Sunless Sea

It's not earned easily, but if you are proficient in English and you also have patience to get in picture in a fantastical world, your reward will be a true treasure among current games. [Issue#250]

More action-focused players will be unable to enjoy Sunless Sea at first, but I hope they take their time to learn what it has to offer and enjoy their trips in the Unterzee, with all the emotion and the frustration that comes packaged in them.

Sunless Sea is special, though it is not for everyone. That's okay.

Sunless Sea is a little darker and less cheerful than its already morbid sister Fallen London, but it’s no less delightful.

The static narratives and roguelike gameplay in Sunless Sea don't always gel together harmoniously, but Failbetter Games has succeeded in delivering a tense and engaging experience and a rich and atmospheric setting.

Sunless Sea is in many ways a real stunning adventure, that dare to be original. Unfortunately the pacing feels a bit slow, and the dialogues aren’t that existing. Still, it’s a good choice for the hardcore adventures, that seeks something new.

I don’t want to sound too down on Sunless Sea. Sadly though, it’s one of those games that I respect and appreciate more than I enjoy and one that I find it easier to recommend than to actually play.

One of the best games I have played in a long time. The text is immersive. I actually feel like I'm part of the story. I find this to be a rare thing in games, you're so often ramrodded towards a central narrative even in games that proclaim themselves to be openended and open world. In sunless sea there are a million little pieces of story, all well written, all tailor made, but free to combine themselves into new and exciting things all of the time. I find myself anxiously wondering if I'll make it to the next port before my food and fuel run out, wondering what I could have done to stop that house from burning down, and generally lost inside the game. This doesnt happen. I dont get lost inside games. Somehow I am.

I have spend now around 10hrs playing this game, and I'm ready to write a review. Let's start with a short summary: Seldom have I played a game that gives me such mixed messages. Sublime text based story and a truly wonderful world battle with bad game mechanics and pure boredom. And while I wish I could fully advise to buy this game, I feel troubled by some pretty bad design choices. The good: This has been said before, the game world and the writing are simply great. The whole world, while really dark makes complete sense. Every port that you explore has new interesting stories to tell. The choices you have to make are meaningful, even if you succeed in challenges you often have to deal with negative effects that come sidelong. Like some artifact you get that is worth a lot but raises your Terror levels. The card systems is kind of artificial, but works really good. You always know what you need and what your chances are to succeed in a challenge. As a whole the setting is wonderful and you strife to learn more from this world, explorer the secrets of the deep Zea and deal with it's terrors. The neutral (People might find this good or bad according to personal taste): The game is really hard. Ressource management is brutal, most of your money is spend on fuel and food. Building up something extra takes a long time. You will die quite some time, and dying is really punishing in this game. In the beginning you loose everything and you will have to start all over again. If you find this troubling I advise you to turn off permanent death witch is an option. (But default is unforgiving mode, so be careful) Also ff you die there is no random content, except the position of islands. So you will have to go through everything you did again. Overall the pace of the game is really slow. Most of the time you will stare at your screen seeing your little steamer make it's way through an almost black screen. Of course this adds a lot to the feeling of the game, but if you are after fast paced action, you won't get it in this game. The bad There are way to little options for ships, equipment etc. After 10 hours I haven't bought a single thing! I have now 2.000 money to spare, which is not bad considering the time I spent and there simply isn't a single thing that would make sense to buy. I repeat that 10 hours in the game and I haven't bough a single upgrade because there is nothing to buy: - New gun -> you will avoid fights 90% of the time anyway - New engine -> makes you slightly faster but consumes more precious fuel - New ship -> WAY more expensive then 2.000 echo While we are at it: combat ****. You will be stuck with a single gun forever because you can't buy another ship, so you have tactical options of 0. Also combat is really dangerous most of the time, so you will avoid it as best as possible. Trading also ****. There simply isn't anything you can trade with the starter ship that has enough margin to cover fuel & food and getting a trading ship is really expensive. Also this is a roguelike game, but dying is the worst thing you can do. You will want to avoid dying in any way possible because it's so extremely punishing. The permadeath option makes about as much sense as for Monkey Island. The Verdict So where does that leave us? Incredible writing vs. crappy gameplay. I the writing good enough to take the pain? I would say yes, but turn of permadeath or you will never explore the wonders of the Zea and only do the same stuff over and over again (remember, the definition of madness...). This game has been compared to Faster then Light (FTL) a lot. But let me say this to you straight away: It's NOTHING like that. FTL is a game stripped down to it's core gameplay. With incredibly deep and tactical fights, fast gameplay and a different outcome every time you start new. The combination of ships, weapons, crew members, augmentations etc. are endless in FTL and you get stuff pretty fast. On the other hand the story is spare and you will just get to make a handful of decisions along the way. That is about the complete opposite of Sunless Sea. Story driven, slow, very spare random elements, a complete lack of equipment and very flat sometimes really boring gameplay. To break it down for you: In FTL hardly every nothing happens in Sunless Sea you don't do anything at least 60% of the time. Would buy again? Yes, but a very close one.

Sunless Sea offers an open world with an abundance to explore and interact with. It has a beautifully drawn 2d top-down world and I instantly felt the victorian steam punk alternative world. However the game can easily overwhelm a newcomer with its many plots, sidequests and stories and items - along with a punishing difficulty (at first) that literally leaves you dead in the water quickly. Once you become a bit secure and can deal with your most basic needs, the game turns into quite a grind - but usually offers more depths to it. Combat and crew management could have been much nicer - as i never really related to my crew.... at all much. All in all, the game with well worth it - and i can only recommend it.

It was pretty boring to play. But the concept and art style were semi cool (other than the character art which were pretty bad). There was also a random r18 scene with a crew member which I was not expecting at all... Surprised that only got it a teen rating, even if it was only words. The combat and story felt pretty dull. I can only recommend this game if you solely want an explorative type game

Made it about an hour north from London. Almost starved before I could buy some food. Sunk by a living iceberg. I was told upfront that my first captain would likely die, and quickly. Doesn't mean I have to like it. Music, art and writing are excellent from what I've seen, but it could be a lot more forgiving. Even for a roguelike.