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Arguably the most awaited game of summer ’16, No Man's Sky finally landed on our PCs and consoles this week. With its immense, unique worlds it brings to the table a new perspective to open-world games, game design… and to life itself.

The game's most likely feature to catch one’s attention is its immensity. This game is not merely open world but open universe. Boasting over 18 quintillion (1.8×10^19) life-sized planets teeming with their own fauna and flora, you can explore each and every one to your liking. Your only limiting factor is the range of the hyperspace jump engines of your current spacecraft and how much fuel the craft presently carries. No Man's Sky is so immense that Hello Games estimated that more than 99.9% of the planets would never be explored by players, The developers managed this feat by procedurally generating almost all elements of the game, allowing mathematical formula to create an exponential set of unique features rather than having the rather small developer team designing them individually. Following in the tracks of Minecraft, the game offers a paradigm shift regarding the possibilities in open-world games.

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However it wasn’t all roses for them. From the game’s secretive development debut, initial tension among the Hello Games team, losing most of their equipments in a flood, delaying the release date, death threats and day-one updates, they've had a lot to deal with. One might also wonder about the point in making a game so immense if all you'll experience is less than 1% of the whole game. But hey, it’s an indie game that offers an AAA experience. We have to appreciate that at the very least!

Moreover, their fundamentally different approach to game design challenges the conventional ways. “The physics of every other game—it’s faked,” the chief architect Sean Murray explained to The Atlantic. Their game on the other hand offers something else. Every star that you see in the sky is an actual place that you can go to and explore. And your exploration is even credited for being the first to discover a planet and other types of information. Within 24 hours of the game's official launch, Hello Games reported that more than 10 million distinct species were registered by players, exceeding the estimated 8.7 million species believed to exist on Earth. “It’s our universe, so we get to be Gods in a sense,” said Murray in the same article.

Speaking about Gods, over on YouTube Mike Rugnetta asks a simple yet pressing question: "If we are able to simulate universes of massive, life-like complexity within our universe, should we wonder or worry if our own is simulated?” No Man’s Sky might not emulate life as we know it but how far are we from creating such an emulation ourselves, how far are we from being our own Gods? Even prominent figures are leaning towards a simulated “reality”. Elon Musk recently fuelled this thought by stating that “the odds that we're in base reality is one in billions”. When confronted to the question, Sean Murray's answered that "even if it is a simulation, it’s a good simulation, so we shouldn’t question it.”

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So what do you all make of it? Should future open-world games be procedurally generated to allow for more randomness and exploration in games? How big is too big? And lastly, what does that signify about our own existence? Are we in a simulation or will we create one? Nevertheless, cogito ergo sum... right?

GBAtemp No Man's Sky Review

 

[mgrev]

I want it. like a lot. shit reviews on steam though.

 

[leon315]

Honestly it's still a boring game and it doesn't worth at actually prize...

 

[Chrisssj2]

Agreed boring as fuck

 

[p1ngpong]

Bought it on steam, saw it was 2.6GB, saw the reviews and refunded it immediately.

I know size isn't everything when it comes to gaming (and other things har har), but a file size that low is just fucking insulting. There is no way you can fit so many promises of a game so supposedly vast in such a small package. It is impossible. And it supposedly runs like crap too. I will just put this game on my shelf with rise of the robots and watchdogs and never bother playing it ever.

 

[osaka35]

Eh, meaning is what you make of it. But the game sounds fun. There's room for well crafted experiences and random experiences alike. Pushing the boundaries of both is a good thing.

Bought it on steam, saw it was 2.6GB, saw the reviews and refunded it immediately.


I know size isn't everything when it comes to gaming (and other things har har), but a file size that low is just fucking insulting. There is no way you can fit so many promises of a game so supposedly vast in such a small package. It is impossible. And it supposedly runs like crap too. I will just put this game on my shelf with rise of the robots and watchdogs and never bother playing it ever.

Did you miss the part about "mathematically generated"? There aren't billions of prefabs, they're generated through algorithm. Thus low size. Yeesh, this is a good thing, not a bad thing. Its like you just pointed at a van Gogh and went " I dunno, there isn't a lot of paint on that thing."

 

[Heran Bago]

Sounds like a fun little indie game. Will pick it up when it's 75% off or more on a steam sale, and by that time the issues might be patched out and extra goodness modded in.

 

[p1ngpong]

Did you miss the part about "mathematically generated"? There aren't billions of prefabs, they're generated through algorithm. Thus low size. Yeesh, this is a good thing, not a bad thing. Its like you just pointed at a van Gogh and went " I dunno, there isn't a lot of paint on that thing."

Did you miss the part where everyone overwhelmingly said the game is shit? I can give you a calculator if you want.

 

[Jonna]

I love this game, and I think it'll be boring if you aren't into exploration and don't have enough patience. The game runs fine for me and I could probably wind up often coming back to it again and again to explore more. I think it's more of a long term gradual game, personally.

 

[osaka35]

Did you miss the part where everyone overwhelmingly said the game is shit? I can give you a calculator if you want.

Lol so GB=quality, that's your point, eh? Well, that logic is...hard to even argue against.

Sad to hear that people think its crap though. The people who like the same games as me seem to love it though, which is a better indicator to me. To each their own though. That other super hyped space simulator game is like 90GB download, so you should find that to be the best game of all time!

 

[barronwaffles]

Procedural generation is nothing new - and it's just a pity they couldn't use the same algorithms to procedurally generate interesting/involving gameplay.

 

[hollowtip]

Did you miss the part about "mathematically generated"? There aren't billions of prefabs, they're generated through algorithm. Thus low size. Yeesh, this is a good thing, not a bad thing. Its like you just pointed at a van Gogh and went " I dunno, there isn't a lot of paint on that thing."

p1ngpong has a legitimate point. While the game can vary a planet's topography, elements, plant, animal life, almost infinitely, it still only has a finite number of models and textures to choose from to populate that planet with. There's very little depth in the planets you visit, and The file size is perfect reflection of much resources the game actually offers.

I also own in the PS4 version and can confirm the game is not very deep.

 

[MRsonic699]

Bought it on steam, saw it was 2.6GB, saw the reviews and refunded it immediately.

I mean.. I don't blame you for refunding it, at all. But it amuses me that we've reached a day where the file size of a game can immediately and directly impact one's opinion. Sometimes small games are too big, and big games are surprisingly small. You could've at least played it for 5 hours or so, and then hammer down your verdict.

 

[HaloEliteLegend]

Novelty is only novel for so long. Can your game survive after its coat of paint becomes rusted? This is one of the many questions game designers need to ask themselves. Unfortunately for Hello Games, it seems the answer to it may be a resounding "No." Sure, No Man's Sky is unprecedented, but as a novice game designer, I can tell you one of the most important phrases is "Gameplay is Golden." No Man's Sky boils down to a night job after our day job. A tech demo that would be exciting to people working in the industry like me at the possibilities on the horizon, but is totally unprepared for mass-media consumption.

Hello Games went in with an interesting concept, but failed to derive proper gameplay from it, resorting to haphazardously tape on elements to give the player something to do. It's a mistake many developers make. They may have a stupendously superb concept, but they fail to build up the core of their experience, which is gameplay, gameplay, gameplay. Always gameplay! Concept sits on top of gameplay, not the other way around. A concept is just a gimmick until proven, and a gimmick is like soft clay. You can sculpt the clay into a brilliant work of art, but you shouldn't place your building foundation on it. Build your building on solid ground, then put the clay in the building. That's what No Man's Sky lacked, and that's what Hello Games missed.

 

[anhminh]

What is the point of creating 18 quintillion worlds when 99.9% of it "would never be explored by players"?

I rather have one world with enough interesting things to do than quintillion boring worlds.

 

[osaka35]

Well, I guess I'll pick up a discounted copy over winter break then. I wonder if it'll appeal to Minecraft fans that like the resource management and exploration most?

 

[Steena]

What's surprising is how didn't everyone see this was a scam from the get-go, we have interviews where the devs say "it's so complex we cannot explain what's in the game, you'll just have to wait and see" and "we have programmed bots to monitor the game universe for us cause we couldn't handle it" --> releases with 1% the depth of Dwarf Fortress, a literal text game made for free. And that's not talking about them lying about entire features like multiplayer, or the aforementioned poor asset combination. Complex algorithms my ass.

A shame this seems to have gotten good sales on PS4 on hype alone, hopefully every single person refunds it on steam at least. Genuinely hope the developer goes under, they deserve it and then some more.
The sooner retards stop pre-ordering, the sooner shit games are allowed to get falsely hyped and make a profit on promises alone.

 

[Mikemk]

For people asking what the point of making 18 quintillion worlds is, I'd like to remind you...
Minecraft has 18 quintillion worlds
Civ V has 18 quintillion worlds.
Every procedurally generated game has either 4 billion or 18 quintillion worlds.
The planets in No Man's Sky have always existed. NMS just reveals them (like that famous sculptor).

 

[Bladexdsl]

not worth buying IMA pirate it

 

[gbaboy123]

it was a bit boring but I guess is a good game. I personally prefer a more complete game with story and good gameplay but I get the concept