I’d rate Below Zero a 6/10. It was an okay game in the sense that the story and game loop is engaging enough to get you to the end, but it wasn’t quite worth it.

Gameplay

To start off, I actually started with the switch version. However, cracking open mineral deposits and catching fish was a terrible match for a controller. The worst offender though were the random crashes and lack of auto-saves forcing me to replay hours of content until I got fed up and gave up.

Despite my first experience with the game, the story and atmosphere of the original got me to try again after about a year when the game went on sale on steam. The first 10 hours on PC were very fun. The controllers felt much better with a mouse and while it wasn’t my first time experiencing the game, I was still engaged by the gameplay loop and trying to unlock gear as quick as possible.

However, the latter half of the game had me retreading great distances because I had forgotten an item, got lost or just needed to turn back that it became a bit of a chore. Base building doesn’t quite work in a single-player story driven game because there is no incentive to have anything more than a functional base. I shouldn’t speculate on the balance of survival mode because I haven’t played it, but non-respawning resources and no way to build a farm ala Minecraft seems like it wouldn’t be that fun either. I already disliked having to swim deeper into the completely safe areas near my base just because I needed one more titanium, silver, copper or table coral.

Speaking of chores and lack of a challenge, the Leviathans in this game are really disappointing. Theres one that does the same amount of damage as something in the endgame area hanging around the surface which was threatening at the start, but it became a routine to just hold w and do something else while I passed though that area as it would take 3 maybe 4 attacks to destroy your Seatruck. I also stopped noticing its existence after a while. The endgame area has quite a few Leviathans which were quite threatening before I was familiar with the area, but then I dispatched all of them in my Prawnsuit because of their low damage, long turnaround time and tendency to get stuck on the terrain. Perhaps Subnautica was similar but I never dared to challenge the Ghost or Reaper Leviathans in that game. I almost forgot the Leviathans in the mid-game area because again they weren’t much of a challenge. Visually they are a lot more impressive however, perhaps because of another predator which gets jobbed by one.

Environmental dangers also become a chore rather than a challenge in late game. Once you have the Seatruck for example, you just need to pop in every 90s and you will never hear the oxygen warning. Cold is similar in the sense that chili peppers are overpowered, and salad is just broken. The cold suit also reduces the rate of temperature loss to the point where its no longer an issue.

If anything, the greatest challenge in the game was inventory management. ‘Rare’ materials save for one are anything but, and the only challenge in getting enough for your crafting is hoping you planned how many you would make off with properly when you found them. Magnetite was difficult to find for me because it blended in with the background, but you only need maybe 6 of it total, but realistically I could have gone without it because nothing its used to make is very useful. The scanner room upgrades, and the scanner room itself is almost completely useless because its impossible to make sense of. The map is just a blob of light and the HUD readouts are not culled by distance (I think I was 1km away and it still showed the location of minerals) and do not show the distance of minerals either. It would be so much better if it stopped showing minerals ~100-200m away and showed a smaller circle if it was further.

I really liked the Ion battery and powercell because I feel like Subnautica could have done with more upgrades. After the early game, you stop getting any more equipment upgrades. I’m already never going to run out of oxygen, why not just give me a 4 minute air tank? Marguiet could hold her breath for that long apparently. If anything it would have encouraged me to explore more outside my vehicles which I think would have enhanced the experience. It would also have lead to less backtracking if I could combine the snow suit with the normal suit. Side note though, the Ion cube goes from having 3000000(?) power to 500 in a battery and 1000 in a powercell.

New stuff

Seatruck

The Seatruck is one of the best things in Below Zero. It’s basically the Seamoth and Submarine rolled into one, with customization that allows you to choose how bulky you want it. Despite my opinion on the different suit situation, I love the fact that you get to choose to make the trade-off by yourself. Perhaps I might have liked it better if the Seatruck was a mobile base you could customize the size and inside of yourself, but I have no complaints about the implementation.

The Seatruck modules were really cool, as was the specialized dock.

The Sleeper module is actually useful yet also adds a lot of flavor, and is situational, so you there are actually situations where you would want to bring it and when you wouldn’t.

The aquarium module is a really fun concept although completely useless for beating the game. Once again the problem is that you won’t be spending the time building up your aquarium in a normal playthrough.

I built the Teleporter module just because, but I never found a situation where I would want to bring it with me or spend the Ion cube to use it. Perhaps it was just too late game, or the 120s of air just isn’t enough for you to travel far enough to justify a teleport.

The fabricator module is a must have. The storage is a little small and the size of the module is much larger than needed for what’s inside. Regardless it is worth taking along because of how important having a fabricator is.

I never got the storage module as I never found the last fragment and forgot which area it came from. However I imagine it could have been useful and gameplay wise makes sense why the fabricator module had limited storage.

Snowfox

The snowfox is yet another useless item. Its handling is poor, speed too low, is too large to fit through caves meaning you have to pack it up or leave it behind and it takes too many inventory slots. I imagine its use is to run from the snow stalkers, but flares already make them not a threat. On top of that it requires an endgame item to craft, and by the time you’ve made it, you probably don’t need it. The one saving grace it has is that it’s a portable heat source, but peppers and salads make it redundant.

Story

The story of Below Zero is a personal one, about finding out what happened to Robin’s sister Sam, and the overarching story is about dealing with loss.

Sam

The PDA entries and character interactions paint a good picture of what transpired at the research station leading to Sam’s death. It was able to convey the sense of solitude and helplessness Sam felt with the other members of the research team being unfazed by the threat of the Kharra virus. It was also able to show the conviction possessed by Sam as she gave her life to destroy the Leviathan site. That said, its kinda weird that Alterra pulled out given that the scale of the damage to the site didn’t look too great, considering the amount of resources they had already poured in.

Robin’s reactions to Sam’s logs are there, but they are quite subdued. Perhaps she has had the time to grieve already which is why? I don’t know, but I would expect more in the face of these shocking revelations.

The Architect

The Architect serves as a parallel to help Robin deal with her loss. In comforting him and sharing the concept of hope with him, she eventually gets to the point where she is ready to move on, demonstrated by her leaving the planet behind for good so that she may explore brave new worlds and new civilizations.

However, the Architect was a very poor choice for this role in my opinion. They were portrayed as a race far beyond human capabilities and are supposed to have superior intellect and even though they do not have one, physical forms. Yet the Architect is so childlike in his understanding of basic concepts of loss and the unknown despite being a top researcher. Even if they do not have a physical form and exist in a hivemind, surely they must understand the concepts, having studied the biosphere and lifeforms of the planet. The fact that there are Architect body parts and physical interfaces imply that their species must have had some notion of what it means to have a physical body.

The rest of the story

Having a greater cast of characters with an actual presence in the story diluted the charm of the original. What made the original so amazing was feeling like you were alone on the planet and desperately searching for any other survivors only to have your hopes crushed over and over and over again. The emotional rollercoaster and solitude on this beautiful yet terrifying planet really sold the fearsome beauty that is the ocean. Unknown and full of wonder, tranquil and full of life, yet empty ready to take your life at anytime.

On the other hand, Below Zero had one of the mysterious precursor race hanging out in your head, and a survivor woman far more capable than yourself just chilling 300m under the ocean. The Architect really took away from the sense of awe and intrigue I had towards their race and Marguiet’s achievements make your exploits feel like mundane chores. On top of that, her role in the story is in the past and she doesn’t actually do anything past the early game. I feel that it would have been better if she only appeared in PDA entries like everyone else.

Hot Takes

I feel that fast travel would have made traveling between areas a lot less of a chore. Perhaps a good implementation could have been like in Satisfactory where you can record the path and replay it. A speed upgrade for the Seatruck would have done wonders too.

There should be a interactive map of some sort. Perhaps a download from the scanner room or being able to use the Seaglide’s in the Seatruck. Perhaps it could have been a system where the fog of war gets lifted when you explore. The limited visibility and getting lost gets old quick especially when you get a bit seasick while at it. Missing a point of interest because you were lost and didn’t see it despite being in the right area is also quite annoying. Beacons are one of the most useful items in the game, but other improvements could still be made such as showing them on the scanner room. The pathfinder would also have been more useful if they could be used in the Seatruck and Prawnsuit and left behind like beacons.

It would be really cool if Subnautica worked like an underwater Satisfactory actually. Renewable resources and supply chains would go a long way towards alleviating the pain points while making the base building more of a focus and adding more gameplay elements.