yeah i found that weird, but i can accept the dissonance i suppose. what it makes me wonder is if there are/will be fully inhabited planets with cities the deeper you go in (which obviously shouldn't rank as "Undiscovered." or maybe they're ust considering it from your viewpoint). i do wonder if there actually is a bunch of cool stuff hidden deep in the game and we're maybe judging it a little too hastily (bunch of spoiler blocked stuff on the neogaf OT suggests this to possibly be true).

If they put a lot of time into it I'm assuming they'd allow players to 'wake up' together and start their journey together as a team of explorers - they'd also have to manage time differently. The universe 'pauses' when you enter the menu of the game I think(?), monsters freeze etc, so they'd have to let time run the same for all players in the game so a player can drop in/drop out and access menus without players nearby having to wait like a turn-based experience.

I really hope the game gets 'tougher'/'weirder' as you go, I don't know how the game is after significant game time.

I'm pleased I am somewhat ignorant of what this game either was to be or by various sourced purported to be. I finally pre-ordered NMS, though I could have waited a day, so I could pre-load. Doom took a rather long time....

If it was bugged, wouldn't Sean Murray just say that on twitter? He even addressed that they met, but promptly ignored the actual fact that they couldn't see each other. He continues being vague, not addressing issues, not answering questions.

How would that not be more fun? That would be 10 times more fun than just having a desolate planet by yourself. And imagine landing on a planet and seeing someone already there, what a cool feeling.

What if it's multiplayer but only once you reach the centre :O

Really? Ok, that's weird. They were in the exact same spot, but never actually saw each other, how could they have "met"? I'm assuming devs can track players and confirm whether they actually met.

Like a NG+? Not sure if people would appreciate that. :) But hey. It'd be a twist of plot if nothing else.

Doom's download is ten times larger than NMS.

Just call him Sean Molyneux.

This isn't strictly relevant, but you did interact with other players (in a very limited way) in Journey: touching them would recharge your scarf juice.

It's not a huge amount of interaction but I think it is pretty core to the experience (or message, if you want to go down that road) of the game!

The amount of people that seem to think this entire game runs on one server/instance, boggles my mind.

@bigsocrates: @funkydupe:

Yeah I'm of two minds on this: first of all; a real, solid multiplayer component in this game could be super fascinating and fun. On the other hand, building out this system in an already complex game that few people get to really use is a bit silly. I can see further down the line if they add space quardinites to everything that let people warp to each other, as well as very robust netcode to accommodate for all of this.

I think Hello Games wants to please people and help their sense of wonder and discover and all that in NMS be nurtured. We'll just have to wait and see how it develops over time.

A billion planets + you need to be in the same instance to find someone. Planetside the game pauses (if I'm not mistaken) when you enter the menu so yeah... real-time multiplayer/interaction seems difficult. :)

My guess is that it's closer to seeing other Souls players' translucent silhouettes on the same plane as you, as in, if you and another player are on the same planet at the same time, you might be able to trigger the scenario in which you see each other, but you almost certainly can't leave the planet together or hang out in space.

It seems like the issue here is Hello did a lot of small versions of things they thought would be 'easter eggs' people will discover, but in the end people want fully-realized versions of those easter eggs and absolutely need to know if they are part of the game or not. Hello doesn't want to give away these things because they consider them easter eggs, but they also don't want to just say 'no' because that (I am guessing) is not technically true. Murray said it is possible to see another player if you run into them while reiterating it is very unlikely and not to count on that happening. I still believe him, I just don't think it's a core part of the game that I should expect to work. They've been very, very clear this is not a game I should expect to play with my friends. I, personally, don't have a problem with any of that.

In the end, this is about devs keeping secrets about things that they don't consider to be core gameplay elements. Running into another player is not part of the core gameplay experience - they have been SUPER clear about that. I see absolutely no problem with them being cagey about what happens if you run into another player. It's an easter egg, he doesn't want to give it away. He probably could have said "the answer is an easter egg", though, but people who buy this game under the pretense that they will find their friends have willfully ignored ALL other messaging around this game, in which they say in no uncertain terms that you should not expect the game to work like that.

"Running into another player is not part of the core gameplay experience - they have been SUPER clear about that."

Just from reading up on this today I'm feeling they've been extremely vague and videos show they've said quite the opposite. They've teased multiplayer and they've said it is possible. If you say something is rare, that's like posing it as a challenge. Almost like saying there's a rare item you can get. During that E3 video linked earlier the interviewer referred to it as an MMO and wasn't corrected by the developer, so yes, I think the confusion is very much a result of the developers not communicating properly. Sharing names of discoveries isn't what most people consider a multiplayer experience.

Everyone treats this Murray person as a child with no ability to understand what goes on around him, that he doesn't know how to talk and explain properly even, let's give the guy some credit. He knows the extra attention his vagueness on multiplayer has brought the game.

This seems like a controversy that could have been easily avoided with a clear statement from the developer instead of some "well it's SO unlikely you'll ever find someone" bullshit.

How about by "met" he meant that their paths crossed? He was surprised that the paths of two players, among 15 quintillion planets or whatever, crossed on the first day. Maybe he didn't literally mean that they met and could see each other and shake hands.

Well.....whatever happens it's got us all talking about the game. We should really be discussing why there's never any platinum and the sentinels are just a dumb idea..

Yes, that's probably what he meant, but it isn't what a lot people read into it; just like his statements in previous interviews on multiplayer pre-release. :)

As someone said in this thread; if the developers intended multiplayer to be very rare and enjoyed by only a few people, they wouldn't have put a lot of effort into it as they're a small team; it'd be like just a small bonus. It'd be shared everywhere on YouTube etc if someone actually found each other knowing the slim chances of it ever happening. That two streamers found the same system and planet within a day wasn't part of the developers plans, I think.

The way people treat Sean Murray reminds me of what lead Phil Fish to give up on Fez 2 - damn the gaming community has a too many people vehemently digging into every mistake notable developers do. I hope this doesn't end up as badly for Sean as it did for Phil.

I really hope there's some sort of multiplayer for those who thought they were promised it but everything they said about multiplayer up to this point has been mad suspicious.

I think it was Greg Kasavin in one of the "Building the Bastion" talking about how if you are not sure if its going to be in the game (like the whip in his game), don't even mention it at all. Because like people have said games change over time, things get added tweaked and tossed out. The only thing you end up doing is pissing off or disappointing the customer who end up going "where the hell is this".

Now Sean straight up said you can meet with other players randomly, which if he wasn't %100 positive was ever going to make it into the game he shouldn't have said at all. Just give the basic PR bullshit answer of "where looking at it, but where not sure at this moment" response that we as fans hate, but they have a very good reason (looking at the shit show that is NMS right now) to give that bland response. And since it looks like any realtime multiplayer was cut or never even made, should have stressed the fact over and over in interviews that its really not in the game, not the vague non-answer he has been giving. would have solved A LOT of his problems now.

They've said it's possible to run into another player. They've also, repeatedly, at length, said that the game is a singleplayer experience; that you should not count on ever finding another player. That is as much a declaration of unlikelihood as it is a warning: this game will not become a multiplayer game if you can find another player. They've said this stuff since day one. If you buy NMS after expressly ignoring their assertions that the game is a singleplayer experience, seeing that as a challenge to convert it into a multiplayer experience, it is your fault when it doesn't happen.

Could Murray say, clearly, what happens when you run into another player? Sure. Does he have to? No, because, as he has said many, many times, this is not a multiplayer game in that way, and it is a disservice to your experience if you go in expecting to 'find' one.

Crazy, considering not one month (edit: found out it was an old quote from 2014) ago he said two players would instance together if they got close enough. That might not be the point of the game but that still doesn't change the fact that he lied.

"You effectively see their suit actually," Murray said. "So you won't know what's inside. It still won't answer for people whether you are an alien or whether you are a human or what you look like."

Edit: here's the link to the interview http://www.pcgamer.com/no-mans-sky-10-burning-questions-answered

Looked up the quote to see where else it was used and it is actually from 2014. The recent article wasn't an interview, it was just pulling quotes from an old one. Things change in developement over that long of a period of time but if you say something like that, the right thinf to do would be to correct yourself.

This dissonance is a factually accurate representation of the early Colonial era. The large powers (mostly European Countries) found the civilisations on other continents and yet described what was there as their own discovery. Hence, in this case, the game can be read as you discovering things for your civilisation/species/archives. The fact you get to name it is the same reason different languages have different names for the same thing, even if one group effectively introduced it to the others. While a selfish viewpoint, the game mechanic does fairly reasonably represent the sate-of-mind of explorers.

I just don't understand how this is a 'lie'. If I'm playing Dark Souls, I don't instance with every single player on the same level as me. I don't see tens of thousands of souls running around Firelink Shrine. I see one, or two. Sometimes I don't see any. That doesn't mean another player isn't in the same place as me, it just means I didn't instance with them. You probably CAN see another player, but you also probably MAY NOT see another player even if they are in the same space as you, and that doesn't necessarily mean you CAN'T see another player. That seems like the whole of it.

Every hour that people continue to question this is another ounce of amazement that bubbles out of me. It's hard to believe this hasn't been cleared up....unless there really is a light multiplayer component and we're all just paranoid?

"No Man's Sky is so large that the chances of you ever finding another player is very very small," is a ridiculous non-answer when asked if players can find each other. "Yeah, our severs only allow instances of 64 players at a time, and we're not adding any features to help players play together, so two people seeing each other is going to be incredibly rare. This isn't an MMO," would be an actual answer to that question, if that is indeed the situation.

But we don't know if that is the situation, because the developer of a recently released game--with a day one patch that wasn't able to be reviewed before launch--continues to be ridiculously vague about a basic question.

Does he "have to" say what happens when two players find each other, or even why that might not being happening as he promised it could? No. And as a potential customer, I don't "have to" view that as acceptable behavior from someone who will be potentially providing me with a product or service.

The sad thing isn't that "it's pretty clear that this isn't a multiplayer game," which is true. The sad thing is "it's pretty clear that this isn't a multiplayer game, and yet the developer went on national television and said it was anyway," which is also true.

I don't even really feel the need for this to be multiplayer, and I never expected that to be how the game worked anyway, but the developer kept saying over and over how it could happen. And I'm someone who actually followed the game somewhat closely. I'm sure there are many who just saw that Stephen Colbert interview and have no idea how focused on single player this game truly is. They just think they're getting a massive universe to explore with their friends. This was really mishandled, and certainly can be called misleading. Whether it crosses over to a "lie" is a bit more subjective, but I'd say it qualifies for me.

A NMS streamer just informed his thousands of viewers it is a "singleplayer game in a multiplayer universe", describing it that way only because the developers said it would be very difficult to find other players... Information spreads really fast whether its right or wrong.

It's all coming in DLC bet your life on it.

And people wonder why developers don't like talking about their games before they're released and rarely give answers when trying to fix things. Gamers can be the worst.

@hunkulese: it's not about what was once promised/mentioned that is now absent, it's about what is still currently vague and misleading right up to release. For sure people can be unreasonable when it comes to the realities of game development but this is done. It's out. It's currently being sold and I don't know what the answer to this question is.

To add some more fuel to the fire, some people say they are finding stickers on their retail No Man's Sky boxes that changed the PEGI rating from 12 to 7 and removed the online icon.

http://i.imgur.com/GOJB3p0.jpg

@mike: Why was it a 12 and now it is a 7?

The current conspiracy theory is that the rating was lowered due to online interactions being removed.

@nightriff: That planned hardcore sex scene between you and one of the monoliths? Had to go.

@lv4monk said:

If your question is "Can I see another player; can we interact?", then the answer is no to both counts. I can't say why the devs refuse to just say this, but if you look at some of their recent tweets and how they skirt the issue I think it becomes clear.

Personally as I am getting 100% what I expected I can't be too mad, and I'm not exactly ready to write off the ability to run into someone though it does seem unlikely, due to the pause menu rather than the size of the galaxy though IDK maybe it's possible that when you get instanced it disables that? No idea if that is actually possible from a technical stand point. I mean even if they made it seem possible to meet up with people my expectations were so low on it happening that if it doesn't happen it's no big deal.

However I have to admit it does seem like they were being intentionally vague and misleading to drive the mystique, the real quote I have a problem with is when asked if you can play it with your friends and he says yes. Weirdly enough I remember watching that interview and I don't remember coming away thinking I could play with my friends. I actually remember telling my friends about this game 2 years ago and telling them how amazing it looked but we wouldn't be able to meet up though you could run into a random person.

At the end I'm not sure how I feel about this, on one hand I never expected to play with anyone else even if you ran into someone, always had the idea that it was a single player game where you might run across someone else so taking out running across someone really changes nothing for me. But on the other hand I can imagine someone wanting to play this because of that possibility and so if it's not possible than it is misleading.

I fucking knew it, No Sale Sean!

(Still planning getting it despite the Drama)

I'm not planning on getting this game, and haven't really been interested in it (though I see why others are, it's an awesome concept and a cool leap forward... excited to see what comes out of it in the long-run)...

I think most of the controversy comes from Sean Murray being disingenuous about the multiplayer. He has said that other players can see you (and, barring servers being the issue, what he said isn't true). I don't think it has to do with "multiplayer" as much as it does the notion that people just don't like being deceived (or lied to), especially when they're having their money taken for the thing they're being deceived about. It happens, in this case, that the topic of the controversy is "multiplayer" and therefore people are getting their jimmies rustled over (what appears to me to be) something that isn't really a big factor in your experience in the game.

Again, that said, servers may clear up and you may be able to see other players and whatnot--but if that was the case why would the guy just respond with "That's amazing, so many people play my game" over and over again?

It comes down to the classic battle of the fan-boy and the anti-fan-boy. Will we ever rise above it, duders?!?

I've always expected NMS to have some form of asynchronous multiplayer like Sporepedia did with little or no actual interaction between players. Sean/HG is not doing the game any favours by constantly alluding to actual multiplayer gameplay. Either they make an official statement about the system being used, or they actually incorporate multiplayer in a later patch.

This is the thing that has bugged me from the beginning. I'm sure Sean Murray is a great likeable guy, but he probably should have been clearer in his messaging (and still should be) or have had someone there who's better at PR. None of these coy vague statements that end with a smirk and a "you'll have to wait and see".

Despite all the shouting (and the fact it's over a year old), Brandon Jones brings up some good points

Here is my take, where I also try to assume the best in people because I am trying to be a less cynical human being.

Some light MP functionality beyond just uploading discoveries was planned and established to be within the scope of the project. At some point it became apparent that this is unachievable, at least not before release, and was quietly scrapped.
Sean, having already played coy with expectations, panics, doesn't know what to say, and decides to commit to the lie and keeps playing coy in the hopes that the problem will fix itself. Either people will forget, take him on his vague wording of 'almost never' or 'close to zero', or maybe the team gets the feature in.
Sean now, for whatever reason, doesn't realise that it's not the lack of MP that is most upsetting to people and his fans, it's the lying.

Of course, this is all going to make me look super dumb if in a few days someone does actually meet someone else.

That actually sounds quite plausible. What kills me is that my reaction to this news wasn't "you promised me I could play with other people! Now I'm sad." My reaction was "I fucking KNEW you wouldn't be able to play with other people!"

My pessimism is my disappointment shield. But yeah, if multiplayer was something included in this game in any meaningful form, it would have been talked about in ways considerably different than the coy non-explanations being offered throughout development. I felt that way no matter how many times the developer said that you could play with other people.

5 bucks says they planned to implement the ability to see other players some time post-release. Maybe they were hoping to save time and focus on other problems believing that there was no way two players would meet up this soon.

Given the reality of how many star systems there are (and the repeated comments on the probability of crossing paths)- would anyone here actually be happier if full perfect multiplayer was in the game, but because of probability you never got to experience it ever. Wouldn't that just make you equally frustrated?

Think of desperately searching the galaxy for someone, only to give up after 1000 hours? Everybody would watch the scarce handful of youtube videos of the times people met and had a great day seeing another player. But your personal experience would be exactly the same as it is now.

Does just the hope of meeting someone change your perception?

People were coordinating and getting to the exact same location on the same planet yesterday. Turns out warp drives make the galaxy a lot smaller.

@mike: True, and the online community could get bigger with good coordination and the internet. But that doesn't ensure anyone could join them. If I start on a random planet I might never find the well documented star map threads to get to where the party is. If anything that would triple my frustration.

@nietzschecookie: The game draws you a path to the centre of the universe. It does that for everyone, it gives everyone that option. If everyone has that option and took it, eventually you'd all end up in the same location regardless of what planet you started out on.

That's one of the reasons I never got the whole idea of "You'll likely never run into another player, but one of the goals is to reach the centre". At some point if we're all hurdling through space towards a single location, your chances of running into people doing the same starts to increase. You would imagine, that if you can see each other and you hit the centre, then if you hang around eventually you'll start to see others.