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Subnautica 2 and InZoi publishers announce voluntary layoff program "amid the era of AI transformation"
(www.rockpapershotgun.com)
this post was submitted on 13 Nov 2025
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Subnautica: holy shit we are geniuses
Subnautica: Below Zero: let's throw away our core concept, but leave something playable
Subnautica 2: let's light a dumpster on fire then take a shit in it
I was thinking what is the key difference that made BZ less enjoyable that the first game: I think it's the fact that in the first game the player is a clueless fragile thing thrown in a hostile and alien world with frightening creatures and a large degree of freedom when dealing with advancing the game or just playing it as a sandbox. The fact that there were clues spread out in the ocean and it was my choice if I wanted to pursue them first or build some vehicle or base, felt like I had a lot of agency. Plus, moving towards a new biome was always very tense as I had no clue what was waiting there.
Because BZ has a better structured story, I often felt forced to follow the beats that it was demanding, but also I think the key issue was that I knew Subnautica so well, all the dread, mystery and sense of wonder was no longer there.
At the end of the day I enjoyed Below Zero, but I wanted to repeat my Subnautica experience and it failed to reproduce it.
You had to discover the world yourself in Subnautica, they pointed you to an island one time, the rest was reading PDAs. You were a silent protagonist, so it was easier to immerse yourself in the world.
Below Zero was so disappointing in every regard except more base building options. (I cant remember if they added them to the original or not in an update). Why did they make the protagonist speak??? Ugh.
You go down on the planet to find out what happened to your sister and you get pretty much railroaded (waypoint here, waypoint there) into leaving without ever even acknowledging your sister again, unless you remember and go looking. All the enemies in BZ had the same "munch munch munch" making them all so uninteresting. The world was small and empty, it literally had no depth. The entire land portion was such a dumb addition and the worm was just incredibly annoying rather than something daunting to deal with.
Subnautica is one of them games you wished you could play blind again. Below Zero though...
It's one of them too often occurring cases where developers don't know what made their original game good.
I loved the main character, her sister, and the other characters. Probably my favorite part of BZ was how lived in and full of history it felt compared to Subnautica.
I agree the land part sucked balls.
I didn't care that much about the creatures in either game, except I did like the reefbacks in 1, and dislikes the brain octopus, electric jellyfish in 2.
I guess I likes the stalkers in 1, and the teeth/metal mechanic was fun.
I loved the submarine!!!