DIVE. DISCOVER. DIE.
"There's nothing for you down here. I know, because I've seen it. What lies at the deepest threshold is not meant for the likes of us. The answers of the abyss are far more cruel than you could imagine. I should have known better, and now my crew has paid the price for my transgressions. I beg you, do not voyage within, or there will be far more suffering to come. Turn back, stay out. Stay out of The Living Infinite."
— An unknown voyager
We Need to go Deeper is a multiplayer roguelike game developed by Deli Interactive, LLC, released on August 1st 2019 after years in early access. The game centers on a crew of players operating a submarine descending into an abyss called the Living Infinite, battling against the hostile environment along the way.
The game world is separated into a variety of biomes, each with their own visual style and enemies for the players to fight. Leftover money and experience is accumulated after each run, allowing players to purchase new items, weapons, and submarines before taking on the Living Infinite again. Items can also be found in undersea locations, including caves requiring players to fight through enemies on foot, a crab called the Trash Hermit can provide items at random, ship upgrades can be obtained by defeating robotic Lair Guardians, or purchased from undersea civilizations. Though focused on multiplayer, there is a singleplayer option in which the rest of the crew is replaced by crew bots, who can operate the ship’s weapons, heal the player, fight off enemies, and assist in repairing the submarine.
Not to be confused with the Memetic Mutation from Inception.
We Need to go Deeper contains examples of:
- Ambidextrous Sprite: Just about everything looks the same no matter what angle it's viewed from. The sub in particular always has the weapons on the side the player is viewing, and player character weapons change hands to keep their bodies visible.
- Arc Welding: The individual biomes appear to have nothing to do with each other, however there is an overarching story behind the Living Infinite and some connections between the areas.
- The Lair Guardians scattered throughout the levels were placed there by the crew of the Nautilus to stop people from diving deeper, and are made of special metals taken from the Meteor. The glowing green energy that powers them is the same as those of the eldritch shrines, as well as the eldritch staff weapon.
- The Time Traveler seems like a goofy character added to mix up the gameplay a bit, but he's aware of the Ancient One and became an ally of Captain Nemo as the two worked together to prevent its awakening.
- One explorer became convinced that the Life Gems which empower the undead creatures in the Cursed Waters originated in the Aurelian Depths, leaving messages indicating such.
- It's implied by some research notes that can be found that the barnacles which spread through the Infected Depths were being studied for medical and agricultural applications, and a few relics are purple fluid in beakers and syringes. The purple potion of the "chemistry kit" item appears to be made from that research, and does damage specifically to barnacle-infected enemies.
- The volcanic turtle enemies shoot the same spike balls as the flowers in the Ancient Abyss, suggesting the turtles collect them from deeper waters to attack with.
- Denizens of a few civilizations imply that the biome's boss is actually holding back worse creatures from lower biomes, or preventing anyone from diving deeper and waking the Ancient One.
- Artificial Stupidity: Though the crew bots are reliable enough to get through a run, if you lack another human player, some of their behaviors will require you to compensate.
- The bots, when manning the weapon, will target every enemy, including non-hostile obstacles, when they should be focusing on the hostile enemies approaching. This is especially irritating in the Cursed Waters, where they will target inactive shrines, releasing squid and hammerhead abominations. They also have a problem recognizing when walls are between them and a target.
- They will always follow the player outside the sub and can't be told to stay put, which is a problem for the Sleepy Giant boss. If you leave the sub unprotected while exploring the monster's innards, nematodes will attack and potentially destroy it. The only way through is to clear out the immediate threats, then dash through the interior and hope you can destroy the heart before the nematodes destroy your sub.
- The bots will automatically target the Ancient One. If you're not prepared with the necessary items, you had better cut the power to your turret, or they will get you killed along with all life on earth.
- Assimilation Plot: Two of the biomes are overrun with a spreading corruption.
- The Infected Depths and everything in it is overgrown with hostile barnacles which want to infect the players, and the rest of the world. If you enter the biome’s civilization, they act friendly while suggesting you should join their hive, and if you attack them, their battle cries show it was a façade.
- The denizens of the Mechanical Abyss have been subject to Unwilling Roboticization, guided by the Great Machine. Like the barnacles, the machines want to infect the player crew.
- Awesome, but Impractical:
- The chemistry kit randomly provides one of five potions, one of which can heal afflictions, another is a health potion, and another deals 40 damage, one of the strongest attacks in the game. Unfortunately, the potion is random, and the health potion can heal enemies if you’re not careful, making it great for healing when you’re safe, and useless in a fight.
- The Tesla crank can generate powerful EMPs, but charging it to full power takes twelve seconds, which isn’t helpful with the game’s hectic combat.
- Dynamite is the game’s most powerful weapon, able to make short work of all but the toughest enemies. Unfortunately, crew bots aren’t smart enough to avoid the blast, and it’s difficult to both avoid the enemies charging at you and keep them in the blast radius.
- Apocalyptic Log: Scattered throughout the caves are messages in bottles recounting the tales of other travelers who perished before the player.
- Body Horror: The various afflictions crew members can catch from the waters of the Living Infinite warp their bodies in various ways, including dripping oily flesh, barnacles, crystalline growths, and pulsing veins, among others.
- Build Like an Egyptian: The civilization of the Ancient Abyss is in this style, being a pyramid beneath an undersea dome inhabited by Egyptians.
- Captain Nemo Copy: Being crew of an anachronistic submarine, the players can fit the mold if they want. Certain choices of clothing, weapons, and submarine can emphasize the similarity, particularly the Espadon with its ramming prow resembling the film version of the Nautilus. To drive the homage home, the remains of Captain Nemo himself can be found in the final biome within the wreckage of the Nautilus.
- Clock Roaches: The use of the time portal to return to the first biome summons Time Devourers which begin to hunt the submarine.
- Cosmic Horror Reveal: The deeper the sub goes, the more the tone transitions from Verne to Lovecraft until you reach the Ancient One, and awakening it triggers The End of the World as We Know It.
- Downer Ending: There really is no truly "good" ending for the crew.
- If you awaken the Ancient One and mess up the process of returning it to sleep, it will destroy the world.
- If you are able to return the Ancient One to sleep, the crew remains permanently trapped within and are never found.
- If you avoid the Ancient One altogether, the Time Traveler returns the sub to the first biome and the endless descent continues. Even if the sub reaches the end again, the crew is left with the only option for survival being to continue the loop until something kills them, most likely a Time Devourer.
- Eldritch Abomination: Multiple, as H.P. Lovecraft is another inspiration.
- The Ancient One is responsible for the existence of the Living Infinite and its strange ecosystems, and the players awakening it will cause the Bad Ending.
- Time Devourers are masses of eyes and teeth which detect and hunt down time travelers, pursuing the sub during the New Game Plus after the sub travels through a time portal. They reproduce by splitting apart, and are not native to the Living Infinite.
- A small one, the Eldritch Spawn, is manifested by use of the Eldritch Staff.
- Eldritch Ocean Abyss: The Living Infinite is one, being incredibly deep and filled with all sorts of monstrous threats. It was formed by the impact of an ancient meteor containing alien life, including an Eldritch Abomination.
- Everything Trying to Kill You: Very few of the Living Infinite’s inhabitants won’t immediately attack the crew. Enemies vary with each biome, but include crabs, penguins, sharks, ghost sharks, zombie sharks, undead pirates, infectious barnacles, starfish, underwater robots, crab people, killer plants, and overgrown clownfish, among other nightmares.
- Fish People: The Atlanteans in the Atlantic Waters.
- Foreshadowing: Attentive players familiar with the inspiration will notice "Mobilis in Mobili" stamped on various barrels and crates, as well as being the signature of a few letters, and be unsuprised to find the wreckage of the Nautilus at the bottom of the Living Infinite.
- Full-Frontal Assault: One of the enemies in Awakened Mode is the Shifter, a tentacled creature which takes the form of a human man in his underwear while attempting to kill the crew. The Shifters took this form after encountering explorer Pheobus T. Ashesgrash, who made the bold move of taking on the Living Infinite in his underwear, which one message bottle reveals came apart some time after first encountering the Shifters. The players can also choose to go forth in only their underwear.
- Ghost Pirate: Some show up as enemies in the Cursed Waters, though there is also a civilization of them whom you can interact and trade with.
- Giant Enemy Crab: The caves of the Living Infinite are filled with them. Intelligent crabs called Decapodians can also attack the ship.
- Going Native: A submariner names Francesco was captured by the Decapodians, and eventually joined their society.
- Humans Are Ugly: Some of the Atlanteans state the human crew are unattractive.
- Invincible Villain: The Ancient One can't be killed, only avoided or returned to sleep using the phonograph.
- Kraken and Leviathan: Two of the bosses are the Leviathan and the "Quadken", a four-armed cephalopod.
- Limited Loadout: The player can only carry one item at a time to start out with, until getting a backpack at which point they can carry a whopping two items.
- Magikarp Power: Of the submarines, the Poubelle starts out slow, weak, and unwieldy, but upgrades to it have twice the benefit, allowing it to become more powerful much faster.
- Money Spider: Many enemies fought on foot drop gold coins despite being animals. The pickaxe weapon is able to increase the odds of valuables being dropped.
- New Game Plus: The submarine can return to the starting point by reaching the Time Traveler’s portal, allowing the crew to go through the game again. Doing so summons the Time Devourer, and enemies get progressively stronger with each run.
-
Nintendo Hard: At the start of the game, you have one item you can use, only four charges to power the sub's equipment, and you must get through several thousand fathoms. There are no checkpoints, no saving, if you die you start right back at the beginning. As you level up, you don't get stronger, you only unlock more items you can equip at the beginning, but can still only carry one at a time. The layout of the biomes and caves are procedurally generated, which can sometimes result in easier stretches, or it can get you cornered by an endlessly respawning frenzy of sharks. Civilizations often sell excellent equipment, but it will often be unaffordable, requiring you to fight a group of tough, high damage-dealing enemies or continue on too weak to survive. If you get all the way and start a New Game Plus, you will be constantly pursued by the Time Devourers, who are too fast to outrun, extremely durable, and will shred your submarine in seconds as their fragments board and infect you with the Time Plague. Then there's Awakened Mode, which adds new enemies and makes player death permanent. - Power Crystal: The skeletal enemies in the cursed waters possess a glowing "life gem" which is keeping them alive.
- Raygun Gothic: One of the updates included some items with this aesthetic, including a Shrink Ray and a Jet Pack.
- Recursive Canon: The game is heavily inspired by 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea to the point of Captain Nemo being a real person In-Universe and having died in the deepest reaches of the Living Infinite. However, a tattered copy of Leagues is one of the trash items which can be found. This is possibly consistent with Verne's writing rather than a joke, as in The Mysterious Island, Leagues is revealed to be an In-Universe book written by the novel's protagonist, Professor Arronax.
- Steampunk: Being inspired by Jules Verne, much of the technology has this aesthetic.
- Submarine Pirates:
- The Cursed Ships of the Cursed Waters will attempt to attack and board your sub.
- The player crew can easily become this by choosing to attack the civilizations they come across to steal items from the shop.
- Tesla Tech Timeline: Some of the advanced technology was created by Nikola Tesla, including a few electrical weapons.
- Underground Monkey: While each biome has its own style and some distinctive challenges, each one has enemies which fill a particular niche.
- An enemy that frequently appears to attack the sub, but isn't too difficult to fight off, such as sharks, volcanic sharks, barracudas, and orcas.
- A slightly less common, but much tougher enemy. Examples include killer clownfish, barnacle maws, angler fish, and volcanic turtles.
- An enemy that latches onto the ship with tentacles, forcing players to cut its limbs, such as the duopus, camo squid, arctic squid, stormy squid, barnacle grabbers, and eurypterids.
- An enemy that doesn't attack the sub, but can get in its path. Flounder, catfish, skin fish, and glisten fish.
- Smaller enemies which approach and board the ship to attack the crew, such as blobfish, sirens, penguins, and decapodians.
- Video Game Cruelty Potential: With the exception of the barnacles and the mechanical waters, the civilizations you encounter are friendly and perfectly willing to sell you valuable items, though you may find the prices high. You can choose to kill them all and steal everything.
- Video Game Cruelty Punishment: The civilizations will defend themselves, and can overpower an underprepared crew.
- Was Once a Man: Several of the enemies used to be humans, other crews who came before the players.
- Ghost pirates inhabit the Cursed Waters and attack players when boarding.
- The Infected Depths is home to the barnacle people, who are completely covered by barnacles and slaves to their will.
- The Mechanical Dome is inhabited by humans who have been merged with the technology of the Great Machine.
- If a player dies while cursed, their ghost may appear and attack their fellow crew.
- The Mad Ones inhabiting the Meteor are implied to be the crew of the Nautilus.
