When playing NMS at launch and now with the Next update, I've always wondered why there are Sentinels in the game (and at least why they are so prevalent) ?

I never understood from the game design point of view, what was their purpose in the game, or what problem they solved. For me it's just makes me feel someone is watching my every step and makes me doubt decisions (or doing things) more as I'm rather playing the game to relax and so I don't really want to fight them, or be chased by them.

Or is their purpose just to provide more combat situations ?

I'm really not sure what the point of them is either. Does anyone further in the game know if the story gives a reason for their existence?

Like why do they care if I'm mining this rock? There's billions of others around.

I've wondered that too. Everything from the GTA star system to the Supply Depot raids makes me think they just weren't happy with the amount of combat in game, but their high health just makes bad combat even worse. Considering how often the sentinels crop up in lore entries and missions as universal antagonist, I wonder if at some point they were planned as more of an enemy faction to interact with than a simple nuisance.

From what I read in NMS fan wiki, they were called "Malevolent Force" in the earlier versions of the game (before release), so might be that they were some sort of enemy faction, or remnant of a long gone civilisation.

I wish they were more actively antagonistic instead of passively flying about until you mine a rock or whatever. Fun part of Terraria is all the stuff trying to kill you at night, and then having to dig out refuge or build a makeshift shelter.

@theht: im on a planet that has these glowing orbs that sell for tens of thousands, but the sentinels shoot on sight no matter what, and its pretty intense combined with the deadly fire storms.

I always wondered the same thing when I played. Why are they everywhere? Why are some incredibly hostile, and why are some more passive?

Even if there's a lore reason, the encounters were never fun. It always felt like they were thrown in there "because video games."

And the Sentinels sucked, but holy shit I HATED the space battles. Especially when I was just getting into a system and kept getting blown up.

I haven't played since the first few months after the game came out, so not sure if this stuff has changed.

Sentiles and pirates are probably the thing I hate most about No Mans Sky. Just let me explore in peace.

Yeah, they're probably my least favorite part of the game.

Not trying to sound sarcastic here but.. Isn't that the whole story of the game? Answering these questions? Everything you do on the main missions is asking why am I here, what are the sentinels, what is atlas, what is any of this?

And I think Jeff semi-spoiled it back at launch: It's all a simulation. I don't know anything else beyond that but I can guess. Some of the missions I've been doing have eluded to answers.

I always assumed they were meant to try and pressure you into moving to another planet (or area on the planet).

I wouldn't mind the sentinel's presence if they were located in a places organically populated before hand rather than just spawning fifteen feet away when ever you get out of your ship or teleport in. Seeing them clearly come out of the ground as soon as you land just looks lazy and enemies just spawning nearby is something I tend to hate in videogames.

I'm interpreting the original question in a couple of ways:

1) Why are there Sentinels everywhere? (Lore validation)

2) Why even have Sentinels in the game? (Gameplay/Design validation)

The first one is actually a addressed in Artemis's storyline, if you pursue that. It's interesting that @maxx2029 mentioned that it feels like "pressure" on what you do, as a player. This second point actually feeds into the first point.

It was mentioned before, but the SPOILER explanation is:

To put it simply: the Sentinels are policing the galaxy based on a grand design, according to the lore.

Whether or not you think it's good game design, that part is up to you.

I really wish there was an item you could craft, be it early game or late game, that made the Sentinels fuck off for a few minutes. They seem to serve a gameplay purpose of "hey maybe you should move on" but sometimes I find the perfect mining spot and they just show up out of nowhere and yell at me.

The other 3 races could probably have fit a similar occasional antagonist role like they do in space, but the land combat probably got a lot worse with player like characters.

Sentinels suck. Getting dropped out of warp by pirates or sentinels sucks. It's not a fun gameplay conceit at all to have something that will come attack you by playing the game of mining for resources and impossible to really ever lose in a chase on foot save for the timer turning them off.

Landed on a planet. Aggressive sentinels. They instantly see me. Try to leave planet, but sentinel ships stop me in space. Guess I'll reload the damn game because I don't actually know how you lose sentinels in space at all. You can't drop the "wanted level" and I can never seem to run far enough inbetween killing them, which only raises the level and makes them harder anyway. Maybe I just personally don't know, but it's so unfun. I make sure to fly in atmosphere if I have a wanted level until it wears off.

They truly suck.

They were easier to implement than ground based alien NPCs...

As much as this game wants to be space Minecraft... They did not take the hint on interesting and memorable enemies...

The Sentinels are part of teh story -for better or worse- of how & why galaxy is teh way it is when they player encounters it.

Is that an interesting story? Meh, it might not be for some because they story of the Sentaisl, Atlus, Vykee, Gek, and Kovacks are dip-feed slowly. Nevertheless, the game is clearly says, "the Sentinels" are broken or out of control. The game drip feeds the sory but ist fairly easy to pickee together wrongly - the Sentinels swepinginto the center from teh fringes of teh galaxy first meet by the the warrior race of Vy'keen. The Vy'Keen or the Sentaisl shot first (on that I am not clear) and a first war was started. However, the ability of the VyKeen to win was spoiled/thwarted by the Gek coming along trying to gain conatrol of teh galaxy. But, then the Gek had to agree the Sentaisals were too strong and not allies when then Sentalsis enslaved the Kvoaks to attack the Gek spawn...or spawning grounds. Or, ist something like that...

So, there is a story given for why the Sentails are there, and that story is WOVEN into the game at a very deep level. I just don't see a clean way to remove all that lore out now...so teh Sentinels are here to stay.

MY TAKE: What I hope happens is players can eventually make an item that, when equipped, makes the Sentinels leave the player alone unless they attack them. That should make anyone who want to bypass that aspect of the game easier.

What confuses me the most is why they have so many different words for the sentinel activity when you first land on the planet. There's "Passive", "Normal", "Lacking", "Low Security", "Relaxed", "Hostile", "Frenzied", "High Security" and probably more, but I can't find any discernable different between the layers other than the binary "the sentinels attack you on sight or they don't". The game will alwaysspawn a sentinel near you where you land regardless of their level, and they always seem to behave the same if you mine in their presence if they're not already hostile.