Feedback after first playthrough of early access

[Glakken]

*SPOILERS* Overall I really enjoyed the EA experience of Subnautica 2, I think the story was interesting and became more captivating as you progress. Learning about the bloom virus, it's effect on people and the aliens that came before kept me motivated to keep finding the black box recordings to uncover more of the story (I reckon I missed several on my first playthrough too). The logs were also really detailed and interesting to read, especially those that paralleled or were based on similar things on Earth.

Game optimisation was mostly great with only one or two occasions where I felt sudden performance issues (hot vents+large entities+tadpole+collision=lag). It also looks absolutely incredible, I was playing on high and it reminded me just how good SN1 looked, felt like this was a true successor to in regards to art/visual style (although the bloom is sometimes blinding depending on location).

Gameplay was fun, felt very similar to SN1 for the most part except with a bit more guidance via the blackbox locations which was appreciated from time to time (I've seen a lot of people struggle to find silver though so maybe there needs to be a bit of nudge to push the player there). The addition of augments is interesting but I feel like there are just some that are WAY more useful than others like the dash, movement speed or invis buffs. Hopefully the addition of more passive slots makes this less of an issue. The active slot feels like it's always going to be taken by the dash just because of how slow you move and how much mobility it gives you.

Some issues have carried on from the first game though, specifically scanning fragments for certain items. I must have found at least 5-8 scannable habitat builder fragments but only 1 flashlight fragment (I saw another at some point early on but didn't have the scanner at the time). This was an issue in the first game where it was easy to miss certain fragments that were very limited in quantity. It would be nice to see more fragments scattered about or added to existing locations in a manner that naturally adheres to your progression. I.e. flashlight/habitat build fragments together in the more midgame sections of the EA (hot vents for example) to ensure you have all the fragments you SHOULD have at that point in the game. In a similar vein, I got the repair tool WAY later than the tadpole which is probably a skill issue on my part but it would be nice to have them align together or have the base dock repair the tadpole if you miss the tool. Exploration should reward you with access to these basic tools/buildings earlier in the game instead of completely locking you out of some if you don't check a certain area imo. This also applies to inventory space, sometimes the biopods are very easy to miss and losing out on key inventory slots really sucks. I feel like this is going to force players into just googling the locations for the biopods with inventory increases instead of finding them as the game progresses. Maybe having the NoA terminals expand your inventory or guide you to the biopod (telling you to go find the biopod nearby) as you progress the story will help people not have FOMO of missing key upgrades.

The way the bioscanner was done was really nice, being told what you needed to scan instead of guessing makes things more enjoyable than running around and scanning random objects. Not to mention the data logs if you previously scanned them give hints to where you can find them again in case you forgot. This makes it less tedious to go back and rescan the lifeforms for your upgrades.

Lategame resources were a bit concerning to me. Conduit crystals seemed to respawn but Troilite was really hard to find and didn't seem to regrow/respawn at all. The axum bacteria also seemed limited in quantity. For me personally I think the axum bacteria is fine to have in limited amounts but seeing as how you need Troilite for late game upgrades and repairing the turbine it feels like it could be a bottleneck/progression stop for players. I built a scanner down near the metal farms to harvest them all and just had enough for my upgrades and fanblade. Idk how it's balanced for MP but it feels like it could be an issue in the future. Lithium is also a bit strange, you're told it's in locations with hot vents but a lot of times around those vents you'll only find sulphur and gold making it feel like it's a bit misleading as to where lithium actually spawns.

Lastly bugs, there are only a handful of bugs I experienced. Leaving the zone to the void triggers a pop warning that will retrigger every time you get back into a tadpole. This made scanning the shiver leviathan quite annoying as I had to mash ESC to close the pop up before I could move in the tadpole. Metal harvesters sometimes just seem to disconnect themselves from the grid/power if you die. Not sure why this happens or if that's the reason but they seem really inconsistent and I could never get them to produce anything. The tadpole with the hauler attachment also has issues docking at the moonpool, sometimes it works, sometimes it tells you there's something obstructing you at the same dock that you've used before. Dying in the shiver leviathans mouth also weirdly respawned me inside the tadpole? Not sure if this was due to the reduced damage upgrade or what but it bugged my character out so much I had to relaunch the game.

I really enjoyed my first playthrough of the EA and can't wait to see what comes next, hopefully we get to continue by crossing the trench to reach the tree using a cyclops equivalent in a later update. Curious to see where the alien storyline takes us.

[Commerçant Voyou]

How long ?

[Glakken]

Originally posted by Commerçant Voyou:

How long ?

Took me about 13.6hrs to complete almost everything on first playthrough.

[Diesel_77]

We only need one more troilite. We cant find anything near the lake pond radioactive thing. Any help?

[Sanquin]

Originally posted by Commerçant Voyou:

How long ?

I'm personally not done yet, but it seems like about 10~15 hours of content, including building a half-decent base.

[Glakken]

Originally posted by Damieeen:

We only need one more troilite. We cant find anything near the lake pond radioactive thing. Any help?

I think the metal farms are supposed to be able to generate resources like triolite but I could never get them to work. Maybe try building some in that metal farm area and see if you get anything.

[Cpt. ᛒarᛒossa]

Originally posted by Glakken:

Originally posted by Damieeen:

We only need one more troilite. We cant find anything near the lake pond radioactive thing. Any help?

I think the metal farms are supposed to be able to generate resources like triolite but I could never get them to work. Maybe try building some in that metal farm area and see if you get anything.

Put the troilite in the metal farmer. Takes 20 min to generate the ore.

[NickHaflinger]

Originally posted by Glakken:

The tadpole with the hauler attachment also has issues docking at the moonpool, sometimes it works, sometimes it tells you there's something obstructing you at the same dock that you've used before.

You can expand the moonpool in all directions. Should make it easier to dock with the hauler attachment.

[Glakken]

Originally posted by NickHaflinger:

Originally posted by Glakken:

The tadpole with the hauler attachment also has issues docking at the moonpool, sometimes it works, sometimes it tells you there's something obstructing you at the same dock that you've used before.

You can expand the moonpool in all directions. Should make it easier to dock with the hauler attachment.

I made a large moonpool specifically for the hauler but it just sometimes seems to struggle to dock probably due to the collision with the ground or the dock itself. Might need to elevate the actual room itself in order to fix it

[dididolbs]

Originally posted by Cpt. ᛒarᛒossa:

Originally posted by Glakken:

I think the metal farms are supposed to be able to generate resources like triolite but I could never get them to work. Maybe try building some in that metal farm area and see if you get anything.

Put the troilite in the metal farmer. Takes 20 min to generate the ore.

That doesn't work when you've used all of the troilite. Wish it did though because now I'm locked out of crafting the ultra high capacity air tank and more entangled power cells/mangalloy ingots

[legoholic]

Originally posted by dididolbs:

Originally posted by Cpt. ᛒarᛒossa:

Put the troilite in the metal farmer. Takes 20 min to generate the ore.

That doesn't work when you've used all of the troilite. Wish it did though because now I'm locked out of crafting the ultra high capacity air tank and more entangled power cells/mangalloy ingots

Yeah almost learned that one the hard way myself.

PS any chance you can share a bearing from the lifepod and depth for the Ultra High cap tank <.<