Dave the Diver is an ingenious sport about underwater exploration and dealing in a sushi restaurant. We plan on having a overview out within the subsequent few weeks, however earlier than then, Matt and I had a fast chat about what makes this sport so charming and particular.
Chris: Matt! It is beautiful to speak to you. We have each been enjoying this sport referred to as Dave the Diver over the previous few weeks. I get the impression you’ve got made much more progress than me, however we each appear to be received over by it.
It is a type of video games that is at all times evolving, however in the meanwhile – I am just a few hours in – it is actually a sport of two components. Throughout the day you go diving for fish and at evening you assist serve the fish in a sushi restaurant. So it is two completely different sorts of video games, the primary being this roguelike the place you discover this ever-changing lagoon and the second being virtually a rhythm-action affair the place you attempt to get the precise order to the precise buyer as rapidly as doable. That is very naked bones, however that is the place I am at. Inform me: what do you make of it to date?
Matt: Hey! I believe that’s each a completely correct and hilariously insufficient description of Dave the Diver; you are completely proper that these two components are the muse of a really fantastic expertise, nevertheless it’s been a very long time since I have been so constantly amazed and delighted by a sport’s utter refusal to stay to the script. I believe I am in all probability a very good few hours forward of you by now, and already Dave the Diver’s careened into the realm of farming sim, briefly gone full-on visible novel, and even shoved an honest-to-goodness rhythm-action musical quantity in there for good measure. It truly is a continually shocking little gem, however I believe its actual trick, the factor that stops the entire thing from disintegrating in an explosion of caprice, is that the diving bit is nice.
Chris: It is so good is not it? From the woosh whenever you arrive underwater to that sense of panic when issues go fallacious. For me, I am at all times panicked that I am not doing sufficient. These diving sections offer you so many various things to give attention to. They’re little procedural dungeons, actually? And also you head in and you have typically received a buying listing of issues to do: quest gadgets to gather, fish to catch for the restaurant. However then there are weapons crates which could internet you a greater gun, issues you possibly can promote for money, all types of assets. There are such a lot of programs to consider however all of them make sense: you could improve gear to dive deeper, and you could improve your oxygen, which mainly doubles as well being underwater. And you could improve what you possibly can carry. I have been in a few conditions the place I had a fantastic haul of stuff, however I used to be carrying an excessive amount of to get to the floor. Have you ever managed to get to a degree the place you’re feeling such as you’re in management down there?
Matt: I believe I’ve in all probability reached some extent now the place I am acquainted sufficient with its primary rhythms of underwater exploration that I typically really feel assured I am going to be capable of get at the least some of that ever-expanding buying listing achieved, however what I really like about Dave the Diver is that, whilst you get to comprehend it extra, and even should you’ve spend time investing in all these beautiful upgrades, that underlying stress by no means goes away. As you alluded to, every thing you do down there may be tied to your oxygen and it is such a canny little bit of design; simply swimming round makes use of oxygen, if you wish to go sooner it makes use of extra, and when enemies land an assault, sure, it goes down too – and, in fact, as soon as it is gone, so are you.
The way in which it is all interconnected means issues can go south amazingly quick, and with oxygen refills simply scarce sufficient that you simply’re by no means fairly certain when salvation will come, you are saved in a perpetual state of steadily mounting panic as you weigh up the knowledge of pushing on. Truthfully, even hours in, it is uncommon for me to do a run that does not finish with a frantic, sweaty palmed sprint to search out an escape pod with my oxygen on its final remaining pixel. However then, it is so laborious to deliver a dive to an finish, particularly when you recognize pushing forward will in all probability reward you with one other of David the Diver’s infinite surprises – after which it is all simply so beautiful down there! I nonetheless cannot recover from the very fact every of these pixel-y little fishes is secretly a lovingly crafted and animated 3D mannequin. Do you discover it as fascinating as I do how from time to time you get a whiff of VERY NOT INDIE BUDGET peering out from behind its indie facade?
Chris: YES! You stated this to me, and I completely cannot get it out of my thoughts. It is probably the most secretly lavish sport of all time, proper? Each system is superbly crafted and delivered and pared again to its easiest model. And it simply runs away in all these instructions and seemingly has the time and the vitality for every thing. Even from the place I’m it is like: let’s make the menu this extremely detailed smartphone. Let’s have a inexperienced tea-pouring mini-game with playful particle physics! Each character has these little cut-scenes that introduce them or introduce an motion they usually’ll at all times be simply fully nailed when it comes to supply. It is printed and maybe made by Nexon, proper, who’re fully large? I might like to know the way this sport got here to be!
Matt: Sure, these cutscenes! All mainly mini cinematic masterpieces in their very own proper! Oh, and I can not imagine we have gone this far with out mentioning the sushi. It nonetheless barely boggles my thoughts that what looks like each doable mixture of ingredient you’ll find is accounted for with its personal dish, and every of these will get a (I’m greater than keen to imagine) culinarily correct little pixel doodle and a lavish illustrated model used within the sport’s Instagram-style picture app – itself one more fantastic, if wholly pointless extravagance. I am not a giant fish eater, however good grief this sport makes me hungry, and I do love that it appears like I am being surreptitiously educated within the historic artwork of sushi making and marine biology as I play.
Chris: Why do you assume all of it works? I am fascinated by the truth that, at its easiest, this sport jams two very completely different sport types collectively, after which solely brings in additional stuff. But it feels harmonious? I believe plenty of it’s to do with the way in which the characters glue every thing collectively – you’ve got these folks with their very own obsessions and functions, and but all of them converge within the quests that the sport steadily pays out to you? It jogs my memory in a bizarre method of the way in which that Civ video games will be so extremely difficult by simply asking you a bunch of questions every flip: the place do you need to transfer a unit? What would you like this metropolis to make? What are you researching subsequent? By these easy decisions you get a sport with a lot richness, and that is type of the identical factor? Run a restaurant, dive for historic treasure, get higher weapons and see all these completely different fish, and it is all simply achieved with a quest construction that stops you from getting too misplaced?
Matt: Why it really works is a troublesome query! I assume you’ve got received that beautiful stress and launch as you go from a day of lovely, sort-of-serene, largely hectic aquatic exploration to a night of comparatively relaxed restaurant working, and it is a stability that feels simply proper. However then it additionally takes that acquainted roguelike loop of ‘get cool stuff to do extra cool stuff to get extra cool stuff’, and makes that cool stuff really feel correctly tangible, prefer it really issues. You understand, the form of +1 in your squatting stat you would possibly get in different video games is sweet and all, however right here you catch a fish and it will get became a beautiful meal that delights a buyer a lot they need to take a photograph of it and share it with the world – and that, such as you say, feeds again into serving to this lovable forged of idiots obtain their hopes and goals. And, in fact, the fixed surprises, the unabashed heat and silliness and absurd dramatics of all of it in all probability go a great distance too! I really feel like there is a Dave the Diver in us all, proper?
