Once Human is a free-to-play survival game where the strange things are not just monsters. You capture anomalies called Deviants and put them to work: some fight beside you, some gather or produce resources, and others become odd companions around the base you build. That mixture of creature collecting, shooting, construction and shared-world survival is the reason to notice the game—not the fact that it now has console store buttons.

The console version is a good starting point for players who enjoy discovering bizarre creatures and improving a home as much as fighting bosses. It asks for more planning than a drop-in co-op shooter: a Scenario determines the rules and content of the world, while the region and exact server determine which friends you can reach.

This is source-checked guidance, not an independent performance review. We have not measured frame rate, controller latency or server stability on a retail PS5 or Xbox.

The monsters do not stay monsters

The most memorable designs turn ordinary objects into unsettling life. Publisher material shows a walking bus-like creature, enormous airborne forms and smaller Deviants that can be secured rather than simply killed. Once captured, these creatures blur familiar game categories: a monster can become a combat partner, a production worker or a reason to rearrange a room.

That changes the survival loop. You are still gathering materials, crafting weapons and building shelter, but the world keeps offering creatures that might solve a problem in an unexpected way. The appeal is closer to collecting a strange household than clearing a checklist of enemy types.

A home project interrupted by enormous problems

Once Human mixes several scales of play. A small group can explore, gather and build together. Larger public events such as Prime War combine boss combat with construction and defense. Personal territory gives creative players a long-term project, while the separate Eternaland space was designed as a place to keep building and meet players across seasonal servers.

The catch is structure. This is not one permanent world with one universal rule set. Scenarios can emphasize different environments, survival pressures or PvP rules. That variety gives the game room to experiment, but it also means friends should choose together before investing in characters and bases.

An animal is not another Deviant

The September 12 developer preview proposes a different companion loop for the September 16 Pacific Time update. These changes were still scheduled, not verified live, at our September 16 morning check in China.

Deviants remain captured anomalies with their own jobs. Beastmaster animals are a separate system: the preview allows one summoned animal at a time, with riding and command abilities. Other classes can ride saddled animals outdoors but cannot use their special abilities. Riding a bear therefore does not make every player a Beastmaster.

Ranching also has a different purpose from collecting combat companions. The planned rules put growth, breeding and production around Energy instead of separate tameness and hydration meters. Gardener combat, meanwhile, uses deployable biomechanical crops, with durability as a new cost. These are three different decisions—managing livestock, commanding an animal and deploying a plant—not one interchangeable pet system.

For a group, that distinction makes the class choice worth discussing alongside the Scenario. Someone interested in breeding and equipping animals may want a different role from the player collecting Deviants for shelter work. Check the live class and Scenario descriptions before committing; this preview does not prove how those roles perform together.

Read the official Beastmaster and ranching preview. The September 2 update notice schedules the next update for September 16 at 4 p.m. Pacific Time. Neither announcement is our hands-on test.

A Chinese studio working inside a global genre

Starry Studio, under NetEase Games, is not using a traditional Chinese legend as decoration here. Its more interesting contribution is production design: it takes global SCP-style anomaly fiction, open-world survival and live-service seasons, then builds a highly visual creature-and-home loop around them.

That is a useful reminder that contemporary Chinese games are not defined only by historical costume or mythology. Once Human is a Chinese studio making a global genre game, with its identity carried by creature design, system mixing and the scale of its shared world.

The one decision to make before creating characters

PS5 and Xbox Series X|S players can play together. Compatible PC and mobile players can also join cross-platform servers. Everyone still needs the same region, Scenario and exact server. A console-only server will not admit the PC or mobile member of the group.

Put the group in the same world

  1. Check that both players selected the same region at sign-in. Stop if the regions differ.
  2. Finish the beginner stages; the server-selection route appears after that point.
  3. Ask your friend for the Scenario and exact server name shown for their character.
  4. Open Scenario selection, choose More Servers, then select that Scenario and server.
  5. Use a Special Invitation Code only when the target server is full. Your friend gets it from their character namecard after signing in.

The code is not a password, account-linking code, or general crossplay switch. If the server does not appear, recheck the region, Scenario and spelling before changing accounts or reinstalling.

Do not treat account linking as a test button

Link the console identity to the game account that already owns the characters you want to keep. One official route uses the web Linking Entry; PC or mobile players can also use Settings → Account → Link Account. In either route, confirm the account details before completing the link.

The critical limit is simple: linking is not a merge. If both accounts already have characters, the process cannot retain both character sets in one combined account. Use an empty account, or contact official support before confirming a choice when both histories matter. The normal unlinking rule includes a 30-day security period; for a PSN-linked existing game account, the FAQ also says that unlinking does not let it bind to another PSN account. Treat the confirmation screen as a decision, not a quick test.

Who may enjoy it—and who may not

Choose with the live-service structure in mind. The official material describes seasonal Scenarios, several server types, account linking and changing world rules. Players who want a short self-contained campaign, an offline game or one permanent server may find that structure more demanding than the creature design suggests.

Free-to-play also does not mean every cosmetic, convenience or future offer is free. Inspect the live console store and in-game screen before spending. This guide does not convert publisher footage into a recommendation about performance or monetization fairness.

Solo players can still explore, build and collect Deviants, but the game’s most distinctive scale changes appear when a group shares a Scenario or joins a large event. Deviants are not merely pets: their combat, gathering and shelter jobs are part of the survival economy. The checked console list names PS5, PS5 Pro and Xbox Series X|S, not PS4, Xbox One or Switch. A Special Invitation Code may help with a full server; it cannot move friends across regions or merge two populated accounts.

Sources and scope

Updated September 16, 2026: added the planned animal and class changes, separating them from Deviants and marking them as a preview. Existing crossplay and account guidance was not re-tested in this update. Confirm the live Scenario list and any account-specific prompt in game.