No Man's Sky exists more than any of us do.

I think it's going to be a trading game with a little Pokemon Snap.

Uh they say less than nothing about what the actual game is other than "you can land on planets and there is no load time". Again.... where is the gameplay? Where is the hook beyond "hey I discovered a planet lol!?"

It exists, but from what I've seen I'm not convinced the gameplay is any good. Once the novelty wears off of traveling between worlds, I think we'll be left with a pretty mediocre shooter. That being said, I'm looking forward to it, but I'm not getting my hopes up.

As far as I understand it, you want to travel to the center of the universe for some reason. Every player starts on his own planet somewhere on the outer rim of the galaxy. To be able to travel all the way, you'll have to upgrade your spaceship and your on-foot equipment.

So you're progressing along a tech tree, which fuels into your progress in the terms of exploration, by enabling you to overcome obstacles, like unlocking better FTL travel and whatnot. Pretty straight forward.

@seppli: I'm really curious if you can / will be able to build things other than (presumably) ships. If it'll be more open or limited compared to Minecraft is what I want to know. I've spent tons of hours in Minecraft, so if this is anything like it then I'd be just fine.

After hearing Danny speak about it, I am super pumped for this game.

The only problem with this is if you comment without reading the actual post. It's very clear I don't actually think the game is nonexistent. Basically: what they'd have us believe is the game is just a nicely-presented hand-picked world.

BUT, after reading some posts in here and hearing more outside info about the game, I think the game is much more legit now... although I'm still thinking it's gonna disappoint a whole lot of people.

@dixego said:

guys what if we're already playing No Man's Sky and this whole thing is just a procedurally generated mess that's about to self-incept guys follow the money

this just seems so needlessly negative.

it's one thing to be skeptical about something, it's another thing entirely to call somebody a liar because of things that *you* have done in the past.

Seems like it is more of a game then Half Life 3

Well at least you got noticed by the likes of Dan Marshall, Mike Bithell and Matt Lees, so good job on that.

What if this thread is actually Frog Fractions 2?

Geoff Keighley ‏@geoffkeighley 2m

Best part of playing No Man's Sky today - confirmation that the game features giraffes.

aaaaand it exists

Yeah this is my big worry. I really hope what little shooting they did in the trailer was placeholder because it looked terrible unsatisfying and boring.

They're not exactly amateurs, but sure this is a tall order. I don't think anybody watching these videos isn't skeptical a little bit. Especially people with experience in the industry, either watching games progress through development or actively participating in the development. But these guys seem genuine, proud, and ambitious. Jesus, would it kill everybody just to be positive about something in games for once?

I agree this game seems overhyped and overambitious at least from the way people have interpreted it and probably will never live up to that, I think it's silly to suggest it doesn't exist in some early stage and to assume it wont get developed into something playable (and probably kind of awesome). There's definitely a little peter molyneux going on here in the sense that what is being explained sounds amazing in concept yet will likely realistically turn out to be a little less exciting in execution.

Still, I'm a firm believer that if you shoot for the stars you might at least make it to the moon, so good fucking luck to them I hope we end up with an interesting and fantastic game.

You can be excited for something without having any expectations for it. I'm not totally sure what the final game will be or if it will have any structure, so I'm keeping my expectations limited. BUT.... What they are showing and what they are saying speaks to me; it has me excited for the possibilities.

If you over-hype anything you will (probably) not have your expectations met and will come out disappointed. Be reserved with your level of interest.

Whatever. I'm tired of cynicism in the gaming industry. Until Hello Games proves me wrong, I trust what they are saying. Just because he said things that you assume you would say if you want to lie about your game doesn't mean a thing.

@metal_mills When he says Minecraft in space he means from a storytelling perspective. There is no story and its about what you are doing that forms that narrative. This isn't a crafting game from anything he's described.

It's the confusion about the multiplayer that does it for me.

I thought when the first unveiled that it'd be something like an MMO, but it seems like it's closer to something like Journey with maybe the coordinate stuff from Starbound (visiting the randomly generated "seed" that someone else got).

The idea of a randomly generated galaxy that's pretty much single player with occasional player intersections or "footprints" (player discoveries) seems a lot more practical than some massive online space sandbox game that's somehow randomly generated but persistent and also came from a handful of indies.

Well, it's not a Kickstarter project and you don't have to pre-order it.

E3 in general seemed pretty tame.

There are parts of this game that will be pretty much impossible to create.

The biggest one is the creature generator, that will never be as sophisticated as some tend to imagine. There will probably be a handful of creature types and the variations will only have altered color schemes and some minor additions (horns and whatnot). Rigging and animation will still need to be done by hand, there's no way such a small team can program a life creation sim that determines how a create will walk on the ground they spawned on.

The planet generator is probably more likely to exist, although I can't imagine you'd see a whole range of totally different worlds. They will have mountains and some lakes and come in different colors. After visiting about 20 planets you'd start to recognize patterns.

Same goes for the stuff in space. There can be only so many types of spacecrafts, you'll see them all over the universe. Another band of pirates over here and the same group of freightcarriers over there, only they are blue now and a little bit bigger it seems.

Which still makes for a pretty awesome game if all of the above is true. You'd have your fun with it, but at the same time I think people would get bored more quickly with No Mans Sky then with Minecraft. And I too have my doubts, especially since there are no real gameplay elements explained at all. You just cruise around the universe and shoot some stuff or not? That makes no sense to me. Could they not explain some of the goals you can chase as a player?
Like becoming a top player in the hall of fame of explorers by visiting as many planets and stuff within the world as you can. Or find a planet with big resources which you can then trade with other explorers for stuff you need to upgrade your ship or build a base on a planet.
What is the purpose of the player in this world besides side seeing? This is way too vague and I feel there's too much emphasis on the world generator then on the actual gameplay.

I don't think the developers are lying, but I do think people's expectations are ridiculous and I don't see why anyone's impressed by this. The visuals are pretty nice and that seems to be just about the only cool thing about the game. A procedurally generated galaxy is not something anyone should be excited about (especially not when coming from such a small team). Randomly generated world are boring worlds, and that's what the game's more or less guaranteed to be after you've flown around in space for an hour or two and seen a handful of planets: fucking boring as shit.

I think Sean Murray from Hello Games has been out there saying it's not the sort of game with quests or goals. It is in fact more along the lines of Minecraft or Terraria, I guess with less an emphasis on building and more on exploring?

There will be certain "milestones" as I understand it. Basically smaller goals like upgrading your weapons, space suit, space ship, stuff like that. There will be combat, both space and ground. I heard a reference to trade, so maybe there's trade stuff in there. I guess that's the problem with the Minecraft comparison; this could very much still be a space sim.

But as with Minecraft, I don't think there's a "purpose" that's given to you. You sort of make of it what you will.

I think many of your trepidations are spot on. I'm sure they can get a lot of variety, but at some point you're gonna start seeing the seams of it all. I hope not though. They've said that as more people play and explore, the in-game galaxy will expand, so there's always more stuff, and obviously it'd be way cool if that new stuff wasn't just the old stuff renamed or recoloured.

It's probably like Destiny, where sitting and having having an extended play session will make things a lot clearer.

@development: You're seriously backtracking now, you said they were lying and the game was an elaborate ruse, now you're saying it can't possibly be as ambitious as everyone is saying. I don't think you'll find many people who disagree with the second, but to claim you never posited that the game was a lie is disingenuous.

@bugbarbecue: I don't think it's backtracking if you say you changed your mind.

This is the best thing I've read all day. Thanks for that.

I feel pretty skeptical about NMS at this point also.

That isn't to say that I'm not excited by the possibilities... more that the possibilities have formed the largest part of the conversation about the game so far. I don't know that much at all about the actualities of what this game is or what it will be?

At the moment there's only 10 people at Hello games and not all of them are working on this title... In short there's only so much that this game can encompass and can actually end up being.

I'm more worried that they're going to create this whole insane universe that's going to be awesome and then there's not going to be anything meaningful to do in it.

@grantheaslip said:

That's the main thing that tempers my excitement for this game. The idea of a limitless universe is cool, but if all of the planets and areas largely "feel" the same (or if each creature/area/planet can be pigeonholed into a handful of different buckets) then all of the endless variety in the world doesn't make a difference. For example, there is not an appreciable difference between a giraffe-like creature with brown spots and a giraffe-like creature with blue spots and an extra pair of legs. Hell, I could even forsee a case where there's not an appreciable difference between any large land-based creature from a gameplay perspective. Will the endless parade of worlds start to lose their luster if they all turn out to feel largely the same? How long will discovering Random Planet 123949717439479B and getting your name plastered on it remain novel? If the universe is truly limitless, what are the odds that many other players are even going to visit your planet when they could be discovering their own?

The potential of this sort of procedural universe is huge, but if the gameplay's not interesting or varied, or if the procedural content doesn't feel diverse enough, it could really take a lot of the "game" part out of the game.

Oh no, it is just Spore again, gaming is doomed. Seriously though, every video posted in this thread that had "gameplay" in the title just showed the same mock up footage weve seen 100 times. This game is a concept yo, there's nothing there. Folks saying Sony wouldn't let a dud onto their stage show are great, no one's ever shown things that don't exist or are fantastical at E3 before right guys?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yDvHlwNvXaM

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zAb2rP9Wp-U

@icemael: I dunno, I think randomly generated worlds can be pretty fun. Walking around in Minecraft in survival mode is super entertaining with its giant mountains and winding cave systems and wildlife and random villages. Same with Spelunky on a much smaller scale. That games plays incredibly well with its generated levels.

Maybe we're just looking for different things to occupy our time and that's why you think they're boring. In theory, what you're saying makes sense but I think there are already a few games that throw a wrinkle in your conclusion.

I really don't understand the reaction from the press and some gamers. I've seen interviews and even listened to developer stuff and they're so goddam vague about what you actually do in the game that it's hard to even get excited for it. I mean really the only gameplay we saw (which, by the way, was obviously SUPER scripted) and even then it was boring as shit. He literally just walked around and looked at things and then new species were uncovered.

Another thing I don't get is why they're putting such a huge emphasis behind the procedurally generated worlds and creatures. Think realistically about that. How lame will some of those creatures really look? Think back to Borderlands and how the vast majority of the guns are shit and you throw them away or sell them. That's kind of what I'm getting at. You'll probably find the really cool, pre-made ones that only slightly differ from each other, and then a bunch of dumb/boring looking ones.

We know nothing of this game. I need a good story and gameplay in my games. This so far reminds me of Proteus, where you just walk around infinitely without doing anything. Sounds novel, but really is pointless after a very, very short time.

I think that's what the OP is getting at, though I think the title should have been worded differently since it really doesn't reflect what he thinks more so than to incite a reaction out of people.

Being able to transition from world to space to world seemlessly is really awesome. But, procedurally generated worlds -are- boring. It's the manipulation of those procedurally generated worlds that makes them interesting.

Exploring with a friend would be cool, but there's no multiplayer in the traditional sense.

So, for those who are excited about No Man's Sky, can anyone explain to me what the gameplay actually is? Do you create an avatar? Do you explore to find loot? How do you get your ship?

I understand there are -concepts- to get excited about when it comes to No Man's Sky. But, I'd like to know what No Man Sky the game is before I allow myself to be anything more than curious about it.

Someone already brought it up, but Spore had tons of awesome concepts. In execution, none of those concepts made for a compelling game. Let me describe some of those interesting concepts.

You start life and explore procedurally generated environments. As you advance genetically (ala a tech tree), you're able to expand the areas you can explore until your creatures can reach the universe. From there, they can fly from planet to planet, exploring other worlds with procedurally generated creatures and environments. Thanks to the power of "the cloud" (Or whatever term they called it in the mid 2000's), some of those planets will be populated with creatures, buildings, and vehicles that other players have created.

I hope the game is fun to play. It would be a bummer if it ends up being super impressive technically while being not so interesting to actually interact with. Kinda like Scribblenauts.

I just watched the video linked above of Destin from IGN and he DOES NOT say that he played the game or saw the game played.

Yes I do know some journalists have gotten behind the scenes looks at the tools, but what about the game?

Can someone link to an actual journalist saying that they actually played or SAW the game played?

I found only one reference of someone saying they saw a hands-off demo that was identical to the stage demo, but they did not give any more details or specifics.

You think this game doesn't exist?

Try the beta.

How awesome would it be if No Man's Sky is really just a highly specialized middleware developer demonstration for procedurally-generated dinosaur planets?

I am actually more curious than anything. I think they definitely have some very impressive tech and I am definitely excited for their game.

But after watching a lot of the developer interviews and seeing just how bold their claims were I started getting a bit suspicious. They seemed to be willing to make pretty wild claims about things that they likely do not have implemented, so I started to wonder if the demo was legit. For example I know once in the past Naughty Dog rendered out and showed a game play sequence that was supposedly running in real time but it actually wasn't. I was just hoping someone could verify that there is any reference to it actually being played.

Well I found this post were the journalist says he say a hand's off demo played by Sean Murray:

http://www.joystiq.com/2014/06/18/no-mans-sky-name-your-own-dinosaur-get-eaten-by-it/

But all the journalist says about the hand's off demo is the following:

"He walks me through the same section of No Man's Sky that was shown off during Sony's briefing. Rather than reiterate it here, I suggest you watch it yourself."

So I guess he saw it played but the language is a bit unclear and he gives no details.

Reading through this thread post release has been an interesting experience. Even now, I don't know if I can answer the question "did the game shown at E3 exist?"

It may have taken years, but boy oh boy have most of your thoughts been vindicated. IIRC at the time there were even some indy game developers (maybe Rami?) and journalists dog piling on your post on Twitter, too.

@sweep: your fears were valid it seems.

After playing the game for about 30 hours. I'm going to say OP should feel pretty smug. They even brought up on the Bombcast how the initial trailers for the game 2 years ago were a far more idealized version than what we really got.

@gnomeonfire said:

I think a handcrafted vertical slice of what you intend for the game to look like is fine under normal circumstances, where you're expected to have something to show at a tradeshow and obviously most of the game is like 40% done so it's totally ridiculous to expect one 5-10 minute chunk of a level to look like completely done. Yeah, stuff like that initial Bioshock Infinite gameplay demo was reeeally just an elaborate test area to show to the press and wasn't even in the final game and almost kinda takes place outside of the story, even if most of the ideas in it did appear in the final game in one way or another, and overall the impression that Infinite made during some of its big chaotic scenes was about on par with what was suggested with that initial reveal gameplay demo thing. I suspect Prey 2 would've worked out the same if it ever came to be.

The problem with doing that vertical slice in a procedurally generated game like No Man's Sky is that when you handpick a vertical slice to show people, whether on that reveal trailer or Colbert's show or whatever, of course the stuff you pick is going to be a massive outlier because you either handpicked the randomly-generated aliens that looked the best or maybe they even hand-designed some aliens for those demos/trailers. Unless you're Jesus in programmer form, most of the procedurally generated creatures aren't going to look as believable/lifelike as the handful of ones you probably spent a few hours handpicking and handanimating.

Where it gets even worse is that due to team size or realities of the PS4 platform, seemingly loads of features indicated in those earlier trailer were cut or never implemented: some of the animal behaviours shown in the trailer, some of the basic terrain shown in the trailer (the real game doesn't seem to have rivers or streams as far as I've seen online), how many things you can actually do while your ship is in atmosphere, not to mention the relatively consistent implications from the dev team that there could be some level of player interaction beyond the very obvious "you see the names people give stuff".

It's one thing when an E3 trailer happens, and you can tell that by the time the game came out, they cut like, one of your Force abilities from a Star Wars game because it wasn't fun/was too broken or something, but the mismatch in features shown in trailers to what is actually in the shipping version of No Man's Sky is significant. It's not that the shipping game is completely terrible, but this is probably going to be pretty high on the list of game trailers that misrepresented how the final game was going to be.

Well this is a fun read in retrospect.

Although personally even the initial trailer did not convince that it was going to be a good game. Because i was struggling to find more than three solid Gameplay mechanics. The whole game seemed shallow and seemed like it could get boring really fast.