Now that I'm farther in, I can say that Subnautica is an exceptional game. It has a knack for opening up new stuff to see right as you think you've found most of what there is at a given tech level.
The game is made much stronger by using a fixed map instead of being purely random/procedural. It helps the pacing a whole lot.
Also, completely unexpected from an exploration/survival game, Subnautica has an great sense of humor.
The big challenge is that you have to be self-motivated as a player. There's not much pointing you towards you goals or even really telling you what they are.
@starkatt It benefits /strongly/ from being to hand-pick and adjust that pacing, which I also assume happened while it was early access. I'm glad I played it after full release, though.
@starkatt I could use a new casual game...
@cute_weeds I really endorse it!
@cute_weeds I dunno how casual it is though? It's pretty suitable for play in short chunks, but I'm nine hours in and only beginning to get into midgame.
@starkatt Yeah, I loved that part. Having to think ahead of time to plan an expedition, make sure I had supplies, tools, etc. Nothing was entirely random exploration, usually I was looking for somethimg specific.
@starkatt It was interesting to learn that, in an abstract pared-down game, when I'm bad at that sort of task compartmentalization in the orthocosm.
@starkatt The PDA has such an unintentionally snarky mood to it, and the story is full of low-key "capitalism hell" humor
"Okay so I feel like I'm starting to understand the scope of things -- oh wait, heck, there's two new biomes!"