Gary Napper, a former Rare design director now working on the dinosaur survival game The Lost Wild, has discussed the design similarities between his current project and Everwild, Rare's nature-focused game that Microsoft cancelled during Xbox cuts last summer. Napper, who is also known for his work on Alien: Isolation at Creative Assembly, explained that both Everwild and The Lost Wild posed a tougher design challenge than Isolation, since they required creatures to feel believable and purposeful up close, rather than simply being a threat that kills the player on contact.

Napper joined Lost Wild developer Great Ape years after the project began, but says his experience on Everwild and Alien: Isolation informs his approach to depicting the game's dinosaurs. He said the team's guiding principle is "animals, not monsters", aiming to instil awe and respect in players rather than a desire to kill, so that some may choose to let the dinosaurs roam free instead of fighting them. The comparison echoes earlier remarks from Napper about wanting players to "respect" the creatures, and highlights thematic overlap between the two projects despite their different settings and tones.