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Sunless Sea


radiofloyd

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From Kickstarter (2013) to Early Access (2014) to official release (2015), Sunless Sea came to be in a manner similar to many indie games in recent years. But even in Early Access it got brilliant reviews and was one of RPS's best games of 2014. Eurogamer gave it 10/10. Those endorsements were enough to pique my interest and I've finally gotten around to putting a couple of hours into it.

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My early impressions are that it's brilliant. Like I said in the Westerado thread, I love games that are a bit original and this is another game that feels unique. Essentially it is a kind of exploration and survival game. The above screenshots are pretty typical. From the safety of the port of Fallen London (read: some kind of dark fantasy post apocalyptic world) you have to explore the sea, visiting ports to talk to the locals, collect stories, trade all manner of things, pick up quests and generally - discover. The problem is, the extent to which you can explore is limited by your fuel and supplies (food), which are not come by cheaply. Not to mention that it's a dark, dangerous world. In many ways, it's similar to FTL: Faster than Light - but if you read the RPS article you'll see that this is much more of a wordy game, more of an rpg, much more of a developed world than FTL.

However, like FTL, death is pretty hard to avoid. When you die in the game you can bequeath certain traits and possessions to your successor, but not everything that you own. So far I've died once, when I wandered too far north and was mauled by some kind of monstrous iceberg that was doing way more damage than I realised and killed me in a couple of hits. I chose to pass on my sea chart to my next character, so the ports I have discovered are still shown on the map.

There are actually two ways to play the game - permadeath, and a kind of soft death option (where you can manually save like a normal game), but permadeath is the default setting and the devs say that it is the way the game is intended to be played, so I've gone with that.

Last but not least, the game looks and sounds stunning. Close to home the sea is brightly lit but the more you explore the sea is shrouded in complete darkness, so you will welcome the glow of an island you can dock at. And I love the colourful illuminations and designs of the various islands and flora and fauna. As you would expect, the soundtrack is minimal but fitting, and just generally excellent. You can listen at bandcamp.

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Ventured out a bit more today, still somehow surviving with my second character, even though I've been close to disaster a few times. There definitely is a correct way to play the early game in this. Bringing port reports home to London gives you quite a bit of echoes (the game's currency), and you need echoes to buy fuel and supplies, to upgrade your ship and to hire officers. The game obviously expects you to visit the local ports and make money this way in the early stages. Of course, after that, it becomes more of a lottery...

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Still plundering the seas with my second character. The map for this game is huge.The far side of the map is a long, long way from London... I have to say, encounters with monsters are rare enough and they are pretty easy to outrun, so I haven't run any risk of dying in a while. The game rewards you for visiting ports more than once (at the very least, each visit since you were last in London will earn you a port report), so I try to revisit ports along the why while also venturing further out to sea. So far I have been earning enough echoes to keep myself stocked in fuel and supplies but not any more than that.

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A decent chunk of the map explored now and I've seen all manner of sharks and sea serpents and giant squids but I certainly haven't mastered the art of making money in this game.

I have noticed that some ports have shops that buy and sell items at different prices to London. I have a feeling that trading might actually be a big part of Sunless Sea. I need to start writing down prices when I am exploring and then comparing them to London.

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Explored more of the bottom half of the map today and came across some interesting islands, including an island infested by spiders (the island is covered in spiderwebs and you an actually see spiders moving on the surface). In the grand old tradition I've taken out a pen and paper and actually started to write down the items for sale at each port and items needed for quests. I have noticed that there is one island, not too far from London, where I can sell an item for more than I bought it for at London, and buy an item there that I can then make a profit on in London. In other words, make a profitable round trip. But I'm kind of limited by my cargo space and I would need to trade large amounts for it to be worth my while. Worth keeping in mind though if I get a ship with a bigger hold.

I got lucky and one of the items I picked up on my travels I was able to trade with one of the NPCs in London for 1000 echoes (I was going to say Euros...). I could spend this immediately on ship upgrades but actually it allows me to do a few things quest wise so I think I'm going to do that instead. I think it will be more profitable.

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My second captain died due to high terror (terror is a stat in the game, that can be raised and lowered by various things). The crew mutinied and I had two very low percentage challenges, both of which would end in game over, and I failed. I actually had sailed around with maximum terror before a few times but that's the first time that happened me. This time, I had most of the map explored except for the south eastern portion which was mostly blank. I figured out how to make money in the game - essentially from doing the quests you can collect in London and not just exploring aimlessly. All in all, I have a good handle on the game now for my third captain. My playtime is at 11 hours and I could easily see it increasing to 30 or 40 (especially with the submarine expansion on the way which sounds really cool). But I think this is a good time to play some other games for a while, Read Only Memories is calling me!

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  • 4 weeks later...

I've been playing a bit on the Steam free weekend, and I really like it. I don't really know what I'm doing, my first game came to a standstill when I found myself at a port without fuel or supplies and no money to buy any more. I'm definitely going to pick it up at some point.

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