Submerged (PlayStation 4) Review

Epic Games made a lot of lofty promises of how incredible their Unreal Engine 4 was going to be, and as of this review that greatness has yet to be seen. Submerged proudly boasts its use of the Unreal Engine 4; it is as unimpressive as anyone could have imagined and makes Unreal 3 look good. When Submerged starts up, it shows a little promise, being colourful and having some nice shadows, but it is all immediately undone after 30 seconds. This is a pretty ugly game with some poorly executed visuals.

The two main characters look really unappealing and resemble E.T. if he had Botox and was stretched out; their facial anatomy looks all wrong, and while it may have been an "artistic choice," the effect is quite disturbing. Never mind that the main girl's dangling scarf-things clip through herself all the time, and that she animates like a blow-up doll being manipulated by unseen Japanese theatre performers. Even the simple act of her walking around looks ridiculous. There have been far more impressive student games that animate and control better than the girl from Submerged.

Speaking of controls, why does this girl move so slowly and feels like she is always on ice? She just kind of slides around on the surface, while she does her canned walking cycles. This becomes even more evident when the analogue control stick is slightly pressed, where she will glide along the floor without even moving her legs! Epic Games would be smart to have their Unreal Engine 4 label stripped from the boot-up of Submerged, because this does not inspire any hope that this is a viable game development tool at all.

Outside of walking, there is also the girl's motorboat, which controls okay; there is a mixed bag of water effects on display, however. Sometimes it looks fine, but other times it looks like something out of a Dreamcast game, with obvious repeating textures… which Submerged is full of. There are sometimes textures on things that look like they shouldn't belong there.

There is rarely a moment when the game runs smoothly, either, and the frame rate can drop to an alarming one frame per second. The frame rate is so bad it can be easily be mistaken for the game freezing or crashing. It gives a sense that Submerged is not a complete game and never even went through a Q&A or bug testing phase, since everything feels jerky and unfinished. The polygon count, too, is weirdly low for a game not on PS3 or Xbox 360, and there are lots of low resolution textures - even the skybox is surprisingly fuzzy and looks very fake and unnatural. The best quality about Submerged is that the lighting is kind of impressive at times, but that is only because the overall package is so sloppy.

Submerged tries to tell a story about a girl who lives in some kind of Waterworld-esque post-apocalyptic setting, while she tries to get medical supplies for her injured brother. The protagonist is apparently named "Miku," but the story plays out with no real dialogue other than the fake language that Miku mutters to herself after she gets a few supplies. There is a sub-plot involving some ugly monsters who are watching Miku as she is slowly transforming into one, which vaguely feels ripped off from the PS2 classic Shadow of the Colossus, but at the end, any tension that was occurring as a result of the slow transformation is completely undone thanks to a deus ex machina.

Speaking of Shadow of the Colossus, Submerged also copies its basic structure, too, by having a protagonist wander a wasteland and climbing structures, only to be instantly transported back to the centre of the map. The only difference here is that Submerged has no conflict. This is one of the main selling points, which is fine, but there have been many adventuring games that have no combat at all and still manage to be engaging. It becomes very difficult to get invested in anything if there is no real conflict or challenge. Games like Journey invite the player to explore in a combat-free world, but there is also a sense of danger. Submerged has no danger - it is a 3D world that can be interacted with that has had pads put on its corners.

The sandbox that Submerged places Miku in is a respectable size, if a bit samey, since most of the buildings are generic, with only a few standout examples that feel unique. The climbing Miku does is pretty much ripped from Ico or Uncharted, but executed far more incompetently, since it feels very stiff and Miku animates like a robotic wind-up toy. As to be expected from such a janky game, the climbing is very glitchy and finicky, since Miku does not always obey inputs and sometimes has a very hard time connecting to the designated climbable points. As this game is also very linear, it can be frustrating to explore, only to reach a dead end with a pointless collectible.

It is never too hard to figure out where to go, since all Miku has to do to find supplies is to keep an eye out for red flowers, which translates in this game to "you can climb here." While navigating the environment, it is especially concerning that the developer might not have implemented all the appropriate colliders, since some of the 3D geometry can be passed through, too. Upon completing the story and continuing the game, Miku is free to explore the city with her brother inexplicably missing. The only thing left to do is gather all the useless collectibles, which are basically caveman drawings that leave hints about the game's lore, but after about 20 it is pretty obvious what happened and the urge to collect all 60 feels lost.