There are many, many survival games in the gaming world. From more casual ones such as Raft, or ones less based on the traditional style of survival such as Terraria, the space has been explored in many different ways. However, if there's any that stands out like no other, it is definitely the game made by Klei entertainment named "Don't Starve."
Don't Starve is a survival game where you have to manage health, sanity, and most importantly, hunger, to try to survive in a world that is made to try to get you killed in almost every way. From hounds that come after you periodically, to giant bosses that can kill you nearly instantly, the game is extremely unforgiving with basically no lee way for any mistakes. Even just doing one thing wrong can destroy an entire run if you're not careful. This may make the game sound extremely frustrating to play, and it can be sometimes, but it's actually what made it a success.
All the way back in 2013, the creators of the game did an interview where they said
"The initial template for Don't Starve came out of a 24-hour game jam that we did a couple of years ago while working on Shank 2. Two of us made a really simple castaway simulator with a day/night cycle and an ever-increasing horde of hungry, leering pig-men who were afraid of your fire. I think that the original inspiration for that jam was a combination of the first few minutes of Minecraft, and the DS game Lost in the Blue. When we picked up the concept again after Shank 2 shipped, it morphed away from the more grounded castaway theme and toward the more fantastical setting that you see today. The art direction borrows a lot from Gorey and Burton, obviously, but there are also elements of early 20th century advertising and German Expressionism."
Emphasizing that "I think that the original inspiration for that jam was a combination of the first few minutes of Minecraft, and the DS game Lost in the Blue", Don't Starve does the same "craft tools to survive" style that Minecraft has. However, comparing the two games, Don't Starve's crafting is a lot more strict, while scarcer resources and far more difficulty of actually acquiring those resources. Not to mention Minecraft has far less dangers for you to avoid the whole game, you regenerate health naturally, and unless you're playing on Hardcore mode, you could always respawn. Don't Starve has none of these (aside from respawning technically, but you have to craft certain things to do that, which is not easy.)
All of these things, and many more, make Don't Starve such a frustratingly difficult game to get into at times. However, this ended up playing to the game's success.
Difficulty can often keep players playing far more than the amount of players it drives away. Golden examples of this are Getting Over it with Bennet Foddy, or Cuphead. These games are designed to be frustratingly difficult, however, the one golden rule they maintain is that they are always fair. If you make a mistake, or get thrown off guard, you use that to learn the next time to try to win. This drive to keep learning, trying, and eventually succeed is what makes these games so enticing to players, and it's exactly what Don't Starve utilizes.
Don't Starve may be as difficult as a survival game can get, but that never ending craving to win against the odds of the world can make a player keep coming back, no matter how many times they lose. And the more they lose, the more they learn, the more they discover, the more they lose again, the more they want to get back to where they were and discover even more to beat the game. This loop of failure, success, failure, success, is what drives so many people to get better, despite how frustrating the game can be at times. It helps that the game is also fun.
Don't Starve's success shows how to properly make a difficult game. The game truly feels like a survival game because of how much you need to manage in order to even just barely make it by. There aren't many games like it that are able to achieve this on such a scale that the game has achieved it on, and it's still going strong to this day! It's an easy recommendation to make for anyone who wants to play a challenging survival game (and also rip their hair out while doing it.)
(Don't starve regular): https://store.steampowered.com/app/219740/Dont_Starve/
(Don't starve together. This is the one I recommend getting, even though it's more expensive, it gets updated and you can play it with friends and play it solo): https://store.steampowered.com/app/322330/Dont_Starve_Together/
Don't Starve Klei entertainment interview: https://game-wisdom.com/guest/seeing-the-forest-for-the-trees-a-dont-starve-interview