Subnautica 2 Gets Scarier With ‘Early Access 2.0,’ But Its Early Access Period Has No End In Sight

Since its early access launch earlier this year, developer Unknown Worlds has delivered quite a few significant updates to Subnautica 2, adding features like a buddy system and, after quite a bit of controversy, a way to fight back against some overly aggressive fish. Now, the team has revealed the game’s biggest update yet, which comes with a boatload of content and an ambitious title: Early Access 2.0.

In a video posted to Subnautica‘s YouTube channel last week, Creative Director Anthony Gallegos described EA 2.0 as “the most substantial update we’ve done since release.” It’ll add a story expansion, new creatures, an entirely new region composed of five biomes, and a Tadpole chassis that adds arms and legs. Most importantly, though, Gallegos described the new map addition as “one of our scariest regions we’ve ever done.” Yikes!

Early Access 2.0 was not given a release window. The vlog also features relatively few peeks at the new content, but Gallegos promised more updates on the content of EA 2.0 via a vlog series that’ll include talks with other members of the development team.

Most players seem to be stoked about the news—the incoming update’s content was largely shaped by player feedback and includes a long-beloved round room base component, which is finally making a return.

However, a few other players are frustrated by the lack of a release date, which likely means that the game’s full release is still pretty far away.

“Early access 2? Come on,” one Reddit commentor wrote. When did we start accepting this nonsense?”

It’s worth noting, though, that the Subnautica 2 Steam page does mention that the game will be in EA for around two to three years, so it’s not like the original timeline is getting delayed to make room for EA 2.0. It seems like quite a few fans of the franchise are still hesitant to start playing Subnautica 2, but I’ve never really understood this, especially considering how solid of a state Subnautica 2 is already in. I’m just hoping that EA 2.0 will be substantial enough to give these holdouts an excuse to finally dive in.