What kind of suggestions does the Dev team actually consider?

BenGachowski

In my past experience with game companies, the development team only occasionally interacts with the community created for their game (Often, I assume, because the company has created the community not for actual suggestions or feedback, but to foster some kind of longstanding player base). Here I can see bug feedback is taken seriously and recorded in real time (that's actually a pretty cool feature), but the impact of game play or related suggestions is a bit harder to see. This not a criticism at all, I just personally want to know what kinds of game play feedback is actually taken in or utilized so I don't waste anybody's time with suggestions or ideas that are doomed to be ignored. I'm asking because I want to know about possible future modding support (this would be a great game to have flora and fauna mods for), and a lot of game devs have strong opinions and rules about things of this sort.

Racer1

To your question, UWE takes all feedback into consideration, and often incorporates (parts of) them into the game. That said, they have their own vision of what the game should be -- for example, remaining largely non-violent despite many suggestions to add all kinds of weaponry.

Regarding mods, UWE has said in the past they want to make the game moddable, but it will likely be after the game is otherwise feature complete and ready for "1.0". Even so, the extent to which modding will be possible is still very much uncertain due to the large number of tools and infrastructure required to make a "mod". I believe it likely that certain parts of the game will become moddable (perhaps scriptable missions)- but a comprehensive (change all aspects of the game) mod is almost out of the question.

Luitjens

Lots! Especially when you can write on their design/feature boards

https://trello.com/b/FQyYBk1n/subnautica-design

https://trello.com/b/WEDPjhjg/subnautica-feature-vote

Tryst

The most successful games allow player modding of some kind. However, it really does depend on how you restrict the mods to retain the balance. You can either have Skyrim style mods that allow the players to decide their own balance or you can maintain some control over things you don't want changed. It really depends on the way you allow them to be implemented.

For a sandbox style game like this, full open modding should be allowed so the players can have full access to creating their own balance. Farming Simulator 2013 started out with farming only until someone modded a forestry ability into it. The latest farming sim (FS14) now uses that forestry ability as standard so modders can often add things to the game that can even impress and inspire the developers.

Giving modders the ability to edit and alter parts of the map, add things to the map like new areas inside the Aurora, add and upgrade existing equipment, add new bits for the base and so on would open up the game for everyone. Modders are responsible for their own debugging etc and a new forum would be required for those using mods to give feedback to the modders themselves. Map edits are loaded separately to prevent overwriting of one mod with another (ie: two mods making new areas inside the Aurora etc).

Many games have done it and even the most obscure games such as Farming Simulator have profited from it.

It's worth a thought by the devs of this game. I am sure there are many people in the modding community that would love to get their hands on a game such as this. It would also improve sales if players could do the things they want to do in a game without taking all the developers time to add it to the game and thereby possibly spoiling the game for others who don't want it. Modding allows you to add mods to make the game what you want without it affecting anyone else.