Nautilus is a first-person underwater exploration game where the player descends into the deep inside a submarine, navigating tight caves and submerged ruins. The focus is on atmosphere, discovery, environmental storytelling, and environmental tension using darkness, scale, and sound to sell the pressure of the abyss.
This project began as a VR prototype concept. I later brought it back as my Personal Project 2 during school, where I scaled it into a shippable first-person experience. From there, I pitched it to my school for Game Project 3 and got the opportunity to take it into full production.
Built in Unity, Nautilus was developed as a multi-discipline student project under a tight deadline. I worked on level blockouts and pacing, submarine layout and onboarding, and owned much of the FMOD audio implementation and sound design. I also provided secondary programming support to help the team ship.
Core idea
This chapter explains how Nautilus evolved from an early VR concept into a shippable first-person project,
and why I pitched it as a full production for Game Project 3.
The first version of Nautilus started as a VR co-op concept inspired by Subnautica’s exploration and the team-based structure of Deep Rock Galactic.The goal was a submarine crew fantasy, with multiple roles working together while facing the unknown.I originally explored this idea before joining PlaygroundSquad, during my previous education.
Early tests made the scope problem clear: VR + multiplayer + role systems was too heavy for a student production.
Instead of forcing it, I kept the strongest part of the idea, the descent atmosphere and underwater mystery, and rebuilt the project around a smaller, shippable core.
For my Personal Project 2, I returned to the concept to prototype the experience in a simpler format.This phase was about proving the core: the feeling of being sealed inside a submarine, guided by sound and limited visibility, with environmental storytelling pulling the player forward.
Once the core fantasy was clear and feasible, I pitched Nautilus to my school for Game Project 3.
The project was selected, and the focus shifted from “big systems” to a deliverable experience:
Strong pacing, readable spaces, and audio-driven atmosphere.
Inspiration
My biggest references for the GP3 version were Subnautica and Disney’s Atlantis: The Lost Empire (2001).
Subnautica gave me the emotional arc I wanted, curiosity pulling the player forward while the deep slowly turns into fear.
Atlantis helped me communicate that adventurous mystery in the pitch, so the tone was clear instantly.To keep the experience readable and tense, I treated inspiration as a set of rules.I built contrast between tight routes and reveal spaces, used landmarks to imply story without dialogue, and relied on sound to support navigation so the submarine never feels silent or dead.
Level Design
Designing Nautilus meant solving a core challenge: underwater spaces are easy to get lost in, especially when the player travels by submarine and then exits to explore on foot. This chapter breaks down how I approached onboarding, route readability, and pacing to make short distances feel heavy and meaningful.
Level 0 / The Onboarding
Our first onboarding layout was too tight for a submarine game. Teaching driving and parking in a compressed space made the opening feel stressful and unclear.
The player was dealing with controls before they had any mental map of the environment.To solve that, we moved the start outside. This gave the player space to read the scene first, then approach the submarine with intention.The airlock became the first clear threshold, a moment that signals “you are entering the mission” before the descent begins.
Level 0 is designed to make short distances feel heavy. The player walks toward the submarine while the world stays quiet and low visibility keeps the space tense.
Level 0 is designed to make short distances feel heavy. The player walks toward the submarine while the world stays quiet and low visibility keeps the space tense.
Even before driving, the player starts learning navigation by reading silhouettes, lights, and the path.Most importantly, the level frames the goal early. While approaching the sub, the player can also see the large drop in the background.That is the promise of the level: “this is where you are going next.” It turns the start into a mission setup instead of a random spawn.
Level 1 / Arrival
Level 1 is a low-visibility navigation test designed to feel vast at first, then become readable through landmarks
and tool-based navigation.
Submarine Area
After the drop, the player is dropped into darkness with limited visibility, so the space has to guide them without clear sightlines.
I shaped the submarine route as a simple oval loop that feels huge at first, then becomes legible as the player reaches key landmarks and a safe landing zone.The goal was to create:
“Lost at first → oriented later” without long UI handholding.
In early blockouts, the cave played too large because movement tuning wasn’t final yet, a classic vehicle-level bottleneck.Once handling stabilized, I narrowed and shortened the route and supported it with more lighting, aligning with environment art so the space stayed feasible and the pacing didn’t drag.
Walking Area
The walking segment is a deliberate vulnerability beat: leaving the submarine makes the player feel exposed, so the route is tighter and goal-driven.
The walking segment is a deliberate vulnerability beat: leaving the submarine makes the player feel exposed, so the route is tighter and goal-driven.I structured it around a clear lever-room objective and readable path edges, so the player always understands where the submarine is and what they’re working toward.
Playtesting showed the return path after the lever was too long and killed tension.In a team brainstorm, we redesigned it into an escape sequence:
The cave collapses on the way back, and the submarine autopilot meets the player on the other side for pickup.That turned boring backtracking into a high-pressure moment while the player is outside and unprotected.
Level 2 / The Bowl
Level 2 is a pacing bridge, a longer submarine sequence that shiftsthe player from fear to wonder before the next
objective-heavy section.
During production this section was originally planned as a later level, but in playtests we realized it fit better before the next parking beat.
The problem was pacing: Stopping again too soon made the adventure feel segmented, and we needed more uninterrupted driving time where players could practice navigation and feel the scale of the world.
My solution was to turn “the Bowl” into a guided discovery space, short in distance but huge in presence.The electric-field entry frames a magical biome reveal (inspired by Subnautica’s mushroom zones and the “whale” sense of awe), so the player goes from tension to curiosity.The route stays readable through strong silhouettes and landmark architecture (the arches corridor), then ends by pointing the player at a clear goal:A collapsed temple entry and a red passage that acts as the final pull toward Level 3.
The end of Level 2 is built to “close the curtain” on the beauty and convert it into purpose.
After the Bowl, I wanted the player to realize the first door wasn’t the destination, it was a hint.
From the submarine POV, the arches corridor reveals larger structures than expected, pushing the feeling that this place continues far beyond what you’ve seen so far.It’s still readable to navigate, but the main job is emotional “We’re not alone down here, and we’re only scratching the surface.”I framed the corridor as a guided discovery beat: silhouettes first, then scale, then a clear pull forward so the player stays curious instead of lost.
I reused the “collapsed hole” idea from earlier levels, but recontextualized it: not artificial damage from Torsion infrastructure, this time it reads as a natural collapse that exposes more of the ancient site.
That shift matters for the player’s story brain:
It feels like the environment itself is opening up, not like someone built a path for you.The shape language and framing are designed to be unmistakable from a distance, so the player understands: this collapse is the new way forward, and it cleanly hands off into Level 3.
Level 3 / Lava zone
Level 2 is a pacing bridge, a longer submarine sequence that shiftsthe player from fear to wonder before the next
objective-heavy section.
Level 3 is where the world stops feeling “hidden” and starts feeling dangerous. The ruins are out in the open, geysers are active, and the environment feels hostile , more like you entered something you shouldn’t.
I shaped the submarine route so the player always has one clear goal: reach a safe landing zone.The cave stays readable by using big silhouettes and a clean approach line, and the submarine assistant helps confirm the direction when the space gets intimidating.From the landing zone, the next objective is already readable: you can sense there is a temple path nearby. The player lands with a clear thought of "I’m going on foot now.”
This blueprint shows Level 3’s submarine route, the cave navigation before you ever go on foot.
After Level 2, I wanted the space to feel tighter and more dangerous, but still easy to read in low visibility.So the cave starts as a narrow squeeze, then opens into one main route that naturally leads into a clear landing pocket.The landing zone is the key moment here:
it’s an obvious “safe spot” inside a hostile biome, and it frames the temple area as the next pull forward.Once the player commits to parking, the level can shift cleanly into the walking section without confusion.
This blueprint shows the full Level 3 walking loop: land → reach the lever → return to the submarine.
I built it so the submarine stays a constant anchor in the player’s mind, even when they’re on foot in a hostile biome.The route starts readable and safe, then intentionally pushes the player into exposed moments (bridge + cliff edge), and finally funnels into the temple as the clear objective.The important part is the ending, after the lever, the level doesn’t ask for a boring repeat. The mechanism triggers an “earthquake” shift, so the return becomes a fresh, faster route back to the landing zone.
This is where the level turns from “hidden ruins” into open danger. The goal was to make the player feel small and exposed.Stepping onto a bridge, walking along edges, looking down into deep water, all while the temple path stays readable ahead.I used the space to create tension without confusing navigation: the route is basically one strong pull forward, but the environment sells risk.
With my environment artist, we used that setup to introduce a fear moment.
A large creature swims through the player’s frame while they’re on the edge of a path, far away from safety.it’s there to make the biome feel alive and hostile, while the route still pulls you forward toward the temple entrance.
Inside the temple, the pacing slows down on purpose. After the exposed outdoor walk, it turns into a quieter space where the player can take in the scale, read a few story beats, and follow one clear objective: reach the lever.
On early passes, the return trip was the weak part. Once the lever is pulled, the player already understands what it means (they saw this setup in Level 1), so walking the exact same hallway back didn’t add much, it just felt like dead time.So the return is treated like a small twist instead of a repeat. The lever triggers a change in the space, the original way back gets blocked, and the player is pushed through a different exit route.It keeps the “I’m heading back to safety” goal, but the path feels fresh, and it lands you back at the submarine without dragging the pacing.