If you’ve spoken to me for more than five minutes, chances are I’ve mentioned Subnautica [official site]. It’s an open world survival game set largely underwater on an alien planet. You explore biomes, collect resources and, as updates to the early access project add more content, start to piece together the story of the planet. I played huge amounts of the game before more significant story elements were added and my big project was my volcano lair’s garden. I collected all the weird and wonderful plants I could and cultivated them in little plant beds outside my underwater home. That’s why, when I had a chance to speak with art director Cory Strader, I immediately wanted to talk about the game’s flora.

Read on to find out how The Abyss, microscopy and a real fish with a transparent head and a visible brain all played their part! P.S. You can click on images to see larger version of the concept artwork or, if they’re game screenshots, to just see them in isolation. … [visit site to read more]

Subnautica [official site] seems like a nautical holiday wrapped inside a survival game. Swim around a gentle ocean and meet lots of colourful fish, chill out in an underwater forest, sunbathe on top of a little escape pod it all sounds very relaxing. Don t be fooled. Subnautica is, in fact, absolutely terrifying.

I can t quite remember when I realised that the sea was actually a vast world of horrors. Whenever it was, this realisation was undoubtedly confirmed when I was snorkeling off the coast of Australia in my early teens. I broke the surface of the water to be greeted by blood. So much blood. Not mine, thankfully. It belonged to a man who had bumped into some coral, which proceeded to rip open his leg.

Coral! Nobody expects this of all things to tear chunks out of them, but that s what you get when you decide to visit the utterly alien sea. In Subnautica, this is even more pronounced because it s a literal alien sea, an entirely new world, that you re exploring. You re not meant to be there and you re definitely not welcome.

… [visit site to read more]

I was wondering which games might make the “Things To Play Over The Christmas Break” list this year when the Subnautica [official site] Precursor update got released. I went through a really big Subnautica love affair earlier in the year, but decided to step away for a few patches as the game is still in early access and I didn’t want to lose the magic by mining out each update in turn. Then Precursor arrived and is tempting me back not only with alien tech and more in the way of narrative but NEW CAVES! … [visit site to read more]