Subnautica: Below Zero Critique
ฝัง
- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 18 มิ.ย. 2024
- Subnautica was one of the more original games of the 2010s, and it captured my imagination in ways that few games ever have. The sequel, Below Zero, shares many of the same ideas, and at a glance looks like it would be more of the same, but to my great disappointment there were a few design decisions that make it a far less interesting and immersive experience than the first game. In this video I try to explain why that is.
Subnautica and Below Zero by Unknown Worlds Entertainment. Subnautica OST by Simon Chylinski, Below Zero OST by Ben Prunty.
Footage from Below Zero, Half-Life 2, Resident Evil 2, and the Subnautica title screen was recorded (and played) by me.
All other footage of the original Subnautica was taken (with permission) from Loopy Longplays' excellent no-commentary walkthrough on TH-cam:
• Subnautica - Longplay ...
Timestamps:
0:00 - Intro
5:37 - The Subnautica Iceberg Explained
17:02 - Immersion Therapy
30:05 - Fluid Mechanics
40:53 - Below Zero - เกม
![[Full Episode] MasterChef Junior Thailand มาสเตอร์เชฟ จูเนียร์ ประเทศไทย Season 3 Episode 3](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/A1XXYbV048k/mqdefault.jpg)
The ice worm + snow fox is ridiculously unpolished btw. Any time the worm emerges to attack, you’re just removed from the vehicle with no animation. It feels like a bug, but it’s intentional.
It goes further than that! When the worm "surfaces" to attack you, it's actually _triggered_ by invisible objects placed on the ground in places you'd normally traverse to get to your goals. There isn't an actual worm burrowing through the ground or even moving underneath the map that randomly bursts through the surface, no. It just straight up teleports to you when you trigger one of its spawn points. And immediately knocks you off the snowfox. Here's a fun fact: You could (I don't know if this was ever fixed, but it worked in 1.0!) use the PRAWN suit and... for some weird reason, the PRAWN suit did not trigger these events, and you were 100% immune to cold while within the Prawn Suit. The only trouble is that there were a few areas where the Prawn couldn't go, but you could do Most of what you needed to do in that awful maze with the Prawn. Just be careful not to get it stuck and save often.
The funniest part about it is that the worm doesn't even need to touch you to knock you off and damage your snow fox AT ALL. Whenever it emerges you just automatically fall off and your vehicle is damaged, even when that thing is literally 20 meters away from you and swiped the air.
The ice worm is so pathetic, really. You can literally just run through the regions it is in, it does too little damage to be a threat as long as you have just a few med kits with you.
@@helion_ut In one of their Let's Drown Out videos that Yahtzee and Gabriel used to do, at one point Gabe says 'ARBITRARY PUNISHMENTS!" and I really wish I remembered the context, but the speeder bike snow worm section reminds me of that. There's nothing really cool or skillful you can do to get through it, it's the worst part of the game. A game that has Subnautica: Below Zero's story in it.
@@thegardenofeatin5965 Yeah, absolutely. Being chased by a Snow Worm and you have to skillfully dodge it on your cool Hover Bike to escape it like in those fancy trailers?
My ass, it just emerges, knocks you off automatically without even hitting you at all, you repair your snow fox real quick, get back up, get knocked off aaaand repeat till you are past it. It's just gameplay trash tbh.
@@Dhalin In my playthrough, and I'd say I'm pretty thorough when it comes to exporation and stuff, I didn't find all of the snowfox fragments. I only found one that you find at 'Reet's joint in one of the 3 nice places in game where a base can go (how is she still alive btw), then a second one somewhere else towards the end. So I just sprinted on foot through all of the on-land segment and never got hit or anything. There's enough peppers around that you can do this in a stillsuit or basic suit without ever being at risk of the cold.
The tightness of the environments was the most frustrating part for me… the drop off points in the first Subnautica game blew me away.
I think that's why they put in the prawn but not the moth, because the moth was wayyyy to fast, so you'd be on the other side of the map in 5 seconds.
8:36 No! This is not one of the things you should let go, because it highlights one of the main problems with this game: it's too simple. They introduce you to a freezing mechanic, then they immediately line your pathway with heat producing flowers. Wouldn't it have been better to have a heat source in the crashed ship, and you have to walk away from it, not knowing if you can find another heat source before you freeze to death? Instead, your path is just lined with heat flowers. Just like your path is lined with oxygen plants. Everything in this game felt like it had the training wheels on.
Well said!
Yup
A good game is one you can look at and think, "would I forget everything about this game just to be an inexperienced beginner again, just for the sake of wondering what it was like not to know how to play it?"
I would say that subnautica is definitely on of the games I would ponder about.
I've had similar thoughts before - I think that feeling of 'I wish I could forget this game and play it again' emerges from games that push the boundaries of immersion. The most recent game that ticked that box for me was Outer Wilds, which I would recommend to anyone who enjoyed the immersive aspects of Subnautica.
Thanks for the comment!
I feel this way about Subnautica and Breath of the Wild
@@moonbeetle0417 YO BREATH OF THE WILD PLAYER WOW I HAVE NEVER MET SOMEONE LIKE ME THAT ACTUALLY MIGHT ENJOY BOTW WITHOUT QUITTING AFTER 1 HOUR BECAUSE THEY CANT GET PAST MAGNESIS SHRINE
They had lightning in a bottle with Subnautica and then smashed the bottle. BZ has plot holes in the writing. There is a complete lack of tension as creatures pose little threat, oxygen plants are abundant, caves are easy to navigate and always lead you to a way out, and 95% of the environment is lit up like a Christmas tree. The game tells and shows you where you need to go next, exploration is very minimal. As a whole I found BZ trying its hardest to hold my hand start to finish. The only thing in BZ I enjoyed more than Subnautica was base building.
Well said! I wouldn't have been so disappointed with BZ if the original game hadn't felt so groundbreaking.
Thanks for the comment!
The only thing I believe you forgot was the sound effects and music. They fired the original composer and the sound and music of BZ, while excellent in a vacuum, are not used correctly throughout the game.
Ambiance is vital to immersion.
Well the creatures didn’t really pose a threat in the first one either but we didn’t know that on our first playthroughs
@@spaceowl5957
I think they don't _now_ because they broke the Reaper's grab attack when they changed engines.
The plot doesnt have holes it has complete and total nonsense. Your sister is a total nut and this is never acknowledged.
I actually tried my best to discover everything below zero had to offer, but most of the time playing it didn't feel good.
Sometimes i stopped playing just to switch back to the original game because i got bored or the game crashed {what never happened to me in the original}
What makes me the most sad is i was trying my best to enjoy it.
I kept asking myself "how am i not enjoying this? It's subnautica! I love subnautica!" But i had to realize that it wasn't subnautica.. it was below zero.
I felt the same way. I was really looking forward to having that Subnautica experience again, so it was incredibly disappointing to see that BZ just wasn't the same game at all.
Thanks for the comment!
The first time I heard her eat, I knew they destroyed any hope of replicating the original.
Top it off with a complete lack of feeling in danger at any point in the game... courtesy of being able to outrun most enemies, or the seatruck shock module... What, only 4 hostile creatures total I think?
Yep, the moment I realised that I could easily tank two hits from all leviathans they stopped being frightening and started being annoying. Thanks for the comment!
I never figured out how to activate the shock thing on the seatruck....didnt need it anyways though lmao
@@kingti85 I never unlocked it either hahaha
If you unlock the shock the leviathans are very annoying but never again threatening. If you time it right they do no damage.
I remember during the later EA, I was killing those non-leviathan annoying creatures with the Seatruck just by running them over lol. During EA they had put dozens of them in the vents area, and I just got so sick of constant attacks that I just went all GTA with my Seatruck, ramming them. IIRC, ramming them still worked in 1.0, dunno if they ever fixed that. Not sure why it works on those, but not those annoying blue enemies in the twisty bridges... but it made the vents area way more pleasant just by killing a few of those with the seatruck. This violent solution of using your vehicles to kill annoying hostile sealife, is in a game where there isn't meant to be any violence... /eyeroll At least in the original, most violent creatures had conditions that caused them to attack... Crabsquids hated light, the chomper fish didn't like you intruding in their domain and/or messing with their shiny objects, warpers attacked you when you got infected with the virus (and left you alone once cured), etc. But in BZ? All the hostile life just straight up hates you and wants you to die for no reason.
I found that they added so much stuff to build, which had no purpose in relation to the tasks your faced with. All those seatruck Wagons are a perfect example. In fact, i finished the game using pretty much exclusively the prawn suit, since its the fastest vehicle using the strafe bug and also can walk on land making the clothing for cold temperature obsolete.
I totally agree, the game can be completed while ignoring the vast majority of crafting blueprints, which is yet another huge missed opportunity to have you engage with the world. The other half of this issue is that certain solutions to problems are insanely over-powered, like the peppers that restore heat, hunger AND thirst. Why bother with any other food source when you have an all-powerful one?
Thanks for the comment!
This is a great review that perfectly articulates the problems I had with BZ as an enormous fan of the first game.
I did still really enjoy playing it because the base Subnautica formula is so different to anything in the video game industry but it could have been so much more.
Thanks for the comment, I'm glad you enjoyed the video!
Despite my mixed feelings about BZ, I don't regret playing it because I do look back fondly on its high points (mostly the exploration and visual design), but the gameplay just fell completely flat for me. It's an incredible shame because like you said the series has the potential to be something really special and unique! Here's hoping they go back to the series' roots for the next one.
Developers have made comments that they did NOT want this game to continue the horror aspect of previous game... in first game they left out guns because of school shootings for example, so kind of the M.O.. It's sad because the horror aspects of Subnautica are what make it such a gem for watching streamers play it. The crystal caverns are a very poor man's immitation of the lost river and lava areas to be sure. Hopefully, someone with more vision makes a survival game with MORE thalassophobia, MORE isolation, MORE horror elements, and MORE user problem-solving and skill to succeed in rather than just spitting out DLC content as a new game.
Thanks for the reply! I enjoyed the decision in the first game to not give the player any weapons, since it contributed massively to the feeling of horror and vulnerability. In BZ, however, I wasn't scared of any creature because I quickly learned that they were incapable of hurting me.
@@Erumore aye, I think the no weapon thing worked out PERFECTLY for the game... though the prawn suit is kind of a weapon. And agree entirely... instead of eerie, tense exploration... BZ creatures were more a mild annoyance. And I had to kill 3 of the shadow leviathans because they kept spawning at entrance to alien areas where I had to leave a vehicle vulnerable outside -- mildly enjoyable but more tedious, frankly.
Then it wouldve been better for this game to be separate from SN aside from taking place in the same planet. It felt like they had tons of ideas that just dont focus on the exploration aspect the playerbase wanted more off from a DLC.
@@angela.luntian Completely agree... I think it originally started out as DLC... and I did like seeing Margaret... but if I was in the game design business, I'd want to make a world 6 times as large, 6 times as deep, and exploit the fear or holes, fear of depth, dark depths, and have more tentacles and suddenly opening eyes that scare a player crapless... Building that with a similar building system and a story on par with SN (not an easy task admittedly but good writers are out there)... and making it coop... THAT would be an EPIC adventure that might surpass even my love of SN.
When you unintentionally (as far as Im aware they weren't trying to make a horror out of the first game either, it just kinda happened) strike gold in terms of game design, and then INtentionally decide that you'll not be repeating that in the sequel.
Does it really take a business expert to see that this is basically corporate suicide?
When i played this game, something felt wrong. Glad you were able to clarify what it was
Thanks for the comment and the kind words!
As I played the first version of BZ where you played as Sam (i think) the story premise was slightly better. You were a researcher at the Zero Station, but while out collecting samples the station is ruined by an avalanche and the orbital station is destroyed by a meteor shower. Now you had to survive and figure out how to contact Altera. But they changed it to the disconnected storyline we got.
Sounds like a much better story
OMG I remember that, i really liked how you could communicate with the Alterra base in the sky and talking with Sam about things both did when they were little
That sounds like a lot better premise
I remember it too since I followed the whole development process and it really was much better, I had a bad feeling once it was announced that the story was gonna be overhauled and my feelings were totally justified.
Why do you reckon they changed this? It keeps the isolated, must-survive storyline we had in the first one which was one of the most acclaimed things by pretty much everyone, and added to the terror, intentional or not.
Getting kyanite for the first time in Subnautica, venturing down the Lost River for the first time in that new freaky environment, having to go to the limits of my current depth capacity, standing on cliff knowing if I fell off I’d be crushed… Without prawn grapples or jet upgrades, falling down unsure if I’d be able to get back up, wanting to venture a bit deeper, get one more crystal… But not sure if I brought enough water and salted peepers to make it back, especially if I got lost… That was one of the most stressful, exciting, and tense experiences I’ve ever had in a video game.
Only now that you point it out so I realize it’s basically the same formula in BZ: having to go as far as you currently can in a hostile environment to get the stuff you need to bring back home so you can upgrade and go farther… It never would have occurred to me that there was any similarly, because I’m the second case, it was so boring and tedious.
I had a similar experience to you in Subnautica, and I can remember being really immersed in the terror of getting to the edge of the space my current upgrades would let me safely explore. When I saw that BZ is almost mechanically identical but feels tedious rather than awe-inspiring, I realised there must be some other differences between the two games that account for that huge difference in feeling. I still believe it's the immersive qualities of the original that made it stand out, and when those qualities were removed from the sequel, its lacklustre fate was sealed.
Thanks for the comment!
Subnautica is accidental masterpiece
Below Zero is true image of developer finding out that it was their idea that made the first game became cult classic
I built the cyclops because it amazed me how big it was. Never actually used it for anything that truly needed it but, as it was the amazing huge submarine I liked using it, even if it wasn't needed. It was amazing.
I agree, seeing and piloting the Cyclops for the first time is a truly jaw-dropping moment from the first game! I used it quite a lot even though I suppose I didn't technically need to, but it made me feel a lot safer when travelling down to the depths of the Lost River.
Thanks for the comment!
@@Erumore i went into the lost river with my prawn suit. Hearing the leviathans screaming had me super scared. Then I learned that getting real close to the edge would get you safe. I was scared even though
I loved that it could function as a mobile base, providing you with almost everything an actual base could.
The Cyclops is required to beat the game. You need it to craft a shield module for the Neptune rocket.
@@thegardenofeatin5965 yeah that's right I forget
Great video!
As someone who was very invested in the first one I bought this expansion very early (even before they changed the plot). Honestly I cannot shake the feeling what the devs hated their own 1st game. It’s almost like they were mad at people for liking it for wrong reasons. As if every choice they made was made in an effort to show you how wrong you are about 1st game.
People liked horror of the dark deep ocean, now it’s lit and there is hardly any horror.
People loved their own story of exploration, well now we have talkative scientist and her quirky alien.
Honestly you are very right about how much this expansion sucked.
Thanks so much for the comment and the kind words!
You may be onto something with the devs being unhappy with the legacy of the first game. It would certainly explain some of the design choices in BZ which seem to make no sense at all otherwise!
"It’s almost like they were mad at people for liking it for wrong reasons."
Fun story about the original Subnautica. While it's built like a dark, vast, and empty world with no way to defend yourself. That was unintentional.
They lacked the time to fill all of the biomes as much as they wanted before release and they removed guns from the game last second as a political message against guns. So it became desolate and you became helpless.
They legitimately stumbled into the essence of good Horror unknowingly and by complete accident.
@@SymmetricalDocking Damn, that really is a surprising fact. I always assumed that Subnautica was intentionally designed with that helpless atmosphere, since it spent so long in early access and they could have added guns at any point. Needless to say I'm glad they didn't, but if they really did stumble into the magic formula for Subnautica by accident, it doesn't fill me with much hope for their next game.
Thanks for the comment!
I think you are exactly right. They simply accidentally got lucky and dont like their original. They resent it.
@@SymmetricalDocking It's funny how such a stupid decision and flawed reasoning like removing guns for political beliefs made the game better, and then the devs seemingly hated that outcome, too..?
If they want the future games to succeed they need to re-center the series around the concepts that made the first so novel and interesting: immersion, isolation, mystery, massive scale, increasingly enormous and terrifying leviathans, and character anonymity.
Also, I very much enjoyed your thoughtful commentary and sparing use of humor. There's a whole lot of cringe in the Subnautica corner of YT and it's refreshing to see some videos that don't make we wince at my screen.
Agreed. I'm just about willing to give them a free pass for BZ since it started as a DLC and had a troubled development, but their next game needs to show they actually understand what made the original work.
Thanks for the comment, I appreciate the kind words!
Speaking of breaking immersion, your Prawn Suit isn't affected by the pressure when it's docked on the Seatruck. I realised this last time and forgot to upgrade the suit, wondering why it was only until I went in the suit it would take damage. It made sense in Subnautica when docked in the Cyclops, here it's docked in the water still. Seems more like an oversight though I guess. I didn't bother making a depth upgrade for it since I was in the crystal caves when I realised, I'd do what I needed to do and just repair it once it was docked again.
just finished the game yesterday, kind of sad honestly, I spent so much time building a good base literally at what i thought was the beginning of the story after meeting margaret, so I though before I acc continue the story let me build a base so when i go out exploring I can acc prepare and get all my stuff ready...but after building it and going through with the story it was done in like 2 hours...there wasn't even a need for a base....In the first game building an efficient self sustaining base was useful because you often had to go on long journeys and had to prepare and do things before setting out....the map here is so small that I barely got to feel the need of my base....The fact that they also fired a dude for an offensive tweet I mean it shows the kind of people running the show, shows why the move from a male to a female protagonist of colour that has a black female and lesbian sister wasn't organic but most likely for their diversity quota. The sappy tumlr poetry about humans she recited to alan was also so damn cringe everything about it made me wish it would end sooner. Margaret as a character came off as so cringey as well they went for the stereotypical bad ass older female with the voice of someone who's been smoking since they were 9 and the worst thing is that they did it so wrong... u don't make someone seem badass by having them say cringey punchlines like "oh I took this leviathan bone and wrapped it around his neck like I'll do to you soon" or some shit like that thats such archetypical writing she constantly says outrageous shit like that as if it's supposed to make us think shes badass but it's just cringe.
Al-an was ight the story was complete bs tho. I played the beta a few years ago and i much better liked the story or at least the general direction they were building, the fans complained that the talking kind of made it less "subnautica" so they agreed to change it to.....more talking? everything about it was just so backwards I'm like genuinely annoyed I wasted so much time building the fucking base lol like I feel robbed of my time.
Off topic, but i just discovered your channel with this vid if your quality of vids is already at this level I'm sure you'll make it big dude, good stuff
Thanks so much for the compliment and for sharing your thoughts!
Another commenter mentioned that BZ gave them the impression that the developers were somehow ashamed of the first game's success, because the fans enjoyed it for a different reason to the team who made it. I think there could be some truth to that, and it would explain why BZ seems so desperate to change the formula and misses the mark in every area that made the original so great.
@@Erumore it's like what happened with Majora's Mask. It's recognized by almost everyone as a fantastic Zelda game but when they decided to remake it for the 3DS we found out that the original director was ashamed of it. Apparently he was never happy with how it turned out and all the changes he made in the 3DS version in my opinion did a lot of damage to the immersion and fun of the original.
It's never a good sign when a Creator isn't happy with their product because people didn't appreciate it the way THEY think they should. It reveals a weakness in their personality that they can't be happy with success if it isn't on their terms and it doesn't bode well for any future projects.
i wished I had known about the firing thing before I purchased bz. I LOVE subnatuica and it's one of the few games that I play over and over. Only complaint is no hardcore achievement. Even the bugs, like falling through the floor, didn't dissuade me from playing. But BZ feels... meh, like a game jam fan fic based on subnautica instead of a sequel. Hopefully, they'll correct these things in the next one.
@@jonservo That's also a huge issue with Nintendo in general where they patch glitches people loved like the BLJ in Super Mario 64
Yeah I wish there was more to the story. It feels a bit too short. What's wrong with Robin as a protagonist? She's just another human tied up in Alterra's mess. Also in Subnautica 1 you find a 5 minute PDA recording between 2 lesbians arguing about one of them dumping the other for some guy. That was so random when I found it. 😂
23:15 exactly. To this day I haven't repaired that bridge. 🤣
Excellent review. You did a great job elucidating many of the experiences I had in playing both games. Really helped me put into words the reasons I didn't enjoy BZ nearly as much. One little note that I think supports your points even further. It IS actually mandatory to build the Cyclops in Subnautica. Though you can explore the deepest depths with the prawn suit, you can't build the Neptune rocket without a Cyclops shield generator. And that shield generator can only be built from the fabricator inside the Cylops itself.
Thank you for pointing this out, I had forgotten about that! I guess it would have been more accurate to say that it's not mandatory to *use* the Cyclops.
Thanks for the comment and I'm glad you enjoyed the video!
I've only watched a few minutes in so far but originally the story was almost completely different from the final project but the head writer left the team so they scrapped the old story, I played what was there of it in early access and it would have been so much better
We had subnautica, an exploration game with horror
We had below zero, an exploration focused survival game
Now, we need Subnautica: the Abyss, a horror focused survival exploration game
It woud be at arround 36.000m below the surface so its a completley different enviroment with entireley new mechanics
Like maybe an experimental prawn suit that if you leave you fucking die
Sounds like SOMA, lol.
I lost my immersion laughing when Robin had Alan inside her and she said “this is… different”. It is so sexually subtexted. I laughed “so Robin just lost her virginity”. It is like a Mel Brooks movie pun you watch as a kid but only when grow up you understand the extra sex layer of the line.
First things I built on my base were two solar panels and a bioreactor, I threw 4 fish into the reactor at the start of the game and that lasted me for the rest of it.
Fully decked out my prawn suit and never once used it.
The teleporting module I used once to test it out.
The spy penglings were annoying, who would carry that and the remote around just in case you happen to run into one of the 6 places where you need it?
Though I gotta say I found the storage module really useful for storing food and items that might come in handy at any time + additonal loot.
I just finished it and it was a very fun experience that felt more polished than the original but managed to undermine its own potential and felt shallow and a bit bloated at the same time.
I have to point out a couple things. 1. If you stop moving underwater in most places you'll alos have the freezing effect, however once you start moving again the freeze effect goes away immediately. 2. The habitate build can be found in three different locations. But I'd have to agree on most of your points.
Thank you for pointing this out, I had no idea! I still stand by my point that temperature has no real effect on gameplay when underwater though, because there's no reason you would stay still long enough for it to matter (and the fact that I finished the game without even noticing it says it all). It's true that the habitat builder can be found in multiple spots, but I do think that the one on the central island is by far the most likely one a new player will find. In any case I still think it's almost guaranteed that you will spend time on land before finding a builder.
Thanks for the comment!
Such a well made review! I’m glad I’m not the only one who felt disappointed in this game, thank you for making this :)
Thank you so much for the kind words and the comment! Judging by most of the comments I've got on this video, I think it's safe to say that a lot of people felt similarly disappointed by the game.
Subnautica=minecraft
Below zero= minecraft story mode
That's how it felt to me
I’ve just finished bz and came on TH-cam to see if anyone had the same take that I had.You’ve just said everything I was thinking after finishing,the voiced character was the biggest issue with immersion
I turned the subtitles off and the voice volume to zero in my last playthrough. Sure I don't get to hear the PDA, but the PDA doesn't really even say anything interesting or helpful so it didn't interfere. The story was so absurd it was irritating. None of the characters had any logical motivations or reasons for any of the things they did. Why the hell did Sam blow up the cave when she could have just used the antidote? Why is Marguerit all the way on Delta island intimidating random strangers? Why doesn't Al-An give more of a shit about the Kharaa? Why doesn't Robin give more of a shit about anything?
Also, I think the map was probably necessary because there's nothing like the Aurora to orient yourself like in Subnautica. In the original game, I eventually started being able to recognize certain parts of the terrain and rock formations. In Below Zero, I really didn't bother paying that much attention because I never had to. The game tells you where to go most of the time.
Those are all great points about the nonsensical motivations of every character. This is why I'm so confused about what the developers were thinking when they spent so much time crafting an authored story, only for it to fall completely flat and make literally no sense at all.
I agree that the map was a necessary evil for the game, since a few key places would have been difficult or impossible to find without it. The downside of course is that you no longer have to pay attention to the world itself, and can pretty much rely on the map to orient yourself.
Thanks for the comment!
@@Erumore I know they had some setbacks with the writer leaving halfway through the original story. I guess what happened was that they were left with an unfinished story and a bunch of assets that nobody really knew what to do with. Even so, they should have left it in development longer but it seems like they gave up on it. It seemed like there were a lot of setups that were put into the game that never lead to anything, such as Fred thinking the Frozen Leviathan was alive. There was supposedly an animation of it breaking free that got cut.
@@thefatherrabbit That's interesting, I did think it was weird that the frozen leviathan thing went nowhere. It's such a shame because a lot of the stuff I criticise in the video has no reason to be in the game in the first place. I really hope some other developer (or Unknown Worlds if they can get it together) releases a game to do the Subnautica concept justice.
@@Erumore Yeah I really don't think the game was complete when they released it. It's frustrating because it seems like it could have been really good but it just didn't get the time or attention it needed. If it were still a DLC it wouldn't be as big of an issue, but it's a fully priced standalone game. It's unfortunate because there are a lot of great QOL additions in BZ that I wish were in Subnautica, but the story really messes with the experience.
Why does Sam even think anything needs to be done about the bacteria. Aliens worked on it for a hundred years and she cured it in a weekend. Also there is no indication anyone is doing any research for malicious purposes. Sam is just paranoid. Her descent into madness following a decent into great depths might have been a more interesting plot.
I really thought I was watching a big-budget TH-cam corporation, but it's just you. Well done!
Thanks so much for the comment and the kind words!
I have a number of problems with this game. But my biggest is that the exploration simply isn’t fun. I don’t know what idiot thought prioritizing winding, claustrophobic, confusing caves over vast cool looking landscapes was a good idea, but they either need to be fired or taken out of a position of control. Subnautica has some caves like this, but I swear like 90% of the required exploration in below zero is going through tight caves.
I think the cyclops has a huge part in this that the developers didn’t even realize until they made below zero. Subnautica one really was lightning in a bottle.
33:46 even if you had the snowfox in the iceworm area, they just home in on you, and you fall right off the snowfox. It's very annoying and I'm glad you didn't have to go through that experience
Weirdly I found the blueprint for the worm-repelling(?) module you can attach to the Snowfox, but by then I'd come so far on foot that I just kept going. I remember there was some kind of thumper device you can craft to distract the worm as well, but there's honestly no point when the threat is basically non-existent anyway. I'm glad I didn't bother with the Snowfox now because what you described sounds really annoying.
Thanks for the comment!
You're right.. I over the game just building the minimum equip posible. And it wasn't until the end that I did found out blueprints like the water filtration machine. Some blueprints I simply never unlocked and never cared about that. The first time I explored every biome was amazing and sometimes frigthening, but there came a point where I began to go through everything without looking to the sides only to fulfill AL-AN tasks...
The visuals are beautiful, but I think first game's world works better :( I also missed a giant leviathan like Sea Dragon and obviously: the cyclops :(
Sounds like we agree about a lot of the game's issues! Thanks for commenting and sharing your thoughts!
Man so true!!! Subnautica was soooo good but Below Zero... is... just not it for me, I don't feel like I am dragged into the story! I feel like I am just following someone elses story.
And then for instance they should have done something with the story by using Altera more! Where are they? Why didn't they follow the big bad company? Heck before it even had a story line with you being attacked by them with Alan! Seriously, that tention between you and Altera could have been good! And the sister story, I mean... I don't have much of a comment for that, because I have no feeling towards her sister.... they didn't build that relation where I would feel about her.
Why not have it like the first demo's where you are already ON the island, have you sister there as while, alive!
Then slowly have you sister explore more of the giant with of course the virus, finding out what they are planning, and then Altera noticing as well! Have that as the main story! Have it that you have a band with your sister by playing along with her, discovering different things, and this is without seeing her, but hearing her! Have conversations, have arguments, let us maybe choose what we want to do in that story! And then at some point, find out she died, having you are character being worried for days! To find out why she hasn't replied after an argument or whatever!
To then find out what truly happened, that Altera killed your sister because she wanted to stop them from using the virus for war!
And while all that happens you happen to find Alan, you he still get's in your head because it is a fun character and dynamic between the 2!
But instead of you just working for Alan, make a deal! You take care of getting Alan a body while Alan helps YOU against Altera!
Make me feel for the characters! Don't make me follow a story that has little to no depth.
Also the first one was terrifying! Man that Reaper!! Here we got a big as shrimp.
Thanks for the comment! In my opinion, they should have scrapped the story with the sister entirely. The original Subnautica is so good because the player character is a total blank slate, allowing you to more or less take their place as protagonist. By making you play as a pre-defined character in Below Zero, the developers take from you the opportunity to have your own story and your own relationship with the game's world.
I agree that Alterra was handled poorly in Below Zero. I enjoyed the subtle critique of ruthless corporations in Subnautica, with your PDA reminding you of how much money you owe to Alterra for using their equipment to survive. Below Zero is about as subtle as a hammer with its story, which is bad enough, and then on top of that the story makes no sense and just constantly serves to take you out of the experience.
I think it would have been cooler and more subversive that Altera was doing beneficial research but Sam went nuts.
You only covered about half the things that broke the games immersion. I really like that the devs were going for something different. What they wanted to do with this game is tell a compelling story and so they sacrificed so much for that. I actually agree with that premise but the story is so non sensical that it is reduced to a bunch of fetch quests and detracts from the game rather than add to it. I hate it when people try to defend the game by saying at least Robin has a personality unlike Ryley. Seriously? Do people not understand the concept of the silent protagonist or blank slate protagonist?
also if you haven't already found this out the snow stalker was supposed to be like the stalkers from the original game but instead of feeding them scrap metal you had to build a spy pengling and use that to gather the fur which is so bizarre and nothing in the game tells you to do this.
I also think the land sections were a good concept very poorly executed. It was the chance for a new hostile environments that were unique and interesting.
Thanks for the comment, I appreciate you taking the time to share your thoughts!
I'm curious to know what other immersion-breaking things I might have missed - I'm sure there must be things I didn't mention in the video, but I still believe that the main immersion killer is the voiced protagonist, because it serves as a constant reminder that you're playing as a character and not yourself. As you said, the choice to have a voiced protag with a defined story meant sacrificing a huge amount of what made the original game so special, and the fact that that story ends up so boring and unimportant is a massive shame.
I had no idea about that original plan for the snow stalkers, although I still don't think that adding in a need for the spy pengling would have made for an interesting interaction. The good thing about the stalkers from the first game is that you need to reach an understanding of their behaviour and how they interact with their ecosystem in order to get the resource you need. Using the spy pengling to gather fur would still be the standard 'go to X biome and pick up Y material', just with an irritating extra step involved.
The land sequences definitely had potential, but I think they are far too frequent and don't involve any interesting differences in gameplay to being underwater. The body temp meter functions more or less identically to the oxygen meter, except it's even easier to manage because you can use consumables to replenish it no matter where you are. Also, like I said in the video, being underwater is just more interesting in general because of the extra dimension.
@@Erumore The devs when designing the game made several deliberate choices to make the game less scary they made the game brighter, creatures deal less damage, and creatures tend to run away if you deal any amount of damage. with the brighter map you can actually see farther in the game. the lack of texture pop is more due to them slowing down the max speeds then render distances. This coupled with the tighter map means there is far less to explore and after finding the same creatures everywhere you stop wondering what is around the next bend. With Oxygen plants everywhere you are at a far less risk of drowning allowing players to slow down and learn more quicker pulling back the illusion of danger. And it is impossible to avoid the leviathans meaning you get desensitized to them. You mentioned the Iceworm but that issue extends to the others as well Yes you did grab the biggest issues of immersion but those design flaws seem to permeate every level of the game were individually it is all nitpicks but they really add up.
And you can have immersion with a voiced character, the trick being to make that character as relatable as possible. This can actually lead to greater immersion but for fewer people because as you add more to any personality fewer and fewer people will relate perfectly, so you need to cast a wide net and the widest net comes from the silent protagonist which the first game used beautifully. Realizing your audience demographic can help you hit as many of the fans as possible but I doubt they put any effort into that. Robin is so unlikeable that it turned a lot of people away.
Yes everyone agrees that the snow stalker interaction was pathetic. and also nothing in game tells you how to do this unlike the original with a few Degasi PDAs and just watching stalkers collect the metal. I thought it would be cool if instead of the spy pengling you could watch a snow stalker hunt a real pengling and see the adults try to defend by spraying it with some sort of spit. The stalker would then stop scratch a bit and maybe drop a fur. Then if you go pick up a pengling the adults do the same to you and you get the recipe for some spray that you can use on the stalkers directly (just use that absurd cure recipe here). In this way you can get the fur just by waiting for a Stalker around pengwins or take the extra step yourself and gain a defense against them to boot (replace using the flares with an actual consumable). On top of that have a PDA or 2 at the base meant to study the animals talking about this.
As for the land sections there was only too much of them because they failed to entertain. Yes there is a challenge to not having the vertical element to the environment but you can overcome that. They even had a more intense weather plan they scrapped that could have helped. Originally the weather was supposed to be more deadly and last longer (presumably being less frequent) there was going to be a weather station akin to the scanner room that let you plan out the land expeditions for when you had couple days clear sky. If the temperature was actually made interesting and not just an O2 meter for above water (yes temperature should have been a concern in water too) they could have built a more interesting map that challenged you to get to the farthest sections. Plus if they could have added more creatures and or interesting biomes on land that would have helped make exploration interesting, as it is the whole game suffers from having the same creatures everywhere you seem to go leading to less surprises and less fear of the unknown.
I have watched a bunch of reviews but the one that closest matches the issues I had with the games would be this one: th-cam.com/video/QUi_T1r1AwM/w-d-xo.html if you are interested.
Yeah I was really excited about the land portions to be honest - to take a game whose specialty is taking you OFF the land, and into the water... and use the fact that you're actually geared FOR WATER to make the land a legitimately dangerous, inhospitable environment. I was interested to see them take what's normally the standard gameplay experience of most games, and turn it into an extra challenge instead of a return to normalcy.
Mostly a letdown, but it COULD have been awesome.
I feel like saying that Ryley doesn't have personality because they don't talk is laughable, because besides the fact that they're a silent protagonist and that's part of their point, though yes I know you can personalize a silent protagonists easily, it works in the OG Subnautica's favor because, well, it's about being along. That and the fact that by the end of the game you can get a rough estimate of their character just because of all they went through. In that they're a quiet determinator that really wants off this water bound hellscape.
They wanted to tell a compelling story? That’s hilarious and sad, and the people responsible should reconsider their career choices. The story is an insultingly incoherent dumpster fire, and the dialogue is among the worst in almost any video game ever.
I have finally completed the Cyclops in Subnautica, and so far it’s one of the best video games I’ve ever played. If a game can frustrate the heck out of me and still keep me playing and having a hard time putting it down, that’s special.
My one issue with the video thus far is the point about jumping into cold water. Water absorbs heat in the summer months and loses heat to the environment in the winter months, which is partly why coastal regions have warmer winters than landlocked areas do. To highlight that, the coldest seawater gets off the coast of Antarctica is approximately -4 Celsius, which can be a difference of upwards of 20 degrees compared to the Antarctic beach. In addition, in Below Zero you're wearing what appears to be a dry suit, a form of wetsuit intended to keep the wearer warm while keeping water out, meaning that by hopping into cold water, you're effectively changing the environment temperature from potentially 50 or more degrees below zero plus whatever heat your body can generate and is retained by the suit into -4 plus whatever body heat your suit can retain.
Thanks for pointing this out! I knew it was a risk to complain about it but I just couldn't help myself.
@@Erumore No problem. I'd also add that while I do know some of this stuff, most of the information is based around Wikipedia information on dry suits and thus may be inaccurate, so there's a good chance I got some of it wrong.
Awesome review! One remark, you actually need to build a cyclops in subnautica, because you need to build the shield module for the rocket and it could be build only in cyclops.
Other commenters have also pointed this out, and it was definitely a mistake on my part. I suppose it would have been more accurate if I'd said that you don't need to *pilot* the Cyclops to finish the game, but that's splitting hairs really. Either way, I think most players will have built and experimented with the Cyclops long before they realise that it's compulsory in order to finish the game.
Thanks for the comment and I'm glad you enjoyed the video!
@@Erumore I actually built it only because it was required, tried piloting it, encountered leviathan that almost wrecked the ship, and then decided there's really no point to the thing.
I still to this day wonder why many people seem to have liked the vehicle. Clumsy and lacking function. Less defensible than any other vehicle, due to its size, less mobile than any other vehicle, due to size, expensive to craft, and lacking any particular extra function other vehicles have. And, you need to spend a lot of resources to build one, making it one of the biggest disappointments in the game for me.
@@gJonii you can build inside it like a base bruh nothin else beats its oppp
@@twitchy.mp3 I didn't really build base much either. I tried each of the different rooms, and the best I could tell, none of them had any use. I think I had radar room, some energy thing, crafting device, lockers, and the docking station when I ended the game. Even the radar room was kinda useless but the game ended around the time I was trying it out.
Base aspect of the game to me was one of the weakest parts of the game. Exploration was fun, but you couldn't really explore with the gigantic submarine.
@@gJonii Cyclops acts as a moving base, thats its particular function that other vehicles couldn't do
you can even store building materials for building a whole base inside it if you feel the need for other building modules and such
it's not meant for scouting, that's the seamoth's job
it can heavily defend itself with the modules such as the shield generator, as well as use creature decoys in case something goes haywire or just don't wanna deal with a threat
you can even opt in silent running while on low speed and completely be silent to avoid anything
Thank you for this well-made video which definitely deserves more attention. One can clearly see that you put a lot of effort into it.
Thanks very much for the comment and I appreciate the kind words!
What a wonderful review. You hit the nail on the head!
Hey man just starting my youtube as well, and I can already tell that you need more sub ASAP. This video was everything I was looking for, and I couldn’t agree more. Keep up the great work, and I look forward to more Subnautica vids. Much love bro.
Thanks for the comment and I really appreciate the kind words! I think I've said everything I wanted to say about Subnautica with this video, so I don't expect to make any more videos about it unless another sequel comes out. Good luck with your own TH-cam journey; if I had one piece of advice it would be that you should make the kind of videos that you like to watch.
No, you didn't have a bug when scanning that artifact. In fact, I think half of the artifacts in the game literally serve no purpose. You go there, you scan, and they don't even bother with dialog. The beacons Alan gives you are just the devs further spoon-feeding you every interesting location in the game, just like the maps and the early reveal of the final objective.
Thanks for pointing this out! I spent a while hanging around that artefact thinking I must have been missing something, so it's good to know that I wasn't alone! What's especially strange is that there's nothing in that area of the map apart from that hole with a useless artefact at the bottom. Why did the devs waste my time making me go there?
I'm pretty late, but scanning all 10 useless artifact thingies unlocked the blueprint for the seatruck teleportation module.
I know the one architect satellite gives you the coordinates for Alan.
Unless you already have Alan, in which case it does nothing
Great video bud hope to see more
Thanks so much, I appreciate the comment and the kind words! And don't worry, there will be more videos to come!
What you said about using the wiki to find the last architect piece because you just wanted the game to end was my exact same experience. I also remember when I knew I had to tackle the land section, I found it hard to boot up the game from the chore that awaited me. And the conclusion to the Sam story left me incredibly confused and then made me laugh so hard, she literally shat the bed and took an innocent person with her. I don't regret playing the game, I would do it again, but it was a step down. Thanks for the video, was a good listen.
hey man love your vid ! i especially agree on your opinions when it comes to the above water regions
To me the biggest downside was small biodiversity. There are several places where you can find Squidsharks. When I discovered a new biome excited what creatures I'll see the game gave me more Squidsharks
That is disappointing. I just finished the first game and am about to play BZ. Even after beating the first game I found three new plants and I also discovered four new animals near the end.
You go to the lost river under equipped, get nickle, and have to leave to craft further depth modules. Both cases are solved by making a nearby base as far as you can safely go while still being easily accessible to the route home.
I've always felt that this video is THE review of Below Zero. It sums up so perfectly why Below Zero didn't work. Really great video. I hope more people come to appreciate this articulate critique.
Amazing video, i totally agree on the points you raised. Great job!
I appreciate the comment and the kind words, thank you!
Great video bud. I was very surprised to see your subscriber count among other things considering the quality of this video. I’m gonna check out your other stuff as well, keep on keepin on. I think your channel is about to hit a growth spurt. I did not seek this below zero out, haven’t watched a video about it in months. But your video just popped up in my recommended. I think the algorithm may be taking hold for you in a good way. Good luck.
Thanks, I really appreciate the comment and the kind words! More videos coming soon.
If the shadow leviathan aggros on you while piloting a seatruck you can just get and and stand around in it (when you have a module attached) and it will immediately lose you and return to its patrol
Knowing subnautica physics, they probably did that so it wouldn’t pressure launch the player at the speed of light when grabbed.
@@greenthunder1000
No, it's because when you're standing in the Seatruck it legally counts as a building and so the Shadow suddenly thinks it can't attack it.
@@CruelestChris no? You answered a different question. In fact, you answered a question that I didn’t ask. What?
@@greenthunder1000
No, it's just the way the truck is implemented means the thing flat-out can't attack it because when you stand up the Seatruck becomes a building. Stupid physics launches were probably never on the table because it's always worked like that.
@@CruelestChris yes, because if it didn’t follow those mechanics a grab would pressure launch the player. Your answer is a result of my problem.
Unfortunatley, the Temperatue is less like food/water and more like oxygen when it runs out. Big oof. F.
Also, small note, the Architects didn't "inhabit" 4546B, it was a remote research site for potential cures to the bacteria. The only structures there were to support the small group there, researchers and scientists. Just a nitpick.
At 23:15 You could also just by pass this whole bridge all together. Build a sub base on the other side, and build up and onto the ledge. Go inside and put a ladder in and just climb up to the top and boom. If you bring the mats with you in one trip you can do all that w/o having to merry go round fetch quest.
28:01 I think there is another Alien Artifact of that same type, so if you'd scanned that type, the other already, that second scan would produce a result (but you could still scan that 2nd object)
43:20 Except this is the thing though my guy, they didn't "plan out" Below Zero at all. It started off as a bet that Charlie Cleveland lost.
God dang this was a good review. I enjoyed it.
I really enjoyed this critique. I love the first game and it sometimes felt like Unknown Worlds didn't understand what made it great and corrected/improved on the wrong parts. I hope they go back and study the first game as they move to make the third.
Well said. Everything you said is valid. And they cut the best thing in the game: the Cyclops. I literally played Subnautica just to navigate the Cyclops in deep, big waters. This game made a small map with no Cyclops. :/
Awesome video. Your take on a game's immersion and how fragile it can be made me realize what happened to what used to be one of my favorite games, risk of rain 2, turning into one of my least favorite.
I'd love to see your thoughts on a game like that, or any roguelike for that matter, where the entire point of those games and their progression is learning more about the game, but as you say the more you know the more fragile that immersion becomes.
For a long time my favourite roguelike was Binding of Isaac, until Enter the Gungeon took its place a few years ago. Hades found a good way to 'solve' that immersion problem by making every death canonical, and it kept me interested for a good 40 hours or so. I might include some of these thoughts in a future video, especially if a good new roguelike comes out in the future.
Thanks for the comment and I'm glad you enjoyed the video!
This is the by far best review for BZ
Thank you
Thanks for the comment, I really appreciate the compliment!
I just didn't want to go back to my base, so I just built across the bridge part and took my prawn over.
What i find interesting about subnauticas final act is I didny need to do the victory lap for materials. I had made numerous trips and scavenged enough resources in trips that I was able to have all the resources in my main base besides titanium ready to go and built the rocket in 15 minutes.
amazing video bro , you gained a subscriber today :D
Thanks so much for the comment and the kind words!
In Subnautica i was immersed.
In Below Zero i was just SUBmersed…
Replayability is the real sign of a game like this. Sub i woud play over and over again. BZ not really i went through one time and that was it. The draw to play the game really. I could get lost in Sub all the time even with my bacons out, BZ i went around the map one maybe two times and understood it all. Maybe it had some complexities missing as well, which could lead back to your immersion.
Most accurate review. Well done. I believe if they did these exact things along with a the things they did, and a Landry list of other things that game would have had the same sucesss. However they kind of trapped them selves now with the ending. unless they ignore it completely.
Game still looks amazing. along with the soundtracks.
I actually didn't find a lot of replay appeal in Subnautica personally; for me the game was all about discovery and finding new things, and once I reached the ending I felt satisfied I had seen it all. I thought that feeling of discovery wouldn't have been there if I replayed it, so I moved on to other games.
Thanks very much for the comment!
@@ErumoreI felt a similar way too after completing Subnautica 1. I loved the game but after completing it I was stuck with the feeling of "Been there, done that." I will revisit it again someday but Subnautica feels more like something to experience for the first time than to replay it over and over again.
in the alpha version of below 0 there was even less sense of isolation ,it started with your sister assisting from the ship in orbit, then they changed it to the one we currently have, but you still have adam talking to you and that survivor chick who gives you instructions
the immersion thing is probably why i enjoy bz most when voices are turned off, which i didn't realize was because of immersion until now
Good review. I felt the same way about the game plus so many more things! You must of speedran the game if you beat it without using all that stuff! lol.
Below zero’s biggest problem was that they kept of the things that made Subnautica “good” but they changed all the things that made the game “great” .It just highlights how much of a masterpiece Subnautica really was.
Thank you for the kind words! I guess I did run through the game kind of quickly... mostly because I was desperate for it to be over.
I agree completely - Below Zero isn't a "bad" game, but it's just so far from the masterpiece quality of the original that it's impossible not to be disappointed by it.
@@Erumore Exactly, the good things about the game like the vast underwater water world, the crafting, and the building are the reasons we liked the game.
But the things like the Aurora blowing up, the sunbeam moment, the leviathan encounters, the time capsules, the cyclops, were the reason we loved the game, and are all now missing. Since you seem willing to listen, allow me to go over some of my main problems with the game.
Subnautica had such an feeling of urgency in the first half of the game that made it great. The radio was buzzing in your ear all the time, you had random things that can hurt/help you around every corner. It had an ongoing sense of pressure because the PDA kept telling you oxygen! Aurora gonna blow! Radiation! Scan yourself your sick! Sun Beam timer! Rescue survivors! It was like nonstop.
But Below zero was alot more passive, there was no urgency, there was no major events that took place, there was no timers on screen, or the need to desperately cure yourself before you die of Kharaa. Even the need for oxygen is a lot less intense because there was oxygen plants in every biome. I didn’t feel under pressure at all during this game.
There also one huge aspect of Subnautica that disappeared in below zero. The feeling of being completely alone and completely stranded in the middle of nowhere. When you climbed up the ladder out of the life pod to see the Aurora for the first time, it was very intense. A massive ship on fire in the distance, water in every direction, and the piercing sound they played. It was haunting but also so interesting.
Below Zero missed this point big time. You are willingly going back to the planet, you are greeted with talkative protagonists, theres land everywhere… None of these things give you a feeling of being stranded, all on your own, and having nothing but the clothes on your back to survive and escape like Subnautica.
The introduction was already enough for me to set the game down. And I didn’t start playing again until 2 months later. Robins reason for even being there was ridiculous. Why was she so unprepared? She “crash landed” on 4546B but she *knew* she was going. Why didn’t she bring a plethora of blueprints and tools with her?? She was a scientist that wanted to do research on the planet yet all she brought was the clothes on her back? She waited to get to the planet to “find” all the tools and habitat fragments just because? Makes no sense. Plus this crash scene was pathetic, she was super confident about her actions yet she got immediately destroyed by the meteor. Seems like the “crash scene” was added just to be a crash scene, no real reason for it. Subnautica had a very serious and very mysterious reason why the Aurora crash landed and it drove the narrative of the entire story. You cant just, “insert crash scene here*” your way into another good story.
And how was she planning on leaving? Even if she didn’t “crash land” her little ship couldn’t possibly be powerful enough to leave the atmosphere and return to Altera right? I mean we needed a *whole rocket* to do that in the first game. Why didnt she have rocket blueprints ready?? If it wasn’t for her and Alan running off to fantasy land then where the heck would she have gone?
Was she seriously gonna ”find out why her sister died” and then when she can no longer escape the planet just go ahead and live long enough until she died to?!?? She was so motivated that she was willing to die because her sister died… wtf?
ALAN was honestly a joke. Whats starts out as mysterious artifacts turn into an alien love story. The reason the alien structures were so deep on Subnautica was because they were using the heat of the lava to generate power for all the facilities. Why was ALANS body fabricator so deep tho? No reason?? Did the aliens just say hey were gonna build this way down here just because? Shit at least give us some background and maybe have ALAN say “the red crystals are needed for the station to work” and then we would understand, heck maybe even have us gather some red crystal because maybe the body fabricator needed to be resupplied, I mean something?!
Then you get to run off with ALAN before even completing Sams work? Like what!?? Why didnt they stop you from leaving until Sam story was finished. Its like Sam was just a big side mission. THEN when you do leave you dont even get to do a Time Capsule?!?! That was one of my favorite things to find in Subnautica, yet another key item missing from Below Zero.
Thank you for reading.
Something I tried to get across in the video is that the main appeal of Subnautica was the "feeling" that it gave you of really surviving in a dangerous situation with nobody else to rely on, so it really is so disappointing that the sequel has you play as a character willingly travelling to the planet and even running into other survivors (I honestly have no idea why they thought this would be a good addition). As soon as I triggered the cutscene that introduced Marguerit near the beginning, I was almost ready to stop playing right there. Sounds like we agree completely on this point about the importance of immersion!
You make a really good point about Robin's poor planning... now that I think about it, it really does make absolutely no sense at all. Once again I have literally no idea what the hell they were thinking when they made this story. All we needed was a new environment to be stranded in, and new rules and ecosystems to learn about - all of the fluff with Robin is such a waste of time, and gets shoved in your face so much that it negatively impacts the rest of the game, and robs you of the chance to have your own personal story like you could in the original game. And as you said, the more you think about it the less sense Robin's actions make sense.
I actually wondered about whether the game would let you leave with AL-AN before finishing the Sam "side-mission", but I didn't care enough to start a whole new playthrough and find out. Now that you've confirmed it, I'm even more sure than ever that the whole Robin story was a horrible mistake. We have it shoved in our faces from the very first minute of the game, and so much of the immersive potential of the game was sacrificed to make it work... and then it just gets totally ignored and you can see the ending without even engaging with it at all? Again I have to wonder what the hell they were thinking, because I truly can't understand how the developers arrived at these design decisions. Is it really possible that they have such a poor understanding of what made Subnautica so good in the first place? I hope not.
Thanks for the conversation!
@@Erumore Yeah I was about halfway through Sam’s story. (Found the frozen leviathan but never cured it). And I decided to focus on ALANs missions thinking he would help me complete Sam’s side of the story but it didn’t happen. I was able to just leave. You can watch speedruns of BZ and all they do is get Alans parts and leave.
But thats the next fatal flaw they made… if they were planning on slowly making the story about Alan returning home thats ok. But the guy would never say much about the accident until after the body parts were found, and then he didnt say anything after either?? Wtf.
Why did ALAN leave in such a hurry? He was very remorseful when describing that he lead the Kharaa research team and he was the one that let the virus escape. Based on that, I was thinking he was going to want to repair the damage he did to 4545B first. Maybe gather more enzyme 42 to take home with him. None of that happened. He just leaves immediately.
They also ruined the game by changing the ingredients to the cure. They make us go through hell and back in Subnautica to find this special cure that aliens have been working on for thousands of years. But then in BZ its literally just some common plants, wtf!?? What a slap in the face to our whole journey with Ryley.
I would honestly change the whole story if I could but all they needed to do to at least wrap
up the game is force us to bring ALAN, Marguerite, and Sam all in on the final missions before we get to leave.
For example: We should of needed to uncover certain research done by Sam to give us an idea of the cure. ( not the ingredients, just the blueprints). Then we should have needed ALANS help finding all the ingredients somewhere (maybe a special stash of enzyme 42 somewhere in his facilities). Then we should have needed Marguerites help somehow. Maybe she could help us build a special prawn suit so we can safely give the frozen leviathan the cure to see if it works. (Rather than just walking up to the stupid thing and pushing A)
This would give everyone a purpose and at least tie up the whole story.
I'm honestly shocked that the devs wasted so much of the player's time with all of the Sam stuff, only to make it optional and completely inconsequential in the end. I actually usually do watch speedruns of games before making a video about them, but for some reason I didn't this time.
I mentioned in the video my dislike for the Alan story as well, which is less of a story and more of an excuse for a fetch quest if you ask me. Just like you said, he withholds his story from you until the end, and then once you finally do complete the fetch quest you don't get anything for it. Also, my first thought when I saw the ending was that it was a dick move from Robin to leave the planet without asking Marguerit if she wanted to come too (especially after the help Marguerit had given her). I noticed the change to the antidote formula as well, and that got on my nerves too.
I like your idea of tying together the different stories into one task at the end - it would definitely give them more meaning, as opposed to the basically zero meaning they have right now. If it was up to me though (and I know this would have been a lot more work for the devs), I think the only appropriate way to make a sequel that could live up to the high bar set by Subnautica would be a brand new environment (maybe a new planet?), with new creatures and systems to learn and understand. I think it's important that the player gets to discover stories for themselves through exploration, while also having that personal wider story of their own struggle to survive. When it comes to how exactly to strand the player character somewhere again (and it's important that they're stranded and not there by choice), I guess another unexpected crash landing would do the trick, although I can see why the devs would want to mix the formula up a bit.
I'm willing to give them a free pass for Below Zero, since I know that it began as DLC before turning into a whole new game, so it makes sense that so much was reused and the story feels a bit tacked on. I can also understand their desire to continue the story of the Architects and the Kharaa from the first game, but if that comes at the expense of the player's sense of wonder and of discovering things that are totally new, then it's not a worthy trade. Like I said, I can let this one go but they really need to step up their game for the next one to convince me that they understand what makes the series so special.
i remember the first time i launched subnautica,i had thalasophobia,i only saw a few clips of it on tik tok,when i got in the water,i was scared of something just coming from behind in the safe shallows,i was too scared to go in the kelp forest,i got scared of basically everything,coral tubes,gasopodes,crashfish,stalkers or sandshark,even the reefback leviathan scared me at first,but then i realized how beautiful these biomes were and how little danger there was in this game and grew more familiar with it,eventually,without realizing it,i became more confident in water,this game cured my thalasophobia
Just as FlyingShazbot said, the only part where BZ is better is base building. Everything else is inferior. I have a very high suspicion that Subnautica was an accidental masterpiece. Not saying the devs don't know how to make a game, what I mean is they didn't neccessarily intend it the way it turned out. And I also aknowledge that after that gem of a game, it's hard to make a sequel, but the voice acting and story hand in hand (with maybe the ambience as 3rd) just totally ruined the experience. When I bought Subnautica on steam (friend was nagging me for some time) in the evening I got so immersed in it, that the next thing I realized is that the sun was already up. Meaning I played at least 10 hours in one sitting. BZ didn't catch me like that and it's a damn shame.
I just watched your video. Really liked it. It is a good video.
I would just like to add a few points of myself:
I don't see many people discussing this part, and for a moment I thought you would. But I hate how they changed the recipe for enamelled glass from stalker tooth to lead. Because lead is only found in outcrops and only 40% of the time. And when you go to the wiki and look for all the stuff that needs lead in Below Zero you can see the problem. Almost everything needs either enamelled glass or lead or both.
You probably didn't notice that since you never build the prawn suit or modifications for the seatruck.
But when you do, you are forced to go lead farming each time. And to add insure to injury you can find so much Kyanite in the game (and other material) that you will never need in these quantities. I mean srly, you need like 3 or so pieces of Kyanite in total but there are rich Kyanite blocks to mine with the drill. Who approved of this?
The other thing for me was, I actually had many bugs in this game.
I once got stuck in the floor in the arctic level which made me freeze to death.
I lost one of those quantum lockers because it vanished into the floor.
One time my Seatruck blew up for no reason. It wasn't damaged or anything. There was no creature around.
I was in the back of the seatruck and boom the top part was gone.
My "quests tracker" didn't track correctly what I did and did not scan. So it told me to go to places where I already had scanned the alien objects while other time not giving me a prompt to go there.
Though I do have to admit in Subnautica one I had a way worse bug which made my cyclops fly away with seizures if I loaded the game with a seamoth inside the cyclops.
That is an excellent point about material gathering! Yet another reason to lament the fact that stalker teeth are no longer in the game. Now that you mention it, it's ridiculous that kyanite is so abundant when it's only used for a small handful of upgrades. I had some strange bugs happen during my playthrough as well, when Al-An gave me markers for alien artefacts I had already scanned, and one time when I scanned an artefact and nothing happened (this one is in the video).
Thanks for the comment and the kind words!
@@Erumore Thanky. You're welcome.
It feels like they just changed the recipe from stalker tooth to lead without ever giving it a second thought. Which feels so lazy.
Do you know the meme with Patrick from Spongebob where in the first panel he is this scientist and in the second is a bumbling idiot?
That kind of sums up Subnautica and BZ for me.
The quantum locker was another thing that was cool but useless. I built one to help move bases but it was disappointing.
Agree with just about everything you have to say about BZ and Subnautica _except_ the immersion that comes from the voiceless protagonist.
I really, really hate the voiceless protagonist model.
The thing is, I _want_ there to be some kind personality to the character I'm playing, even if I'm supposed to put myself in his shoes and play the game as if all events were happening to me. It breaks immersion for me as a player when the player character remains completely mute to even the most fantastical events occurring to him as part of the game.
Barely escape a huge ocean beast? "..."
Finally complete some difficult puzzle to unlock a new item? "..."
Watch as your rescue ship explodes in mid-air? "..."
Finally kill the main bad guy you've been fighting for the whole game? "..."
It's simply unbelievable to me that major events like these would not elicit some kind of reaction from the character. I want some kind of personality; doesn't have to be a deep character study, but at least a sketch would be nice. The trick to this (and what Unknown Worlds did not follow) is keeping the protagonist's voiceovers to a minimum. The _Thief_ series did a masterful job with this (younger gamers, this series is outstanding and worth the price of a few bucks at GOG). Garrett's personality is established with a brief mission overview before the level loads and the rare 1 -- 2 sentence comments that pop up in random spots as you play. That's it. _Alien Isolation_ deserves honorable mention as well with the character of Amanda Ripley. Again, she's not chatty; but she does have enough dialogue to give you some insight into who she is and what motivates her.
However, I agree with you that Robin and the Alien in BZ are very annoying. She talks too much and whenever she opens her mouth it's usually some trite observation or snarky comment. Al-An keeps bringing up these philosophical questions that I don't care about and, worse, by introducing one of the unseen alien beings from the first game as a chatty Cathy, it robs them of their mystery.
This is an interesting perspective! What I find immersive about the silent protagonist of Subnautica is that it allows me to more or less "become" the character I'm playing as, and makes it easier to fall for the illusion that I'm really in the game's world. I didn't even really imagine a "character" that I was controlling, I just (subconsciously) imagined being there myself. It didn't bother me that the character never openly reacted to anything, because my own reactions as the player are far more important, and I think the original Subnautica rightly focused on that. In fact, one of the reasons I really disliked the voiced protagonist of BZ was because it robbed me of that chance to have my own reactions to things in the game's world.
Thanks for the comment!
@@Erumore I think a good example of this is Dishonored versus Dishonored 2. Dishonored is one of my favorite games of all time. You are Corvo, zipping in and out of the shadows, silently avenging your Empress and protecting the future of her daughter. YOU are crouching on that window ledge, just waiting for that bastard to get in range of a drop assassination. However, the first time I loaded up Dishonored 2 I walked around and clicked on a globe only to hear a voice line that jarred me out of the zone. Basically everything you can click on in that first room has a voice line and it felt like "Get out of the way, I'm trying to be Corvo".
Sadly, I have never finished Dishonored 2 as Emily because my favorite play style (ghost/lethal) turns her into a raging psycho that wants to burn down the world and I can't stand it. Given a blank slate I would have rationalized it as her copying her father's lethal efficiency, never hesitating to kill if needed but equally willing to put the blade away when no longer needed, as it is implied Corvo did between games. I'm all for having the world change, or even deteriorate, based on your actions and I'll even accept a dreaded Bad Ending but I really can't sit through having her threaten to murder someone and piss on their corpse every time I click on someone's shopping list.
@@DynamiteRaven I guess that's always going to be a problem in first person games, where the presentation is inherently more immersive than a third person game. When the character speaks and has their own thoughts, it rips you out of the immersion in a very jarring way. For a weird example of the opposite thing, I always found it strange that Dead Space has a silent protagonist even though it's a third person game.
I don't think it's even that Robin talks too much, but that she doesn't talk about anything interesting. She is an alien researcher with a sentient alien in her head, but there's no sense of awe and wonder to being given this incredible opportunity to do something nobody else ever has. She's annoyed and then treats him like she's talking to her uncle who votes for the Wrong Side, as well as never once addressing how sketchy and evasive he is on certain subjects.
I think part of the problem here is that the player has no input in how Robin responds to the alien voice in her head. As you rightly said, a reasonable scientific response to that situation would be to sit down, have a conversation and try to discover as much as you could, but of course you can't do that because Al-An is really only there as a contrivance to move the plot forward. Even if the game did let you speak to him at will, any conversation with Al-An is going to be inherently immersion breaking, simply because Robin's voice is not the player's.
Personally the only time I felt like below zero was a good sequel, possibly great was my very little time in the mercury, there was no fetching or markers, just pure exploration in the confines of that ship. That’s the only place oxygen plants belong in as well so I don’t have to go out every time interrupting my reading. Great video I love that ending comparison of releasing your fish cause I did the same thing too without realizing it
My method of dealing with the land based parts was to prawn suit my way around. And then prawn suit my way though end game. Because my sea truck bugged out and couldn’t be used any more. Then again in the OG game I only really used the prawn suit for the end game too. Fond memories of Spider-Manning desperately from the sea dragon after it swam though the rock and jumpscared me
Same happened to Dead Space 2. Introduced a speaking character and suddenly it wasn’t me trying to survive anymore.
i dont get why people say the problem with B0 is imersion, the problem is that the story events happen at a thousand miles a second, you feel very hand held, with barely a moment to do anything, the map is also tiny, with lots of places you only go once of twice, making base crafting a waste of effort and materials.
there's also the problem with the above water locations which feel janky due to how the cold mechanic works.
then there's the story aspect, which feels like another wasted effort, you try to uncover the secret when in fact, it happened exactly as you were told before, not only that, but while its understandably what the sister has done, it still feels like a bad action done in a bad way. so we cant even agree with her.
I'd really like to see a shift away from the character of any game doing the "I need to X" or "I should X". I know; I saw the popup and can think.
Honestly I knew this game was going to be bad the moment, during the original Subnautica, they fired their main sound guy in a knee jerk reaction to some memes he was posting on Twitter. Don't get me wrong, the guy was getting saucy on there and really liked being snarky, but it was a personal account. This guy did all of the terrifying sounds from the based game and was responsible for the ambience that MADE it so immersive...
And they fired him without a second thought. There was no deliberation, there was no negotiation, there was no "Hey man, let's sit down and talk about why you can't be doing this" or "Please delete these posts", they just gutted him from the company.
That, right there, told me EXACTLY what kind of employers were working on these games and how by-the-numbers they were. This, for the record, was back when the game was still pretty niche and before it had picked up mainstream popularity, too. There was no public image they were protecting, it was purely a "I don't agree with your politics" ordeal which really reared its ugly head when the FIRST thing they announced about the sequel was that it would have a "Black female lead" with a "more pronounced role". Not that her race or gender itself were a problem, but you HEAR that kind of corporate speak and it tells you where their priorities are at; not with quality or well constructed environments, but with optics. They fired a man who contributed to their success over optics, they continued in a different direction because of optics. When you consider that, the whole trajectory of this game makes a lot more sense.
Why the story feels so barren, forced and uninteresting.
Why things feel scaled back.
Why some of the technical issues from Subnautica passed along to this game.
Why the sea monsters feel less scary and everything feels so slapdash rather than like a polished product.
Why basically gameplay flow elements were poorly structured and thrown in with little consideration for things like "pacing" and "does this even have a purpose (sea prawn)".
I avoided buying this game like the plague and didn't for a good two years after its release where I still only played it on a friend's system. Low and behold, the red flags did not lie. It was a shallow and vapid experience compared to its predecessor, the resources went to the wrong places and it expanded its scope with the story mode without actually committing to any of the new things leading to them being hollow.
That, and there was no chance they were going to make the Leviathans scary with the guy responsible for the original's stellar sound design was just gone. People forget about this, but the scariest part about Reapers wasn't when you could see them. It was when you COULDN'T see them but the air (or lack of) was ripe with the ambience of their roars; the player left to quietly ascertain whether they had been spotted and were getting charged or if the Reaper was making roaring for the sake of it.
when they announced below zero i spent so muhc time watching videos about it, looking at concept art and stuff. But at one point i decided to stop until the final version comes out so i could experience something new for the first time. And when it came out it felt almost the same as the first early access, it was just more polished. There were no new biomes that werent there when it was first announced, as concepts or in the game. I was so disappointed.
Woah I did not realize that this was from a TH-camr this small, mad sick that it’s 40 something minutes.
Thanks for the comment and I appreciate the compliment! I'm trying to make the kind of videos that I like to watch myself.
I finished the side quest for the sister and I didnt notice, I kept thinking i missed something.
Below zero dropping the scary and open ocean atmosphere in exchange for an annoying protagonist with a plot hole ridden story was probably one of the worst ideas they could have done for this game
The most depressing thing in the game is when you go to the lowest point of the map, you pass the ONLY leviathan in the game, and after a lot of searching you finally find the tunnel, walk into the crystal tunnel and ALL YOU FIND IS A STUPID PICTURE IN A FRAME that you have to scan. The highlight of the game is a picture in a frame that needs to be scanned. Nothing else there. Not even a stupid room.
theres 5 distinct leviathans and 2 variations in the game, what are you talking about?
The thing with the Water, and yes I have no knowledge in the field myself, is that the Water is warmer than the snowy surface. Because Water freezes below 0°C So since it's still fluid it probably is warm enough.
Below Zero fails to accomplish so much of what made the first game incredible that the greatness of Subnautica 1 feels like an accident in hindsight.
Worthy of a sub..... Pun not originally intended.
I actually originally found the builder tool under water in a small abandoned base so i dont really see that as the first one youd find but the second one
the thing i hate most is how almost everything is a 1 time scan, like the snow fox builder, way more things should be found as fragments.
I’m so glad that others think this game just didn’t hit the same as the first(Great vid)
Thanks for the comment and I'm pleased you enjoyed the video!
playing the story i realized that the protagonist, her sister and Marguerit are just horrible people, and terrorists and alterra was actually just doing medicine work with the khara. AND it was indeed sams own negligence in trying to boobytrap the leviathan room so her coworkers would all die if they entered the cave.... wow what a horrible protagonist to play as. THAT is the reason why they wouldnt have given the protagoonist her own story and baggage
My additions to the critique: 1. We all totally forgot about the crashed ship, right? It wasn't even mentioned in this analysis, and I forgot all about it until now. It was the Mercury? I am sorry to say that I somewhat scoffed when I saw it, like, "Gotta check the box off on the list, Crashed Ship with survivors story, Check". It pulled me away from the immersion; surely, no, how could there be yet another Degassi-like story on this planet!? Anyhow, I also agree with the character speaking as being the #1 issue, as it does indeed put you at odds with your characters actions. Ok, back to enumerating items. 2. Everything in Below Zero just felt "less". No Stasis rifle, no Propulsion Gun, no Cyclops, smaller world, no Seamoth, no huge alien bases. I feel like they took away a bunch thinking along the adage of "less is more", but really, less is less. 3. I really wish they had made a mission in the game that required a journey over the arctic icecap for hundreds of kilometers while dodging ice worms. That would have been epic. At least to end on a positive note: The most memorable and epic moment I had in the game was standing over a juvenile Snow Stalker that I had knocked out with some drugs, while fighting off its parents with a flare, and realizing that I had no idea if the developers had altered the flare mechanic to eventually run out, and trying to figure out how I would harvest the fur off the youngling while juggling flares. Fun times.
I couldnt get any fur off the young. I even killed one and dont think I got fur. I didnt know anything about drugs- thats actually amazing.
What happens to the Mercury crew? Did they make bases somewhere?
Another TH-camr made a alternative plot in five minutes that still involved Alan, Margarit and Robin and was dramatically better and added a reason to go deeper and pursue the goals.
Which one?
The prawn suit is really nice for the land areas….instead of the snow fox.
It might have just been me but in subnautica you can build a base really anywhere you want but in bz I genuinely was getting frustrated at the fact I had no decent place to build one. And the only time I was genuinely scared in bz was when you get that first cutscene on the island because I never expected it from a game like this
36:30: Subnautica cannot be completed without building a Cyclops; you need to build a shield module in the Cyclops' module fabricator to build the Neptune rocket, so constructing a Cyclops is mandatory.
I went to that Phi base, that enclaved base near spawn, the greenhouse and the underwater mining facility before going onto that Delta island. So, by the time I had the map, I had mostly explored the entire map anyways. I chose to ignore story. With the island telling me to get off, I did. I had no interest staying either. Despite all my effort leaving the girl alone, she still accuses me of following her.
I ate peppers as the solution as soon as I found them. They made almost everything easy.
nothing about the first game is strictly horror either its just that there happens to be a feeling a lot of people get about the ocean and the murkiness of the unknown as shadows float in and out of view. So even if they did not intend for it to be horror it was going to be that for many people anyways as a pure consequence of how certain people react to ocean environments.
i think the biggest issue was it was an indie game that tried to go triple A to quickly. The hype i think was around that for an indie game it was surprisingly well done a game that has almost no narrative and no gun play or weaponry of any kind really. Because of the fact that the whole game just does actually exist around tedious crafting yes even the first one but was still somehow engaging was what made it a hit with people. but what made you not focus on it was that it was a unique experience to you. You explored at your own pace, everything was up to you. Thats how you can get away with at its core a very basic bare bones game in reality. If you start introducing characters then you have to go hard on it. You have to start playing with the big boys and not be held back by simple repetitive crafting mechanics. They need to decide which path to take. Indie survival or narrative experience with depth pun not intended. What you can't do is try and do both and then fail at both as well.
38:20
Subnautica 1 positive interactions with fauna :
1 stalker tooth
2 sea trader mineral spawn near foot and bio matter spawn
3 gazopod gaz capsules before they explode to make torpedo
4 some ressources on the back of whales
below zero positive interaction with fauna :
1 spiral plant inside ventgarden (big jellyfish)
2 sea monkey can give you materials
Well reviewed... Finished Subnautica 20 times... This one 2 and was bored and pushing at end of 2nd run. They gave up on immersion to provide some room for virtue signaling with the exaggerated diversity in cast. I do recommend building prawn suit -- use it for travelling and leave snow fox on its pad. One thing I particularly dislike is, instead of having to reach out farther into more dangerous territory for better tech / blueprints -- it's just a matter of the quantity of simple, mostly easily accessible alien devices that mostly look alike many in barely differentiated caves. If you want the transport module for your sea truck, you'll have to find them all -- that said, it's hard to find an excuse to use it. Land areas were cryptic but boring... fighting biggest predators to death with prawn suit was fun for a bit. Biggest problem is the size of the world in below zero is like 1/6th so bit clear why the feeling of exploration is blunted severely.
Thanks for the reply! I think another thing that contributes to BZ's world feeling smaller is the map you can find in the central habitat, which basically shows you all the areas of note in the game. Once you have a map, there's no reason to explore on your own.
Like why is my PDA an Indian accent?? Why cant I change it. Sometimes its hard to understand. They literally used an online tool for the computer voice in the PDA and switched it to Indian accent but dont let us switch it to something that might be easier to understand. Also…it lost its sense of humor.
I’m gonna say it right now.
I hate crystal caverns. I couldn’t finish the game. Why? Wasn’t because I was totally bored, wasn’t because it wasn’t as good. It was because my water ran out in the caves, and I couldn’t get out fast, so I was trapped in limbo of trying to get water over and over without being able to escape.
That sounds terrible. I hated the caves because it was almost impossible to find your way around thanks to the (lack of) visual design, but your story shows an awful consequence of that poor design.
Thanks for the comment!
If desperate you can eat gel sacs for water. I did that one time when I was lost in there and could not get out. Also the water filtration suit (if you find it) solves that problem by making you water. Just bring extra food.
@@aguyfromnothere that’s great but this comment is a year old bro
I agree with a lot of things people talk badly about Below Zero but they don't really take much of the enjoyment of the game from me.
I finished Subnautica for the first time recently in about 24 hours playtime (despite having played it about half way through 2 times prior) and have spent around 8 hours playing Below zero now and I almost enjoy it just as much. Maybe it's just that I enjoy Subnautica as a whole for a different reason than the majority of the playerbase or that 8 hours of playtime just isn't enough yet but I really love both games.
I think that 8 hours is long enough to comfortably say that you're enjoying Below Zero! At least in my case, something felt wrong almost immediately when I started playing, so if you're past that then I think you're good.
I think the majority of negative criticism for Below Zero (my own included) comes from the fact that it disregards the aspects of Subnautica that made it a truly unique and engrossing experience, and really fails to live up to its legacy. If you've enjoyed both games an equal amount then I guess it's just that you enjoy the games for different reasons, as you said.
Thanks for the comment!
Actually man I play both subnautica games stoned and it's fun as shit for me wherever I go.