Fair enough. I personally like Roguelikes... as long as the start of the game is fun.
Subnautica is a game where I enjoy the start of the game. There’s just enough variation that each start feels unique, while familiar enough that each new survivor I play gets established faster than the one before. Unknown Worlds managed to make resource gathering challenging enough to be entertaining IMO, while keeping resource requirements low enough that it didn’t feel like a grind to me.
When I tried No Man’s Sky, I realized fairly quickly that there would be no replaying the start of that game. In fact, I got so tired of the grind to simply keep my life support working, that I quit and uninstalled after about a week IIRC. Given that I have 20 year old games that I like to start up and play until I feel like victory is inevitable, or survival is assured, that’s really saying something.
I love Roguelikes, but I’m not a fan of using “one death mode” in games which aren’t designed around it.
That said, there are some games which I find work very well when played in “roguelike mode” even though they aren’t true roguelikes. Minecraft is one. I have a main world I’ve been playing for many years now which I just keep building anew into where I can die over and over again, but I also occasionally start new hardcore worlds just for kicks. Minecraft’s start is always so completely unique and different that the game lends itself greatly to a hardcore mode, because the game start is always so different and interesting.
For myself, Subnautica’s start isn’t different enough every time to make hardcore mode worth it. The life pod locations are the same in every game. I know the devs experimented with a proc gen world for the game but eventually went with a hand crafted one instead, and while that did wonders for the game’s superb atmosphere it also lessened the appeal of Subnautica hardcore mode to me. It would be neat to have an alternative proc gen world in the game alongside the hand crafted one!
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