Photography, taking inspiration from Beyond Good and Evil.

moultanomoultano Creator of ns_shiva. Join Date: 2002-12-14 Member: 10806Members, NS1 Playtester, Contributor, Constellation, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue, Reinforced - Shadow, WC 2013 - Gold, NS2 Community Developer, Pistachionauts
edited November 2013 in Subnautica General Discussion
I'm not sure how many people played Beyond Good and Evil. Fantastic game, one of my favorites. The main character in the game is a photographer, so one of the side tasks in the game is to photograph all of the species on the planet. This ended up being my favorite part of the game. The critters hide in all sorts of interesting ways, and photographing them (and just seeing them!) became great motivation to explore my environment and pay attention to it. I found every little nook and cranny in the world, mostly motivated by doing wildlife photography.

Beyond Good and Evil feels quite similar to a Zelda game in its gameplay, so it's useful to compare the two. Zelda games are full of side things to explore with interesting environments. However, at the end of a side track the payoff is never satisfying. Even when you get the ultimate payoff of a quarter heart, it's still just a numerical increase in your stats, not something with any verve or life to it. It just reinforces the fact that this is a game world, and it starts and ends with your character. This makes the whole experience feel flat and unsatisfying. Beyond Good and Evil, in contrast, felt like a fully realized ecology.

In addition to the joy of just finding all of the species and seeing the wondrous shapes they would take, I loved that I could interact with my environment in a non-violent way. Some of the species doubled as enemies, but some of them were just there for ambiance, and I loved that they became part of the gameplay as well.

At any rate, just something to think about. I'd love to see a cornucopia of amazing critters in subnautica, and I'd love to be able to photograph them rather than kill them! :)
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Comments

  • GrimfangGrimfang Join Date: 2003-02-04 Member: 13086Members, Constellation, Reinforced - Shadow
    Some sort of achievements that isn't tracked would be nice. Like taking a photo as you mention. To compare to a game like wow, before they added the achievement system you could do a lot of things that gave you some cosmetic nice reward, that didn't affect any sort of the game. Some of these were almost like a hidden easter egg. However when they added the achievement system, it became more like a checklist of things you had to do.

    So I would like to see some sort of things you can do through exploration or similar. Most maps in NS have some sort of easter eggs/ hidden rooms or small nice features you can enjoy. I hope that Subnautica will find room for something like this, but it's in the nice-to-have category :)
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  • SteveRockSteveRock Join Date: 2012-10-01 Member: 161215Members, NS2 Developer, Subnautica Developer
    Hmm been looking for an excuse to play BG&E recently. Will check it out.
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  • InsaneInsane Anomaly Join Date: 2002-05-13 Member: 605Members, Super Administrators, Forum Admins, NS1 Playtester, Forum Moderators, NS2 Developer, Constellation, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue, NS2 Map Tester, Subnautica Developer, Pistachionauts, Future Perfect Developer
    SteveRock wrote: »
    Hmm been looking for an excuse to play BG&E recently. Will check it out.

    Doooo iiiiit...
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  • ObraxisObraxis Subnautica Animator & Generalist, NS2 Person Join Date: 2004-07-24 Member: 30071Super Administrators, Forum Admins, NS1 Playtester, Forum Moderators, NS2 Developer, Constellation, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Silver, WC 2013 - Supporter, Subnautica Developer, Pistachionauts
    edited December 2013
    Squeal_Like_A_Pig wrote: »
    The player being able to take pictures of various wildlife that they encounter is is actually something we've discussed a lot, and are hoping to add to the game.

    What would be awesome, if the player could construct some kind of 'internet beacon' or comms device for a portable Wifi hotspot. They could then take pictures and upload them to Twitter/Facebook/G+ etc in-game.
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  • clankill3rclankill3r Join Date: 2007-09-03 Member: 62145Members, NS2 Map Tester, Reinforced - Shadow
    Squeal_Like_A_Pig wrote: »
    The player being able to take pictures of various wildlife that they encounter is is actually something we've discussed a lot, and are hoping to add to the game.

    It would be nice if the light of the camera influence he behavior of the animals.
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  • BacillusBacillus Join Date: 2006-11-02 Member: 58241Members
    Another thing that's beautiful about Beyond Good and Evil is how naturally it expands the game world. At no point the game goes "ZONE UNLOCKED!!!12121", but the updates on your ship allow you to cross the borders that limit your playground. Whenever you update your ship, it allows you to peel off another layer from the whole game world, not just to access some specific new area with some new stuff in it. It works very well in tandem with the exploration elements like the photography.
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  • zbott105zbott105 Join Date: 2017-01-02 Member: 225902Members
    Cool
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  • SirAntonySirAntony Join Date: 2019-05-09 Member: 252797Members
    edited May 2019
    great topic, just what I need now!
    What program do you use for photo processing?
    In fact, now there are many cool services that have their pros and cons
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