Steam reviews
353,428 of 380,143 Steam user reviews are positive (93%) and Steam's own label is “Very Positive”, according to Steam's review summary for Raft at the last data refresh.
What Steam reviewers mention
19 of the 20 sampled reviews recommend it. Substantive texts describe a relaxing ocean survival and raft-building game that several find best with friends, with complaints about slow development, chest management, an aggressive shark and fading replay value; several other texts are one-word praise or jokes.
Sample: 20 reviews from Steam's English filter (10 most helpful, 10 most recent, ), 19 recommending · how Claude counts topics
- Co-op and Solo Play (praised in 6, criticised in 3 of 20): Reviewers praise easy drop-in co-op and say friends make it better, one finds it fun alone, while two call solo play lonely or boring and one warns shared chests strain friendships.
- Shark and Survival Mechanics (praised in 2, criticised in 3 of 20): One reviewer likes the shark as constant pressure and another finds survival well-tuned, but others say the shark returns too soon or attacks too often and hunger and thirst feel tedious on normal.
- Story and Island Exploration (praised in 4, criticised in 1 of 20): Reviewers say the story and islands add objectives and grew more exciting with updates, and they enjoy exploring them, while one negative review calls the story poorly written and the islands bland.
- Raft Building and Storage (praised in 5, criticised in 3 of 20): Reviewers enjoy growing a tiny raft into a large floating base, but three complain about chest and inventory chores, and one wants to build on islands or make a second raft.
- Development Pace and End Game (praised in 2, criticised in 5 of 20): Reviewers welcome story updates and see room to grow, but criticize slow development, with one tired after three years, and say replay value fades and the loop goes stale after the ending.
- Relaxing Atmosphere (praised in 5 of 20): Reviewers describe a chill, sometimes zen-like experience of drifting across the ocean, gathering resources and fishing at an unhurried pace.
Games like Raft
- Stranded Deep
- Subnautica
- Valheim
Drafted by Claude; not individually verified.
Good for
- Co-op survival players who enjoy shared creative building projects
- Those who like gradual resource progression from primitive to advanced tech tiers
- Players who want survival mechanics without oppressive permadeath — save states persist
Avoid if
- Repetitive early-game resource hooking loop feels tedious before the mid-game opens
- Solo play can feel slow — multiplayer is the intended pace for most content
- Shark attack frequency without armor upgrades becomes annoying before defenses unlock
Is Raft an indie game?
Yes. Steam lists Raft under the "Indie" genre, and its publisher is not on this site's major-publisher list.
- Steam genre tags on record: Adventure, Indie, Simulation — includes "Indie".
- Developer: Redbeet Interactive.
- Publisher: Axolot Games — not on this site's major-publisher list.
The rubric, its limits and the publisher list: methodology.