Subnautica 2 Early Access - Player Feedback & Suggestions

[Slav3106]

First, I want to say that the game’s graphics are great and look like a solid upgrade over the previous titles and older engine. After spending some time in Early Access, I’ve compiled some constructive feedback across a few key areas of the game to help with the journey to 1.0.

Visuals, Lighting & Resources

The game is incredibly vibrant and looks absolutely amazing at night. However, some visual features need a bit of attention. Depending on the lighting, it is currently very difficult to distinguish between minerals unless you are right on top of them. In the first Subnautica, we could easily spot quartz from afar, so the visual clarity of resources could use some tweaking. Additionally, the flashlight currently feels redundant. It provides more light than the Wakemaker, but not enough to justify taking up a precious inventory slot. In my playthrough, I quickly replaced mine with the Wakemaker and never looked back.

Flora, Fauna & Combat Mechanics

While the colors are beautiful, some of the creatures feel a bit too colorful to be genuinely scary, unless that is the intended direction. Their behavior is also a bit inconsistent right now. Hostile creatures act a bit like annoying mosquitoes—they bite quickly and often, but barely do any damage. It would be much more engaging if they were slightly slower (allowing us to actually use skill to dodge them) but dealt significant damage to make them a real threat.

Damage mechanics in general feel inconsistent right now. The Sonic Resonator is required to clear Bloom Clankers and successfully kills Bloom Parasites when targeted. However, neither the Sonic Resonator nor the Multitool is capable of dealing damage to any other creature in the game. On a similar note, regarding the developer philosophy of making Leviathans unkillable: I’d argue against this approach. Players should be able to deal damage. You could give them massive health pools based on difficulty so they aren't easily farmed, but we need "impact feedback." Hitting them should trigger roars, hit animations, fleeing, or boosted aggro. Even if the goal isn't to kill them, our desperate actions need to feel like they have a tangible impact.

Audio & Atmosphere

Subnautica 1 perfectly blended passive creature sounds, the soundtrack, and biome visuals—like the Gasopods echoing through the colorful Safe Shallows, contrasting with the murky, terrifying silence of the Lost River. Subnautica 2 has great music, beautiful visuals, and good sound effects, but they don't quite "stitch" together yet to create that same cohesive, immersive atmosphere.

A big part of this is the Leviathan audio. The "tense soundtrack" that plays when a Leviathan is near is a cool addition, but it shouldn't replace legendary sound design. Right now, the music activates when you just swim nearby, even if you haven't seen the creature. We need the return of terrifying, distant roars (like the Reaper). The roar itself should create the tension before the encounter. The dynamic music should act as a background enhancement, only taking over when the creature is in full aggro.

Map Design & Navigation

The new map feels dense and well-designed, but traversal feels a bit too shallow and easy. It feels like we are missing the best spatial features of the previous games: the massive, terrifying open spaces of S1 and the deep, complex underground tunnels from the very starting areas of Below Zero. It used to be incredibly easy to get lost and die in those deep tunnels, which made exploring them thrilling and highly replayable.

Speaking of traversal, is the Prawn Suit (or a similar vehicle) not returning? Given the lack of creature combat and the Sonic Resonator taking over large deposit mining, it seems that way. This would be a huge shame, as the Prawn Suit was one of the most iconic and fun features of the first game. We are definitely eager to see what you have planned here.

Balance & Replayability

For the final 1.0 release, we really need more difficulty options for high replayability. A standard run is fine, but players need hardcore, customizable experiences—similar to the popular "Deathrun" mod from the first game—rather than just standard permadeath. It would also be great to see some randomized progression. Categorizing blueprints into tiers and randomizing blackbox contents within those tiers would add massive replayability while preventing early-game soft-locking.

Finally, the survival pacing needs some adjustments. I built my base near the Old Habitat in the shallows and completely depleted the area of Bladderfish, to the point where hydration became incredibly annoying. It makes sense for deep, late-game areas to lack water resources, but the surface shallows shouldn't deplete this easily. Story, tech, and power progression also feel a bit too fast right now. I assume this is just compressed for Early Access testing so we can see all the features, but it will definitely need to be stretched out for the final release.

[my witness]

Great post, and I think a lot of what I'd add boils down to it being the 1st week of EA, like will we get more base deco/color customization, proper labels for tadpole (I can't get it to show up on mine so maybe it's half in there), a submarine meant to be piloted by 4 people but able to be piloted by 1?, etc.

Mechanicswise:

The dash is super useful to get early on, for example, but I have no incentive to try the other active mods at all or I lose critical movement. This is preference and a consequence of never taking it off for 20hrs, but something that should be considered.

Likewise, it seemed a bit easy to get biomods after getting a certain upgrade, where many felt less useful or game changing by that point. Maybe some can be adaptations instead, or more hidden, like I don't get told what to scan to unlock it, but i have to read my data bank or look for creatures and guess which one could have which mod to offer. One in particular seems a bit overpowered (camo) while another is visually nice but useless (biolum) - but I think the schedule mentioned eventually equipping multiple, which will be interesting to test as well.