Away From Life

Stranded, again

Away From Life, launched into Early Access on April 22, 2026 from developer Cursor Games and publisher IZilla Games, drops you into a familiar setup: you've survived a helicopter crash and now have to live off a chain of remote islands, hunting, gathering, building shelter, and crafting tools while working out how to get home. It's a genre with well-established touchstones, and Away From Life landed to a Mixed reception (235 reviews, roughly 67% positive) that reflects both real affection for what it does well and real frustration with how unfinished parts of it still feel.

Familiar shores, done beautifully

The comparisons to Stranded Deep and Raft come up constantly and are clearly intentional, and reviewers largely agree the visuals hold their own against those benchmarks — island and underwater environments draw consistent praise as gorgeous, especially given the size of the team behind them. A number of reviewers specifically prefer Away From Life's decision to let resources respawn over time, something they'd long wished for in Stranded Deep, arguing it removes a frustrating late-game resource scarcity without trivializing the survival loop entirely.

An early access game that acts like one, in a good way

Beyond the visuals, the strongest praise in the sample goes to the development pace: patch notes appear on close to a weekly cadence since launch, and reviewers repeatedly credit the developer with visibly responding to feedback and publishing a public roadmap. Several critical reviewers explicitly frame their negative score as conditional, saying they'll return once specific issues are addressed rather than writing the game off entirely — a pattern that suggests real trust in the team even amid real frustration with the current build.

Where does my stuff go

The sample's single most serious and most consistently reported problem is a bug where crafted items, storage containers, and even fully built rafts disappear or end up floating disconnected from their intended location after saving and reloading. It's described independently across English, German, Russian, and Brazilian reviews, sometimes costing players hours of accumulated progress, including one account of losing an entire stockpile of boat fuel to a crash immediately after a major crafting milestone. This isn't a cosmetic annoyance — it's the kind of bug that actively punishes exactly the kind of long-session investment the genre is built around.

Sailing is a chore

Closely related is a widespread complaint about raft and boat handling, which multiple reviewers describe as slow and unwieldy enough to make early island-hopping feel like a waste of time rather than an adventure, at least until a faster boat becomes available deeper into progression. Turning in particular draws specific criticism as sluggish, with one reviewer describing two real-world hours spent just turning a raft toward its destination.

Co-op that doesn't always connect

The co-op mode earns some of the sample's warmest praise — several reviewers say playing with a friend is where the game is genuinely at its best — but it's also where some of the roughest bugs surface. Reports include friends spawning stuck underwater with no way to free themselves, characters resetting entirely when rejoining a server, and hosts becoming unfindable to joining players mid-session. For a game where multiplayer is clearly a major selling point, these are significant, credible complaints rather than isolated hardware quirks.

Combat that doesn't quite land

A smaller but recurring complaint concerns combat, with several reviewers reporting that both melee weapons and firearms sometimes fail to register hits against enemies reliably. It's not framed as the game's central problem, but it compounds the sense of an unfinished build when survival tension depends on combat actually working as expected.

Managing expectations for an early access price

At $12.99, most reviewers consider the current build reasonably priced given its early access status, though a vocal minority feel it's steep for what's currently on offer, with one reviewer specifically arguing it should cost closer to $5 in its present state. Several reviewers also flag thin content variety once the initial exploration wears off — a relatively small archipelago and sparse wildlife encounters — alongside one specific complaint about an extended in-game night cycle that can leave players staring at a near-black screen for what feels like half a session.

A skill tree on a desert island

One design choice draws a more mixed reaction on its own terms: a talent or skill-tree progression system layered over the survival loop, which one Russian reviewer specifically calls out as an odd fit for the genre, arguing that gating basic tools and abilities behind unlocks undercuts the immediate, resourceful feeling that makes castaway survival games appealing in the first place. Other reviewers don't object to the system directly, but the broader progression pacing draws occasional complaints about how long it takes to feel meaningfully stronger or better equipped between islands.

Who should wash ashore

Away From Life is easiest to recommend right now to genre fans already comfortable with early access roughness, especially anyone with a friend willing to ride out bugs together for the co-op experience. Players who want a finished, reliable survival game today, or who are especially sensitive to lost-progress bugs, should wait for the item- and raft-disappearing issue to be resolved before buying in.

The verdict

Away From Life has real bones: a gorgeous castaway setting, a fun co-op loop, and a developer that's clearly still building in public with visible momentum. Right now, though, a serious item- and raft-disappearing bug, clunky boat handling, and rough multiplayer syncing make it a game best approached with early access expectations firmly in place — worth trying on sale, worth revisiting as patches land, but not yet the finished Stranded Deep rival it's aiming to be.