DSE should really integrate ocean content into the base game

[aidancode]

DST famously suffered from adding an ocean many years after the game first released. DSE is a great opportunity to make that better.

DST Ocean Problems:

- the barrier to entry for ocean content is somewhat high, either requiring a lot of food to survive a long journey or game knowledge the game doesn't teach you about where lunar is. There's also pirates to worry about which makes this problem a lot worse

- food sources are either not worth the effort or extremely powerful (some are also good but only late game)

- most of the ocean is pretty unspecial. The ocean suffers from needing to be larger than the mainland to feel fitting while not having the content to support that

- there are only 3 islands, and only 1 is particularly useful in the early game

- there are only 2 boat types, no water mounts, and the boats are very clearly designed for multiplayer

DSE potential solutions:

- more water biomes right off the coast to entice players to go to the ocean

- important progression could be put in the path of the ocean, the same way some important progression was put in the caves. Think light bulbs.

- viable singleplayer and multiplayer options for ocean exploration and combat that both feel good to use

- the ocean could be smaller or have more guided exploration like pearl's message in a bottles

[Capybara007]

Something i really hate is that in DST the devs want you to play it slow and safe because of the sea stacks, hopefully that doesnt exist in DSE or at least there is some high skill ceiling mechanic that lets you dodge sea stacks like a professional captain

[goblinball]

I know a lot of ppl have talked about how much they enjoy archipelago world gen in the past so I think it’d be cool if we got smth like that in elsewhere, although not to the degree of something like shipwrecked obviously. Maybe you could also have some of the islands connected together underground with caves, too

[Creatorofswamps]

15 hours ago, goblinball said:

I know a lot of ppl have talked about how much they enjoy archipelago world gen in the past so I think it’d be cool if we got smth like that in elsewhere, although not to the degree of something like shipwrecked obviously. Maybe you could also have some of the islands connected together underground with caves, too

Just imagine how cool the Shipwrecked volcano would look with the Elsewhere generation

[Draggofroot]

On 4/22/2026 at 1:34 PM, aidancode said:

DST Ocean Problems:

- the barrier to entry for ocean content is somewhat high, requiring a lot of food to survive a long journey 

imma disagree with this, i always loved to think of boating trips as an expedition that you have to prepare for

[ShadowDuelist]

I agree with the OP.

The ocean should be a gateway that expands the game, not a self-contained biome with only a handful of activities.

For example, if you want to add more content, you could extend the ocean and introduce new continents. If you want to support an explorer playstyle, you could generate many -procedurally generated- islands with different resources, creating excitement when discovering them for the first time.

If you want certain areas to be inaccessible early on or offer high risk–high reward, you could block parts of the ocean with major challenges. It would follow a similar idea to the ruins, just on a larger scale.

[ZeRoboButler]

Dst's ocean I liked a bit initially, but then much like the old farming system, it kinda felt like a resource dump if I wanted to engage with it the way I wanted to. 

3 large sails, a couple chest and some fish storage, plus all the other parts of the ship really added up. Sure if you played someone like wolfgang or woodie you could worry about either the necessary collection of resources less or just do the minimum and go goose or paddle strong with wolf. 

Instead of rocks blocking us all the time, it would have been great if there were player based threats that were not just a way to slow you down. I thought the pirates where a pretty cool way to pose that threat, but often they seem to smash your sails and strand you out at sea which i like less. 

I hope that Dse's ocean is gonna have new vessels, with surface areas and interiors hopefully! Ever since woodlegs was in shipwrecked the idea of a proper vessel in Don't starve has been so cool to me, rather then these tiny boats and cookie rafts. Don't get me wrong I love them in their own right because at the time when i first saw them, these where amazing, but I hope Dse's technical limitations are lessened by a new engine or tech.