Why is Robin so disinterested?

[OdinXivraj]

Is it just me or does Robin seem completely disinterested about damn near everything going on? The line delivery and writing are just awful. I just finished eliminating the Kharaa and uncovering the fate of Sam. Which is the whole point of the her trip there. And she talks like she's checking off her grocery list. After which the game basically is just like "Okay that's done. Go do the other thing now" no fan fair or anything to make the player feel like they did something. If Robin can't get excited for the happenings in the game can you really expect the player too?

I legit felt more attachment to the plot of the first game and that was just PDA logs and environmental cues. The idea for this games story is decent enough but the execution is horrendous. Seriously Robin is a Xenobiologist and she rarely makes attempts to learn about the Architects from Al-an. Settling instead for quips and the most general observations about how different the species are.

Anyone else feels this way? I still have to do that one last thing needed to trigger the ending but if its anything like that I really might just play something else. Remember the sense of triumph as you finally uncovered the what happened with the Sea Emperor and the Kharaa. Before finally escaping? Or putting together the importance of the peepers? I wanted that for the sequel but so far nothing...

[Ruiner]

"You can type this ♥♥♥♥, but you sure can't say it!". I don't blame the voice actor, she is a legit actor.

The writers weren't capable of making a character with any scientific interest or curiosity, so they wrote her as a tween. It's a huge mistake to have called Robin a scientist.

Really they should have just made her a passenger on a cruise spaceship with her parents, who found out her sister had died on a planet nearby so she launches a lifepod to find out what happened to her. The meteor storm would prevent any rescue.

There we go, from 5 minutes of thinking about it I improved their garbage writing.

[Atomsk]

Anyone who looks at this game critically will come to similar conclusions. Half the dialogue harks back to when they're playing silly games or pointless relationship drama. I'm still uncertain as to the point of Sam's story other then an excuse for Robin strand herself. Apparently death by negligible accident is unacceptable but dutiful terrorism is a-ok?

I kinda had to convince myself to just finish the game and get it over with. The conclusion to Al-an's story wasn't too exciting either. Tipped their hand too much on that one if you ask me.

Might as well finish it since you've already spend the money.

[Suomipoika11]

Yeah, compared to Subnautica, writing is quite meh. In original, even with plot armor on, you had urgency to head on deeper and deeper. Now, it's just busywork , if they'd had at least hinted that Sam might've been alive, or that Alans presence in your head would be detramental to your health.... One can only wonder how original script was going, before it was scrapped for ...reasons unknown.

[OnlyZuul]

The first iteration of the story made much more sense to me, I wish they had fleshed that one out instead of rewriting this nonsense they delivered to us.

[Montoya]

Actually from the earliest betas, the writing went way down. Originally there was a more fitting voice, much better setting (loved that one where you started working in a base and an avalanche destroyed it).... Lucky the game is not only history centred tho.
What annoys me a lot is that the game places 100000 audio and text logs on small areas, and it is difficult to keep up with them while exploring, checking for oxygen, etc as they interrupt each other. Robin will also interrupt the audio logs.

Plus they made the sister unlikable! I can't care a bit about her, all I can collect from logs is how annoying and pushy she was.

[Suomipoika11]

Speaking of writing quirks, was there ever any mention on how Margaret was still alive ? Sure, she's a tough one who could kill Leviathan with bare hands, but she got infected over 10 years ago, with no idea how to develop an antidote....

[Jekko]

Originally posted by Suomipoika11:

Speaking of writing quirks, was there ever any mention on how Margaret was still alive ? Sure, she's a tough one who could kill Leviathan with bare hands, but she got infected over 10 years ago, with no idea how to develop an antidote....

she survived inside the leviathan's belly and got carried to the arctic, her colleagues died of the virus but she lives... this grandma has a pretty beefy plot armor

[Meewec]

Originally posted by OdinXivraj:

I legit felt more attachment to the plot of the first game and that was just PDA logs and environmental cues. The idea for this games story is decent enough but the execution is horrendous. Seriously Robin is a Xenobiologist and she rarely makes attempts to learn about the Architects from Al-an. Settling instead for quips and the most general observations about how different the species are.

to be fair she is probably a bit more worried about having someone else in her head

plus, imagine the whining if she talked more than the story related occurrences that are already there.

for me the story never mattered much, it was there and interesting enough but i was hooked and invested in the base building. on that subject, it seems my below zero base i've started has an angry neighbor

[Suomipoika11]

Originally posted by Sotek Winsss:

Originally posted by Suomipoika11:

Speaking of writing quirks, was there ever any mention on how Margaret was still alive ? Sure, she's a tough one who could kill Leviathan with bare hands, but she got infected over 10 years ago, with no idea how to develop an antidote....

she survived inside the leviathan's belly and got carried to the arctic, her colleagues died of the virus but she lives... this grandma has a pretty beefy plot armor

That, or she has no white cells, only mini Kengish Khans....
Still, pretty bad plot oversight...

[AuldWolf]

The pieces are there if you care to notice them. I'll go over some of it, but this will have some spoilers for obvious reasons.

It's not disinterest, it's disdain. These are two very different emotions and Robin is conveying the latter. Well, to me they're different, anyway. You learn early on that Robin has a very sceptical perspective of the whole Alterra situation, she loves Sam but she begrudges her for being foolish enough to throw in with them. She has the passive anger of a very tired person who's watching their world burn.

One of the first logs you have access to tells a sordid tale of how Xenoworks had been acquired by Alterra, which means that soon all employees would be getting shiny new toys; Including an Alterra PDA. So why then did Robin keep her Xenoworks PDA? Her distrust for this transgov is off the charts. There are moments where you can hear sadness and resignation in her voice, nowhere is this more clear than when she finally eradicates the kharaa. Robin is a very depressed person as up until now, her Universe hasn't had much wonder.

You can hear into the game that Al-An and the architects have given her something of a glimmer of hope, this is where Robin often sounds at her most emotional. Such as when Al-An describes the harmony of the collective, and Robin tells him that she'll help him find that again. You can tell it sounds better to her than her own life's experiences, she's hopeful but also a little bitter about it too. You can see that in how she challenges Al-An's perspective of collectivism.

You hear her begin to open up toward the end of the game, being more emotive as she spends time with Al-An. She still has that jaded edge to her voice—you can hear it when she notes that some of Al-An's behaviour was manipulative—but she's opening up to the possibility that everything might not be terrible forever, that there might be a way that she could be happy.

In other words? Robin is a person who suffers with depression. The clues are all there, you just have to care enough to notice them. It doesn't help her that discovering what happened to Sam likely wasn't an accident. I won't spoil anything as it should be up to each player to put together that for themself. There were a lot of... unreliable characters amongst the Alterra crew, whom Robin saw right through but Sam was too trusting to be able to.

I like this. It isn't often that you experience a character who isn't of the status quo. I appreciate it. There are those who're more wearied by human behaviour than others. I mean, when I look around these forums and i see the dollar store white whine about the PDA voice, that's something I feel too.

Footnote: One other point I'll bring up is the dialogue between the two regarding sleeping. It's strongly hinted at that Robin has had some fairly awful nightmares, which is also indicative of depression. Al-An responds with how he'd prefer positive dreams, showing that seeing Robin in distress was a negative experience for him.

[Gared]

Originally posted by AuldWolf:

Footnote: One other point I'll bring up is the dialogue between the two regarding sleeping. It's strongly hinted at that Robin has had some fairly awful nightmares, which is also indicative of depression. Al-An responds with how he'd prefer positive dreams, showing that seeing Robin in distress was a negative experience for him.

I think you are looking into it too much. Or seeing something you want to see of yourself. Which is a beautiful thing about creative works and absolutely valid.

But still, you are adorning a mediocre story.

The dialogue you brought up about sleeping is a great example. In that dialogue, Al-An is surprised by the experience of being in the middle of disorienting and fragmented thoughts.
He questions the nature of it, to which Robin answers that no one knows why animals dream, and that it's a mixed bag. Sometimes she dreams of flying, sometimes it's chasing her sister (which relates to her current state of mind), and ... defending her doctoral in an underwear.

So, let's deconstruct it: she's saying, literally, as in quote: "we can experience impossible joy and also impossible terror in dreams". And then gives an example of being in her underpants.

Alright. let's consider this a batum-tsss, fake laughter moment. Or the fact that Robin is not about to spill her most intimate thoughts and conceal it in humor, although the delivery doesn't sound like it. She sounds pretty serious about it, but that's just my take on it. Moving on, Al-An replies: "your biofeedback indicates, that flying is the most enjoyable dream. I hope you have more of those, mainly for my own safety" - therefore concluding the underpants punchline.

I personally do not consider this good writing, if you are trying to talk about serious topics questioning humanity and our existence.
If your goal is to be humorous, then this instance is pretty low-grade humor, all things considered. Really, who among us had a hearty laugh hearing it?

But, I guess this writing is pretty good if you are doing something T-for-teens rated.
Although I don't think that teenagers are at all that deserving of this stereotype.
Because for someone facing serious existential questions for the first time in their life .. this writing is still pretty low grade. Underpants might work for some, I don't know

[Halliwax]

As I see it, some people complained that there was any monologue/dialogue from the playable character at all, and rather than commit to making that writing good in spite of complaints, the devs decided to cut a lot of it and make most of what's left to be generic quips.

In Subnautica 1, the people on board the Aurora and the Mongolian team were contractors looking to do a job. It makes sense that they might not get along that well when faced with the unexpected situation of crashing onto this alien planet.

But Below Zero makes the same mistake as the Prometheus movie. This time the crew are mostly scientists who know they're going to a dangerous place and with the expectation of encountering an intelligent alien civilization. It's not going to be a bunch of bickering regular Joes, they would be absolute professionals. In an interview about The Martian, Andy Weir talks about not falling into that trap of forcing conflict from interpersonal drama that wouldn't be there.

[RunningBare]

Originally posted by OnlyZuul:

The first iteration of the story made much more sense to me, I wish they had fleshed that one out instead of rewriting this nonsense they delivered to us.

This, the exhilaration felt when the avalanche buried the base was great, I thought this is gonna be an epic 2nd episode, then what we get is meh.

[IG-JF-CF]

I agree completely. This is the second draft of the story, but the first draft had the same problem. The protagonist was flippant and snarky and didn't seem interested in the environment. In both drafts I told the developers via early access feedback that it was dumb, and they ignored this feedback.

[Meewec]

Originally posted by Arkendight:

He questions the nature of it, to which Robin answers that no one knows why animals dream, and that it's a mixed bag. Sometimes she dreams of flying, sometimes it's chasing her sister (which relates to her current state of mind), and ... defending her doctoral in an underwear.

So, let's deconstruct it: she's saying, literally, as in quote: "we can experience impossible joy and also impossible terror in dreams". And then gives an example of being in her underpants.

Alright. let's consider this a batum-tsss, fake laughter moment. Or the fact that Robin is not about to spill her most intimate thoughts and conceal it in humor, although the delivery doesn't sound like it. She sounds pretty serious about it, but that's just my take on it. Moving on, Al-An replies: "your biofeedback indicates, that flying is the most enjoyable dream. I hope you have more of those, mainly for my own safety" - therefore concluding the underpants punchline.

going to school/work in your underwear/naked is apparently a common dream