There’s still no solid release date for Subnautica 2, but the studio making the fishy survival game have given folks a glimpse beneath the surface of development in a devlog video. There are shots of a bubbly submarine speeder pod, and a brief sighting of a sea creature that does an annoyed underwater bark at you, before headbutting something it doesn’t like. We also get some idea of co-op, with footage of two players helping each other out – a feature that’ll be new to this sequel.
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“We’ve taken everything that we’ve learned from our experience on the previous games
and we’ve poured it into Subnautica 2,” says Design Lead, Anthony Gallegos. The video shows the developers testing lots of stuff in Unreal Engine, like building bases, repairing vehicles, and scanning lifeforms. There’s a little taster of what it’ll be like to build things side by side with a pal – nothing new for survival games but a still novelty for Subnautica. The plan is to allow up to four players.
It’s not a long video and it doesn’t make huge waves in terms of its revelations but it does cause a few interesting ripples. One new thing in this sequel is that you’ll “evolve your genetics to adapt your body for survival” in the water. And we get a hint of how that’ll come about – the player scans some slime and finds “useful genetics”, which your computerised assistant recommends you expose yourself to. Of course. What could go wrong?
I could get into every little detail hidden away in the video. I’m intrigued by the environments listed in Unreal, for example. The “Shallows” and “Plateaus” sound familiar to those who’ve played the first Subnautica (one of our best survival games). But the “Observatory” and the “Graveyard”? I would like to know more.
No. No. I should stop. Subnautica is best enjoyed when you don’t know what’s lurking out in the depths. All the beauty of Unknown Worlds’ survival games comes from piecemeal discovery, in the slow methodical exploration that comes from unlocking a slightly swimmier set of flippers or a breathier oxygen tank, letting you go deeper and further than before. The studio has more of these “road to early access” devlogs planned, they say, but part of me wants to shut my eyes and wait. Subnautica 2 is coming out “later in the year”, with a few biomes and an incomplete story.
