That sinking feeling
The developer ofFull Fathomdescribes it as a “thalassophobia sim”.
Things could not get any worse.
And then you see it.
Something in the green haze outside.
In the most pitchy of elevators it is “horrorSubnautica”.
So yes, it is a bit like the wet wandering of Unknown Worlds' survival game.
Yet there is something greebly and clunky about the machinery of Full Fathom.
All the lights just went out.
The game’s demo went up in July, so I’m a little late to the underwater party.
But I won’t let that stop me.
“Use your throttle,” advises a handy leaflet in the control room.
“Holes are bad.”
In the end, I barely get the submarine moving and almost perish in a nearby ruin.
Outside the ship, spikey urchins will puncture your suit and sap your strength.
I get lost in a dark house when my flare goes out.
Luckily I am scroungy enough to have picked up a can of compressed air for emergencies.
I can’t fully blame myself for the incompetence.
This is your warning that the demo is quite hands-off when it comes to tutorials.
I enjoy hating him.
Meanwhile, there is a frame story that sits outside all of this, full of fun meta touches.
The pause menu here is a set of controls mounted on the wall.
A neon hotel sign reads “Alpha Demo”.
An authentic looking exit label on the door reads: “This door will exit the game”.
I think that’s cool.
