Is There A Story?
At the moment there’s a little bit of a story. If you happen to find land, audio files can be found in places that aren’t very easy to access. Apart from this, the story is up to you to play out. Do you want to explore the massive Aurora that initially crash landed on this planet, or do you just want to build as much as you can and create a faultless system of tunnels to safely navigate the ocean? The choice is yours.
Flora and Fauna
Now I know that I said Subnautica can be enjoyed without having to come across any hostile creatures, but that doesn’t mean you’re completely safe all the time. Some sea creatures will target you if you get too close and can result in your death, starting you back at a previous location.
The native flora can also become harmful if you’re not careful, like Deep Shrooms or Drooping Stingers. It’s a good idea to hang back a bit and suss out the actions of something before getting up close and personal.
Aesthetic Charm
Mission 1: Put out fire without burning to death.
Being underwater surrounded by coral reefs, alien sea creatures and having a night and day system, Subnautica gets a great chance to show off it’s dazzling graphics. Coral lights up at night, sea creatures swim around doing their own thang, and effects such as fire and explosions are epic events. If you eventually find land, you’ll be presented with a beautiful, tropical alien landmass to explore and also come across unique materials required for crafting.
The soundtrack and sound effects in Subnautica are incredibly atmospheric and completely match your adventure. Chittering sounds at night time become quite unnerving and the moans of a Reefback are beautiful to hear.
With the release of VR systems, Subnautica is now compatible with Occulus Rift which will make for an incredibly immersive experience for all OR users.
Final Thoughts
Subnautica is a great survival game for any type of gamer. If you’re happy to just swim around and explore your surroundings whilst at the same time building up a small base, you’ll find Subnautica incredibly charming and quite relaxing too.
The beginnings of my underwater fortress of solitude.
For hardcore survival game fans, there’s also heaps for you. The map is gigantic and the waters become quite deep, inviting you to go visit whatever lurks beneath. You’ll find heaps of gameplay and incentive to play over and over again by mapping out the area with beacons, building up your base to include a Mobile Vehicle Bay where you can craft submersible vehicles, or just hunting down the biggest and baddest creatures.
Subnautica is a surprisingly flexible game and despite it still being in Early Access, there is so much to do and the game feels like it could even pass off as a finished product. Unknown Worlds Entertainment’s work in progress comes highly recommended by GameReviewsAU so get onto Steam and get playing it now!