Subnautica: Released (SPOILER WARNING past Post #1)

[Zarniwoop]

There should be a Gaming Law that prohibits using Unity for anything 3D. Developers would be forced to use Unreal that way, at least the ones who want to make modern looking games.

Those who don't comply would get 1) no release on digital gaming sites 2) no release at retail 3) no reviews/covering of any kind at bigger gaming sites and 4) no threads on Codex.

Problem solved, we just need to make an Anti-Unity Union.

:russia:

I should have said "Speaking to everyone in general and not to you specifically."

The size of the world is another consequence of the Unity engine's limitations, although most of the time, I find that games with absolutely huge open worlds are mostly empty. In my view, the roughly 5km-diameter world (it's a little more than 2km from dead center) seems big enough to be serviceable, since it's packed with interesting things and all seamlessly connected; however, certainly by the middle to late game, a player will notice that he's surrounded by an abyss.

If any of you have any ideas for getting good programmers back into game development so that Obsidian et al. stop licensing trash game engines and start building their own again, let me know. The Unity cancer is everywhere, and seemingly the only way out is to find another hobby.

It's no coincedince that this thing is named after the Master from Fallout's evil plan to take over the world.

Do you join the Unity, or do you die here?

Join. DIE!
Join. DIE!

 

[Cyberarmy]

Kind of looks like what No Man's Buy SHOULD have looked like, eh?

Anyway, not into this genre, but I imagine people who are, would like it.

Actually this is kind of the game that people like you and me can enjoy. I hate crafting/survival games with a passion but I'm in love with this game. (similar feelings for The Long Dark too) Like Blaine said, this game feels like an adventure game most of the time. And if you like exploration this game did that right.
Only downside for me is the non existant replayability. Building hueg/different bases just for the sake of it don't interest me at all.

 

[Unkillable Cat]

Only downside for me is the non existant replayability. Building hueg/different bases just for the sake of it don't interest me at all.

There is some replayability to it, though I do agree there's little reason to return to it once you've seen what it has to offer. This is also a point of concern for the proposed DLC - how will they encourage players to return to a game they've already been through?

With my current playthrough I'm planning on making it my ultimate playthrough, i.e. find everything of relevance. That includes those precursor caches that (so far) haven't been mentioned anywhere but people can stumble upon if they're really looking. Another aspect is the "gotta catch'em all" of the Scanner - find everything that's scannable in the game. This is made challenging by two things in particular - the Rock Grub (correct name?) which is so tiny you'll get lost looking for it, and a plant even rarer than the other rare plant I mentioned previously. So far I've only been able to find it in one place in the Mushroom Forest where I could scan it.

 

[Blaine]

Please stop with the spoilers.

I can't believe I have to be that guy... it feels like shit, but it's critical that people know nothing specific about this game before experiencing it for the first time.

 

[Zombra]

Anyway, not into this genre, but I imagine people who are, would like it.

FWIW, I am lukewarm on crafting/survival games, but I was hooked when trying a gift copy.

 

[Jazz_]

How can someone say that diving in this game is realistic? You don't need to switch gases at depth, you don't need to decompress (granted that would suck in a videogame waiting hours just to resurface), you don't get the bends, and so on and so forth.
It's a cool game but the world size is a big turn off and the alien fauna is kinda underwhelming.

 

[Blaine]

IT'S A FUCKING GAME.

In the context of a game that is not a hardcore simulation meant to emulate real-life physics and situations as closely as possible, they're fine. The diving and swimming are convincing enough to feel somewhat authentic to people who haven't dived professionally.

I lived by the ocean for ten years (2005-2015) and swam like a fish all summer long. When I was stationed at Diego Garcia many years ago, I got a SCUBA certification mainly because there was an instructor and a suitable pool due to the Navy presence there and not much else to do. I spent as much of my free time as I could snorkeling, although I did very little SCUBA diving because that required more planning and materiel.

Did you know that medieval knights didn't have hitpoints, didn't wear their armor everywhere about town, and could be killed by a single shot from a crossbow? Fuck, these games are SHIT! Where's a squire to carry my shield? Where are the attendants to gird my character before battle? Why does my character look bathed? He only bathes twice a year.

 

[DarkUnderlord]

Listen bitches, you can build a massive sub which you use as a portable base, and which carries either one smaller sub or a Mech with which you dominate the local species.

You can also build pretty underwater bases but there's not much point in that really except that it's fun.

 

[MediantSamuel]

Good game, yes.

Any tips on where to go for Cyclops parts scans? I can try random wrecks but it takes a while finding them.

 

[Cyberarmy]

Near Aurora's wreck? There are good amount of small wrecks near it.

 

[Unkillable Cat]

Good game, yes.

Any tips on where to go for Cyclops parts scans? I can try random wrecks but it takes a while finding them.

For bridge and hull parts, try the slope that runs west from the front tip of the Aurora wreck, the one that has Mushroom trees at the bottom.

For engine parts, try the underwater parts of the mountain island.

EDIT: The rear section of the Aurora also has Cyclops parts now, I found bridge and engine parts there - as well as Reapers.

 

[MediantSamuel]

For bridge and hull parts, try the slope that runs west from the front tip of the Aurora wreck, the one that has Mushroom trees at the bottom.

For engine parts, try the underwater parts of the mountain island.

Good shit, thanks.

Isn't just outside the Aurora reaper territory, though?

 

[Blaine]

Isn't just outside the Aurora reaper territory, though?

What are you... chicken?

 

[Unkillable Cat]

Good shit, thanks.

Isn't just outside the Aurora reaper territory, though?

The front tip of the Aurora is 100% Reaper territory, especially the further down you go. You don't need to move very far west along that slope for you to be able to blast "Don't Fear the Reaper" on your Seamoth stereo without a care.

As for the mountain island, the northern waters are also Reaper territory, so try looking along the west/southwest first.

One thing I've noticed, but need to revisit to confirm it, is that the western part of the plateau that the Aurora rests on used to be full of crates and small wrecks and goodies - but now they're all gone. Same thing with all the crates that could be found while you're trying to get into the Aurora wreck.

 

[fantadomat]

Is the game ok for a single play? Does it have some kind of story? Also Blaine you should name the faggot!

 

[Drakron]

Is the game ok for a single play? Does it have some kind of story? Also Blaine you should name the faggot!

Maybe, you could just go into Creative and follow the breadcrumbs and see the whole story, its not really much completed with the survival pretty much padding the runtime but they give you the option to ignore the whole thing in Creative.

Also some people dont seem to have got why I said that, been playing it in EA for about 2 years and I have seen the game evolved, the water physics arent realistic because I recall back in the day we could build modules above water and if you damage them, they would flood despite then being above water, I am not sure if they fixed that and also I also recall the base used to flood at the same rate no matter how many modules was composed so damage to one corridor would flood a entire base at the same rate that a single corridor module but they eventually worked on that. As for diving being realistic ... your subs would collapse after certain depths (depends on sub and what modules they have) but you would be perfectly fine, this I dont think ever changed so excuse me if I dont think being able to dive to 1500 meters without suffer any effects is "realistic".

Also I think someone complained about base management and he is right, sure you can make huge bases but they are pointless because of things got cut ... I recall when we were supposed to experiment on the fishes by manipulating their eggs so they could get different traits and behavior, there were some non-funtional placeholder items for that effect but that was dropped, there is no way to store power in the base despite that being at one point in the roadmap, there is a lot of things missing and things that are entirely pointless fluff (like the coffee maker) were sure you can make a huge base but there is no point because you cannot really do anything in there, there is the "large alien container" that a aquarium and you can put eggs there and they will hatch but does nothing because it was meant for gene manipulation and since that was cut (unless it appears on DLC) its just there so you can look at the fishes.

I am not going to spoil the oh so interesting storyline but I will say this, the more it gone into that the less I became interested on the game.

 

[Unkillable Cat]

there is the "large alien container" that a aquarium and you can put eggs there and they will hatch but does nothing because it was meant for gene manipulation and since that was cut its just there so you can look at the fishes.

It still has a use: Stick a couple of Reginald fishes in an alien containment, wait a bit and you have a self-sustaining supply of food. Combine it with salt from the water filtration system and you can ensure a steady supply of Cured Reginald food packs to take with you on long trips. Unfortunately you usually get the Alien Containment so late in the game, you have at least two other food sources up and running well before that.

But I get where you're going, and there are tons of things in the game that they had plans for, but never went through with. Like monsters attacking the base and the need for vast power at the base to conduct specific research. As a result the nuclear reactor is a neat thing to have, but it's utterly useless.

For a base I would say the bare essentials is 2 multipurpose rooms (one for storage & crafting and another for making foodstuffs), a moonpool and some free space on the foundations outside for exterior growbeds. I also like to build a 3rd room as my own personal sleeping quarters, a 2nd moonpool, a scanner room and an observatory. As I usually tend to build my base in the Safe Shallows since they're in the center of the map, there's no need to use any other power supply than solar panels.

One other thing I noticed they didn't do jack shit about is the Scanner Room. The Scanner Room is a brilliant idea horribly executed. Once you build one you get a holographic projection of the surrounding topography - this is pretty much the coolest thing the room does. You also get two camera drones which you can take control of and send exploring... but only up to 500 meters from the Scanner Room, so that's useless. But by far the biggest and most broken feature of the Scanner Room is the scanning aspect of it. There's a list of items you can have the Scanner Room look for, and it will display it on the holomap in the room, or make it appear on your HUD if you have the upgrade. Really useful when you're looking for that particular resource... except the Scanner Room only allows you to pick from the resources that are in its immediate vicinity. If you want to scan for other resources than those, you must either go out and "find" them (by swimming real close to them) or bring them to the scanner room and drop them nearby (putting it in a container won't work). This "adds" the relevant resource to the Scanner menu for the duration of your current session. Yes, the list resets if you load your savegame. Also, good luck moving about stationary resources like heat sources and databoxes.

Players pointed out countless times to the devs how the Scanner room interface was broken and needed to be fixed, especially since the list of resources was confined to one screen's length on the scanner monitor, everything else on the menu was unavailable. After many months of people whining, the devs finally sat down to fix it and... added scrollbars to the resource menu. That's it. Nothing more. I feel like I'm playing a game out of the 1980s when I use the Scanner Room because it's so clunky, primitive and restrictive.

So we're left with a lot of base structures and modules that are neat and sound cool, but in reality are just dress-up pieces.

Yes, it's a fun game, but from a design perspective it's a clusterfuck. Oh, and you only get one save slot, and there's no autosave.

 

[Drakron]

They got fixated on the oddest things, take the Cyclops ... sure it was invulnerable and needed no power but it was very restricted and then they decided to "balance it", the only abuse people could do with it was building a fabricator on it so they started to mess around with it, making creatures attack it and then added a silent running that is so "gaming" that one must laugh at the idea and for what? the damn thing is only there for higher crash depths and to carry the Exosuit and Seamoth anyway and you might just save the trouble and use the Exosuit from your Base. I dont get WHY balancing the Cyclops was such a important deal and some of the stuff they added to it is clearly hacked in since the launcher tube makes no sense at all were they put it because the model wasnt meant to launch anything.

Another pointless thing is the power transmitters that was added very late, because there are no batteries as the power system is basic there is no reason to have power generating structures disconnected from the base, the only one that cannot be directly connected is geothermic but why bother? even fission is less annoying that go around plopping transmitters that would be important if solar panels efficiency depended on depth but since its a flat per panel without any considerations ... hell why didnt they just made a floating solar farm so people have to use the transmitters to power bases further down into the ocean.

Also there is the Neptune Rocket that is the escape but you cannot use it before you turn that thing off and for that, you have to do the entire storyline anyway so the whole thing servers no purpose because you already beat the game, building the thing is a mix of victory lap and busy work for no real reason, in fact why the hell would the player want to leave a life supporting planet for what basically is a deathtrap.

 

[Unkillable Cat]

They got fixated on the oddest things, take the Cyclops ... sure it was invulnerable and needed no power but it was very restricted and then they decided to "balance it", the only abuse people could do with it was building a fabricator on it so they started to mess around with it, making creatures attack it and then added a silent running that is so "gaming" that one must laugh at the idea and for what? the damn thing is only there for higher crash depths and to carry the Exosuit and Seamoth anyway and you might just save the trouble and use the Exosuit from your Base. I dont get WHY balancing the Cyclops was such a important deal and some of the stuff they added to it is clearly hacked in since the launcher tube makes no sense at all were they put it because the model wasnt meant to launch anything.

Two awesome bugs related to the Cyclops:

# Stick the power efficiency module into the Cyclops, and the sub manufactured power if you stuck in some rechargers, making it entirely self-sustainable power-wise. (This has been fixed.)

# If you somehow managed to drop an item inside the Cyclops (not as easy as it sounds) then the "weight" of the object would violently capsize the sub, sometime to the point that it would travel hundreds of meters away from its current position while laying on its side. Best way to do this is to build a medikit fabricator, then try to take medkit from it while your inventory is full. (Not sure if fixed.)

even fission is less annoying that go around plopping transmitters that would be important if solar panels efficiency depended on depth but since its a flat per panel without any considerations

Which way the panels turn is relevant, have them all face south for maximum efficiency.

And finally, one of the Easter Eggs of the game which got axed early on:



EDIT: Interesting. Seems they did add something new for the 1.0 release besides the "ticket home" - time capsules. These can be found dotted around like storage containers and the like, except they not only contain usefull stuff, but also a short message (plus image) from Craig McGill, which gets saved to your PDA.

So there's a fun challenge involved in trying to find all of these time capsules. The one I found had a Stillsuit in it, so I'm literally pissing my pants with glee now.

On the downside I'm listening to the crew logs. It's hard to accept a Mongolian CEO speaking with a Scottish accent. The rest of the voice cast isn't that hot, either. I feel like I'm listening to an episode of Duck Tales here.

(Also, your in-game name is Ryley Robinson.)

 

[Shadenuat]

My favorite minecraft-like, well after Terraria. But fuck I love the mysterious biological oriented science exploration plot of Subnautica. Peace love fishies. I adore games where ecology of the world makes all kinds of sense and is put on a first place in design priority.

There are some things that I feel were always a terrible missed opportunity though.

1) Navigation. Beacons are OK, but there is no way to create some sort of map out of them. Same for scanner room. No matter the amount of upgrades, you're always in the dark how map of Subnautica actually looks and works. I wish you could create overlapping stations of scanners and connect beacons to them and create at least a surface map, even if it would exist only in scanner room.
I think my biggest achivo was hunting in shroom caves using multiple air tubes Jules Verne oldschool style. It's just too easy to get supah easy vehicles in this game instead.
2) Useless Things. There are just too many useless things and useless exploration places. Most of biomes are useless in most ways, as well as base upgrades. You never truly feel the need for food and water, especially with magical fruits and potatoes. No particular reason to get busy with energetics or other types of supplies.
I swear, the magical melon destroys whole Subnautica survival balance. It must not exist.
The things you find during exploration except main plot and some actual pretty landmarks are fairly useless. Laser cutting shit to find a cap or a chair is boring. So most of biomes are interesting only when you visit them first time.
I always get reminded of Terraria with that stuff. At least there you wanted a big base for NPCs. I wish you needed to solve some sort of biological problem during the plot by building many tanks for fishies and plants and supporting them in your base.

Spoiler

instead of feeding 5 plants you probably already had to the giant underwated dragon waifu

3) Too much chore with 24 crates of Titanium. Whole endgame is full of that.

Are people still dumbfucks and pissed at that you have to be scared of actual gigantic wildlife, and have to stealth through, and avoid, direct confrontation with them in a peaceful way? I wish everyone who cried for a harpoon or rocket launcher would get real harpoon sticked in their asses. They would probably cry for a power fist in a Thief game.

 

[Drakron]

Wildlife pissed me off because predators arent that aggressive, especially when its something they have never seen before ..its also excessive because sure a few predators are fine but since we are unarmed besides the knife it starts to escalate when more and more things keep appearing with no means of defense, apparently we are supposed to be dealing with then with the stasis gun but the game feels more like a FPS with knife only.

The problem is not "I must have a gun" but rather the 2-3 sharks swimming in the same zone you are and being difficult to juggle them because eventually one would just go in and take a bit out of you, note people dodnt usually complained about Reapers because they were easy to spot and avoid then but your main use for the first aid kit is not being injured in exploration, its being injured by being bitten by a shark or stalker because those kinda sneak up on you and you take damage.

I never had a problem with Reapers and I did Aurora runs back when there were 3-4 of those around the upper side of the wreck but Stakers pissed me off being how much damage I ended up taking just because they just appear and bite you, even bitters are more fair ... Tiger Plants are complete horseshit, I dont care if you like then but they are complete horseshit that should not be in the game in the way they are.

 

[Blaine]

Yeah it's kinda dumb that the predators are basically treasure chest/resource node guardians, because that detracts from the illusion of a realistic biosphere; but then again, this is a game, and there are essentially treasure chests and resource nodes, albeit more interesting ones than in an MMORPG for example. If players could just ease in and take everything without riling up predators, then there'd be barely any conflict at all. Still, most predators do have their own unique behaviors and don't just flat-out arrow at the player.

They could have done a lot more with predator light and sound sensitivity, too. It's still an existing mechanic, but you won't be able to stealth your way through everything. Again though, if you could just sneak around with your light off grabbing stuff, that would probably become boring.

Tiger plants are interesting, because you can plant your own and they will help to ward off predators. They'll also fire at you unfortunately, although they won't do any damage... but they can damage your base. I hope the developers either already have or are planning to remove the aggression of owned tiger plants toward the player character, or at least make the base immune to them. Also, they'll rarely hit you if you're circle-strafing or moving laterally to any appreciable degree.

 

[Country_Gravy]

This game is awesome

 

[sullynathan]

It's like No Man's Sky but underwater

 

[Turisas]

It's a fun game no doubt, but it would've been hell of a lot better with actual weapons and fishies to harpoon and packs of xenodolphins that rape you if you aren't careful. Their reasoning for the omission of proper violence was laughable, too:

Spoiler

Charlie Cleveland, Subnautica’s game director, responded to a post on Steam this weekend explaining that real life gun violence, including the Sandy Hook shooting, inspired him to depict something other than guns in his game. He described it as “one vote towards a world with less guns,” one in which “we use non-violent and more creative solutions to solve our problems.”

Currently, while players have several non-lethal weapon options to protect themselves from the terrors of the deep, there isn’t much in the way of firepower. The absence of deadly weapons appears to be an ongoing debate both on Steam and on the game’s forums. In September, Steam user Vasheeri asked this question yet again, wondering if the decision was lore-based or, failing that, to maintain the game’s balance:

Is it lore baised [sic]? because for all I know something shot/emp’d your ship and thats why you crash in the first place. If the “company” or whatever your character works for does not approve of ruining the ecosystem of this beautiful planet then I say BALLS to that! your ship is making damn well sure to ruin the ecosystem by crashing into the planet, leaking radation [sic] (at least the repears like it) and exploding multiple times sending random crap into the vast sea, whats a few more fish corpses gonna do (no telling how much harm you are doing already with the simple act of removing a floater from a rock, that could of been another floating island in a few thousand years D: )

Soooo, anyone wanna explain to me why this is? (probably just a dev choice to prevent you from killing everything and to always make you fear the random bone shark) but if its a dev thing then i would like to know.

The thread had fizzled out in September, but when it returned to life over the weekend Cleveland decided to respond:

I haven’t read all the comments here, but I’ll chime in here, as I’m the main reason we don’t have violent/weapons in the game.

Subnautica was being birthed right around the time of the Sandy Hook shooting. This was a particularly nasty shooting, although many people don’t realize America has school shootings every day. Every. Single. Day.

Yet, for reasons I cannot understand, our people and the corporations that influence our country want to continue making it easy for people to get, carry and use pistols, semi-automatic and fully-automatic weapons.

I’ve never believed that video game violence creates more real-world violence. But I couldn’t just sit by and “add more guns” to the world either.

So Subnautica is one vote towards a world with less guns. A reminder that there is another way forward. One where we use non-violent and more creative solutions to solve our problems. One where we are not at the top of the food chain.

[Update 4/8/16: Charlie Cleveland reached out to me to clarify that he meant “mass shootings” rather than “school shootings” in the above “many people don’t realize America has school shootings every day.” He also provided the data regarding gun violence from which he drew this statement.]

The response has been met with both praise and criticism by users on the Steam thread, with people debating gun control, as well as Subnautica’s lore and balance. While deciding not to add guns to a game is unlikely to have massive real-world ramifications, it’s refreshing to see developers be intentional about their ubiquity in so many modern games. Whether video game violence leads to violent behavior has long been a topic of debate, but Unknown Worlds has decided to eschew weapons in favor of exploring how people can live with— or, as is usually the case in Subnautica, in spite of— their environment.

What a bunch of faggots.