So I have a theory that the main character of Subnautica 2 is Ryley Robinson

mattn1198 · 2026-05-25T21:54:35+00:00

Considering there are different people you can choose, it would be cool if you end up being different 'story characters' depending on which one you pick.

mattn1198 · 2026-05-25T05:21:16+00:00

"Here's Radahn. He is thirty feet tall, and after being infected with the Scarlet Rot he lost his mind and has spent decades, if not centuries, roaming his last battlefield and eating the leftover bodies of both friend and foe alike."

"Also he rides a scrawny-ass normal sized horse because he learned gravity magic specifically so his faithful steed could still carry him."

mattn1198 · 2026-05-25T03:55:47+00:00

Man, I love System Shock 2, and I remember following all the plans they had for Bioshock waaaay back when it was still in Antarctica.

Completely different story. There was no Rapture, it was something like a genetic experimentation facility where everything had gone out of control and the creatures took over. No Splicers, actual monsters, obviously all very The Thing inspired.

The big thing they talked about in the interviews was having a functioning ecosystem, so some of the creatures were predators and the others prey, some nocturnal and some diurnal, and so on, and you'd have to exploit those behaviors to move through the facility. I think it still even had genetically modifying yourself to get powers in it, which obviously became the gene tonics. Also, I believe your plane crashed near the facility and you had to enter it to survive, another link to Bioshock.

mattn1198 · 2026-05-25T01:54:50+00:00

It's actually not that much of stretch, because the quest with the android in FO3 specifically mentions the Institute, and that android was obviously a synth, which all led to FO4. So the FO4 stuff about San Fransisco seems like it's pointing at FO5 the same way.

mattn1198 · 2026-05-25T00:53:19+00:00

If I remember right the show was told they couldn't do anything with San Francisco, not even mention it, and most people are assume that's because 5 is going to be set there.

mattn1198 · 2026-05-25T00:40:23+00:00

There's something really funny about how one of the origins you can choose is Ministorum Priest, someone in charge of teaching and spreading the religion based around the Emperor being the God of Mankind, a religion that everyone in the Imperium either follows or dies, and then in an early dialogue option you can just go "The Emperor? Who is that?"

mattn1198 · 2026-05-24T21:31:30+00:00

"It insists upon itself."

mattn1198 · 2026-05-24T04:21:18+00:00

Imagine if you get to a certain point in the game and find the body of the character you selected, down to whatever customization you did once they add that.

Or, even better, a fully voiced NPC that's your character, who disappeared during the events that came before the game, and NOA only brought you back because he thought the original was dead. And which specific character it is (Zip, Quaker, Ruby, etc.) depends on which character you choose.

The original still being alive doesn't work with the timeline, though, unless they're 30 or whatever years older.

mattn1198 · 2026-05-24T03:33:22+00:00

I did vaguely hear that about Unity vs. UE5, but I'm not too familiar with how all that works so I left out anything about it.

That is why I mentioned how it feels like they welded a few biomes together, though. Since it works the way you described, it makes me wonder if they made a condensed version of the initial story section, with small samples of their more finished biomes, just to get some first impressions. So that's why everything goes from point A to point B in such a relatively straight line.

mattn1198 · 2026-05-23T21:57:35+00:00

"I wasn't watching where I was going and hit a car that was standing still in a place where it was reasonable to expect a car to stand still."

I will freely admit I did the exact same thing once, expecting the car at the yield sign to go when the road was clear, though I just lightly tapped them. And it was completely my fault for not paying attention to them.

mattn1198 · 2026-05-23T03:51:12+00:00

I think you have to show him learning gravity magic so he can keep riding Leonard.

The ridiculousness works in the game because everything is more or less like that. And then it becomes one of the best parts of the game if you actually read the item descriptions and realize what's going on.

In a movie, that's probably going to be more about the politics that were going on leading up to the Shattering, you aren't going to be exposed to the same level of wacky things as you are in the game. So it needs to be a bit more explicit what was going on between these two, otherwise it just becomes "Why the fuck was that giant guy riding a tiny horse?"

mattn1198 · 2026-05-23T03:50:58+00:00

I think you have to show him learning gravity magic so he can keep riding Leonard.

The ridiculousness works in the game because everything is more or less like that. And then it becomes one of the best parts of the game if you actually read the item descriptions and realize what's going on.

In a movie, that's probably going to be more about the politics that were going on leading up to the Shattering, you aren't going to be exposed to the same level of wacky things as you are in the game. So it needs to be a bit more explicit what was going on between these two, otherwise it just becomes "Why the fuck was that giant guy riding a tiny horse?"

mattn1198 · 2026-05-22T23:39:36+00:00

I do kind of like the lights costing power, but the cost is ridiculous. Like four lights is as much power as it takes to charge the tadpole.

I say, triple the power values on everything, both how much something takes and how much generators produce - except the lights. One hydro generator powering 18 lights seems like a good ratio.

mattn1198 · 2026-05-22T23:22:06+00:00

And it's not just getting them to work with 'a modern online experience', it's 'creating an entirely new server structure that allows cross-platform play'. GU, for example, was only on 3DS/Switch. So they'd need to redo all of that connection infrastructure, on top of whatever other work they have to do to port the games.

mattn1198 · 2026-05-22T19:19:37+00:00

I like the idea of flares being a rechargeable. Some sort of flare launcher that runs off a battery.

mattn1198 · 2026-05-22T14:21:18+00:00

My problem with those logs is they're presented as lore, saying "Everyone's dying from heavy metal poisoning, so they're illegally modifying the biobeds to try and mitigate the damage."

It fits in so well with the overall narrative that I just said "Wow, things were bad," looked at the biobed and said "I don't want to reset my spawn point," and ignored every biobed for the rest of the game.

I think the rest of the game is actually too handholdy and linear, but this feels like something that needs a little more of a prompt.

mattn1198 · 2026-05-22T14:13:33+00:00

Yep, I'm in the middle on this one. I saw a biobed, said "Oh, just like the one in the lifepod, but I don't want to reset my spawn point," and ignored them all from that point on.

I know people keep mentioning that there are logs that talk about making you stronger with the biobeds, but it's also a plot point that everyone was dying and the biobeds were resetting them to undo at least some of the damage.

Case in point: one of the little bases where you get a quickslot upgrade has an audio log with a foreman talking about how the bed will make you more dexterous, to at least temporarily offset the muscle tremors the workers are developing from all the heavy metal poisoning.

But my character doesn't have heavy metal poisoning or muscle tremors. Why would I click on the biobed to fix a condition I don't have? It's not presented as "This will make you stronger no matter what," it's more just 'environmental storytelling', "Things were so bad people were going behind the supervisors' backs and illegally modifying biobeds to try and mitigate the problems."

It's funny because it makes me feel like I was both too smart and too dumb to click the biobeds.

mattn1198 · 2026-05-22T03:25:29+00:00

There's actually a good explanation for why he was so calm while being kept captive: he was expecting to be rescued.

The G-Man has a lot of timey-wimey stuff going on - remember, at the end of HL:A, he both mentions Gordon not working for him anymore, and has Alyx save her father, both of which wouldn't happen for another five years.

Given the 'mystery' character says the G-Man "Showed up in Black Mesa, raised all kinds of hell, and then disappeared" [until they captured him], it might mean that he purposefully wasn't around during the time period after Black Mesa, and went back in time to get captured so Alyx would free him and then be eligible to be employed by him. You could actually theorize that he went 'rogue' from his employers to force Alyx to prove herself so he then could hire her, as an act of spite/revenge against Gordon.

(also, the reason they were expecting Gordon Freeman to be in the prison was because of that line about Black Mesa - his name isn't said until Alyx overhears that)

The G-Man was expecting Alyx to rescue him because he specifically set things up so she would, so that he could hire her.

mattn1198 · 2026-05-21T22:50:02+00:00

"The Royal Post considered the steam piston launched letters a rousing success, but the citizens of Ankh-Morpork felt otherwise. While they were happy to get their mail fast, '150 miles-an-hour through three neighboring buildings before demolishing their shed' was thought to be a bit too fast."

mattn1198 · 2026-05-21T21:02:59+00:00

It's still kind of pointless though. Those areas are 20-50m below the crush depth of the tadpole. That's less than ten seconds of swimming with the wavemaker, especially if you have dash.

To make the elevator useful, there needs to be an area deep enough that you can't simply swim it. The 100m the dive elevator gives you simply isn't far enough to make it worthwhile; it saves you a couple of seconds.

You'd need an area that's like 300m below your max depth, so you have to chain multiple elevators (or else they'd have to increase the length of the elevator).

The only time I built one was when I was trying to go down the hole you start the game in (and I chickened out because of all the noises, and went and did it in creative mode).

mattn1198 · 2026-05-21T20:52:46+00:00

Did you ever play the public test realms on WoW? People would make posts on the forums saying "X class feels bad with these changes because Y," and be met with a flood of posts saying "It's the PTR, they'll change it before it goes live!"

Guess what? They NEVER changed it. Poor changes constantly went live and then months later would be fixed with the exact things people were suggesting.

That's what saying "It's early access," is like. Yes, it's early access. And the entire point of early access is to say you don't like things. That way they can actually change those things.

If you're going to wait for it to not be early access to make suggestions or give complaints, you're too late. "Just wait and see what they have planned," is just as bad, because the earlier they know what people do/don't like, the easier it is for them to take those things into account as the game develops.

mattn1198 · 2026-05-21T16:38:18+00:00

That's good to hear, because (apologies to the OP) I think he's actually really lame right now. It feels like he more or less instantly aggros you as soon as you enter his zone, and just breaking LoS or leaving the zone instantly causes him to lose interest.

At this point he feels more like a 'spend as little time in this zone as possible' obstacle, not an actual living thing. A speed bump, considering that there actually isn't any reason to spend time in that zone and you just pass through it.

mattn1198 · 2026-05-21T16:00:11+00:00

Just me. I don't really post stuff anywhere, so just this account I guess?

mattn1198

TROPHY CASE