Subnautica is a survival game developed & published by Unknown Worlds Entertainment. The game’s story consists of the player being stranded in an ocean planet called “Planet 4546B”, after their spaceship, the Aurora, crashes on the planet’s surface. The player must fight against the planet’s wildlife and survive until help arrives or find a way to go back home. The game aims to capture those players who like survival/creative games. Games like Minecraft, The Forest, and Ark: Survival Evolved.
Subnautica’s graphics are quite impressive for a game released in 2014. While the game’s graphics may seem plain and lackluster when being on dry land; Subnautica more than makes up for it with is beautiful aquatic sea life and diverse underwater environments. From lush coral reefs, underwater volcanoes, kelp forests, and underwater cave systems.
IGN says, “Descend into the depths of an alien underwater world filled with wonder and peril. Craft equipment, pilot submarines, terraform voxel terrain, and out-smart wildlife to explore lush coral reefs, volcanoes, cave systems, and more.”
Subnautica’s mechanics is very impressive. The game allows you to explore the ocean and gather resources found on the ocean floor to build bases, vehicles, equipment, and upgrades. The game allows the player to be as creative as they want when building their bases. The player can build vending machines, coffee machines, trashcans, desks, counters, beds and more. The player build power sources to provide their base with electricity or clean running water. Subnautica allows the player to personalize their base & choose how they want to live in the game.
GamesRader+ says, “Collecting food and water, building an underwater habitat, and surviving the elements are all satisfying aspects of the experience, buts that’s only because [of] Subnautica’s palpable ambience, cerebral story, and powerful fear factor…”
Subnautica’s gameplay is really compelling as you don’t only have to worry about your health, hunger, and water consumption. But, also your oxygen levels. So the player must always keep an eye on their oxygen if they don’t want to drown. The game can be brutal with how much it punishes the player for dying. Any materials the player had will automatically be lost but the player has the option to wither leave their items behind or attempt a rescue mission. Subnautica also has a creative mode.
Subnautica, however, does not have multiplayer. So, sharing a base or resources with a friend is impossible. Just like any other game, Subnautica has its fair share of glitches. For example, sometimes the player will witness their items glitch in their hands or the player will see fish keep swimming against rocks.
GameSpot says, “[There are] a few technical issues like long load times and the odd crash in menu screens.”
The game really makes the player “grind” to find items like copper ore, silver ore, gold, diamonds, and rubies. All of which are scattered around the ocean floor, and the player must resurface before drowning. The game has theses huge chunks of resources like lithium or lead, but the player must have a special piece of equipment in order to mine and obtain those resources. The game requires the player to find blueprints, scattered in wreck sites on the ocean floor, in order to craft equipment like a laser cutter, propulsion cannon, and a “seaglide” to vehicles like a submarine and prawn suit.
GameSpot also states that, “Diving into wrecks makes for the most intense moments in the game, especially when you’re at significant depths. Bigger wrecks almost always seem to be in the neighborhood of the nastiest monsters on the planet, which means you need to sneak in and out.”
Subnautica captures those game who love and play survival/creative games. With the game’s vast underwater environments and compelling gameplay. Anyone who picks up a copy of the game will be both overwhelmed and pleased with what the game has instore.
