Deep Rock Galactic is a small marvel. It’s one of the best co-operative games on the major platforms, with perk- and equipment-driven progression, excellent class design, complex, procedurally generated maps, and a good sense of humor, and it weighs less than 5GB.
It’s no wonder it has a 97% approval rating on Steam at the time of writing.
The gameplay loop is very satisfying too. Much of the game revolves around exploring the levels and mining for resources in a fully destructible environment.
Every now and then, aggressive aliens living in the game’s several biomes come swarming, turning the game into a thrilling shooter, with each class having their own range of available weapons and abilities.
And when you come back, all your hard work will be converted to hard credits and handy resources you can turn into upgrades, and, crucially, customizations for your space dwarf miner.
There are also pretty diverse missions, including basic mining, building a not-quite-oil rig (with a fantastic special movement option), and some even weirder tasks, like industrial sabotage, requiring players to adjust their tactics and mindset a good bit.
But, as delightful, exciting, and always fresh as DRG is, sometimes you might want to change things up, play something different, but just close enough to stay in the vibe. Which is why we’ve assembled a list of ten games which have what you like in DRG, but do them in different ways or with emphasis on different things. We’ve got the range from shooters to bullet heavens, so let’s get into the drop pod and mine for Deep Rock Galactic alternatives.
| Game | Release | Genres | Developer | Video | |
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 | Warhammer Vermintide 2 | 2018-03-08 | Cooperation | Fatshark | |
 | GTFO | 2019-12-09 | Action | 10 Chambers Collective | |
 | Helldivers Digital Deluxe Edition | 2015-12-07 | Action & Shooter | Arrowhead Game Studios | |
 | Aliens Fireteam Elite | 2021-08-24 | Action, RPG | Cold Iron Studios | |
 | Payday 2 | 2013-08-13 | Action & Shooter | OVERKILL - a Starbreeze Studio. | |
 | Terraria | 2011-05-16 | Adventure | Re-Logic | |
 | Hardspace Shipbreaker | 2020-06-16 | Simulation | Blackbird Interactive | |
 | Monster Hunter World | 2018-08-09 | Action | CAPCOM | |
 | Lethal Company | 2023-10-23 | Horror, Survival | Zeekerss | |
 | Deep Rock Galactic Survivor | 2024-02-14 | Action, Survival | Funday Games | |
 | Left 4 Dead 2 | 2009-11-16 | Action & Shooter | Valve | |
 | Warframe: Starter Pack | 2013-03-25 | Action & Shooter | Digital Extremes |
Warhammer: Vermintide 2
| Release date: | 2018-03-08 |
| Genre: | Cooperation |
| Developer: | Fatshark |
Vermintide 2 isn’t here just because you can play as a dwarf scout.
It’s also here because it makes DRG’s occasional enemy waves the core element of the experience, and the mix of melee and ranged combat with some extra abilities thrown in makes combat a ton of fun. Admittedly, you won’t see resource gathering, but tight teamwork focus and potential for level mastery make up for this.
Vermintide 2 is set during the End Times of WH Fantasy, as the ratlike Skaven invade human cities and join forces with Chaos worshippers. VT2 handles co-op for up to 4 players, who can choose from five characters, each with four available classes (the fourth ones are DLCs) with different abilities, traits, and weapon selection. It’s fast, brutal, and funnier than you’d expect.
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GTFO
| Release date: | 2019-12-09 |
| Genre: | Action |
| Developer: | 10 Chambers Collective |
If fantasy trappings aren’t what you’re looking for, perhaps GTFO could be of interest?
It’s a co-operative horror shooter sending your team into dark, twisted subterranean tunnels populated by weird monsters. You are just disposable prisoners sent down by the mysterious Warden, told to retrieve some items or fix an issue and, if you are somehow lucky enough, return to base.
GTFO might well be the hardest game on the list. Most, if not all, missions present you with an unfairly difficult task and limited resources. Without solid teamwork, you might not make it back, and honestly, even with your teammates your chances are flimsy if some of you can’t stay silent around the hibernating weirdoes lingering in the places you need to explore.
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Helldivers
| Release date: | 2015-12-07 |
| Genre: | Action & Shooter |
| Developer: | Arrowhead Game Studios |
As a twin-stick shooter Helldivers is a little bit different from Deep Rock Galactic, but despite the change of perspective, you might find a few elements in common.
First of all, it’s oriented towards a four-player co-op, and while you’re not a bunch of dwarves working for a space corporation, you’re still at the whim of a science fiction organization keen on putting you in harm’s way.
The titular Helldivers, and your player characters, serve to protect Super Earth from threats to the dystopian government. The missions always involve a lot of running and gunning with a top-down camera, but you’ll often need to perform additional tasks, as deemed by the enlightened rulers. And if the twin-stick shooting isn’t your vibe, Helldivers 2 very successfully shifts the perspective to TPP.
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Aliens: Fireteam Elite
| Release date: | 2021-08-24 |
| Genre: | Action |
| Developer: | Cold Iron Studios |
Aliens: Fireteam Elite is a great option if you recently watched the classic movie and thought you can do better than these marines.
It’s also a good pick if you want to kill alien bugs, but need a break from DRG’s colorful, blocky aesthetic. Fireteam Elite does a great job capturing the looks and tone of the original movies, and its story feels well rooted in the established canon, a treat for fans.
The game is story-driven, with dedicated missions slowly unveiling the mystery behind the planet. Your marines come in seven classes equipped with special abilities, perks, and upgradeable weapons. Of course, there’s also plenty of cosmetic customization, because what good would a co-op game be if you couldn’t look cool in front of your teammates?
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Payday 2
| Release date: | 2013-08-13 |
| Genre: | Action & Shooter |
| Developer: | OVERKILL - a Starbreeze Studio. |
Payday 2 is cut from a slightly different cloth than previous games on the list.
While violence is very much present, it’s mostly a game about cooperating on a specific job. Sure, it’s high-stakes heists rather than mining for resources on an alien asteroid, but that doesn’t mean cooperation and knowing your toolset aren’t essential to success.
Thanks to a measure randomization of layouts and events, each heist your crew of criminals goes on will feel unique. As you complete missions, you’ll gather experience points, which you can invest into skill trees, specializing into roles such as Mastermind or Enforcer. Of course, you can also multiclass, if you think another specialization offers something synergizing with your build.
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Terraria
| Release date: | 2011-05-16 |
| Genre: | Adventure |
| Developer: | Re-Logic |
The second half of the list will be devoted to games which aren’t exactly co-op shooters, but do capture some element of DRG’s appeal in other ways.
Terraria, for example, is a great option if what you want is to dynamically reshape the environment to your needs and collect resources to make vital improvements to your home base and gear.
Terraria is a 2D, pixel-art action-adventure with a strong focus on crafting and exploration. It also has plenty of combat, particularly in the dark tunnels of the underworld. Despite being 2D, delving the caves of Terraria can be much more dangerous than mining Hoxxes, especially once you start going after the nightmarish bosses. The riches gained from the endeavor are worth it, though.
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Hardscape: Shipbreaker
| Release date: | 2020-06-16 |
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| Developer: | Blackbird Interactive |
Hardspace: Shipbreaker is a game about trying to salvage as much as you can from a wrecked ship floating somewhere in space.
You’ll be spending a lot of time moving in three dimensions using a handy tether, deploying your laser cutter to extract bits and bobs from the ship, and avoiding plentiful hazards, which tend to involve explosions caused by careless actions.
All of that hard work in order to clear a debt you have with the company which employs you. This game is truly a cousin to DRG. In time you’ll work your way up to higher certificates, opening a way toward new tools which might drastically improve your ability to acquire valuable parts and stay alive. It’s a fantastic, immersive, physics-driven first-person game, well worth checking out.
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Monster Hunter (World, Rise)
| Release date: | 2018-08-09 |
| Genre: | Action |
| Developer: | CAPCOM |
It’s somewhat out of left field, but hear us out.
The Monster Hunter series is about going out from a secure base to face-off against huge monsters and gather resources for just a metric tone of crafting. Doesn’t that sound like hunting the dreadnoughts in DRG? Well, except MH are third-person action games mostly oriented toward melee combat with oversized weapons.
In terms of gameplay, MH are far from DRG, but MH World and Rise are excellent at what they are doing and the cooperative experience they offer. They utilize a completely different set of skills, but if you wished Deep Rock Galactic was more like Dark Souls and had more dinosaurs and dragons, do give MH World a shot. If you want to also sprinkle in a bit of webslinging, try MH Rise.
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Lethal Company
| Release date: | 2023-10-23 |
| Genre: | Horror coop |
| Developer: | Zeekerss |
What do you get when you put four people in hazmat suits, and employ them to run salvage missions in abandoned facilities on extremely dangerous moons?
Well, you get Lethal Company, a cooperative survival horror game you might know from tons of clips of people dying in Schadenfreude-inducing ways. Despite the inherent hilarity, LC can get quite tense and challenging.
Missions are timed, so if somebody can’t make it back to the ship before the deadline – tough luck, have fun being left behind. There’s a ton of bizarre environmental hazards, the facilities are trapped to hell and back, and there’s a lot of fauna very eager to munch on your bones. There’s also the worst monster of all: the ever-rising company quota you must meet if you don’t want to get vented.
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Deep Rock Galactic: Survivor
| Release date: | 2024-02-14 |
| Genre: | Coop |
| Developer: | Funday Games |
If you love Vampire Survivors or other bullet havens, but also yearn for the bug-filled mines.
Take a look at Deep Rock Galactic Survivor. It has plenty of restructuring the map layout with a handy pickaxe (or drills), familiar resources (such as Nitra), hordes of bugs to murder, and the four classes from original DRG. And all of that is put into a bullet heaven formula… with a twist.
The game isn’t actually about surviving. It helps, but the goal is to kill a dreadnaught slumbering on the last stage of each deployment. After killing the elites or the boss you also have only 30 second to make it back to extraction. Otherwise, your weapons (up to four) are still auto-firing, you can pick upgrades on level-ups, and there is a persistent upgrade system improving your chances.
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Ok, maybe some Rock and Stone
Welcome back from the dive. Hopefully, you’ve found some gems you’d like to inspect closer to play something different enough from DRG to keep things fresh, but not far enough for your favorite aspects to be completely absent. And don’t worry, Hoxxes IV will be there when you come back.