Sorry to those accustomed to Normal who’ve had to make some expectation adjustments, but you have to be realistic. This expedition is not a permadeath.

The distinction between Survival and Perma is that in the latter, you literally lose everything. Not just the rewards; the entire save. The whole point therefore is to give a one-shot sense of realism that raises the stakes of an otherwise fairly easy (once you have the hang of it) game.

This isn’t the case in this expedition. Not even close. It’s more like going back to a save point, only even better for keeping certain progress, and actually progressing you further.

For actual permadeath players, this carries none of the risk or consequence of an actual permadeath save.

Also worth highlighting that this gameplay decision isn’t arbitrary: based on The Last Campfire, Hello Games include on occasion a deeper thinking as to the philosophy, to show players different points of view. Here possibly something like the “inevitability of death”.

The fact that so many of you are getting pissy about the dying part indicates they were probably justified in this as a beneficial writ large lesson–while it still also being just a game. That they even called it permadeath when it’s really a survival seems to give this theory some credence.

Another benefit, is the kind of enjoyment you’ll get out of the game after finishing an expedition like this. Like you’ve gone from Mordor back to Hobbiton.

These guys are high-concept developers who know what they’re doing. Trust in the game, and, seriously, stop with these fucking complaint posts. It’s not an actual permadeath.

Title. I just beat the main story, and as a cosmic horror fan I absolutely love how the devs took a game with no story and turned it into a lovecraftian meta-commentary on the game’s development cycle. The way I interpret it each update that gets implemented is a canon event in which the Atlas introduces a new element into it’s universe, bringing us further along the sixteen minutes. This also heavily implies that the sixteen minutes will only end when the game stops being developed and updated. It’s wild how such a simple premise has been transformed into this introspective, existentialist story that left me with that same bittersweet feeling other of my favourite media gives me.

Bravo, hello games.

And I’m so sorry Artemis ;_;