Recent reviews by Random_of_Amber

Beautiful, charming, and -- if, like me, you have a bone-deep fear of open water -- on more than a few occasions downright terrifying, Subnautica is from start to finish a fantastic experience. To anyone with a sense of adventure, who enjoys a light-to-moderate challenge full of discovery, I recommend it highly.


Taking my usual sweet time, I enjoyed a satisfying hundred hours exploring Subnautica's stunning environments. If, after many days spent plumbing its fathoms, the delight of discovery had worn thin, what replaced it was not disillusionment, but a sense of hard-fought-for familiarity -- of having dared the depths, and at pains learned the habits and character of this planet's creatures and locales. What begins, then, as a story of isolation and dread-of-the-deep survival, ends rather with a tug on the heart's strings at having, ultimately, to leave 4546B, its inhabitants, and its captivating mysteries, behind.

Many of the story's puzzle pieces are 'hidden gems' you will only discover if you make the effort to explore widely and deeply, with a keen eye always watching out, and your trusty scanner always in hand. How the planet's creatures behave, even, is tied up with the overarching narrative, and your own progress in cultivating your chances of survival. The game is not 'lore heavy'; rather Unknown Worlds have taken here a lighter touch, filling in just enough detail to keep you keen to know more, but leaving space for you to make your own educated deductions. Seeing my theories proved or disproved, as the game advanced, was much its own pleasure.

Looking back, however, I do wish I could change a few things about how I played Subnautica. So here are my thoughts.


First of all, hoarding: I spent far too much time building up my capacity to hoard, and hoarding, all manner of Subnautica's resources, thinking this 'useful', even 'essential', to my progress. Please believe: it is not. This is why 'Creative' mode exists: so unless the act itself is your reward, then get what's required to build the technology you next need, and go explore. When 'Survival' is over, your grandest hoard is rendered instantly meaningless. But THEN, by all means, go 'Creative', and build the seabase(s) of your wildest dreams.

Second, on mods and modding:

Subnautica is wonderful. If like me, however, once you learn a game has mods you cannot help yourself, then let me offer some advice, as several several really do break the game and its sense of marvel. Let me start there.


(1) Map mods (even, e.g., this one[www.nexusmods.com]): Early on, you will ask 'why no map?!' I can now tell you: without it, you have to learn 4546B's biomes visually, mentally map its secrets by way of features and landmarks, and feel your way through its environments with what will be (initially) an unnerving sense of dislocation and anxiety. I played forty hours or so without a map mod. Having one certainly made the game easier, but it did NOT make my experience better. Mainly, it served to hasten the end, as in the late stages I blasted my way from one side of the crater to the other, piloting with immersion-killing pinpoint accuracy.

(2) Nightvision[www.nexusmods.com]: A profoundly important element of Subnautica is its vertiginous moments of having to boldly delve into the black abyss of its fathomless deeps. The first such moment is belly-clenching in the best possible way; but honestly they never really got easier for me -- until this mod eliminated them entirely. This lights up the seabed for miles, and annihilates all fear and mystery. Use the game's built-in scanning and sonar features instead: they hint, where this flat out reveals.

(3) In-vehicle scanner modules[www.nexusmods.com]: The desperate desire to scan that incredible new thing, contrasted with the desperate fear you feel at having to leave the relative metal-bound safety of your vehicle to do so, really IS the experience. This kills it.

(4) Biome HUD Indicator[www.nexusmods.com]: Detrimental to immersion. Intrusive and irritating in implementation.

(5) Increased vehicle storage[www.nexusmods.com]: See above, re: hoarding. This is only a means to that end. Yes, vehicle storage is paltry; but that too was surely by design, and should hint at how best to play.

(6) Cyclops nuclear reactor[www.nexusmods.com]: Just OP. Why worry about powering your sub at all?!

Also: Some vehicle upgrade mods are fun; but most are more than slightly OP. Caveat emptor.


Some QOL mods, and overall improvements to base game features, that I'd wholeheartedly recommend:

(1) More Quickslots[www.nexusmods.com]: Why only five? Why?!

(2) Quit to Desktop[www.nexusmods.com]: Shouldn't have needed a mod.

(3) Show Available Items[www.nexusmods.com]: I know what I own. Or at least I should!

(4) Blueprint Tracker[www.nexusmods.com]: So many blueprints. Scrolling through that PDA page every time you need to remember the components for something is just tedious.

(5) Fast Craft[www.nexusmods.com] AND EasyCraft[www.nexusmods.com]: The first time your fabricator makes something, you're all 'cool!' The fiftieth time, less so. You quickly notice (a) how slow batch fabricating is (for which, FastCraft), and (b) how ridiculous it is to have to find in storage the stuff for thing #1 needed in turn for thing #2, needed in turn for thing #3, etc. (for which, EasyCraft). Crafting should be a (quick) means to the better end of exploring and progressing.

(6) Ambience Music Fading Out Fix[www.nexusmods.com]: Fixes a jarring musical bug in the final release. When you don't notice this mod working, that means it's working!

(7) Resource Monitor[www.nexusmods.com]: IF you hoard (even mildly), your containers will be numerous. This gives a sensible screen from which to see AND retrieve all items in storage. Brilliant.

(8) PDA Pause[www.nexusmods.com]: This game presents a fairly constant flow of enjoyable flavour-text, but the PDA doesn't pause so you can read it without being eaten by some denizen of the deep or asphyxiating from oxygen loss. Just irritating.

(9) PDA Radio[www.nexusmods.com]: No more need to return to base to physically click on the radio to receive messages. They go straight to your suit. The more event-heavy early stage of the game may feel slightly rushed; but worth the trade-off.

(10) Cyclops Enhanced Sonar[www.nexusmods.com]: Why is the sonar of the one extremely cumbersome to manoeuvre vehicle so worthless?



To hammer it home, then: Subnautica is all about immersion. If a mod breaks that, or overpowers you for the game world, it will ultimately chip away at your enjoyment of an otherwise great experience.

Get out there and get diving!

I am a fan of (nearly) all things Cthulhu. Serious player of the board games. Serious player of the card games. Seriously looked forward to this game during production. So while I would love to be able to recommend this, the fact remains that the game, and gameplay, are plain awful, and the story and visuals lacklustre.

So many ideas have been thrown in to the mix here, and not a single one given any scope to breathe or develop before the game is just... over. (E.g., so-called character development and player powers which more or less in no way affect the game; the 'psychic detective' mode of analysis which you only get to use about three times in the game, total; and so forth.) And don't get me started on the circa 2005-style 'gunplay'. Gads. So, so bad, and worse -- so very unnecessary.

Such an enormous missed opportunity with this one. There are little flashes of brilliance and persuasive atmosphere -- there would have to be, or I'd never have played through to the end. But these are all but thoroughly drowned out by a truly ill-considered set of game mechanics, and overall quite poor writing and presentation. What a shame, for a product that showed such promise in production. And oh, what a disappointment for lovers of the mythos.