| No Man's Sky | |
|---|---|
 Cover art by Simon Stålenhag[1] | |
| Developer(s) | Hello Games |
| Publisher(s) | Hello Games[a][b][c] |
| Producer(s) | Will Braham |
| Designer(s) | Gareth Bourn |
| Programmer(s) |
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| Artist(s) |
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| Composer(s) |
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| Platform(s) | |
| Release | |
| Genre(s) | Action-adventure, survival |
| Mode(s) | Single-player, multiplayer[d] |
No Man's Sky is an action-adventure survival game developed and published by Hello Games. It was released worldwide for the PlayStation 4 and Windows in August 2016, for Xbox One in July 2018, for the PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X and Series S consoles in November 2020, for Nintendo Switch in October 2022, and for macOS in June 2023. The game is built around four pillars: exploration, survival, combat, and trading. Players can engage with the entirety of a procedurally generated deterministic open world universe, which includes over 18 quintillion planets. Through the game's procedural generation system, planets have their own ecosystems with unique forms of flora and fauna, and various alien species may engage the player in combat or trade within planetary systems. Players advance in the game by mining for resources to power and improve their equipment, buying and selling resources using credits earned by documenting flora and fauna or trading with the aforementioned lifeforms, building planetary bases and expanding space fleets, or otherwise following the game's overarching plot by seeking out the mystery around the entity known as The Atlas.
Sean Murray, the founder of Hello Games, wanted to create a game that captured the sense of exploration and optimism of science fiction writings and art of the 1970s and 1980s. The game was developed over three years by a small team at Hello Games with promotional and publishing help from Sony Interactive Entertainment. The gaming media saw this as an ambitious project for a small team, and Murray and Hello Games drew significant attention leading to its release.
No Man's Sky received mixed reviews at its 2016 launch, with some critics praising the technical achievements of the procedurally generated universe, while others considered the gameplay lackluster and repetitive. However, the critical response was marred by the lack of several features that had been reported to be in the game, particularly multiplayer capabilities. The game was further criticised due to Hello Games' lack of communication in the months following the launch, creating backlash from some of its players. Murray stated later that Hello Games had failed to control hype around the game and the larger-than-expected player count at launch, and since then have taken an approach of remaining quiet about updates to the game until they are nearly ready to release. The promotion and marketing for No Man's Sky became a subject of debate and has been cited as an example of what to avoid in video game marketing.
Since the game's initial release, Hello Games has continued to improve and expand No Man's Sky to achieve the vision of the experience they wanted to build. The game has received a plethora of free major content updates that have added several previously missing features, such as multiplayer components while adding features like surface vehicles, base-building, space fleet management, cross-platform play, and virtual reality support. This has substantially improved No Man's Sky's overall reception, with multiple websites citing it as one of the greatest redemption stories in the gaming industry.[5][6][7]
- ^ Stålenhag, Simon. "Commissions, Unpublished Work and Solo Pieces". simonstalenhag.se. Archived from the original on 29 October 2020. Retrieved 26 October 2020.
- ^ "No Man's Sky - PS4, PS5 & PS VR Games". PlayStation. Retrieved 11 August 2022.
- ^ "Earcom - About". earcomaudio.com. Archived from the original on 8 June 2023. Retrieved 28 June 2021.
- ^ "No Man's Sky ByteBeat Update". nomanssky.com. 16 December 2019. Archived from the original on 29 August 2023. Retrieved 28 June 2021.
- ^ King, Jade (17 December 2023). "No Game Deserves Its Redemption Arc More Than No Man's Sky". TheGamer. Retrieved 24 January 2024.
- ^ Moore, Jared (7 September 2021). "No Man's Sky Gets Steam Review Redemption, 5 Years Later". IGN. Archived from the original on 24 January 2024. Retrieved 24 January 2024.
- ^ Subi, Farhan (30 December 2022). "The 5 best gaming industry redemption arcs". TechRadar. Archived from the original on 24 January 2024. Retrieved 24 January 2024.
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