7 Ways Subnautica 2 Proves that the Ocean is Scarier Than Space

If Subnautica 2 manages to prove anything, it's that sci-fi doesn't necessarily have to take place in space in order to be immersive, mysterious, and occasionally terrifying. Having crash-landed on the planet Proteus, your job is to survive and adapt to the surrounding environment, all the while finding out what happened to the other scientists in the area.

While the game does not lean into its horror elements as much as it perhaps could have, there are still plenty of things that strike a sense of unease into the player. Whether it's approaching a strange-looking wreck and knowing that thousands of souls have perished aboard, or simply being caught out in the vast open ocean as the darkness takes over, these are the ways in which Subnautica 2 proves that the ocean can be scarier than space.

7 Limited Visibility

Out of Sight Does Not Mean Out of Mind

One of the first things Subnautica 2 drives home is just how unsettling a lack of visibility can be. Even if your immediate surroundings appear safe enough, you just never know what might be lurking just a few meters beyond in the endless blue. This constant sense of uncertainty can make exploring quite a daunting prospect, particularly if you haven't got the right early game items at your disposal.

As if visibility wasn't already bad enough on the best of days, the prospect of nighttime makes it all the worse. Although Subnautica 2's waters are populated with all kinds of bioluminescent creatures, not all of them are necessarily friendly. To make matters worse, much of the game's most valuable equipment can only be found in the deepest, darkest caves, where your survival skills are sure to be tested.

6 Descent Into Madness

Just Ignore The Whispering Voices

The history of seafaring gives us more than a few tales of madness. When spending days, weeks, and even months on end out in the open ocean, it's not uncommon to start humming a popular shanty one moment, and the next, you're naming a volleyball Wilson and talking to it for several years.

Subnautica 2 plays with the theme of madness by introducing the new Proteavirus, which infects the water in certain parts, causing players to hear human voices and fragments of memories from long-drowned souls. A prolonged stay in space certainly has the potential to drive one completely insane, but no such case has yet occurred. As for divers, there have been many reports of those who, for one reason or another, lose their minds temporarily if not altogether.

5 There Is Definitely Life Out There

And You're In Their Home

As the old saying goes, the terrifying thing about space is that you're either alone or you're not. Out in the open ocean, particularly on the hostile planet Proteus, there's no doubt that you're surrounded by other lifeforms. The only real question becomes how many and how big the most hostile ones are.

The answer, in Subnautica 2 at least, is pretty damn big. In addition to Leviathans and giant crustaceans, you'll also have to be wary of the myriad other hostile creatures, which are not limited to fish. There are plenty of poisonous plants and fungal pockets, which can impair or disorient you even if they don't kill you outright. The constant threat of other lifeforms means that you have to be much more paranoid in the ocean, particularly when you consider all the other factors at play, too.

4 Everything Wants To Eat You

It's Nothing Personal

Not only are there many other bizarre and unpredictable lifeforms sharing in your new habitat, but plenty of them also see you as just another daytime meal if you cross their path at the wrong time. When landing on Proteus, you're nowhere near the top of the food chain. While smaller fish like Bluemoons and Geordies can make for a quick hunger-averting snack, you can equally end up on the wrong end of 'dinner time' if you happen to swim into the wrong areas unprepared.

If mutated sharks, leviathans, and toxic fungi weren't enough to discourage you, then how about the fact that the very World Tree at the center of the game's surface is also actively trying to brainwash and consume you? There are plenty of things to worry about when it comes to space exploration, but being eaten alive is usually not as legitimate as it is in a deep-sea setting.

3 A Range of Documented Phobias

Too Many To Count, In Fact

The laundry list of phobias that could potentially affect players in Subnautica 2 is certainly an extensive one. From thalassophobia and megalophobia to trypophobia and ichthyophobia, you'll encounter plenty to make your skin crawl if you don't have the stomach for it. Another phobia, which is perhaps more niche but equally triggerable in Subnautica 2, is that of megalohydrothalassaphobia: the fear of large, submerged, man-made objects.

Space certainly has its share of existential horrors, but there's just enough familiarity with the ocean to induce a whole range of fears in players who are prone to them. While I personally don't suffer from any such phobias, I can't help but feel a slight chill when peering over an abyssal canyon edge or seeing the lifeless husk of a spaceship disintegrating on the ocean floor.

2 The Torment of Near-Safety

So Close Yet So Far

One of the other especially tormenting aspects of underwater exploration compared to outer space is the fact that safety so often feels just out of reach. Unlike being fully committed to a long-haul stay on a faraway planet, exploring the oceans always brings the desire to eventually step ashore on dry land again.

Whether you're exploring deep caverns in a volcanic biome or simply planning a routine food-gathering trip, you always have the concern of returning to safety somewhere in the back of your mind. Subnautica 2's fascinating game world can often tempt you to explore beyond your means, only to leave you blacking out due to lack of oxygen just a few meters from the water's surface.

1 No Way Home

Guess We're Never Getting Off This Planet

Unlike a typical outer space mission, where the return journey has usually been planned in advance, the Subnautica series purposefully crash-lands you onto alien worlds with almost no hope whatsoever of escaping. As a result, you're forced to not only survive, but literally adapt to the surrounding environment, a process which makes you question how long you can truly even remain human.

Even on the off-chance that you could blast your way back into space, Subnautica 2 does a good job of making that seem like an unappealing situation. On top of murderous and corrupt corporations, debt slavery, and general tyranny, the game makes you feel as though the society that you might have once hoped to return to is, in fact, just as bad as the one you've landed upon.