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Alien Horizon

Alien Horizon Game Cover
89%Game Brain Score
Most mentioned positive aspects:gameplay, graphics
Most mentioned negative aspects:story, optimization
89% User Score Based on 154 reviews

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PCWindows
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Alien Horizon Game Cover

About Alien Horizon

Alien Horizon is a single player survival city builder game with a science fiction theme. It was developed by Purple Nebula and was released on January 30, 2024. It received positive reviews from players.

Alien Horizon is a sci-fi survival city builder set on an inhospitable alien planet. Faced with imminent destruction of Earth, humanity pooled together their resources and sent sleeper ships to nearby potentially habitable planets. But this one turned out to be much less habitable than expected. Can you survive anyway? Features complex resource management, no contact with Earth, exploration…

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Alien Horizon screenshot
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Alien Horizon screenshot
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Alien Horizon screenshot
Alien Horizon screenshot
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Reviews

89%Audience ScoreBased on 154 reviews
gameplay9 positive mentions
grinding1 negative mentions
  • Extremely detailed and complex colony builder with deep survival and economic management mechanics that provide a rewarding challenge for strategy enthusiasts.
  • Strong sense of realism and immersion through managing logistics, citizen welfare, resource production, and expansion on a harsh alien planet with a plausible sci-fi setting.
  • Active and responsive developer with frequent updates and ongoing improvements; the game offers substantial content even in the free preview alpha stage.
  • Steep learning curve with overwhelming complexity and insufficient in-game guidance or tutorials, making the game difficult for new players to grasp initially.
  • Performance issues including crashes, high memory usage, and bugs particularly related to pathfinding, logistics, and UI elements, which diminish playability at times.
  • User interface can be cluttered, unintuitive, and lacking important quality-of-life features such as UI scaling, clear tooltips, and better prioritization controls.

  • gameplay

    38 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
    24% positive mentions, 68% neutral mentions, 8% negative mentions

    The gameplay offers a deep and engaging colony-building experience with realistic and challenging mechanics that blend survival, management, and exploration effectively. However, it can feel complex and sometimes unclear to new players, with certain mechanics still unfinished or underdeveloped, resulting in occasional frustration. Despite technical issues and a steep learning curve, the core gameplay is praised for its polish and potential, though some recommend waiting for further updates to resolve missing features and stability problems.

    • “The core gameplay revolves around constructing and expanding a functioning colony capable of supporting a growing population.”
    • “This constant need to explore and exploit the surrounding environment keeps the gameplay engaging and prevents the colony-building systems from becoming repetitive.”
    • “Alien horizon preview alpha delivers a rewarding blend of survival, city-building, and economic management mechanics wrapped in an engaging science-fiction setting.”
    • “Certain mechanics can feel unfinished, and new players may find the learning curve challenging due to the depth of the management systems.”
    • “Game mechanics are unclear, a lot.”
    • “Instability, poor gameplay mechanics, amazing concept.”

  • graphics

    14 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
    29% positive mentions, 50% neutral mentions, 21% negative mentions

    The graphics feature a charming, comfortable art style that effectively supports gameplay and atmosphere despite not being high-resolution or cutting-edge. While visuals may appear dated with visible polygons and occasional clarity issues, especially for a strategy management game, performance and polish still leave room for improvement. Overall, the graphics complement the experience but are not a standout element and may feel underwhelming compared to high-budget titles.

    • “While the graphics are not designed to compete with large-budget strategy titles, they effectively support the gameplay and help establish a believable atmosphere.”
    • “The graphics are not that high res, but look very pretty, and even 'comfy'.”
    • “The graphics look good, you can still see many polygons which remind me a bit of a 90's game, no bugs so far.”
    • “This should be early access, although I can imagine people being put off by the current state of graphics, as it's the first thing you see in a game.”
    • “Setting all the graphics to minimum and fiddling with my graphics card settings didn't help.”
    • “I can run real-like graphics like SnowRunner at high above 60 fps, yet this runs on lowest settings below 30 fps constantly and gets worse with exploring the map (which is mostly barren).”

  • story

    9 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
    33% positive mentions, 34% neutral mentions, 33% negative mentions

    The story is minimal, offering only a basic premise about humanity seeking a new home on an alien planet, with little to no in-game lore or narrative depth. Players found it unfulfilling and lacking replayability compared to games with dynamic storytelling or varied missions. Overall, the story serves more as background context than a compelling or engaging element of the game.

    • “Set in a future where humanity is forced to abandon a doomed Earth, the game begins with a desperate mission to establish a new home on a distant alien planet.”
    • “The sparse, somber music reminds me of Kenshi, and is probably the only indicator of the high stakes of this colonization mission.”
    • “Make sure you follow the missions; they are an important stepping stone to learn the game.”
    • “Whilst I enjoyed my time with it, I ultimately walked away feeling unfulfilled. Even if I managed to build one colony to endgame, I probably wouldn't play it again. Unlike RimWorld, which I can play repeatedly with different starting conditions and random events shaping the story, this game sorely lacks that variety.”
    • “There is no story or lore in the game; only the blurb on the store page provides any context.”
    • “Make it about generals you can send on missions (and they are AI-powered with stat points). They perform missions like in Command & Conquer, focused on collecting resources and ships for progress!”

  • optimization

    9 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
    33% positive mentions, 34% neutral mentions, 33% negative mentions

    Optimization is currently a significant issue, with users reporting serious performance problems, crashes, and resource management bugs, especially as the game scales up. While the game shows promise and depth in its mechanics, it requires a dedicated optimization pass and bug fixes before it can run smoothly and be fully enjoyable.

    • “Overall very promising, I can't wait for an optimization pass to be done so I can play the rest of the game.”
    • “As for my recommendation, I would optimistically say hold off a bit for balancing and bug fixes, but if the major two items are fixed, then the only thing this game may need is optimization and some additional buildings/techs.”
    • “Yes, it is an alpha so there are missing features and bugs and optimization to work on.”
    • “There are some serious performance issues: the game overheats my PC after five minutes and crashes after 20 minutes once the population gets too big.”
    • “Pathing issues, poor performance, and general jankiness.”
    • “Optimization is poor.”

  • stability

    4 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
    50% positive mentions, 0% neutral mentions, 50% negative mentions

    The game runs but is plagued by significant stability issues, including frequent lag, frame rate drops, and system crashes causing freezes and bluescreens. While the community offers helpful support, players with older hardware may find the game too demanding and prone to disrupting their systems.

    • “Runs great.”
    • “All that also requires zooming in and out a lot and my computer is just melting, frame rate goes to hell, lag and longer times for already slow gameplay and finally at random, but a dead certainty each session, the computer freezes, bluescreens and has to restart/repair/diagnose itself and it's just too rough on this old system so I actually had to stop playing until I can afford something that can run the game better/safer.”
    • “Buggy for sure, but Discord server is very helpful.”

  • atmosphere

    3 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
    100% positive mentions, 0% neutral mentions, 0% negative mentions

    The atmosphere is effectively crafted through supportive graphics and thoughtful design elements, such as the distinct orange color theme and dynamic lighting that enhance immersion. Players find themselves drawn back to the game, appreciating its detailed environment and complex management systems that contribute to a believable and engaging experience.

    • “While the graphics are not designed to compete with large-budget strategy titles, they effectively support the gameplay and help establish a believable atmosphere.”
    • “I would find myself happily thinking about resuming play throughout the day; a sure sign the developer struck the right atmosphere for me. I loved the orange color theme on the main ship and logistic vehicles — trying to find them on long journeys on the map often means waiting until night and looking for the bounce of their headlights.”
    • “Complex construction and resource processing chains, interesting waste management, atmosphere and temperature management.”

  • music

    2 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
    50% positive mentions, 0% neutral mentions, 50% negative mentions

    The music is sparse and somber, effectively conveying the high-stakes atmosphere of the game, similar to Kenshi. However, some users experience issues with the music and ambiance cutting in and out or sounding choppy, possibly due to a bug, and would appreciate an option to adjust or disable it.

    • “The sparse, somber music reminds me of Kenshi, and is probably the only indicator of the high stakes of this colonization mission.”
    • “For me at least, the music and ambiance both play at full volume no matter what I do, and frequently get choppy and broken up, like there's some interference (could be a bug, but if it's a feature, it'd be nice to have the option to turn it off).”

  • grinding

    1 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
    0% positive mentions, 0% neutral mentions, 100% negative mentions

    Grinding in the game is often seen as tedious and frustrating, especially when combined with inventory management issues, making resource collection feel like a repetitive and cumbersome chore.

    • “Now combine this with the storage issue I've already mentioned, and it very quickly becomes annoying (and even tedious if you're not ready for it) to keep track of 'material I won't use until next semester' number 12.”

  • humor

    1 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
    100% positive mentions, 0% neutral mentions, 0% negative mentions

    Users find the humor in the game to be clever and playful, with an appreciation for the developers’ potential to add amusing combat elements involving rebellious AI ships. The lighthearted tone suggests a desire for entertaining and witty scenarios within the gameplay.

  • replayability

    1 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
    0% positive mentions, 100% neutral mentions, 0% negative mentions

    The game offers strong replayability, with most users rating it highly and finding it enjoyable to play multiple times.

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Play Times

300h Median play time
300h Average play time
300-300h Spent by most gamers
*Based on 1 analyzed playthroughs
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Frequently Asked Questions

Alien Horizon is a survival city builder game with science fiction theme. Common tags for Alien Horizon include free to play, futuristic, 3D, indie, colony sim and others.

Alien Horizon is available on PC and Windows.

On average players spend around 300 hours playing Alien Horizon.

Alien Horizon was released on January 30, 2024.

Alien Horizon was developed by Purple Nebula.

Alien Horizon has received positive reviews from players. Most players liked Alien Horizon for its gameplay but disliked it for its story.

Alien Horizon is a single player game.

Similar games include InfraSpace, Per Aspera, Cliff Empire, New Cycle, The Crust and others.