The Sea Emperor could possess human-like intelligence and engage in dialogue with you.

[rudolf]

So, we're about to meet the sea emperor in the precursor aquarium, see it swim around, harvest what we need to cure Carar and that's it. Then we disable space gun and so forth. How does a player know to engage in any of these things? Now, the Sea Emperor eats only micro-organisms, even though a creature like this could probably devour reapers. Reason for this behaviour? Compassion. A Sea Emperor is a pacifist, understanding quality of life, the struggle between the fauna in the vast ocean, the sufficient nature of difficulties all organisms must endure on the planet. Therefore, the Sea Emperor doesn't have it in it's nature to engage in anything resembling aggressive behavior. Instead, the Sea Emperor, once with it's friends, swam in the seas, talked to each other, comforted each other.

So as the Player sets foot to the Prison Aquarium where the Sea Emperor lies, the precursors had indeed understood the self-awareness and the substantiality of it's thinking process that they had constructed machinery for translating this very thought process into signals and messages they could intepret. The Player, in order to communicate with it, must use this machinery to talk to the Sea Emperor, before he/she can continue with the quest of curing Carar and leaving the planet.

I had brainstormed dozens of possible courses of dialogue between the Player and the Sea Emperor, but I'm going to explain what I was after, because we're not going to settle with some skyrim-tier banter. It has a hint of Toriel from Undertale, but necessarily has the main point in philosophy, resembling, for example, the computer terminals from Talos Principle. So the dialogue is thought-provoking, but at the same time it provides you with a very unusual sense of comfort, after harvesting and surviving in the sea ambience and silence, only guided by the voice of your PDA for necessity.

So, to give this impression that the dialogue is VAST and seems infinite, there should be a lot of options to choose from, but from which many would also resemble what the player would actually want to ask. This is definitely not an easy task to accomplish with traditional dialogue systems from RPGs, but the options matter more than the implementation. All of the dialogue could be a breath of fresh air and unexpected from a survival game that has colossal creatures of carnage with you.

But that's just an idea in the end. I trust the developers so much with this game. The lore is phenomenally detailed and oddly engaging, a lot of history to root for. If all the pieces fit, Subnautica could honestly become a survival classic and a submarine exploration game that no other game could ever top.

[rudolf]

oh wow I just wrote an essay for Steam discussions...

[Alice]

kinda a different storyline that i can imagine: once the player entered lava zone,the virus would automatically infect the player which made him suffer from near-death situation. in order to find the cure,he must search deepin the lava lake to reach emperor facility to gain his cure.

but things won't go as smooth as we thought. several warpers appears as security system and activate code 419b4, destory every infected organism. that was a sad story,he was torn apart with a consicious mind,by the end of the final moment,the emperor established a mental link to this unfortunate victim,she spoke:James（players name）,are you there? Mary（his lover）? you are still alive? i'm sorry,James,things just happened you couldn't stop it.please let me go,you must accept the fact. no, Mary,i will go with you,i am already death now,nothing could stop me to stay with you...not yet（loudly alien voice）,he now realize Mary is dead for years,it is his memory and love brought up the illusions,or perhaps the introspection he wanted,because what standing behind Mary is the emperor.
dialogue: human,i am the sea emperor,Carar. for centuries i been prisoned for experiment,they（precursor）captured me and extract my tissues for bio-weapon development,many of my brothers/sisters died during the test. for a sole survivor like you,i had saw everything in you,your past is settled and cant be undone. your future is unknown... future?i am dead already,maybe you are just a ghost that walk in my mind to separate Mary from me....
pathetic human lifeform,a puppet,let me show you something（another storyline ）...James was shocked about the scene emperor showed.
he decided to avenge his family and save his daughter on sunbeam（misery）.


quite a exciting to imagine things,if you are interested please make a comment,may this be a good story

[rudolf]

I was driving how both the Sea Emperor and the Player are the last of their species on the planet which is why it would be good to have a confrontation of such magnitude, I still think they have to do the Sea Emperor so that it counterbalances all the loneliness on the planet. A lot can be done with the Emperor to turn the experience of the whole game and I think a lot of dialogue will suffice. Simple monologue from the Emperor will still leave the player with the sense that he cannot really affect a creature of this intelligence and must remain on a quest alone.

[The answer is the question]

Reminds of the dlc for mass effect 3 where you get to talk to a Leviathan.

[sonicmaster920]

dude that's actually a really good theory

[The answer is the question]

Yes its a good late game quest/back story idea.

Reminds me of a movie where a human and alien pilot crash land and being mortal enemies at first combat one another but later forge an uneasy friendship realizing they both die without cooperating.

http://m.imdb.com/title/tt0089092/plotsummary?ref_=m_tt_ov_pl

[Lobo'ren]

....... That was beautiful sir! I look forward to seeing this games story grow!

[sonicmaster920]

dude maybe ur rite, maybe the sea emperor is some kinda sentient being with vast intelligence and you would have to translate it....but you lost me here when you said disable the reaper mountain cannon from way down there would you not just go to the cannon and disable it from there

[maestro]

My theory for the end game and just a theory will be find Sea Emp eggs, cuz they contain the
'enzyme 42' to cure you of the Carar virus that you must have because the cannon won't let you disable it because you're infected (as seen on YT). Once cured, it will let you deactivate the gun and then something will be safe to come rescue you or you will build a ship or something.

What I'm really wondering is how wiki says Sea Emperors are algea eaters. Will that mean that they won't try to kill you?

[rudolf]

Originally posted by Maestro4202:

My theory for the end game and just a theory will be find Sea Emp eggs, cuz they contain the
'enzyme 42' to cure you of the Carar virus that you must have because the cannon won't let you disable it because you're infected (as seen on YT). Once cured, it will let you deactivate the gun and then something will be safe to come rescue you or you will build a ship or something.

What I'm really wondering is how wiki says Sea Emperors are algea eaters. Will that mean that they won't try to kill you?

This is precisely why I think they have a good place to be intelligent.

[SolarSabotage]

Originally posted by Maestro4202:

My theory for the end game and just a theory will be find Sea Emp eggs, cuz they contain the
'enzyme 42' to cure you of the Carar virus that you must have because the cannon won't let you disable it because you're infected (as seen on YT). Once cured, it will let you deactivate the gun and then something will be safe to come rescue you or you will build a ship or something.

What I'm really wondering is how wiki says Sea Emperors are algea eaters. Will that mean that they won't try to kill you?

Once you cure yourself of the Carar, you can go disable the Array, allowing you to build the rocket and escape the planet.

[OverwatchJunky]

Originally posted by sonicmaster920:

dude maybe ur rite, maybe the sea emperor is some kinda sentient being with vast intelligence and you would have to translate it....but you lost me here when you said disable the reaper mountain cannon from way down there would you not just go to the cannon and disable it from there:mno9mechanicalpower:

When you try to disable the cannon it says that the weapon can't be deactivated by anyone who is infected/contaminated by the Carar ifection due to the planetary quarantine.

[Guns4Hire]

The sea emperor will talk telepathicaly to you he will probably say this:hatch my eggs my babies have enzymes that will cure you forever then you scan yourself (Press R) and the PDA will say the infection is gone then you go back to the G.U.N deactivating it and then find all the items that will be needed to build a rocket

[rudolf]

It is now confirmed that the Sea Emperor will commence in telepathic dialogue with the player. It may or may not be because of this thread, but I feel very happy that there will be personality to this amazing creature https://trello.com/c/DeCG2FOn/6267-add-emperor-telepathic-dialog-for-triggering-earlier-in-the-game

[DeadlyDialga]

Originally posted by peremoinen:

It is now confirmed that the Sea Emperor will commence in telepathic dialogue with the player. It may or may not be because of this thread, but I feel very happy that there will be personality to this amazing creature https://trello.com/c/DeCG2FOn/6267-add-emperor-telepathic-dialog-for-triggering-earlier-in-the-game

It may. One of devs, TJ just asked if the players would like the PDA to translate or have a voice actor.