Review Submerged (Switch)

Game: Submerged
Genre: Puzzle Adventure
System: Nintendo Switch (also on PS4, Xbox and iOS)
Developer| Publisher: Uppercut Games
Price: $9.99|£7.99| € 8,99
Age Rating: EU 7+| USA 10+
Release Date: 7th June 2019

Review code kindly provided by Uppercut Games

Submerged is a third-person combat-free game in which you explore a mysterious flooded city and discover the beauty of desolation in vast outdoor environments.

A heart wrenching story

As you may know if you are a regular here at LadiesGamers.com, I love a good story in a game. If a game manages to grab my attention enough that I really want to find out why, when and how it all happened then I’m all in. Submerged is such a game, which is special, as the developers manage to tell the story with hardly any word spoken or text shown. They set the scene, make you feel the atmosphere and witness the desperation at close quarters.

At the start, you see a girl and a boy in a small fishing boat, puttering towards a mysterious flooded city. They find shelder on the top of the clocktower of what used to be a church. Miku, the girl, carries her wounded little brother Taku to a stone bench, exhausted from their trek to find help. They find no one in the city. She is, however, adamant to do whatever it takes to help him survive this ordeal. To do so, she has to go out into the flooded streets and scale buildings to find supplies and medication.

A brief but adequate tutorial

The game has a tutorial, introducing new elements one by one. But it’s minimal, a lot is left to you. Apparently, the city has been flooded for quite some time, judging by the way nature has taken over what mankind has built. Only the tallest structures are visible above the water.

You find out what structures or greenery give Miku enough foothold to climb up on. Which buildings you can scale, and which you can’t explore. It’s a pity you don’t see the insides of buildings, just the exterior. But the developers have managed to make it attractive to find what’s around the next corner anyway.

The map shows everything you have discovered and where your temporary home is. And – is for the tale that is told in diary entries. Found around the city, they recount what happened here to make the city revert to nature. You can collect all the animals you can encounter. And finding the supplies you need, one by one, adds diary entries to the story of Miku and Taku. They are stories of a broken world and of a broken family.

Pressing Y brings out your telescope, which makes a little focussing sound when it finds something. By turning to the right direction a pin is placed on the in-game map for you to explore later. These can be locations with supplies, or where you will find collectable diary entries. Plus, it tells you were to find power-ups for your boat.

Distracted by the beauty of the game

As I often do, I didn’t read up on the game before I started. I want to be surprised, and game with an open mind. After all, my reviews depict my own feelings about a game. At the start I was intrigued and a little bit apprehensive: what would I find? Mad Max scenarios played in my mind, as this was so clearly a post-apocalyptic adventure. Would I have to battle mutants or would my boat be overturned by the sea creatures?

Nothing of the sort. Submerged has no fighting in it. You can’t fall either, jumping from ledge to ledge and walking on tall structures. The game takes care of that. Submerged is all about pure exploration with puzzle elements thrown in. This means you can play the game in whatever way you see fit. Go straight for the supply missions, which means the game is fairly short. Chase the diary entries and make your collections complete. Every way you choose is good.

Often, I have found myself in search of a building I wanted to explore, only to be distracted. By vistas that take your breath away, a beautiful sunset over a desolate landscape. Seeing a billboard with a commercial on it, corroded by rust but still recognisable. Or watching a whale that jumps out of the water and effortlessly glides back into the dark waters again.

Conclusion

Submerged works well in handheld mode on the Switch. It was the perfect game to accompany me on my daily commute to work. Relaxing and meanwhile I couldn’t wait to see how the story ended. Especially when a couple of cut scenes were thrown in that made me very curious.

If you like an action packed game with a lot of button mashing and the need for superb dexterity and reflexes, then don’t go for Submerged. If you like a good story, exploration and beautiful vistas, then by all means give Submerged a try. I can safely say I Liked it a Lot.