At the Xbox & Bethesda Showcase, Xbox premiered the official trailer for the Grounded update, Shroom & Doom, which features a new giant spider boss. Echoing the movie Honey I Shrunk the Kids, Grounded is a co-op survival game where players are shrunken down to the size of an ant and have to navigate the dangers of the backyard. The game is currently in a preview and has been since its initial release in July of 2020, but has been receiving updates with additional content and fixes. The full release is expected later this year.
Grounded was developed by Obsidian Entertainment, which is well-known for having developed Fallout: New Vegas and The Outer Worlds. Different from what usually comes out of Obsidian, this survival RPG gives players the option of playing by themself, online, or with up to three friends. After making a character and being shrunk, players explore the backyard like never before where every action a player makes causes a reaction. To survive, players have to make shelters, tools, weapons, and armor.
The trailer released at E3 included a lot of memorable moments, and a lot of the updates include what players have asked for in the game (via Xbox and Bethesda Games Showcase). However, possibly the most memorable moment of the trailer came towards the end of the trailer where the enormous spider, the Brood Mother, was introduced as a boss the player has to fight. The Brood Mother harks back memories of Aragog from Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets. Of course, it isn't that big actually. It is a "normal" size spider, the player is shrunk to the size of an ant; everything looks larger than life. The benefit of the Shroom & Doom update featuring a spider is there is an arachnophobic mode. If a player is afraid of spiders, they can use a slider to adjust how much of a spider fear they have and change the appearance of the spider. The more the slider is adjusted on arachnophobia mode, the more the spider will appear like shapes instead of a spider.
Earlier this year, the team at Obsidian behind Grounded announced they would be slowing down the frequency of updates to the game and focus on more substantive updates. The Shroom & Doom update is the first glimpse of what updates will look like in the future. Although the developer team announced there would be a big patch coming at the end of June, an expansion of this size was unexpected. In this update, along with the new Brood Mother, players can expect the ability to sit down, build castles out of mushrooms, unlock achievements, and tame a pet. The Shroom & Doom update for Grounded is available June 30 on PC, Xbox One and Xbox Series X, and will available to play on Xbox Game Pass.
The prior content update to Grounded added giant/regular size bees and mosquitos. Before that was the Koi Pond update, which let players swim in ponds and explore the potential dangers underwater. This update is also rumored to include changes to giant f0od, additional photo mode features and, something that Xbox players love, achievements. Although other aspects of this game are interesting, the Brood Mother definitely catches everyone's attention. With this attention to detail Obsidian is giving to Grounded, it feels they are preparing to get the game to a state where the full game can be released and come out of early access.
Source: Xbox