Game Reviews Volume 2

No Man's Sky (PS4, PC)

Ever since I was a little boy I have looked up at the stars andwondered where my place is within the great big infinity that weexist in. What lies beyond our planets edge and of course will I everget the chance to go to space to glimpse at the vast blackness thatencapsulates us.

No Man's Sky, for me, is a way to live out these impossible fantasiesof mine. Of being a space explorer that travels the unknown universein search of new worlds, new life forms, new adventures that I am thefirst to discover.

In the days following its release, No Man's Sky has received anunprecedented amount of disappointment from players and criticsbecause it didn't align to what they initially thought the game wouldbe; they talk about what they would rather have seen done with theproperty and what they hope to see added in the future. Whilst I'llcertainly touch on what I would like to see added, I'm looking at thegame as what it is, not what I wanted it to be. What is it exactly?Well it's quite possibly the most engrossing game I have ever played.

Your goal in No Man's Sky is relatively simple. Travel to the centreof a universe so large that you cannot possible visit every planet orsolar system that has been created by the games complex algorithms,responsible for randomly generating everything you see.

You start next to a crashed spaceship. It's badly damaged, out offuel and your life support is slowly draining away. You might haveeven been spawned in on a planet with a dangerous climate, or likeme, infested with vicious wildlife, to make your first few hours thatmuch harder.

Once you've collected the resources necessary to get your shipflying, you're free to continue exploring the planet for as long asyou like, or to jet off into outer space to find even more coolthings that will possibly never be seen by anyone else.

The game leaves you to your own devices from there on out. Do youstart heading towards the centre of the universe? Do you freelyexplore? Or do you take an interest in one of the optional storylinesthat NMS has to offer? Personally I opted to follow the Path of theAtlas storyline. Which so far has more than a feeling of 2001: ASpace Odyssey about it...which is no bad thing. Speaking of which,you can clearly see that Hello Games have spent a lot of time withclassic sci-fi literature, the kind of stuff I grew up on (like Dune& Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy) and it's amazing!

I know of people who are 20+ hours in and have still yet to leavetheir starter planet because they are just so content with where theyhave spawned.

Of course NMS gives you an incentive to explore by rewarding you fordiscovering new animal species, plant species, planets and solarsystems. It not only rewards you with in game currency when you findthis stuff, but also gives you the opportunity to name it whateveryou want if you are the first person to discover it (which is highlylikely).

I've yet to encounter another player, or something already discoveredby someone else in my 15+ hours with the game, but in that time Ihave discovered 10 solar systems each with various planets, moons andspace stations to explore.

Nothing in my entire life has quite given me the thrill of being ableto take off from one planet, fly around space for a bit, land onanother planet and experience it all without a single loading screen.Every time I engage my hyperdrive I get a little giddy about what Imight come across, and every single time I am blown away when I'mpresented with something I didn't expect to see. It's one of theexperiences in my life that I can say truly took my breath away thefirst few times I did it.

But as marvellous as the whole idea of NMS is, it's core gameplay issomewhat less exciting. Dull resource mining, time consuming itemcrafting and unfairly small inventory slots plague an otherwisemagnificent experience. The best comparison I can give to NMS isMinecraft. You have a particular thing that you want to build, so yougather the resources you want to build it. But the biggest differenceis that in Minecraft it's generally much easier to find the resourcesyou want and they are usually more plentiful. In NMS it's a slowgrind to achieve any kind of progress for upgrades to your ship,exosuit and multi-tool. You could spend hours working towards ablueprint and never actually progress anywhere because the randomlygenerated planets you've been visiting are low on the particularresource you are looking for. I had this problem when searching forAluminium, a fairly common element that somehow managed to avoidbeing generated at all for over half of my playtime so far, when allI wanted to do was build one simple upgrade.