Once Human Has Begun Cross-Platform Testing For Mobiles
NetEase Games, the online games division of NetEase, announced on Feb. 28, 2025 that cross-platform testing for Once Human on mobile devices and PC has begun, allowing for a much wider number of players around the world to eventually play the game.
Once Human is a free-to-play, post-apocalyptic, third-person open-world multiplayer survival game developed and published by Starry Studio, a subsidiary of NetEase. The game was released on July 9, 2024, and is currently only available on PC.
“The Once Human cross-platform test is live and will run until March 30, with players in Europe, Japan, and North America able to participate. Players could sign up by completing a survey within Once Human or join through one of the game’s official social media communities,” the company said in a press release and added: “There will be limited slots.”
If the testing goes according to plan, Once Human should be fully cross-platform between PC, Android, and iPhones in April this year.
Once Human Story And Gameplay
Set in a world devastated by an event called Starfall where an alien substance known as Stardust has mutated a majority of lifeforms on the planet into Deviations, players are tasked with a number of things all leading to a common goal – survival.
Progressing in the game involves resource management in terms of gathering and building bases, while keeping hunger and hydration in check, and maintaining a certain degree of sanity. Success comes from beating bosses, defeating enemy strongholds, and gathering loot from dungeons known as silos.
Game Reception
Once Human received mixed reviews when it launched and garnished an average rating of 8/10 by critics and has been hovering steady around that approval rating even after more than 120,000 reviews as of the time of this writing.
On Oct. 17, 2024 the game saw its first major update with new content in the form of a scenario called The Way of Winter. Three months later, players were introduced to a season label system – Visual Wheel: Lunar Oracle – on Jan. 16, 2025. New labels are scheduled later in 2025 for April, possibly coinciding with the upcoming release of the cross-platform for PC and mobile devices, then in July, and lastly in September.