine feelings for the game and its plot. To some, this might be the lowest hanging fruit to base a dinosaur horror game around simply because we have been there and done that across multiple films and a few indie titles here and there. To me, that was the beauty of Clawed. From a video game perspective, it lived up to my hopes and dreams for what a Jurassic Park game could and should be.
Predator Or Prey?
While playing Clawed, I found the gameplay to be pretty standard issue, which made it pretty easy to get my bearings especially for what lay ahead of me. Aspects of crafting are woven into the gameplay loop with the player having the ability to come across various components which allow you to create various ammo, traps, and decoys. Normally when I play games like this, I often brute force my way through enemies and ignore aspects like crafting out of pure overconfidence in my fighting abilities, but the trend I found within Clawed was that it would humble me in an instant and I should’ve reworked my tactics.
Prehistoria is home to a wide range of dinosaurs that are either friendly herbivores or blood thirsty carnivores that want to rip your face off. My experience with all of the dinosaurs made me feel small and very much like I was the prey in this scenario, despite my vast array of ballistics. The one moment that stuck out to me was when I was swimming within the broken down enclosure of the mighty Mosasaurus. Through my whole time navigating the submersed bits of enclosure, I couldn’t help but feel panicked that it would appear out of the depth to swallow me whole. Clawed did such a great job creating that sense of uneasiness when fighting other dinosaurs that I never even saw the Mosasaurus. This is where I feel Clawed really shines through by putting the player on the bottom of the food chain and forcing them to think quickly.
Final Thoughts
The world of Prehistoria is very unforgiving and puts the player right in the middle of many people’s worst nightmares. While navigating the broken down attractions and decrepit staff buildings, the haunting roars and footsteps of apex predators can be heard from a mile away or directly behind you if you aren’t careful. The park itself is expansive and littered with small details that clearly indicate all hell had broken loose and you’re left to put the puzzle back together and figure out what actually happened here. While the park itself is full of life it will hand you your next death and it won’t apologize for it. With its constant flow of challenges, puzzles, and dangerous enemies I found that my short time with Clawed was well worth the time I spent with it, and it is those same things that turned me into a blood thirsty raptor simply wanting more game to sink my teeth into.
