So I have been playing ... (180). Subnautica!

I had liked the idea of playing it for several years, then it sat in my backlog for a few more. To be fair, everything was sitting in the backlog these last few years as I was gradually moving house, setting up the computer stuff at country home, then spent the best part of the year focused on my novel revisions. I did play some Into the Breach (which I didn't record & then lost the advanced game saves on my Linux laptop), also dipped into the comfort zones of Nox and XCOM2 (Long War Of The Chosen, check out full playlist here). I also recorded another Waking Mars playthrough (this time in Estonian!), and ... 

Oh, wait, I did record some more play that totally warrants its own post, at least a summary. Dangit. I'm gonna break the chronology of gaming here because if I don't complete this post here now, I know I'll end up with another ten-year draft or ghost-of-a-post, and who needs that. 

So - Subnautica. I had meant to buy it for a while, then meant to play it for a while more, then, once launched, I played it pretty much non-stop for a few weeks. 

When I had played a bit and was well immersed (ha!), then I got a capture going as well. Here's the first, still rather fumbly episode: 

This one includes a lot of IRL recap (later episodes less so). 

I only started watching other people play after my first game completion, so there's a ton of quite elementary stuff that I missed or didn't learn on my own (such as: the fact that you can carry along whole extra air tanks, not just the little bladder; that you can right-click-slice and cultivate not just the big life forms, but also the shrooms and gel sacks and such; that you can place the exterior grow beds under water also; that the cyclops shield zaps away the leeches; that the Seamoth zap-charge needs to be activated to work). 

Then there are other things that reflect my in-world choices - building only small bases & not rearranging the landscape too much (even if I had figured out the underwater grow beds, that is), relying on foraging instead, not harming the fauna too much (not even the deadly ones). Basically, not fighting against the local ecosystems but rather swimming alongside them. 

Here's another episode from the first session: 

And here is the whole playlist in its full glory 

I'm gonna hit 'post' and maybe add some bits & bobs later. Whenever it seems like I'm abandoning this blog, I'm probably busy on the Estonian side (see new link atop the right side panel). Or I could have caught the flow and be in full writing mode. Yeah, let's go with that!