Barotrauma is a great game with a well thought out design for groups of players especially. You feel like a real explorer with a crew to back you up and just like the character traits in the game, everyone has their own personal ticks that make the game more fun and enjoyable. When your crew is at maximum and plans all thought through it is fun to see how far you have come as you fly through areas.


Positives:
1) Group Game
Every Class fills an important role on the ship, except Assistant... ew. Every class can encapsulate a different gamer's personality.

2) Mechanics
Simple mechanics like falling and breaking your legs on a huge ship are really funny even though it should be annoying.

3) Horror
The game gets more fun the worst things get, your medical officer has been gardening for the past couple of rounds?
BOOM THE MEDICAL QUARTERS ARE ON FIRE AFTER HOURS OF GROWING EXPLOSIVE PLUMS!

You find an underwater palace that looks like it was made by the gods?
"HOLY **** THERE ARE THINGS KILLING US IN HERE! SWIM! SWIM! SWIM AWAY!".

"I'm sure this 6 skull quest will be fine, we have taken on 1 of these things before, I'm sure it will be fine"
CRASH! *All onboard lights turn red*
"EVERYONE BATTLE STATIONS! GET YOUR WEAPONS READY, THEY ARE BOARDING! SOME OF YOU MAY DIE BUT THAT'S A SACRIFICE I AM WILLING TO MAKE!"
*As your captain runs to grab a diving suit instead of preventing the ship from plummeting*

4) Mods
Mods for this game are pretty damn cool, increasing the size of ships you explore is my favourite as it also adds more enemies to random encounters, turrets, and with more to explore, comes more treasure. Higher risk, higher rewards.

5) Creation
The ability to make really cool stuff and have improvements past the first iteration is awesome. I think we have almost unlocked the best oxygen tanks in the game and it's amazing to see our level meaning something. Rather than in games like Skyrim (example) where you only get something every 20 and it takes forever and by the time you reach the end of the game you really don't need half of the random stuff you have to unlocked.

6) Updates
The developers have put real effort in, had a vision for an interface, and a team game that works well.


Negatives:
1) Death Patch
After a recent patch, death doesn't just take away some health for a long period of time but resets your character's skills. You could be a level 200 in steering and it could have taken 10/15 hours of in-game time to reach that and suddenly a breach in the hull sweeps you off your feet, you die instantly from the pressure and suddenly you're back to square one at level 50 at best. This was a horrible decision from the developers, please change this to losing 20 or 30 points in your top skills or something similar. We end up resetting more often than not as we really just want to have fun and not spend another 3/4 hours making wrenches just to get that Mechanical Engineering skill up.

2) Ew
Assistants... Ew, just ew. Are these creatures even allowed on ships?

3) AI or just A in this case
I tried to do the single-player campaign but honestly, I would rather drive screws in between my toe nails, the AI don't listen to anything outside of fix or follow which means you have to kill everything, pilot everywhere, build everything, and control the reactor all by yourself.
There is an order to turn on the reactor, I spent 20 minutes telling the crew to do it through commands and ended up doing it myself. Instead of continuing, realising every time we would run out of fuel I would have to do it myself. I shot the whole crew, then committed suicide before quitting to play exclusively with real people and never return. AI are good at following simple commands

4) Glitches
Glitches are unavoidable, especially with this physics engine, but basically the biggest glitch is when a creature (usually small) gets stuck in the hull somehow and we have to usually injure ourselves to kill it.


Improvements:
1) Deaths
As mentioned a better system should be implemented for death, it's not fun and honestly makes people on my ship want to quite with how much it pulls away from the experience. It's fun to make cigars and random bio husk mods, but when you die and then go to make them and joke around about it, you immediately remember, oh yeah I can't do that until I play another 5 hours. If you could control this or change the setting so people could still choose to have it, that would be good I think.

2) Host Improvements
I like that you can set different abilities for different players like banning, kicking, buying , and so forth. However, I have to set this with every new lobby I make, could you set it so depending on lobby name or create a file that stores these options for each player on the hosts computer or something like that.

3) Difficulty control
As I mentioned in the death one, my friends and I are quite far into the game and we even have to change our ship because of crushing depth now which is an awesome feature that we never thought about until we got warnings about it. However, I feel like enemies are a little too easy, granted we still die, but I would love to change the difficulty at will, even if it's just in the lobby as we really don't want to start over, but I feel like we could be beaten up more.

4) Random encounters
More random encounters with clowns and messed up things please, I would love for things to be a little more random in the depths. Getting attacked by a random pirate/bandit ship would be cool.


Conclusion:
If you are looking to get stuck into a group game, where communication is key, everyone feels useful, and the world can be as you make it, this is the game for you, the world is interesting with a lot to explore.

I would recommend at least 3 people, as you need a captain, engineer/mechanics, and another who can help fix and fight or just fight, medic/security.

Keep in mind that like a job in real life, not every role is going to be as fun for you as it could be for another, it is personality thing.

Roles:
1) If you like talking and telling people what to do, the captain is for you.
2) Like messing around, shooting things and being the man with the gun, security will be good for players who just want to hang out with friends as it's a simpler role.
3) Medic is similar to security but you must be willing to put you gun up last as everyone will be relying on you out in the field to learn how to heal people as quickly as possible. Being someone who likes to learn crafting, mastering a game mechanic, and messing about with everyone's genetics without consent will be good for you.
4) Mechanic and engineer is for those who like to master a craft as well, although one will be more focused on the ship's inner workings and one the hull/equipment.
5) Assistants are for slimy sewer rats with no hope at a real world relationship with a human... Ew.

The single player has much to be desired and will make you want to kill everyone, although if you can play it, it apparently has a lot more interesting NPC interactions within the world.

If you actually read all this, I hope to get to the bottom of the planet and continue playing with my crew for a long time.

Rating: 8.2/10, could be a strong 8.8 or 9 if more updates and improvements are added.

[h1]Quite long Review, but if you are on the fence, give this a read [/h1] Barotrauma is a great game with a well thought out design for groups of players especially. You feel like a real explorer with a crew to back you up and just like the character traits in the game, everyone has their own personal ticks that make the game more fun and enjoyable. When your crew is at maximum and plans all thought through it is fun to see how far you have come as you fly through areas. [b]Positives: [/b] [u]1) Group Game[/u] Every Class fills an important role on the ship, except Assistant... ew. Every class can encapsulate a different gamer's personality. [u]2) Mechanics[/u] Simple mechanics like falling and breaking your legs on a huge ship are really funny even though it should be annoying. [u]3) Horror[/u] The game gets more fun the worst things get, your medical officer has been gardening for the past couple of rounds? BOOM THE MEDICAL QUARTERS ARE ON FIRE AFTER HOURS OF GROWING EXPLOSIVE PLUMS! You find an underwater palace that looks like it was made by the gods? "HOLY **** THERE ARE THINGS KILLING US IN HERE! SWIM! SWIM! SWIM AWAY!". "I'm sure this 6 skull quest will be fine, we have taken on 1 of these things before, I'm sure it will be fine" CRASH! *All onboard lights turn red* "EVERYONE BATTLE STATIONS! GET YOUR WEAPONS READY, THEY ARE BOARDING! SOME OF YOU MAY DIE BUT THAT'S A SACRIFICE I AM WILLING TO MAKE!" *As your captain runs to grab a diving suit instead of preventing the ship from plummeting* [u]4) Mods[/u] Mods for this game are pretty damn cool, increasing the size of ships you explore is my favourite as it also adds more enemies to random encounters, turrets, and with more to explore, comes more treasure. Higher risk, higher rewards. [u]5) Creation[/u] The ability to make really cool stuff and have improvements past the first iteration is awesome. I think we have almost unlocked the best oxygen tanks in the game and it's amazing to see our level meaning something. Rather than in games like Skyrim (example) where you only get something every 20 and it takes forever and by the time you reach the end of the game you really don't need half of the random stuff you have to unlocked. [u]6) Updates[/u] The developers have put real effort in, had a vision for an interface, and a team game that works well. [b]Negatives: [/b] [u]1) Death Patch[/u] After a recent patch, death doesn't just take away some health for a long period of time but resets your character's skills. You could be a level 200 in steering and it could have taken 10/15 hours of in-game time to reach that and suddenly a breach in the hull sweeps you off your feet, you die instantly from the pressure and suddenly you're back to square one at level 50 at best. This was a horrible decision from the developers, please change this to losing 20 or 30 points in your top skills or something similar. We end up resetting more often than not as we really just want to have fun and not spend another 3/4 hours making wrenches just to get that Mechanical Engineering skill up. [u]2) Ew[/u] Assistants... Ew, just ew. Are these creatures even allowed on ships? [u]3) AI or just A in this case[/u] I tried to do the single-player campaign but honestly, I would rather drive screws in between my toe nails, the AI don't listen to anything outside of fix or follow which means you have to kill everything, pilot everywhere, build everything, and control the reactor all by yourself. There is an order to turn on the reactor, I spent 20 minutes telling the crew to do it through commands and ended up doing it myself. Instead of continuing, realising every time we would run out of fuel I would have to do it myself. I shot the whole crew, then committed suicide before quitting to play exclusively with real people and never return. AI are good at following simple commands [u]4) Glitches[/u] Glitches are unavoidable, especially with this physics engine, but basically the biggest glitch is when a creature (usually small) gets stuck in the hull somehow and we have to usually injure ourselves to kill it. [b]Improvements:[/b] [u]1) Deaths[/u] As mentioned a better system should be implemented for death, it's not fun and honestly makes people on my ship want to quite with how much it pulls away from the experience. It's fun to make cigars and random bio husk mods, but when you die and then go to make them and joke around about it, you immediately remember, oh yeah I can't do that until I play another 5 hours. If you could control this or change the setting so people could still choose to have it, that would be good I think. [u]2) Host Improvements[/u] I like that you can set different abilities for different players like banning, kicking, buying , and so forth. However, I have to set this with every new lobby I make, could you set it so depending on lobby name or create a file that stores these options for each player on the hosts computer or something like that. [u]3) Difficulty control [/u] As I mentioned in the death one, my friends and I are quite far into the game and we even have to change our ship because of crushing depth now which is an awesome feature that we never thought about until we got warnings about it. However, I feel like enemies are a little too easy, granted we still die, but I would love to change the difficulty at will, even if it's just in the lobby as we really don't want to start over, but I feel like we could be beaten up more. [u]4) Random encounters[/u] More random encounters with clowns and messed up things please, I would love for things to be a little more random in the depths. Getting attacked by a random pirate/bandit ship would be cool. [b]Conclusion: [/b] If you are looking to get stuck into a group game, where communication is key, everyone feels useful, and the world can be as you make it, this is the game for you, the world is interesting with a lot to explore. I would recommend at least 3 people, as you need a captain, engineer/mechanics, and another who can help fix and fight or just fight, medic/security. Keep in mind that like a job in real life, not every role is going to be as fun for you as it could be for another, it is personality thing. [b]Roles:[/b] 1) If you like talking and telling people what to do, the captain is for you. 2) Like messing around, shooting things and being the man with the gun, security will be good for players who just want to hang out with friends as it's a simpler role. 3) Medic is similar to security but you must be willing to put you gun up last as everyone will be relying on you out in the field to learn how to heal people as quickly as possible. Being someone who likes to learn crafting, mastering a game mechanic, and messing about with everyone's genetics without consent will be good for you. 4) Mechanic and engineer is for those who like to master a craft as well, although one will be more focused on the ship's inner workings and one the hull/equipment. 5) Assistants are for slimy sewer rats with no hope at a real world relationship with a human... Ew. The single player has much to be desired and will make you want to kill everyone, although if you can play it, it apparently has a lot more interesting NPC interactions within the world. If you actually read all this, I hope to get to the bottom of the planet and continue playing with my crew for a long time. Rating: 8.2/10, could be a strong 8.8 or 9 if more updates and improvements are added.