Dave the Diver follows the story of Dave, who has been called to work at a secluded part of the ocean dubbed as the Great Blue Hole. Although his diving expeditions were mainly for the purpose of business, Dave somehow got himself involved in discovering plenty of secrets hidden beneath the ocean. Read ahead as we go through the events of the prologue of Dave the Diver and share some helpful tips for a great playthrough.
Prologue Objectives:
Introduction
The game starts as we see the protagonist Dave relaxing at the beach when he then suddenly gets a call from his friend Cobra. Dave then flies over to meet Cobra at what is known as the Great Blue Hole. Cobra shares that this spot in the ocean is special as its ecology changes very quickly and he sees it as a business opportunity, which is why he hired Dave to be his diver and business partner.
You then get to learn the controls of the game as you guide Dave through the world. Start by moving Dave to the edge of the boat to start a dive.
Diving Mechanics
Everyday, Dave gets two attempts to dive, one in the morning and one in the afternoon, which increases to three attempts later on in the game once night diving has been unlocked. Dave can stay underwater almost indefinitely per dive, provided that he has enough oxygen or O2 in his tank. At the beginning of the game, you are only limited to a certain depth and you will have to upgrade your diving suit to access the deeper parts of the ocean.
As Cobra mentioned, the ecology as well as the map changes every time you dive. There are a number of pre-generated maps that the game randomly chooses for each dive, at least for the shallower section of the ocean. These maps often contain different kinds of biomes where certain types of fishes can only be found in. as you go deeper, the map layout almost always remains the same, making it easier to navigate.
Moving under the ocean is as simple as using the directional keys. Dave can swim faster at the cost of a higher O2 consumption. Also, the O2 meter also serves as the health bar, and once the O2 runs out, Dave will suffocate and will be brought back on to the surface. If this happens, you will lose most of your catches within your current inventory.
To get back up to the surface safely, you can either swim to any part of the surface, or locate an escape pod that will instantly bring you back up the surface. These escape pods can be found randomly placed in different parts of the ocean and finding one right away is crucial, especially if you have a lot of fishes and other stuff in your current inventory.
Fishing Mechanics
Dave will start off with just a Dive Knife which he can use to stab fishes with. You will have to swim close to a fish and swing the knife to deal some damage to it. However, most fishes will swim away, so the knife itself won’t be as effective of a fishing tool as the next tool in Dave’s arsenal.
Luckily, Cobra also gave Dave the Harpoon which is the main fishing tool for the game. The harpoon allows you to aim at a fish and fire a harpoon at it. Depending on the size of the fish, your harpoon can pull the fish towards you or just deal damage to it, especially if they are larger fishes. The harpoon can be fired indefinitely and it can also be upgraded later on.
After successfully catching a fish, its log will be added to your fish compendium, plus it will be stored in your current inventory. Dave can only carry a certain amount of weight and getting closer to the limit or exceeding this weight will make Dave over encumbered which will slow him down. You can either discard some unwanted items, place them inside caches which will be unlocked later, or decide to resurface and bring you haul back to the boat.
Fishes that are caught using the harpoon will always be at a poor (1*) or good (2*) quality since it will always kill its target fish, but later on, you will get access to better tools that will allow you to nab a fish while it is still alive which will give you catches that have great (3*) quality.
After completing the harpoon tutorial, Cobra will call you back up to his boat. He will then tell you that there is a sushi bar nearby that is about to open tonight and he thinks that your help will be much needed. You can accept or decline this offer, but regardless of your choice, you will still have to go and help the sushi bar. Head over to the left side of the boat and then select Sushi.
You will then arrive at Bancho Sushi where you will meet the head chef Bancho. Your conversation with Bancho will then be interrupted by a huge earthquake and it wrecks most of the stuff in the bar. Despite this, Cobra and Bancho decide to still push through with the opening of the bar tonight. Since your catch from earlier won’t be enough, Bancho demands that you catch more fish before the bar starts its operation tonight.
Prepare Sushi Ingredients
Once you’re back on the boat, go for another dive and catch 7 more fishes. You can either stay on the starting area since there are enough fishes to fulfill the objective, or do a bit of exploring. Be careful as there are dangerous creatures that are either hostile towards you or just harm you when touched. You can also catch more than the required fishes and fill your max weight capacity as more fishes will be useful in upgrading dishes.
Head back up to the boat once you’re done catching fishes. You will then get to review a log of your catch for the day; the fishes that you caught will automatically be turned into fillets. It will be nighttime once you resurface, so head back to Bancho Sushi and prepare for the opening.
Repair Bancho Sushi
Back at the bar, Bancho will then tell Dave that not only will he be catching the ingredients that the bar needs, he will also be helping out in serving and preparing the menu for the bar. Bancho will then guide you through the basic menus and operation of the bar.
One of the most important section that you need to focus on for now is the Menu section. You will have to manually add to the menus the dishes that will be served to the customers every night. The dishes that you can serve will depend on the ingredients that you have on hand.
First, register a dish from the recipes that you have unlocked. Most simple recipes are unlocked once you have obtained its ingredients, while more complicated recipes will be unlocked through other means later on.
Selecting a recipe will let you view the ingredients it requires, its selling price, the happiness points it can give, as well as the amount of servings that one recipe can make. The overview icon will also give you an idea on how many of that recipe you can serve for the night based on the amount of ingredients that you currently have.
There is also the Enhance button that allow you to improve a recipe at the cost of its ingredients. Every upgrade will raise the selling price and happiness points that a dish can give. The cost of enhancing will also rise up, requiring more ingredients the higher the level of the dish reaches, and a dish can only be enhanced to a certain level.
Remember that any unsold dishes will have its ingredients discarded at the end of the night, so it’s best to learn how to stay on top of your menu and learn how many dishes should be stocked for the night. If you run out of dishes while there are still customers, they will be served with the basic Norimaki. However, you can manually restock the dishes and change the menu during operating hours, provided that you still have the ingredients and time for it.
For now, simply add the dishes with the highest selling price first to reach the $100 goal.
Next, Bancho will teach you about serving beverages to customers who order them. This will be a short minigame where you have to pour the drink into the cup and try to fill it just right at the line. Customer who get at least a good grade of drink will get a bonus and will pay more for their dish.
Afterwards, Bancho will teach you about serving orders. Customers will have their orders shown above their heads and Bancho will immediately queue it up and prepare the dish. Your job is to get the dish once Bancho is done preparing it and serve it to the right customer.
Customers can only wait for some amount of time before they get impatient and leave, and customer who have waited for quite some time will leave a not so good review later on. It’s important to pay attention to which customer ordered which dish first so as to prevent them from waiting for too long.
As you progress through the game, you will be able to hire staff that will help in the kitchen and in the dining area which will greatly improve the efficiency of the bar’s operation.
After completing the bar tutorial, Bancho will then open the bar to real customers. Do your best to serve the orders right. You should also pay attention to the wasabi counter on the right side and make sure that there’s always wasabi available for the dishes. Replenishing wasabi will be another minigame where you have to manually grind the wasabi root into paste. Pay attention to leaving customers as well as you will need to bus out their plates to make room for more customers.
Once the bar is done for the night, you will see a summary of your sales and the score that you have obtained based on your service. The Artisan’s Flame will also be introduced which is a kind of currency that is used to unlock better dishes later on. At this point, you will most likely not hit the goal yet, but you can still work on it through several days.
During your first night, you will get a cutscene where a boat delivering packages gets attacked by a giant tentacle and gets pulled into the water.
Day 2
On the next day, you will get a call from Ellie who is an ecologist studying the ecology in the Giant Blue Hole. She will ask for your help in gathering some specimens which will start the Red Ecological Data sub mission.
Afterwards, you then get to access your smartphone where you can look through a bunch of apps that can help you throughout different parts of the game. Some of the apps will still be locked at this point. Best to check your Calendar app to be on top of any special events that you will encounter as you play. Also check you Mail app to look through the emails you got as some of them contain helpful operator promotion codes that can give special rewards.
On your next dive, catch as many fish as you can. Beware as you will start encountering more dangerous and hostile fish that could harm you and could deplete your O2 if you’re not careful. Once you head back to the boat, Cobra will suggest that you should carry a gun to help in dicey situations. He then introduces you to Duff who is a guns expert.
As you talk to Duff, he will tell you that conventional guns won’t be enough. The Weaponsmith Duff sub-mission will then start, where you will have to collect the necessary materials to craft your gun. Completing this mission will reward you with the Basic Underwater Rifle. You will also get to access the Weapon Shop app, where you can purchase more guns and upgrades.
Once you have collected $100, Cobra will come in and congratulate you for collecting the money to rebuild the bar; this will also complete the prologue. On the following day, you will meet Dr. Bacon, who will ask for your help in looking for an artifact that they believe came from the ancient civilization of the Sea People, which will then proceed to the next chapter.
See next: Chapter 1 – Traces of the Sea People