Diving is something a lot of people really enjoy – whether it’s to be up close to the variety of colorful fish, or to explore all of the marine environment home to thousands of species. It’s really special being able to witness things which may not be around for much longer, which is exactly why it’s something people like doing. Whilst roughly around only 27% of the seafloor has been discovered, less than 0.001% of the deep ocean floor has been explored. It’s impossible to tell what dangers or species lurk in the darkness of the ocean, but the inhabitants of the deep ocean in Dive or Die is enough to keep many as far away as possible from any body of water forever.
Dive or Die’s uniqueness was what made it really enjoyable
With the thousands of games we have to choose from the hundreds of different genres, many particular aspects will have us hooked instantly, and one of those things is definitely uniqueness. For those who dip their feet into one specific genre much more than others, they tend to see some recurring themes or aspects which can leave them feeling bored and lackluster from the wide range of games to choose from – which despite the different names on the cover seem quite similar in comparison. Dive or Die in particular is one of those games which you’ll look at and instantly know it looks like one of those indie gems – which I think you can already guess, that was indeed the case.
The tense and creepy opening scene wasn’t the only thing that had me hooked, but the artwork, roguelite features, and of course the diving. What made the diving so fun was that each dive was essentially like playing the game for the first time, you would encounter new items, explore deeper parts of the abyssal pool, come face-to-face with the new horrors which inhabit the ocean, and progress closer to collecting all eight relics. What made dives really challenging and tense was the limited oxygen supply and the dangerous enemies lurking around which sometimes surprised you and could leave you in an extremely vulnerable position, now since it’s a roguelite you naturally have a health bar, along with sanity, and of course oxygen. Either of those running out resulted in death, so it was extremely important to look out for all three and decide whether or not exploring more was really the smart move, especially if it was with a high level character that you could only use to venture to unexplored parts of the abyssal pool, which obviously is the key to beating the game.
Risks are something you have to take whilst playing this game and I learnt too late that without taking any you’ll find yourself stagnant for quite a long time, which isn’t really beneficial when the clock ticks down after each day. In all fairness, the game doesn’t give you many hints on where to go or what to do in specific situations, so you have to rely on your intuition which highly results in death, so I do think beating Dive or Die on your first attempt will prove to be quite the challenge – though that’s to be expected for a roguelite title.
With that said, you will have to make the most out of the resources you’re given to maximize the odds of collecting all relics. Having as many workers as possible in your camp is the key to surviving another day. Assigning people to specific roles levels them up overtime which can be used to upgrade their stats and overall productivity on the structure they’re manning. Upgrades for all buildings are also available, which have a wide variety of effects such as more weapons and items available to craft and upgrade, larger population of camp, more expedition points unlocked, amongst many other useful effects.
Managing upgrades and available resources wisely will be the difference between drowning and appeasing the Maker of Rain, so it’s always best to take risks to try and salvage more useful things for the camp, but at the same time not let your overconfidence be your demise, because what you don’t want is having to use a low level resident as the diver, which as you can imagine isn’t convenient.
The execution of making an aquatic horror effective was something Dive or Die achieved greatly
Underwater horror is a sub-genre not commonly explored in horror games, and I wish more games like Dive or Die did try exploring those themes. The struggles which most developers likely face is thinking of ways to make games like those unique, with your usual horror games set on the surface – it’s much easier to think of a location, an antagonist, an atmosphere, and weapons, amongst many other things. Since they’re an extremely common setting, it wouldn’t take too long to come up with a rough idea of a game, and then put those ideas to action. With an underwater horror title it’s a bit more complicated than that, there are only so many ways to make it unique before it starts to become a cycle of recycling the same monsters and locations.
However – in Dive or Die’s case it executed it perfectly. It had plenty of uniqueness to make it engaging and enjoyable, whether that was down to the designs of the creatures, or certain areas within the abyssal pool, it made each dive exciting and tense because of that. The atmosphere throughout was perfect, and the opening scene really set it up especially with the appearance of the Maker of Rain, which was the first time the true horrors of the abyssal pool were revealed. I was surprised going in blind that it was a roguelite as I didn’t particularly get that “vibe” from it, I was further intrigued to find out that it had an in-game counter for when all of the tasks needed to be completed by, which made for a much more tense and horrifying experience, knowing full well that failure would mean the whole world ending – so pressure wasn’t something we are exempt from.
