The moment of truth nears for ultra-anticipated survival game Subnautica 2. Who can't relate to this classic blunder: You promised the heads of the game studio you acquired a $250 million bonus if their game sold well, and now it's the most-wishlisted game on Steam and it's looking like you'll have to pay up. Ay, caramba! What's a CEO to do? After consulting ChatGPT, the answer that Krafton CEO Changhan Kim came up with was to fire the studio heads despite not having a convincing reason to do so other than to get out of paying them $250 million. It didn't work out. The studio in question is Unknown Worlds, and the game is survival adventure Subnautica 2, which is out in early access this week—and still looks primed to hit whatever revenue goal will trigger that big payout, which is back on the table after a judge slapped an UNO Reverse Card on Krafton's plans. The publisher announced today that Subnautica 2 has been wishlisted over 5 million times on Steam. The drama kicked off in July 2025, when Unknown Worlds CEO Ted Gill and founders Charlie Cleveland and Max McGuire were unexpectedly told to pack up their desks. Initially, Krafton claimed that the three studio heads were fired because they were planning to release Subnautica 2 prematurely, and that it was so flawed that this could cause "irreversible harm to the entire IP franchise." We at PC Gamer thought this was pretty strange at the time, because we'd recently been planning a Subnautica 2 cover story for our magazine. We were awaiting the artwork for the cover in June 2025 when we were told that the studio was no longer able to commit to an in-depth feature, and the whole thing was cancelled. How'd they go from being ready for primetime to so-bad-it's-unreleasable seemingly overnight? In the ensuing lawsuit brought on by the ousted studio heads, we learned about the $250 million bonus, some of which would have been shared with staff at the studio, according to Bloomberg journalist Jason Schreier. The o