As one of gaming’s best comeback stories of the year, No Man’s Sky developed by Hello games was released on August 12th of 2016 as a sci-fi, exploration, base building, space game. For some short background, the initial release of No Man’s Sky was very poor. The game was much more underwhelming and repetitive but worst of all, the “end game” would just send players back to the beginning without much incentive to start again in a never-ending loop.
However since then, the developers, unlike many who have run into such situation, stayed dedicated and redeemed themselves over the 2018 year and with the huge update known as NEXT, which was released on July 24th, 2018, gave life to the game and made it one step closer to what people were expecting.
How to Download No Man’s Sky
To do download the game simply click on the Download button at the end of the review. The game is available for download on Steam and on GOG.com You can also download the game from PS4 Store or from Microsoft Store.
The Game Review
The game works on an open world concept where the player can do whatever they want so as long the game can support the idea. If you want to be a space pirate fighting in space then do so; maybe your more of a “down to earth” person, build a giant farm and factory for all your collected goodies.
The game’s world is limited to many generated worlds that all have different resources, conditions, wildlife, and more which all gives players new things to experience and gives the thrill of exploring everywhere.
While I have yet to play the big NEXT update, from player feedback and what was expected we know that NEXT included the ability to be in the third person outside of vehicles, an optimization update, a multiplayer update allowing to explore with 3 more friends, and lots of tweaks to resource gathering as well as NPC behavior. Admittedly, the NEXT update is quite new so it is constantly being patched as of now but it changed the direction No Man’s Sky was going for the better.
However, regardless of NEXT, there are still persisting problems to point out from my personal experience and a recent talk with players on the forums about the NEXT update. For one, the “optimization” updates really seem minor as many players, including myself, who have the privilege of owning “10XX” graphics cards still have FPS problems and lag that hangs around. The graphics can be a bit awkward as well until you find a preference which I personally struggled with in the beginning as well.
Resource gathering still remains somewhat of a hassle and NPC interaction, while much better now, still remains bland and rather aggro towards the player if anything. While certain relationships usually cause NPC aggro to players, many neutral relationships have a better chance of turning negative than positive. And while I would have to play NEXT for myself to make sure, but it may just be that by using NEXT to become a mediocre game from poor promises, the hype took over to exaggerate its content. However, I do give a big prop to the developers that stuck with it until now to create a better game for players in the future.
