You are invited to a special Subnautica livestream event! Please join us on January 30th, 6PM UTC as we premiere the Below Zero Early Access Trailer and launch Early Access on the Steam store.

Below Zero is not finished. It is full of bugs. It lacks polish, runs poorly, and is missing features. We are offering Early Access not because we want your money, but because we want your feedback. We make better games when we make them with you.

You can watch the stream on YouTube, Twitch, or on the Below Zero Steam Store page. Checkout the the Early Access site to see a countdown to stream start, and add the stream start time to your calendar.

We can't wait to welcome you into the icy depths!

- Unknown Worlds

Today Subnautica released on PlayStation & Xbox One. Obviously, given this is Steam, that's not the most exciting news to post here. But this is a big day for us, and we owe you a big thank-you.

We've never released a game on consoles before. It's a terrifying new world. Without you, our wonderful community of players on Steam, we never would have been able to release Subnautica on Xbox or PlayStation.

Those of you who played Subnautica through Steam Early Access, and then throughout launch, provided all the feedback, bug reports, and support that allowed us to build a solid game. Without that, console release would have been out of the question.



You put up with awful frame rates, countless horrible bugs, and long, long wait for release. Thank you.

If you would like to add a console copy of Subnautica to your collection, check out the purchase options at unknownworlds.com.. We'd appreciate any retweets on Twitter or shares on Facebook you think appropriate. If you have friends or family who play games on consoles, we hope you might let them know that PS4 and Xbox options are now available.

Even as we release on consoles, we are cranking full steam ahead on Below Zero. Below Zero is a stand-alone expansion to Subnautica, a new chapter of adventure in a frozen, arctic region of Planet 4546B.

We never like to talk dates. Game development is super unpredictable, and if we gave you a date, we would inevitably disappoint. We are very much looking forward to offering Below Zero in Early Access. Our plan is to release in Early Access as soon as we have a few solid hours of arctic gameplay.

In the mean time, stay tuned and we'll keep you updated on Below Zero's progress.

- Unknown Worlds

This Steam Community group has been neglected. For eight years, we forgot it existed. Before this post, the last update was from Flayra in January 2010, offering Natural Selection 2 pre-orders! It's time to bring it back to life.

Back in 2010, Subnautica wasn't even a twinkle in anyone's eye. NS2 hadn't topped Steam on Halloween. People were using iPhone 3's. Windows 7 was only a few months old. This is a vintage Steam Community, and resurrecting it is an opportunity for reflection.

Since 2010, Unknown Worlds has been through a lot. We've navigated near-death financial valleys to the heady heights of #1 top-seller on Steam. Our team size has grown from around 10 to around 40. We've gotten a little older, a little wiser, and formed firm friendships as a team.

Through it all, the consistent force behind our survival and success has been you. You've hurled feedback on Twitter, debated design on Discord, reviewed roadmaps on Trello, shared trailers on YouTube, endured horrific Early Access bugs, delayed updates, awful frame rates, and so much more.

Your engagement with the development process is the critical secret sauce. Without all of you, our games would probably suck.

To everyone that has followed us since 2010, and before, and to everyone that is with us now, and to those thinking of joining us in future, thank you. We're pumped to keep making great games with you.

- Unknown Worlds

Calling all divers: Valve has opened nominations for the 2018 Steam Awards.

No, we're not here to beg you to vote for Subnautica. We're here to ask you to vote for anyone - Any game you are genuinely impressed by, excited about, enamoured with. Perhaps a game that isn't a massive-budget mega-studio game.

Why are we asking you to do this? Subnautica was a big game for us. Before Subnautica, we had struggled from month to month. We know what it's like to be a small independent developer, unsure of whether we will exist in future.

With your Steam Awards vote, you have the power to lift a developer out of the ocean depths, just as you lifted us by purchasing, reviewing, and enjoying Subnautica.

Take a look through your Steam library and think about what games truly moved you this year. Maybe there's a gem in there that deserves attention - Mash that nominate button!

With love from your diving developers,

- Unknown Worlds

Since, release, we've been blown away by the response to Subnautica. We're thrilled that so many of you have enjoyed exploring planet 4546B, and we want to create more underwater adventures for you to enjoy.

To do that, we've decided to build a stand-alone expansion to Subnautica, called Subnautica Below Zero. Set in an ice-bound region of planet 4546B, after the events of the original game, Below Zero will offer a new chapter in the Subnautica universe.

We would like to show you some of Below Zero's concepts, and share our plans for release.



In the coming months, we will release an unfinished, early version of Below Zero in Early Access. We will then begin releasing consistent content updates, carefully crafting the game based on your feedback - Just like the original Subnautica.

We don't want to specify an exact date, or even a vague date, because setting dates never ends well for anyone. We can never predict how long development will take, and we don't want to set any expectations we can't be sure we will meet.



The concept of Below Zero is still developing. We are keeping the core gameplay mechanics, such as base building and open-ended exploration. We are also exploring new ones, such as thermal management, and more voiced dialogue at the core of the plot. We're still in early stages and nothing is set in ice. These features may change prior to, and during, Early Access.

To be notified the moment Below Zero is available in Steam Early Access, subscribe to the Subnautica Development Mailing List. We can't wait to get your feedback on a new underwater adventure.

- Unknown Worlds

Update 12 Jun 2018 - the WDC sale has ended, thank you everyone who participated

You saved the underwater world of planet 4546B. Here on Earth, our own oceans need your help. This weekend, we are joining forces with Valve and the ocean charity Whale and Dolphin Conservation (WDC). 15% of Unknown Worlds’ profits from the sales of Subnautica will go to WDC.

4546B is a world covered in water. Earth is not so different: 71% of the Earth’s surface is covered in water. Startlingly, they contain around 90% of the Earth’s biomass. That means that there is far more life under the water than above it: Out of sight, and often out of mind.

Agricultural runoff, drag-net fishing, deforestation, plastic waste, even acidification via increased carbon-dioxide levels in the atmosphere. Earth’s oceans are taking damage from multiple sources. Life below the waves is dying, shrinking, and disappearing.

We made a game that takes you to an alien world, a world that needs your help. You saved that world. This weekend, we ask that you think about ways in which you can help to save the Earth.


WDC is a global organisation that works to:

• Create healthy seas, including tackling plastic pollution in our oceans
  
• Put an end to hunting and commercial whaling
  
• Tackle bycatch, an accidental entanglement in fishing gear, which kills an estimated 300,000 whales and dolphins every year
  
• End the cruel practice of keeping whales and dolphins in captivity

You can find out more at http://whales.org and follow WDC on twitter at @WHALES_org. In the United States, WDC is registered under charity number 1014705.

Since launch, we have been prototyping potential Subnautica expansions, working on Xbox One launch, and working on tidying up some of the more glaring bugs in the Steam 1.0 release.

Today we released an update that includes a bunch of that tidying up. Here's the list of changes:

• Main menu button texts update correctly when switching languages
  
• In-game menu button text colors fixed
  
• F8 panel fully translated
  
• Cyclops flooding leak indicators now clearly outside of the hull
  
• Controller navigation and selection boxes fixed
  
• Builder menu usable with swapped mouse buttons
  
• Lifepod fabricator lighting fixed
  
• Cyclops hatch door collider fixed
  
• Disallow poster placement where wall lockers are disallowed
  
• Non-localized text removed from color customization terminal
  
• Physics bugs with ion cubes and precursor keys fixed
  
• End-game achievements now trigger
  
• Lost river creatures now immune to brine
  
• Player mask now correctly lit
  
• Can not despawn Aurora by building a base next to it anymore
  
• Seamoth hatch animation fixed
  
• Changing quality settings in game reminds player to restart the game
  
• Time capsule UI simplyfied
  
• Pathfinder tool recipe adjusted
  
• Entering exosuit while sprinting fixed
  
• Fixed saved game rocket not being ready for launch
  
• Reduced hitching when rebuilding a base
  
• Fixed moonpool ladders not working properly when cinematics have been skipped
  
• Time capsule fixes for various platforms
  
• Added option to turn off subtitles.
  
• Updated TimeCapsuleTitleFormat
  
• Fixed base interiors looking incorrect when viewed from inside a vehicle or another base
  
• Fixed Cyclops interior not looking correct when viewed from a vehicle
  
• Fixed low LOD of certain base windows
  
• Re-caching of entire world (to help with hitching a little)
  
• Options menu screen resolution fix
  
• Fixed localization of deconstruction errors
  
• Added TimeCapsuleTitleFormat to English.json
  
• Translator credits update
  
• Translation updates

Enjoy!


In the early days of Subnautica development, updates did not have names. They had numbers, like Update 8. We eventually switched to names, like Seamoth Update, because they were punchier.

Under the hood the named updates continued to have numbers. Update 84 reverts to the old school: A Subnautica Update with no name.

- Hugh (UWE)

This post was edited to include additional changes pushed in a small update released just after Update 84. Together the two updates constitute Update 84.

Since launch, we have been prototyping potential Subnautica expansions, working on Xbox One launch, and working on tidying up some of the more glaring bugs in the Steam 1.0 release.

Today we released an update that includes a bunch of that tidying up. Here's the list of changes:

• Main menu button texts update correctly when switching languages
  
• In-game menu button text colors fixed
  
• F8 panel fully translated
  
• Cyclops flooding leak indicators now clearly outside of the hull
  
• Controller navigation and selection boxes fixed
  
• Builder menu usable with swapped mouse buttons
  
• Lifepod fabricator lighting fixed
  
• Cyclops hatch door collider fixed
  
• Disallow poster placement where wall lockers are disallowed
  
• Non-localized text removed from color customization terminal
  
• Physics bugs with ion cubes and precursor keys fixed
  
• End-game achievements now trigger
  
• Lost river creatures now immune to brine
  
• Player mask now correctly lit
  
• Can not despawn Aurora by building a base next to it anymore
  
• Seamoth hatch animation fixed
  
• Changing quality settings in game reminds player to restart the game
  
• Time capsule UI simplyfied
  
• Pathfinder tool recipe adjusted
  
• Entering exosuit while sprinting fixed
  
• Fixed saved game rocket not being ready for launch
  
• Reduced hitching when rebuilding a base
  
• Fixed moonpool ladders not working properly when cinematics have been skipped
  
• Time capsule fixes for various platforms
  
• Added option to turn off subtitles.
  
• Updated TimeCapsuleTitleFormat
  
• Fixed base interiors looking incorrect when viewed from inside a vehicle or another base
  
• Fixed Cyclops interior not looking correct when viewed from a vehicle
  
• Fixed low LOD of certain base windows
  
• Re-caching of entire world (to help with hitching a little)
  
• Options menu screen resolution fix
  
• Fixed localization of deconstruction errors
  
• Added TimeCapsuleTitleFormat to English.json
  
• Translator credits update
  
• Translation updates

Enjoy!


In the early days of Subnautica development, updates did not have names. They had numbers, like Update 8. We eventually switched to names, like Seamoth Update, because they were punchier.

Under the hood the named updates continued to have numbers. Update 84 reverts to the old school: A Subnautica Update with no name.

- Hugh (UWE)

This post was edited to include additional changes pushed in a small update released just after Update 84. Together the two updates constitute Update 84.

Subnautica has emerged from Early Access to launch on Steam. To celebrate, we have released a Cinematic Trailer that offers a glimpse of events on Planet 4546B before the crash of the Aurora starship.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rz2SNm8VguE

You can also catch the Cinematic Trailer on:

• Twitter
  
• Facebook

If you love Subnautica, please consider giving the Cinematic Trailer a 'like', 'share' or 'retweet' on YouTube, Twitter, or Facebook.

Thank you, and we hope you are enjoying the dive!

- Unknown Worlds

Subnautica has emerged from Early Access to launch on Steam. To celebrate, we have released a Cinematic Trailer that offers a glimpse of events on Planet 4546B before the crash of the Aurora starship.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rz2SNm8VguE

You can also catch the Cinematic Trailer on:

• Twitter
  
• Facebook

If you love Subnautica, please consider giving the Cinematic Trailer a 'like', 'share' or 'retweet' on YouTube, Twitter, or Facebook.

Thank you, and we hope you are enjoying the dive!

- Unknown Worlds