pay attention to the amount of noise
generated, as hostile creatures will
investigate and potentially damage it.
Fires can break out on board, forcing
you to leave the controls and run
around frantically with an extinguisher,
and the prospect of losing what
amounts to a considerable investment
in playing time is a good enough motive
to keep the precious sub moored in a
safe place for much of the time.
Prison break
Although Subnautica initially seems
like an open-ended survival and
crafting experience, it’s firmly
anchored to a story that’s revealed
as you progress towards the ultimate
goal of building a rocket to escape
your watery prison. The playing area is
contained within about a 2km radius
of the crash site, beyond which there
seems to be nothing but a bottomless
pit, and the game will dispatch you
to every biome within this densely
populated zone as you follow radio
signals and discover how and why the
Aurora came to be here.
It’s a strikingly beautiful game at
times, with a believable feeling of
resistance as you push through the
water, but it’s littered with immersion-
breaking glitches that often spoil
those ‘wow’ moments. Breaking
through the surface generally causes
the framerate to flatline for about
a second, and the draw distance
underwater can be distractingly poor,
with objects failing to appear until
you’ve spent a while staring at the
empty place where they’re meant to
be. It’s not uncommon to swim faster
than the game engine can draw
the seabed, and one time when we
descended into what we assumed
was a chasm, we looked up to see the
underside of the world being gradually
composed above, shutting us in.
Meanwhile our home base managed to
attract some sort of giant electric eel,
and it’s still there because its head is
permanently wedged in a wall.Although it’s hard to ignore the
ever-present technical ropiness,
Subnautica deserves the benefit of
the doubt. Completing the main story
is an epic task that’s unlikely to be
done in less than 40 hours, and you
could easily double that if you get
drawn into constructing a luxurious
base. Tracking down every type of
resource and fabricating every piece
of equipment, useful or otherwise, is a
colossal time-sink, but this is the kind
of game that makes you want to stay
for the long haul. QHUNGER
GAMES
If the thought of
constantly having to
find food and water
for your character
makes you shudder,
there’s also the
option to play the
story in a more
forgiving mode where
you won’t have to
worry about any of
that stuff.
Alternatively, there’s a
hardcore ‘one life
only’ mode for
masochists and a
creative mode that
gives you an invincible
character and
unlimited resources
so you can try out all
of the things you
can’t possibly afford
in the main game.“It’s beautiful
but littered with
immersion-
breakin
litches”
ABOVE The wreck
of the Aurora is
riddled with
mutant crabs
that have
feasted on
human flesh.
LEFT Getting
hands-on with
the fish is the
only way to find
out if they
serve any
purpose.OXM VERDICT
A totally unique
survival experience
impressively set
in a compelling
alien world.8
FAR LEFT Having
a big electric
fish attached to
our base makes
it easy to find
in the dark.beautiful
More Xbox news at gamesradar.com/oxm THE OFFICIAL XBOX MAGAZINE 081