my feedback after 125h...
daganael
france Join Date: 2018-02-09 Member: 237219Members
france Join Date: 2018-02-09 Member: 237219Members
HI everyone,
First things first, I have to say that it’s the best game I’ve played in years, by far ! Everything is great : the story, the look, the immersion, the rhythm. The time-capsule, man, what a great idea ! You guys did an incredible job there !
It so incredible, it feels like a good book : you want to rush into it and, in the same time, you don’t want it to end, ever… It needed to be said because of course I’m gonna talk about what I feel is wrong or need improvements.
DISCLAMER : My 50c only. I don't pretend I'm right, so haters be civil. I'm just sharing my thoughts about a game, nothing important
also english is not my native language. please be nice about it
I. let’s starts with the small things
- ladder in bases need the same animation as in the escape pod or the cyclops.
- energy balance is overall fine maybe a bit too easy on us but it seems that fully charged or unused module have a huge impact. Like a fully charged seemoth docked in a moonpool use a lot of energy anyway. Same feel about the modification station. shame.
- we need a way to monitor time, a simple day/night cycle monitor in the PDA would do.
- upper light in the prawnsuit doesn’t feels right. If you’re too close to something, the light seems to come only from the bottom and so, you’re basically blind.
- desk should do something in the base, like being able to shut the lights and other small things.
- please add distance in beacons overview and maybe rename capability
- day/night cycle should not affect lighting condition in (deep) caves. It’s weird.
- small lockers can be named, not the big ones which are the one you want to use in 95% of the game, shame. An elegant solution (to me, don’t trash !) would be to assign an icon to the locker and to display it within the yellow circles on the locker.
- due to the prawnsuit design, and to have a common gameplay through all vehicles, you should add a keyboard lights toggle in vehicles and remove or reassign the right-clic in the seemoth and the cyclops.
- scanners should not get already-looted-results (databoxes but also stones and minerals. If we took it, it’s not there. don’t scan it
)
- add a blueprint for extinguisher and its wall mount
- put the name on both sides of the vehicles...
- let us rotate the moonpool as any other base blocs
- let us choose the LOD distance
II. then come the cyclops. The ship is great but the control panel and most of the bridge section doesn’t work.
- the settings panel (colours, name) should be moved to engine section, close to the upgrade fabricator or on the other side, in the unprades panel. Another solution is to put it in tabs in the docked vehicle panel.
- Instead, put a 3D holographic of the cyclops to replace the health monitor you got and add to it a display of what battery’s left (holographic cylindre of each battery with in level and color change (green, orange, red)). It’s very annoying to have to enter pilot mode to see how much battery’s left or run to the engine’s room.
- should be able to change light to red manually for diving.
- Maybe all predators should respond to light as they respond to sound. It would add interesting gameplay, forcing us to be blind in many occasions.
- to be honest, and maybe it’s a game design choice, but we don’t see a damn thing when moving this thing. Even tho the window is quite bigger than the seemoth’s ! Two reason for that I think :
* the point of view is fixed whereas on the seemoth you alway look through the clear part of the window. it may be interesting to change that into a seated-moving-pilot-position : you sit on a chair that rolls inside the window sphere (to some extends) to let you look at what you want (and not you feet…) The HUD follows. It would also have more high-techy feel than the current ‘nautilus’ one. Like a seemoth front for the cyclops. Moving the first person view to manage engines and upgrades is very cool, so to keep it. Add a keyboard toggle for free view. The 3 cameras make the cyclops… workable. But let’s be honest, it’s shitty to move this thing around. As it is, you don’t explore the world with your e-peen submarine. you recon with the seemoth, put a beacon, come back to board cyclops, rush to the beacon
* too many things in the display with the wrong sizes… Remove the old-school compass, put a smaller version of the holographic display instead and a light (but readable) compass on it (maybe a « rose-des-vents » on the cross plane of the holographic display) that way we can have important informations in front of us and see to the right.
- it doesn’t feel right that you cannot add the vehicle upgrades console in the cyclops (if I missed it, I’m so sorry). There’s room for it as an upgrade of the vehicle console that came with the cyclops or, as it is, on the other side of the ship. Plus… the only time you need the prawn suit thermal reactor, is also the first time you got a chance to get some kyanite… and you can’t craft it… unless you go base and back, takes hours… so you don’t do it and the module is useless. Because when you’re back home (if you go back at all…) the game is finished. Well…
III. end game
the game suffers form some lack of purpose to a major part of it : building your base. I mean, except for the vehicle upgrade console in the moonpool (and if you put it in the cyclops….) there’s just absolutely no point building a base at all. None. Except that it’s cool, fun to some extend. But do you need it as a part of the game ? No, you can put everything you need in the cyclops and more and it's way better to have everything with you at all times than to go back and forth all the time. In a locker, put what you need for a scanner (scanner room + range upgrade + multipurpose room + bio reactor + one fish or mushroom to put in it) and you’re all set. So you might as well put in that locker what you need for the moonpool and the console too… well you get my point. We need a purpose to this base. And, as you can imagine, I have some ideas about it but let’s continue with issues for now.
End game scaling... That’s a problem many many games have. You’re building something brick by brick. It’s hard. Everything you drop as a meaning and is precious. You even plan dives for this or that, to get to your next goal and suddenly you have a prawnsuit and now, in one or two drilling, you have more materials than you need through the entire game…
At that point in the game, you loose the survival aspect of the game to a more straight forward scenario. Now you’re like : « that cyclops was very cheap… » and the launch pas and neptune ? as good as free. Now you get that the crafting part and its economy is more a pretext to the scenario than an actual part of the gameplay. So it loose taste and you’re only option is to rush to the end of the game. It’s sad if you ask me. Because, who want’s to leave this planet ? hum ? it’s amazing here ! I want to know every part of it. I want more.
IV. I know it’s not a beta anymore but I give you my ideas anyway.
we need more purpose for the base, for the prawn suit… make it bigger and more expensive !
For exemple you can make the electronics not refundable when deconstructing. That way we have to think carefully before deconstructing all the time.
What you can do is adding bigger/usefull elements that cannot be moved around in a locker. Something big (not movable => base), expensive in ressources (give sens to the prawnsuit other than the scenario needs), and useful for explorers/survivors (people who want to stay in the ocean as I do). Here’s my idea :
Add a map room, a big expensive map room. The map would not be provided. players will have to build it, brick by brick, using scanners and sonars. Informations collected by scanners and sonars will feed the map datas. Give sens to the exploration and help you find everything and not give it up to google at some point.
To go with it, and because we already move the scanner with us in the cyclops, add a bigger submarine. One with a built-in scanner, rooms for two vehicles. make it big so it cannot go everywhere (not in the deep for instance, no need to change everything to the scenario, it great as it is). Something like the beluga or the draconis : https://www.behance.net/gallery/13857237/SUBNAUTICA
the way I see it :
- you need a blueprint for a builder arm for the prawnsuit (2 parts). normal components.
- you need a blueprint for the map room (4~5 parts). can only be built with the prawnsuit equipped with the new arm. very expensive
- you need a blueprint for a build/docking station for the new sub like the neptune (4 parts or more). can only be built with the prawnsuit equipped with the new arm. expensive
- you need a 3 parts blueprint for each sections of the sub (5?). each section needs to be build separately (like the neptune) and is expensive. parts could be : engine, bridge, cargo, bays, scanner
- once built the sub needs to be docked in it’s station for charging it’s big energy needs (no removable batteries. => justify nuclear reactor in the base)
Some ideas about that new sub :
* scanner needs to be operate manually, so you cannot activate and move the sub around for fast datas mapping.
* scanner range can be set by user to some extend. greater range implies more energy consumption.
* pilot tech might be VR in game (you sit and VR glasses come down on your head) => no need for a front pilot post. no visibility issue. feels highthecky
this might give a nice gameplay for explorers, give more sens to the prawnsuit gathering and to a fixed base.
There it is, it's all for now. I might edit the post to add some more while playing a new game, hardcore mode this time.
Cheers all, enjoy subnautica and see you after the next dive
-daganael-
First things first, I have to say that it’s the best game I’ve played in years, by far ! Everything is great : the story, the look, the immersion, the rhythm. The time-capsule, man, what a great idea ! You guys did an incredible job there !
It so incredible, it feels like a good book : you want to rush into it and, in the same time, you don’t want it to end, ever… It needed to be said because of course I’m gonna talk about what I feel is wrong or need improvements.
DISCLAMER : My 50c only. I don't pretend I'm right, so haters be civil. I'm just sharing my thoughts about a game, nothing important
also english is not my native language. please be nice about it
I. let’s starts with the small things
- ladder in bases need the same animation as in the escape pod or the cyclops.
- energy balance is overall fine maybe a bit too easy on us but it seems that fully charged or unused module have a huge impact. Like a fully charged seemoth docked in a moonpool use a lot of energy anyway. Same feel about the modification station. shame.
- we need a way to monitor time, a simple day/night cycle monitor in the PDA would do.
- upper light in the prawnsuit doesn’t feels right. If you’re too close to something, the light seems to come only from the bottom and so, you’re basically blind.
- desk should do something in the base, like being able to shut the lights and other small things.
- please add distance in beacons overview and maybe rename capability
- day/night cycle should not affect lighting condition in (deep) caves. It’s weird.
- small lockers can be named, not the big ones which are the one you want to use in 95% of the game, shame. An elegant solution (to me, don’t trash !) would be to assign an icon to the locker and to display it within the yellow circles on the locker.
- due to the prawnsuit design, and to have a common gameplay through all vehicles, you should add a keyboard lights toggle in vehicles and remove or reassign the right-clic in the seemoth and the cyclops.
- scanners should not get already-looted-results (databoxes but also stones and minerals. If we took it, it’s not there. don’t scan it
)- add a blueprint for extinguisher and its wall mount
- put the name on both sides of the vehicles...
- let us rotate the moonpool as any other base blocs
- let us choose the LOD distance
II. then come the cyclops. The ship is great but the control panel and most of the bridge section doesn’t work.
- the settings panel (colours, name) should be moved to engine section, close to the upgrade fabricator or on the other side, in the unprades panel. Another solution is to put it in tabs in the docked vehicle panel.
- Instead, put a 3D holographic of the cyclops to replace the health monitor you got and add to it a display of what battery’s left (holographic cylindre of each battery with in level and color change (green, orange, red)). It’s very annoying to have to enter pilot mode to see how much battery’s left or run to the engine’s room.
- should be able to change light to red manually for diving.
- Maybe all predators should respond to light as they respond to sound. It would add interesting gameplay, forcing us to be blind in many occasions.
- to be honest, and maybe it’s a game design choice, but we don’t see a damn thing when moving this thing. Even tho the window is quite bigger than the seemoth’s ! Two reason for that I think :
* the point of view is fixed whereas on the seemoth you alway look through the clear part of the window. it may be interesting to change that into a seated-moving-pilot-position : you sit on a chair that rolls inside the window sphere (to some extends) to let you look at what you want (and not you feet…) The HUD follows. It would also have more high-techy feel than the current ‘nautilus’ one. Like a seemoth front for the cyclops. Moving the first person view to manage engines and upgrades is very cool, so to keep it. Add a keyboard toggle for free view. The 3 cameras make the cyclops… workable. But let’s be honest, it’s shitty to move this thing around. As it is, you don’t explore the world with your e-peen submarine. you recon with the seemoth, put a beacon, come back to board cyclops, rush to the beacon
* too many things in the display with the wrong sizes… Remove the old-school compass, put a smaller version of the holographic display instead and a light (but readable) compass on it (maybe a « rose-des-vents » on the cross plane of the holographic display) that way we can have important informations in front of us and see to the right.
- it doesn’t feel right that you cannot add the vehicle upgrades console in the cyclops (if I missed it, I’m so sorry). There’s room for it as an upgrade of the vehicle console that came with the cyclops or, as it is, on the other side of the ship. Plus… the only time you need the prawn suit thermal reactor, is also the first time you got a chance to get some kyanite… and you can’t craft it… unless you go base and back, takes hours… so you don’t do it and the module is useless. Because when you’re back home (if you go back at all…) the game is finished. Well…
III. end game
the game suffers form some lack of purpose to a major part of it : building your base. I mean, except for the vehicle upgrade console in the moonpool (and if you put it in the cyclops….) there’s just absolutely no point building a base at all. None. Except that it’s cool, fun to some extend. But do you need it as a part of the game ? No, you can put everything you need in the cyclops and more and it's way better to have everything with you at all times than to go back and forth all the time. In a locker, put what you need for a scanner (scanner room + range upgrade + multipurpose room + bio reactor + one fish or mushroom to put in it) and you’re all set. So you might as well put in that locker what you need for the moonpool and the console too… well you get my point. We need a purpose to this base. And, as you can imagine, I have some ideas about it but let’s continue with issues for now.
End game scaling... That’s a problem many many games have. You’re building something brick by brick. It’s hard. Everything you drop as a meaning and is precious. You even plan dives for this or that, to get to your next goal and suddenly you have a prawnsuit and now, in one or two drilling, you have more materials than you need through the entire game…
At that point in the game, you loose the survival aspect of the game to a more straight forward scenario. Now you’re like : « that cyclops was very cheap… » and the launch pas and neptune ? as good as free. Now you get that the crafting part and its economy is more a pretext to the scenario than an actual part of the gameplay. So it loose taste and you’re only option is to rush to the end of the game. It’s sad if you ask me. Because, who want’s to leave this planet ? hum ? it’s amazing here ! I want to know every part of it. I want more.
IV. I know it’s not a beta anymore but I give you my ideas anyway.
we need more purpose for the base, for the prawn suit… make it bigger and more expensive !
For exemple you can make the electronics not refundable when deconstructing. That way we have to think carefully before deconstructing all the time.
What you can do is adding bigger/usefull elements that cannot be moved around in a locker. Something big (not movable => base), expensive in ressources (give sens to the prawnsuit other than the scenario needs), and useful for explorers/survivors (people who want to stay in the ocean as I do). Here’s my idea :
Add a map room, a big expensive map room. The map would not be provided. players will have to build it, brick by brick, using scanners and sonars. Informations collected by scanners and sonars will feed the map datas. Give sens to the exploration and help you find everything and not give it up to google at some point.
To go with it, and because we already move the scanner with us in the cyclops, add a bigger submarine. One with a built-in scanner, rooms for two vehicles. make it big so it cannot go everywhere (not in the deep for instance, no need to change everything to the scenario, it great as it is). Something like the beluga or the draconis : https://www.behance.net/gallery/13857237/SUBNAUTICA
the way I see it :
- you need a blueprint for a builder arm for the prawnsuit (2 parts). normal components.
- you need a blueprint for the map room (4~5 parts). can only be built with the prawnsuit equipped with the new arm. very expensive
- you need a blueprint for a build/docking station for the new sub like the neptune (4 parts or more). can only be built with the prawnsuit equipped with the new arm. expensive
- you need a 3 parts blueprint for each sections of the sub (5?). each section needs to be build separately (like the neptune) and is expensive. parts could be : engine, bridge, cargo, bays, scanner
- once built the sub needs to be docked in it’s station for charging it’s big energy needs (no removable batteries. => justify nuclear reactor in the base)
Some ideas about that new sub :
* scanner needs to be operate manually, so you cannot activate and move the sub around for fast datas mapping.
* scanner range can be set by user to some extend. greater range implies more energy consumption.
* pilot tech might be VR in game (you sit and VR glasses come down on your head) => no need for a front pilot post. no visibility issue. feels highthecky
this might give a nice gameplay for explorers, give more sens to the prawnsuit gathering and to a fixed base.
There it is, it's all for now. I might edit the post to add some more while playing a new game, hardcore mode this time.
Cheers all, enjoy subnautica and see you after the next dive
-daganael-
Comments
I missed the extinguisher, I'm sorry, no real need to craft some. But I never found its wall mount and that's what I think needs to be added.
Thanks for your comment, it needed clarification.
I think most of your concerns derive from the POV of experienced gamer, investing a hundred hours in the game they are reviewing.
The game was designed as a casual game, and for new players (particularly casuals) the game experience will be very different.
I think the game need a major overhaul in mechanics, specially power and food/water. I would also like a "fatigue" meter, to force the player to return to a base for resting every once in a while.
And effective "easy - hard" options.
Now the game has launched most changes should focus on bug squashing and polishing (quality of life changes, optimization, etc...), but given the game is very unique and full of potential I'm optimistic about modding, expansions and future games derived from this one.
-Make animation for Cyclops pushing kelp out of the way
-Make a drop-off system for building large vehicles where the player can place items in the printer's resource reserve and print vehicles bit-by-bit instead of building an enormous submersible out of stuff in the player's pockets
-Allow vehicles to be repaired with repair tool while in dock
-Make the cutefish less creepy
-Make leviathans stop going through walls
-Make seamoth stop going through walls
-Make PRAWN stop going through floors
-Remove bugs where the player glitches through Precursor bases and gets stuck in the walls
-Improve water texture for waves
-Improve lighting (we want shimmers on sea floor)
These are just a few of the things which need to be done before the Arctic is done.