Primal Survivors review: A prehistoric horde shooter flaws by setbacks

Afil Games released another twin-stick shooter in Primal Survivors last week. It follows up on its previous games such as Mighty Mage and Stickman's Arena and seems to continue the trend of developer Antonio Filipe pumping out games left and right in a quantity over quality setup. It is a horde shooter similar to Vampire Survivors, except a much more scaled down version of it.

Just like Vampire Survivors, Primal Survivors allows you to level up and select 1 of 3 power-ups each time. Your starting weapons are a choice between a rock or a bone, with the rock being the only real choice based on stats.

I found the control setup to be incredibly frustrating with having to aim at enemies. You have to aim with the right stick and hold zR (R2) to fire. You only shoot in the direction you are aiming in. There is an auto-fire like Vampire Survivors, but it doesn't function as it should. While aiming, you repeatedly shoot where your crosshair is. Once you stop aiming, however, you default to shooting at a 90-degree angle instead of your last position. It's an unnecessary piece of added inconvenience that wasn't necessary.

A new enemy shows up every couple minutes with one of three bosses arriving every 5 minutes. Rounds last 15 and are pretty easy. The standard enemies post no real threat as I made it through an entire round without getting hit a single time. Even the bosses seemed bugged out. The first time I fought the wasp boss (1st boss), it got stuck behind a tree unable to move so it got wiped in seconds. The mammoth and monkey are funny variations, but again pose no real threat or offer anything of substance to the game.

Visual wise, they are pretty low quality with them topping out in an extremely low-rez, pixel type of graphics. There was a weapon unlocked near the end of the game, but it was unfortunately a “too little too late’’ situation. This allows you to auto fire at the closest enemy just like Vampire Survivors, however, it's so late in the game that the interest to try for will wain out before most players even get to it.

I played the game on Switch, but even Xbox or PS users can unlock all but 1 of its achievements in 1 playthrough. Only the ‘’Die 15 times” will need you more playthroughs.

Primal Survivors is available now on PC, Steam, Switch, Xbox and PlayStation.

Primal Survivors (Nintendo Switch) Score: 5/10

Primal Survivors is an average title with nothing to really make it stand out or be remarkable in any way. Afil Games has been pumping out titles lately, but I'd like to see what they could do with a little more time on a single game as opposed to the mad rush of cornucopia titles.

A copy of this game was provided to App Trigger for the purpose of this review. All scores are ranked out of 10, with .5 increments. Click here to learn more about our Review Policy.