Subnautica plus Subnautica: Below Zero (NSP, XCI) ROM + v1.21.71113 Update

Subnautica plus Subnautica: Below Zero is a combination of the award-winning game Subnautica with its sequel Subnautica Below Zero, this exclusive Nintendo Switch experience immerses players in the captivating mystery of the water world on planet 4546B.

Engage in crafting equipment, piloting submarines, and outsmarting wildlife as you explore vibrant coral reefs, volcanic landscapes, intricate cave systems, and more. Survival becomes paramount in both treacherous aquatic zones and frozen terrain.

Subnautica was released in early access for Windows in December 2014, macOS in June 2015, and Xbox One in May 2016. The game was released out of early access in January 2018 for macOS and Windows, with versions for PlayStation 4 and Xbox One in December 2018. The physical console versions were published by Gearbox Publishing. The Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 5, and Xbox Series X/S versions were released in May 2021. It received generally positive reviews from critics and had sold over 5 million units by January 2020. A sequel, Subnautica: Below Zero, was released in May 2021.

Introduced in early access via Steam and the Epic Games Store in January 2019, Subnautica: Below Zero was released for macOS, Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Windows, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S on May 14, 2021. The physical versions of the game were published by Bandai Namco Entertainment. It received generally positive reviews from critics.

GAMEPLAY

Subnautica is a survival action-adventure game set in an open-world environment and played from a first-person perspective. The player controls the lone survivor of the crashed spacecraft known as Aurora, Ryley Robinson, as he is stranded on a remote ocean planet known as 4546B in the Galaxy of Andromeda. The main objective is to explore the ocean and survive its dangers while completing tasks to advance the plot. Players can collect resources and blueprints, construct tools, build bases and submersibles, and interact with the planet’s wildlife. Some of the most extreme dangers to the player include dangerous fauna.

But not limited to Crabsquids, Warpers, Mesmers, Bonesharks, Ampeels, Stalkers, Crashfish, and Leviathan-class lifeforms like the Reaper, Sea Dragon, and Ghost Leviathans. Fauna varies by location and is spread across ecologically distinct biomes that primarily include: the Safe Shallows, Crash Zone, Mushroom Forest, Kelp Forest, and the Grassy Plateau. The majority of the game is set underwater, with two explorable islands hidden in the NW and SW regions of the map, and a simulated day-and-night cycle that affects visibility, along with an eclipse that happens on rare occasions. The game supports VR headsets, such as the HTC Vive and the Oculus Rift, with the additional input of a keyboard and mouse or game controller.

SUBANAITCA PLOT

Subnautica takes place in the late 22nd century in a spacefaring future. The Aurora, an infrared deep-space vessel constructed by the Alterra Corporation, has been sent to a system at the outer reaches of known space on its maiden voyage under the pretenses of constructing high-speed space travel infrastructure. Unknown to the crew is that the ship was also sent to the system to search for and, possibly, rescue the crew of a ship named the Degasi, which crashed on planet 4546B ten years prior. As the Aurora does a gravity slingshot around 4546B, it is attacked by a mysterious energy pulse and crashes on the planet. Several crew members manage to eject from the ship in escape pods, but only the player character—non-essential systems maintenance chief Ryley Robinson—survives.

During this time, Ryley repairs the radio in his Life Pod and gets messages through it from a trading ship called Sunbeam, led by Captain Avery Quinn. Quinn talks to Ryley and states that Sunbeam is on the far side of Andromeda but promises to take Ryley home, telling him that they will pick him up upon landing on a mountainous island, one of two in the game’s playable region. As the Sunbeam begins landing, a giant alien facility fires upon it and it explodes in mid-air as Ryley watches. If the player manages to disable the facility before the Sunbeam lands, Quinn tells Ryley they are unable to land due to a debris field and will instead inform Alterra Corporation of the situation. Ryley finds records of the Degasi’s crew stating that only three survived the initial crash, but later two out of the three are confirmed dead and one is presumed dead.

Ryley also learns of the existence of the ‘Precursors’, an ancient, advanced alien species that came to planet 4546B approximately one thousand years ago in search of a cure for a highly infectious disease, known as the Kharaa Bacterium. The Precursors discovered Kharaa during the exploration of an unknown planet, and the disease spread due to a failure in quarantine procedures, killing over 140 billion individuals. Investigating thousands of planets in an attempt to find a cure, the Precursors eventually located a species of organism in 4546B that they named the Sea Emperor Leviathan, which produced an enzyme that could cure Kharaa. However, the only living Sea Emperor was too old to produce the enzyme in enough potency to have any effect, and the Precursors were unable to force its only eggs to hatch. In an attempt to investigate the egg-hatching process of the Sea Emperor, the Precursors took the egg of a related Leviathan, the fire-breathing Sea Dragon, but the mother destroyed a Precursor research facility and released samples of Kharaa into the planet’s ecosystem.

Forced to evacuate, the Precursors enabled a facility known as the Quarantine Enforcement Platform, which consists of a large weapon that fires on any ships attempting to leave or land on the planet — including the Degasi, Aurora, and Sunbeam. The Sea Emperor, who seeks the freedom of her children, communicates telepathically with Ryley and helps him discover the prison in which she is held captive. She gives Ryley information on how to hatch her eggs, who does so and is cured by the enzyme produced by the juvenile Sea Emperors. Ryley then disables the Quarantine Enforcement Platform (only achievable by one not infected with Kharaa) and constructs a rocket with blueprints collected from the captain’s quarters within the crashed Aurora. After escaping the planet, the Sea Emperor communicates with Ryley a final time, promising that the two “go together” although they are different.

SUBNAITCA: BELOW ZERO PLOT

Two years after the events of the original game, scientist Robin Ayou smuggles herself onto planet 4546B in a frozen biome named “Sector Zero” to investigate the circumstances of her sister Samantha’s death, which Alterra claims were a result of “employee negligence”. During the past year, Alterra had built several research bases on the planet but had recently withdrawn all of its personnel, allowing Robin to land on the planet. Shortly after landing, Robin picks up a distress signal and goes to investigate it, discovering an alien sanctuary containing the digitized consciousness of a living precursor.

The alien introduces itself as Al-An and forcibly downloads itself into Robin’s brain just as the sanctuary’s power runs out. Angry at Al-An for intruding into her mind, Robin agrees to help it construct a new body for it to transfer into. To carry this out, Robin combs the planet for alien installations and artifacts to find the necessary components and materials. Al-An also explains that it did not try to contact Alterra because it believed Alterra’s motivations did not align with its own, and it did not want to risk them finding a way to its homeworld. During their search, Al-An admits that it was one of the lead scientists researching a cure for the Kharaa bacterium and it disobeyed orders by trying to hatch Sea Dragon eggs, leading to the initial outbreak of Kharaa in 4546B.

Meanwhile, Robin also continues her investigation into Samantha’s death. She searches all of the abandoned Alterra research facilities and finds out that Alterra discovered the corpse of a leviathan frozen in ice that was still infected by Kharaa. However, instead of destroying the Kharaa, Alterra decided to start researching the bacterium for useful applications. Fearing another outbreak and concerned Alterra will use Kharaa to develop bioweapons, Samantha decided to sabotage the project by using explosives to collapse the cave holding the leviathan, while her friend, Degasi survivor Marguerite Maida, destroyed the lab holding Alterra’s Kharaa samples. However, Samantha was inadvertently caught in the blast and killed by falling rubble. Unable to determine the cause of the cave-in, Alterra wrote off Samantha’s death as a result of negligence.

To prevent Alterra from returning to the planet to restart their research, Robin recovers a cache of antibacterial agents Samantha had made earlier and uses it to neutralize the Kharaa infecting the frozen leviathan. Eventually, Robin can recover all of the components necessary to build a new body and fabricate it. Al-An transfers itself to the new body and decides to return to the precursor homeworld to see for itself what had happened to the other Architects, as well as to atone for its past mistakes. Al-An activates an Architect phase gate and Robin travels with Al-An to the precursor homeworld, uncertain of what they will find there.