A Little Embarrassed...
SeaBlade
California Join Date: 2015-03-18 Member: 202287Members
California Join Date: 2015-03-18 Member: 202287Members
Hey, Marine Bio Major and SCUBA diver here! Been loving this game since the early days! Everything is so cool and refreshing to see. And I understand some of the "changes" or "suspension of belief" concepts in the game, like the hands being used in the swim animation (I usually slow down and hold the stasis rifle to avoid it hehe). My confession isn't like that.
OK have been fighting this since, I think, the Aurora update, maybe posting it here will get it off my chest. I am now scared when I play Subnautica. Like as if I am playing a horror game, but most horror games (save for jumpscares, obviously) do not scare me as much. I had no idea why, I love the ocean! I love Subnautica's ocean. Was it the Bone Sharks? No I love sharks! Elasmobranchs rule! Reaper Leviathan is scary right? Nah he is badass and makes me laugh when he gets me. Is it the huge depths that I go here compared to real life? Not really, I'd go deeper if I could do so safely irl.
So what is it?
I think I figured it out. When I learned diving, my teachers and even my father (old instructor) pounded the buddy system of diving into me. If I lose sight of my dive buddy on a dive, that is bad news. I switch into a management mode of "calm down, count 5 minutes on the computer and slowly look for bubbles." But in Subnautica's world, I am alone. So this dive buddy instinct is driving me nuts, but getting rid of that is a bad idea.
This is so embarrassing, among my video game friends I am the ocean freak and usually the least frightened by things, but this is just eating at me, and making me play less.
I understand that multiplayer might not be a thing, and if at all way later in the future. But I wish I had some kind of dumb AI thing that I could bring with me into here. Something that I knew I could see near me that can help me in case of trouble.
Maybe I should just stream and pretend something like Twitch chat is my dive buddy... They would get me killed but still... Another solution would be for me to somehow separate diving in games to diving irl, but Subnautica is so good and immersive that I don't want to do that either.
TL;DR
Not having a dive buddy scares me! And that is embarrassing to me. Not suggesting a fix, just getting it off my chest... Hah... OK feeling better...
OK have been fighting this since, I think, the Aurora update, maybe posting it here will get it off my chest. I am now scared when I play Subnautica. Like as if I am playing a horror game, but most horror games (save for jumpscares, obviously) do not scare me as much. I had no idea why, I love the ocean! I love Subnautica's ocean. Was it the Bone Sharks? No I love sharks! Elasmobranchs rule! Reaper Leviathan is scary right? Nah he is badass and makes me laugh when he gets me. Is it the huge depths that I go here compared to real life? Not really, I'd go deeper if I could do so safely irl.
So what is it?
I think I figured it out. When I learned diving, my teachers and even my father (old instructor) pounded the buddy system of diving into me. If I lose sight of my dive buddy on a dive, that is bad news. I switch into a management mode of "calm down, count 5 minutes on the computer and slowly look for bubbles." But in Subnautica's world, I am alone. So this dive buddy instinct is driving me nuts, but getting rid of that is a bad idea.
This is so embarrassing, among my video game friends I am the ocean freak and usually the least frightened by things, but this is just eating at me, and making me play less.
I understand that multiplayer might not be a thing, and if at all way later in the future. But I wish I had some kind of dumb AI thing that I could bring with me into here. Something that I knew I could see near me that can help me in case of trouble.
Maybe I should just stream and pretend something like Twitch chat is my dive buddy... They would get me killed but still... Another solution would be for me to somehow separate diving in games to diving irl, but Subnautica is so good and immersive that I don't want to do that either.
TL;DR
Not having a dive buddy scares me! And that is embarrassing to me. Not suggesting a fix, just getting it off my chest... Hah... OK feeling better...
Comments
I'm a former SCUBA diver. The world of Subnautica is particularly scary for a number of reasons... Most probably because it's meant to be.
In my case, it isn't the lack of a buddy that gives me the heebie-jeebies. Truth be known, roughly half of my logged diving hours were spent looking for buddies who suddenly decided to go 'Thataway' (without letting me know) for no particular reason. Pretty damned irritating. Ruined quite a few otherwise enjoyable dives.
You might say that I became accustomed to solo diving rather too easily. Therefore, not a huge fan of the multi-player Subnautica concept.
Actually, I find the smaller creatures far more unnerving than any of the Xeno-Selachii or Mister Reaper himself. Bleeders, Crashes and Biter Fish give me the absolute yips. Fortunately, the fact that they emit audible warning sounds diminishes their psychological impact, but that doesn't count for much when one of them spawns right behind you. Ah, the joys of having a 'slow' PC.
The phrase "blind, flailing panic" seems to adequately describe what happens next.
Those numbers on the depth gauge worry me the most. Diving on pure O2 at 500 metres shouldn't be happening. This tends to play on my mind a bit, too. Add a constant barrage of ominous hull noises and other assorted weird sounds, and you've got a game that is apparently designed to keep scraping away at your already red-raw nerves.
All things considered, you've got nothing to be embarrassed about.
Just pretend your really using some mixed gas and the O2 on the HUD just stands for the O2-part of the mix.
And maybe its really meant that way.
Well looks like we have different sources of panic, even irl I can recall playing with things like Arrow Worms during night dives as they tried to bite at me. Little guys and big guys, not much difference to me, I just try to remember to respect their space and expect the unexpected from them. Diving always has something exciting!
Oh yeah, the depth freaks me out, my dives average only at 60 feet, probably less. So like 20 meters lol
Oh don't worry, even the most experienced divers will get goosebumps in pure blue waters, having no references is freaky. I think I get that feeling, but I wouldn't say I hate the unknown. It's just unsafe to not know how deep the water is. I am excited on dives because I don't know what I will see, so I love the unknown, but fear the unsafe! And water where you cannot see any reference points is just unsafe, we don't even have a depth line... Which would be a useful item indeed. Like drop a line down as reference to the surface, I know we have a gauge, but just having something besides pure and utter "blue-ness" around you as you descend is nice. Like having an anchorline to descend on. I am working on building a vertical base down to the reef to see if it removes goosebumps XD
Not really, it'd be cool, but I could care only a little less if the concept of multiplayer comes to fruition. I have friends that don't dive that would find this a cool way to pretend to be my dive buddy lol.