{"id":1595517,"date":"2026-06-02T16:34:04","date_gmt":"2026-06-02T16:34:04","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/jnjbLbSi9UQBvuXbJThbW7"},"modified":"2026-06-02T16:34:04","modified_gmt":"2026-06-02T16:34:04","slug":"part-of-me-wishes-we-could-see-the-subnautica-2-the-devs-scrapped-the-dwarf-fortress-of-ecosystem-simulators","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/arcader.org\/news\/part-of-me-wishes-we-could-see-the-subnautica-2-the-devs-scrapped-the-dwarf-fortress-of-ecosystem-simulators\/","title":{"rendered":"Part of me wishes we could see the Subnautica 2 the devs scrapped: The Dwarf Fortress of ecosystem simulators"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Subnautica<\/a>, if you ask me, is a game about being incredibly wet and alarmingly hungry. It’s an under-the-sea game (you can tell from the name) about hoovering up resources and using them to construct ever-more complex tools that you transcend the barriers placed before you by nature. That’s what Subnautica was, and, though I’ve not played it yet, that’s why I’m pretty sure Subnautica 2 is too.<\/p>\n

But what if actually it was an ecosystem simulator, or a game where you were constantly bopping between different planets, not just trapped on one?<\/p>\n

It’s more likely, or at least possible, than you think. In a chat with MinnMax<\/a>, Subnautica 2 game design lead Anthony Gallegos reflected on the numerous ideas Unknown Worlds dreamt up\u2014and scrapped\u2014for its immensely popular sequel<\/a>. <\/p>\n

“We even entertained ideas like, ‘Should this be a direct sequel to Subnautica'” recalled Gallegos. “Should this be about the same character again? Should we continue the story of [Below Zero]? All those things were explored before we ended up going in a different direction.”<\/p>\n

Also on the table: something Sea of Thieves-flavoured, centred around “endlessly replayable loops.” The long wind-up on development for Subnautica 2<\/a> gave Unknown Worlds the space to iterate a lot on some pretty out-there stuff. “We spent like eight months just prototyping wild ideas. Wild ideas like: ‘What if we made an ecosystem simulator?’ And so some of our early prototypes were like\u2014there’s these things that eat clams and the clams breed at a rate of one every 90 seconds, and the clams will then\u2014if you’re not careful\u2014eat the kelp forest.<\/p>\n

“So what does the player have to do to achieve a balance between [eating] the urchins, the urchins eat the kelp, and left to its own devices, how could these things fall apart or not?”<\/p>\n

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