Will you buy Subnautica 3 in EA, on release or not at all?

[リアンダ]

I've bought both Subnautica and Subnautica BZ in Early Access. While I did not regret that decision for the originial I wish I had waited to make a more informed buying decision when it comes to the latter. BZ is in my books an inferior product to the original in almost every aspect and not worth the 30 USD asking price.

Personally I'm not sure which direction UWE will go with part 3. Will they take notice of the drastically lower sales of BZ compared to the original? That BZ has about one third of the reviews and about one third of the daily active users the original has? Will they return to a more sandbox open world, with plenty of space to build and explore and a protagonist that doesn't banter 24/7 taking away any sense of danger, isolation and loneliness? Or will they double down on a linear, shallow (in every sense of the word) experience in a world that has been tamed by mankind to a degree where a geriatric women infected with a supposedly deadly disease can survive on her own for years.

Personally I am not sure which way they will go but the phrases "Californian developer" and "listening to player feedback" don't go together very well these days. So my guess is we'll probably get another relatively linear experience that ignores gameplay in favor of investing ressources into elaborate cutscenes, neverending audiologs, and other plot centric gimmicks. A plot that will once again one dimensionally deal with such novel topics like "destroying evironment: bad, big corporations: bad" while featuring a stereotypical sassy poc woman.

So personally I won't be buying SN3 unless there is plenty of stellar post release reviews from critics I know allign well with my own personal taste instead of buying the game blindly. But what do you think? Will you buy the game day one? I would love to hear what you think, where you agree and/or disagree. Wish you all a nice weekend.

[Lywelyn]

SZ smelled woke from miles away just by looking at reviews, and little investigation gave way to realisation, and so i voted with the only tool efficient for that, the wallet ofc.

a 3rd entry in this licence ? sure why not... i'll wait to see once the game is out and investigate again before a buy...

[*Gen*HeroCrusher]

If the Devs can stop virtue signaling it might be worth a buy.

[Shait]

Never, I do not support woke mind virus and virtue signaling.

[Cockadoodledoo]

Unsure, they played too many and all wrong cards with BZ. I am not buying into EA again.

[リアンダ]

Lywelyn a écrit :

SZ smelled woke from miles away just by looking at reviews, and little investigation gave way to realisation, and so i voted with the only tool efficient for that, the wallet ofc.

I don't think they needed a consultancy group like SBI for the game to feel woke since the studio is located in one of the most liberal states in one of the most liberal countires in this world. But either way I hope they return to a politically neutral position where escapism is the focus rather than "current year"-ing the game. I think SN1 struck that balance quite well. If they do explore the topics of corporate greed and the destruction of the environment (again) I hope it's in a truly meaningful way for once. Give us gameplay options where certain methods of ressource gathering are efficient but unsustaineable wgile others require extra work but are sustaineable on the long run. Let us explore on our own how to balance efficient survival with being mindful of the exploitation of the environment rather than simple messaging à la "destroying the nvironment is bad mkay. Big corporations and capitalism are also bad mkay."

[Kikinaak]

Saw the game was on sale, and dropped into the forums to see if they've fixed the horrific eating and drinking sounds. After years of feedback on the first game and this one, nope. Until they demonstrate theyve learned by making both existing games misophonia tolerable, my odds of buying anything from these devs are sub zero.

[SoulSlayer]

they claim subnautica 3 will be co op so that will be a buy for me

[Casino]

Kikinaak a écrit :

Saw the game was on sale, and dropped into the forums to see if they've fixed the horrific eating and drinking sounds. After years of feedback on the first game and this one, nope. Until they demonstrate theyve learned by making both existing games misophonia tolerable, my odds of buying anything from these devs are sub zero.

They're much, MUCH better than they used to be in my opinion.

[Freedom Manager]

Not too hopeful, but I will anyway.

[The Seraph of Tomorrow]

Long Story Short:

Probably Not

Why?

As you can see by looking at my comment, I never bought "Below Zero" because of a long series of design choices that deviated from the original formula.

- Failed to revive the mystery that made the first game great.
- Poor Story
- (Annoying) Chatty Characters
- Lack of Immersion
- Obvious Political Undertones and Overt Political Design Choices.
- (Bad) Design Choices Made for Plot Convince
- Voiced Protagonist
- Not creating more Large and Massive creatures
- The unknown is scarier than the known, and the horror was gone once this was abandoned.

Players like myself (most Subnautica players) just wanted to see a vastly improved and expanded upon version of the original Subnautica. A bigger play area, new creatures, new mysteries, new gadgets. and wild new biomes. Instead what we got instead was a bad story.

I don't have much hope for any future titles by the team, as they have shown that they made the first game well because they had to in order to succeed. Now with a larger budget, they make what they want and are happy to spite their own customers.

The Subnautica team should take notes from the game P.A.M.E.L.A if they want to add voiced characters to the plot. https://store.steampowered.com/app/427880?snr=5000_5100___primarylinks

[リアンダ]

KaveMan a écrit :

Both games were absolutely brilliant, Supported both during early access, Was a great pleasure to have been part of the development process..

Having an active working relationship with the devs does kind of invalidate your opinion on this matter don't you think? Of course you're gonna buy a product you've been working on. You should ask them for a key or an artist copy btw, most my clients tend to give me copies of their products if I ask them nicely.

KaveMan a écrit :

PS: Just sad that the public consensus bias ruined it, Can't trust the public negative opinion, They don't know what is good.

Am I so out of touch? No it's the children who are wrong!

But seriously let's assume that there is a consensus bias. Why did it affect Below Zero but not the original. In other words why was BZ treated unfairly and the original wasn't. I would love to hear your explanation for this.
Personally I like to think my explanation for it is fairly simple. A lot of talent left the company or was fired. The remaining team/new hires misunderstood what made SN1 a hit, ignored most feedback reminding them to not stray too far from the original formula and as a result failed to catch lightning in a bottle for a second time. That's it, there's no mysterious "consesus bias", no grand conspiracy.


Now if I had to guess the core ingredients for a SN it would be these. Implement them and you'll probably please most of the fanbase:

- a main focus on the gameplay loop of upgrading your gear to dive deeper to find new upgrades to dive deeper to find new upgrades etc.
- upgrades are aquired in a non linear fashion, eg spawn in multiple semi randomized locations to enhance replayability
- meaningful and organic interactions with the environment. This means more varied creature behaviour and more varied ways of collecting ressources
- enough space to build large bases in a variety of locations and maneuvra large submarines like the cyclops
- unscripted player stories are pretty much always more important than scripted stories. Meeting your first reaper leviathan proably stuck more in you head than meeting the sea emperor. Create gameplay mechanics flexible enough to allow for such organic encounters rather than focussing on linear story telling devices
- communicate a felling of loneliness and challenge adequate for your underwater Ronbinson Crusoe tale. No bantering scientists, no geratric women, no bored space handyman complaining about alien bird poop. If the player encounters traces of other humans they should always serve as reminders of how unknown, unforgiving and dangerous this alien planet is
- make sure your game's protagonist is a quiet one. Leave the players alone with their own thoughts and impressions. Let the music and environmntal storytelling do the talking for you rather than a protagonist who never takes her circumstances seriously.
- add optional (!) coop. Personally I prefer playing games like Subnautica solo but I have seen plenty of players asking for a coop mode for years now so I think on average it would be a welcome addition if it's optional.
- And finally hire Alex Ries again. Dude is an absolute genious, loved the work he did on Below Zero.

[Hotklou]

ShakingZealot a écrit :

KaveMan a écrit :

Both games were absolutely brilliant, Supported both during early access, Was a great pleasure to have been part of the development process..

Having an active working relationship with the devs does kind of invalidate your opinion on this matter don't you think? Of course you're gonna buy a product you've been working on. You should ask them for a key or an artist copy btw, most my clients tend to give me copies of their products if I ask them nicely.

Every single player that gave the devs feedback, suggestions and bug reports during the Early Access period of the game were part of the development process of the game, you know? That doesn't mean they all were on the development team though, but they did contribute to the development of the game through their feedback. Every game needs playtesting, and would likely be better off if the players gave good and useful feedback, not only to report issues and give the devs inspiration for new things to add, but also to tell the devs what they like and what not and how things could perhaps be changed to be more to their liking. That is largely what Early Access is used for these days.

[リアンダ]

Hotklou a écrit :

ShakingZealot a écrit :

Having an active working relationship with the devs does kind of invalidate your opinion on this matter don't you think?.

Every single player that gave the devs feedback, suggestions and bug reports during the Early Access period of the game were part of the development process of the game, you know?

Wait you really think that when the poster said "Was a great pleasure to have been part of the development process" he was just talking about buying and playing the game in Early Access. Well in this case I guess I need to update my résumé. It appears I have "developed" lot more games than I inititally thought...

Hotklou a écrit :

That doesn't mean they all were on the development team though, but they did contribute to the development of the game through their feedback

Here's the reality of Early Access. Early access games are, for the most part games released incrementally through vertical slices. It's very rare to see games that truly are in "Alpha stages" when they enter Early Access and the few that are often confuse players. I can garuantee you if you released a real aplha game to the public, including grayboxed levels, placeholder meshes, unpolished UI, etc. you'd get torn apart in the review section. What players get served as "Early Access" on Steam is ususally very far along in the developement cycle and as a result will often not see any significant changes. Maybe a blance tweak here and there or a new soundfile or slight tweaks to a model like chaning the hairstyle, etc.

You can easily test this yourself. Try to think about the three most significant changes to SUbnautica Below Zero that were implemented because of player feedback. We're they really impactful on the game as a whole. Or did the devs pretty much decide what the game would really be like long before it ever went into Early Access. Meaning your involvement into the developement cycle is almost exclusively limited to providing them with additional funding, helping them to gauge customer interest in their product and finding the occasianal bug here and there. There's nothing wrong with this btw, but thinking you were involved in the developement because you bought a game in Early Access is like saying you helped write a book because you preordered it on Amazon.

[Hotklou]

ShakingZealot a écrit :

Hotklou a écrit :

Every single player that gave the devs feedback, suggestions and bug reports during the Early Access period of the game were part of the development process of the game, you know?

Wait you really think that when the poster said "Was a great pleasure to have been part of the development process" he was just talking about buying and playing the game in Early Access. Well in this case I guess I need to update my résumé. It appears I have "developed" lot more games than I inititally thought...

The early access players that gave the developers feedback were not developers themselves, but they did help the developers through their contributions, even if only a little, to shape the game into what it is today. I'm sure there were bugs were reported by players, if nothing else, and those bug reports were most definitely "contributions to the development process". There are many different roles that need to be filled when developing a game, and playtesting is one of them. And there are almost always players during the early access period of a game on Steam that could be considered such, since they play the game and then contribute their feedback.

[リアンダ]

Hotklou a écrit :

. I'm sure there were bugs were reported by players, if nothing else, and those bug reports were most definitely "contributions to the development process".

So the biggest contribution of the collective playerbase was finding a few bugs here and there. Do you really think this is significant enough to feel like you are part of the developement? It's a bit like saying "I helped build that restaurant" because you ate there once and told a waiter you found a typo in the menue. I mean if we follow the previous poster's logic it would be pretty much this. I will buy Subnautica three in Early Access because I was part of the developement by buying Subnautica 2 in Early Access. By that logic every game that offers Early access would be wortth buying because it then makes you part of the games developement.

I'm not trying to be an ahole here btw but collectively finding a few bugs here and there is not what I consider to be involved in the development of a game. If you have ever seen a professional QA tester at work you will have notcied how they spend their entire workday actively breaking the game, deliberately tackling areas where they think bugs may occur. They will actively try to produce crashes, maybe by dropping a few hundred objects in Subnautica's persitent world or by exiting and entering a loading area quickly, or abusing Ai, find holes in level geometry, glitching through walls by messing with colliders, etc. They will usually do this with checklists, reproduce known bugs in other areas where they may occur, then suggest solutions how these bugs could be avoided, etc. A QA tester doing their job is definitely a developer but just playing a game in Early Acess doesn't really seem comparable to that.