![]() The player is given a set of survival systems that they’ve probably encountered in other games before: find food, find water. So, the first type of mystery they uncover is not a narrative one, but a systemic one. The player violently crashes on the surface of a planet they’re confused, the don’t have much narrative context, and they’re surrounded by a world that feels truly alien. The opening of Subnautica is an abrupt one. So, with that out of the way, let’s dive in! (That is the last ocean-related pun I’ll make in this essay, I promise). But if anything I’ve said piques your interest, I highly recommend you pick it up on your digital platform of choice and enjoy some of the most wonder-provoking experiences gaming has to offer. If you have no intention of playing Subnautiuca, and due to the intense thalassophobia it evokes, I can absolutely understand that, feel free to read on. ![]() I avoided wiki pages, trailers, and even other reviews of the game until I had finished it, simply because that particular rush of discovery is Subnautica’s emotional core. Even seeing screenshots of late game areas or learning about late-game craftables can take away from the exhilaration of seeing something for yourself for the first time. Being a game all about mystery, Subnautica’s experience is cheapened, though not ruined, if you lose the experience of discovering it for yourself. But what made that feeling linger? On a metatextual level, I enjoy that Subnautica had one last mystery for me to solve, and I hope that, through this essay, I can do that, because exploring Subnautica’s various mysteries has been one of my most engaging gaming experiences of the past two years.īefore I continue, I do want to give a spoiler warning of sorts. When recently starting my third playthrough of Subnautica, I was surprised to find that the sense of mystery was still present, even though I knew all the secrets of the game’s lore and the intricate details of its systems. ![]() I’ve played many games with fascinating systems to dig into, but on repeat playthroughs that mystery is gone, because I already know how they work. I’ve played many games with a mystery-focused plot, but on repeat playthroughs that mystery is gone, because I already know the answer to the mystery. *Something* about Subnautica makes me play and experience it differently from other games, even other games in its same survival-crafting-Minecraftlike genre. This has been my biggest barrier to writing about Subnautica, despite having played it for almost two years now. But the biggest mystery in Subnautica for me personally has been figuring out exactly how it evokes and maintains its sense of wonder. My favorite thing about Subnautica (2018) is that it is full of mysteries, from the backstory of the watery planet you crash land on, to the unique mechanics sets you discover, to the unmapped and objective marker-free world.
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