What happens when you take System Shock-style immersive sim design, lock it inside a research facility, and then fill the corridors with dinosaurs? You get something pretty close to Athanasia, a wonderfully grimy retro survival horror FPS entering Steam Early Access today, October 19, 2026.
Developer Momentum Games is not being shy about the inspirations. Athanasia explicitly cites System Shock and Dino Crisis, but the interesting part is how those two ideas connect. This is not simply an FPS where somebody replaced zombies with velociraptors. Exploration, limited resources, environmental interaction, alternate routes, stealth, traps, and knowing when not to fight are all part of the survival equation.
Why Athanasia is interesting: Dino Crisis provides the prehistoric panic, while System Shock provides the maze-like facility, interactive systems, resource pressure, and freedom to solve problems in different ways. Early Access launches October 19 with roughly the first half of the planned game.
- What is Athanasia?
- Where System Shock meets Dino Crisis
- These dinosaurs are problems to solve
- The facility might be the real star
- What is actually in Early Access?
- Check out Athanasia on G2A.COM
- Games to try if Athanasia sounds good
- Like the dinosaurs, not the System Shock part?
- More dinosaur horror on G2A News
- Athanasia FAQ
- Maybe do not open that door
What is Athanasia?
Athanasia is a first-person survival horror immersive sim set inside a mysterious South American research facility where things have gone catastrophically wrong.
You play as researcher and explorer Carmen Flores, sent to investigate disappearances and strange phenomena surrounding the facility. What she finds is a labyrinth of abandoned machinery, locked rooms, recordings, scientific secrets, and prehistoric predators that should absolutely not be walking around a modern laboratory.
Momentum Games describes Athanasia as an old-school FPS immersive sim and survival horror game inspired by 1990s PC design. That heritage is visible immediately. The facility is not just scenery between combat encounters. It is something you have to understand.
Computers, machinery, locked paths, hidden routes, limited resources, improvised tools, and environmental knowledge all feed into how you survive. Athanasia wants the player to think about the space around them instead of treating every encounter as an invitation to empty another magazine.
Where System Shock meets Dino Crisis
Calling Athanasia “System Shock meets Dino Crisis” is unusually easy to defend because both halves affect the actual game design.
| Reference | Shared DNA | What Athanasia does differently |
|---|---|---|
| System Shock | Interconnected facility, environmental interaction, resource pressure, alternate approaches, logs, exploration | Trades cybernetic mutants and rogue AI horror for prehistoric predators and a research mystery |
| Dino Crisis | Research-facility disaster, survival horror pacing, limited resources, dinosaurs as dangerous recurring threats | Moves into first person and adds much more immersive-sim-style environmental problem solving |
The comparison matters because Athanasia is not chasing the usual modern dinosaur-game fantasy. You are not taming a Tyrannosaurus, building a Jurassic theme park, or mowing through endless waves of raptors with an assault rifle.
You are stuck somewhere you probably should not be, carrying resources you probably do not have enough of, while something considerably faster and toothier than you wanders nearby.
These dinosaurs are problems to solve
Athanasia’s most promising idea is that its prehistoric creatures are not supposed to behave like disposable FPS fodder.
Steam specifically tells players to pick fights wisely. Weapons exist, but so do distractions, improvised items, traps, stealth, and opportunities to take advantage of the environment. Learning about your enemies and surroundings is meant to create different solutions to the same dangerous situation.
That is the right instinct for dinosaur horror. A raptor stops being frightening very quickly if it is just a funny-shaped soldier with a health bar. The tension comes from uncertainty: where is it, what has it noticed, what resources will this encounter cost, and can you avoid the confrontation entirely?
Athanasia also teases creatures beyond familiar dinosaurs. Its official description talks about threats from prehistory and the future, so the first recognizable reptile in a corridor may not be the strangest thing Carmen eventually finds.
The facility might be the real star
Good immersive sims turn levels into systems rather than hallways, and that appears to be where Athanasia wants to separate itself from more straightforward dinosaur shooters.
The facility is built around exploration and interaction. Machinery can become part of the solution. Doors are obstacles rather than permanent walls. Resources can be combined. Equipment caches reward poking around dangerous corners. Recordings explain what happened while presumably giving a dinosaur time to sneak up behind you.
That design also gives limited resources more meaning. Ammunition is not merely a number next to a gun icon. Every bullet spent solving one problem is a bullet you will not have when the next problem has claws.
Visually, the low-fi industrial corridors, blocky interfaces, amber displays, chunky equipment, and retro-futurist technology complete the 90s PC mood. Athanasia looks old on purpose, but the important question is whether it can capture the flexibility that made those older immersive sims interesting rather than simply copying their pixels.
What is actually in Early Access?
Athanasia is launching unfinished by design.
Momentum Games says the Early Access version contains the first three areas, representing roughly half of the intended game. The core systems are already in place and most planned enemy and item types have been implemented, while much of the remaining work centers on level design, art production, additional content, and polish.
The planned 1.0 version currently targets six distinct areas, more enemy variety, and a wider selection of weapons and equipment. The studio currently hopes to reach 1.0 around the middle of 2027, although it explicitly warns that development may take longer.
Early Access trade-off: Jump in now if experimenting with the systems and helping shape the game sounds appealing. If you mainly want the complete six-area campaign, waiting for 1.0 makes more sense.
Check out Athanasia on G2A.COM
If the combination of prehistoric survival horror and immersive-sim problem solving sounds like your kind of terrible research expedition, you can check the current Athanasia marketplace offer on G2A.COM.
Check out Athanasia on G2A.COM
Games to try if Athanasia sounds good
Athanasia sits in a very particular corner of gaming, so the best alternatives depend on which part of the pitch actually grabbed you. Maybe it is the dinosaurs. Maybe it is the System Shock-style facility. Maybe you just want to feel horribly underqualified for whatever is stalking the hallway outside.
| Game | Why it fits | Biggest difference | Best for | G2A.COM |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Dino Crisis | The obvious ancestor: dinosaurs, scientific disaster, limited resources, puzzles, and survival horror pressure. | Fixed-camera classic survival horror rather than a first-person immersive sim. | Players who mainly want the original dinosaur-horror formula. | Grab it on G2A.COM |
| System Shock | Best match for interconnected first-person exploration, environmental systems, resource management, and multiple solutions. | Cyberpunk horror instead of prehistoric horror. | Players who care most about Athanasia’s immersive-sim side. | Grab it on G2A.COM |
| Prey | Another excellent example of a dangerous facility becoming an interconnected puzzle where tools and creativity matter as much as weapons. | Far more ability-driven and RPG-heavy. | Players who want a more modern immersive sim. | Grab it on G2A.COM |
| Alien: Isolation | The pick if the real attraction is feeling hunted by something physically superior while scavenging, hiding, crafting, and improvising. | Much more focused on one dominant predator and stealth-driven horror. | Players who want vulnerability and pursuit more than systemic combat. | Grab it on G2A.COM |
Like the dinosaurs, not the System Shock part?
There is another dinosaur-horror game arriving only ten days after Athanasia, and it may be the better recommendation for anyone who looked at everything above and thought, “Dinosaurs sound great, but I really do not want to hack computers and count bullets.”
Terrible Lizards releases on October 29, 2026. It is also first-person dinosaur horror, but almost everything else about the survival fantasy is different.
The simple choice: Pick Athanasia if you want dinosaur horror mixed with weapons, resources, exploration, and immersive-sim problem solving. Keep an eye on Terrible Lizards if you mainly want to be chased by dinosaurs and survive through movement.
Terrible Lizards takes place in 1992 at Dalton’s Dinos, a decaying Route 66 roadside attraction in New Mexico. The staff have vanished, your car is dead, there are no cell phones to save you, and a mysterious caller wants your help finding a missing child.
Then the creatures start hunting you.
The key difference is that Terrible Lizards has no weapons. Instead of fighting, you survive through first-person parkour. That means running, jumping, climbing, wall-running, bouncing, and sliding through the environment while the creatures behind you do their best to shorten your life expectancy.
| If you want… | Choose… | Why |
|---|---|---|
| System Shock-style exploration and systems | Athanasia | Weapons, resource management, environmental problem solving, alternate approaches, and interconnected spaces |
| Pure dinosaur pursuit horror | Terrible Lizards | No combat; survival comes from escaping and outmaneuvering the creatures |
| Slow exploration and careful resource decisions | Athanasia | Closer to classic immersive sims and survival horror |
| Fast movement and chase sequences | Terrible Lizards | Parkour is the central survival mechanic: run, climb, wall-run, bounce, and slide |
It also makes October 2026 a strangely good month for dinosaur horror. Athanasia arrives first with the slower, more systemic approach. Ten days later, Terrible Lizards goes in almost the opposite direction by asking what happens when the answer to a dinosaur problem is simply run faster.
There is already a Terrible Lizards demo available on Steam, too, so anyone intrigued by that contrast can try its movement-focused approach before the full October 29 release.
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More dinosaur horror on G2A News
Athanasia arrives during a surprisingly healthy period for games that remember dinosaurs can be frightening instead of merely collectible. If that is the part of the pitch that grabbed you, these are the most useful next reads:
- Clawed is Dino Crisis meets Jurassic Park, and dinosaur survival horror is suddenly everywhere
- Games Like Dino Crisis
- The Lost Wild revealed: dinosaur horror that feels way too real
- Best dinosaur games of all time
Athanasia FAQ
Is Athanasia a Dino Crisis-style game?
Yes, but not only that. Dino Crisis is one of the developer’s stated inspirations, particularly for dinosaur survival horror, but Athanasia combines that idea with first-person immersive-sim systems closer to System Shock.
Is Athanasia complete at Early Access launch?
No. The initial Early Access version contains three planned areas, which Momentum Games says represent roughly half of the intended game. The full version is currently planned to contain six areas.
When will Athanasia reach version 1.0?
Momentum Games currently aims for the middle of 2027, but the studio has explicitly said that schedule may change as development continues and player feedback arrives.
What if I want dinosaur horror without the immersive-sim systems?
Terrible Lizards is worth watching. It releases on October 29, 2026 and replaces guns and resource-heavy problem solving with first-person parkour. There are no weapons, so surviving its creatures means running, climbing, wall-running, bouncing, sliding, and using the environment to stay ahead.
Maybe do not open that door
Dinosaur horror has been weirdly underserved for decades. We have endless games about shooting dinosaurs, taming dinosaurs, breeding dinosaurs, and building parks full of dinosaurs, but surprisingly few understand the basic fact that being trapped indoors with one would be absolutely terrifying.
Athanasia understands that. More importantly, it seems to understand that fear gets stronger when the player has choices. Shoot the creature. Distract it. Trap it. Sneak around it. Find another entrance. Spend a valuable resource now or gamble that the hallway ahead is safe.
And if all of that sounds like too much admin for your dinosaur nightmare, Terrible Lizards is waiting right behind it with another philosophy entirely: no weapons, no elaborate combat plan, just move.
If Momentum Games can make Athanasia’s systems interact as well as the premise suggests, it could become one of those wonderfully specific indie games that makes you wonder why nobody combined these ideas sooner. Just remember the first rule of mysterious research facilities: if the scientists were experimenting with time travel and dinosaurs, whatever is behind the locked door is probably locked for a reason.