Pets

I think taming some of the smaller fish like the nibbler or hammerhead to follow you around and help protect you while you explore and gather resources could be beneficial and fun

Good idea in my opinion, it could also be kind of similar to the idea in this suggestion: https://subnautica2.nolt.io/13966 and also be a new rare species.

For example, it could be a creature with defensive abilities that can distract by outmaneuver or confuse a Needler Mango and/or marrowbreach, or temporarily stun hostile creatures using sound waves or an electrical attack.

It also wouldn’t need to follow the player into every biome. It could be useful in the currently playable areas but prefer staying close to the seafloor, cliffs, or other familiar terrain where it can play dead if we go in deeper and more dangerous regions. If the player ventures too far into hazardous areas, open areas or goes to deep, it could simply leave and swim back toward shallower biomes or a home using a safe route, requiring the player to reunite with it later.

From a story perspective, it could be a young creature of an species on the brink of extinction whose parents have died, allowing the player to raise it. Instead of becoming a fully capable companion immediately, it would first need to be nurtured/raised through feeding and interaction before it can assist the player.

It could also be introduced as a reward for returning to safer, earlier biomes. That way, it would mainly be useful in those areas while offering little or no advantage in the more dangerous regions that the player still has to explore.

A creature like this could also take inspiration from dolphins. The player could use a cue card item to suggest simple actions it should do like follow, search for ressources, return home instead of issuing too direct commands, making it feel more like working with an intelligent animal than controlling it. And if it gets hungry it can go home for itself or something like ore ignore work commands or something like that.

It could also have a cooldown after defending the player. After protecting the player, it would become stressed and need some time to recover by resting or playing before it can help again instead of fleeing. A simple Hunger and Stress meter could reflect its current state and determine how willing it is to respond to the player’s cues.

Kind of ‘eh’ on the idea of pets, but I would certainly welcome a return of the Aquariums we had in Sub1/Below Zero, where we could drop in random eggs, wait for them to hatch, and have assorted fish in our tanks.

I actually didn’t mean the idea as a traditional pet system.

What I had in mind was more of a mutualistic relationship with a creature that is temporarily unable to survive on its own because it’s threatened or orphaned. From a story perspective, it would be more like a conservation effort with benefits than “owning” a pet.

The creature should be a companion with its own needs, instincts, and a certain degree of autonomy rather than a convenient tool. It could refuse to follow the player into especially dangerous areas, return home when stressed or hungry, or simply decide to leave if necessary.
It could even be written so that, near the end of the game, it is released back into the wild or joins members of its own species again if the player helps reunite them.

Since a system like that would obviously be a fairly large undertaking, I think it would also make sense as something with a lower development priority, or later as a free DLC if the developers ever felt it was worth pursuing.

My main point was simply that I think something pet-like could fit Subnautica if it’s designed as a believable companion instead of a collectible or permanent follower. I think that could complement the core Subnautica experience rather than replace or undermining it.

And sorry for kind of hijacking the original post—I didn’t want to create yet another “pet” suggestion. Of course, whether something like this is worthwhile or feasible is entirely up to the developers.