Now that we have finally reached a point where most discussion about the game has decisively shifted, I feel like we also need a "sit-down and get real" topic for the present and the future of No Man's Sky. The praise for overdelivering with every update is well deserved and their Minecraft-like "buy once, free updates forever" policy is a full-on jackpot.
What I want to do is put aside the "rags to riches" and "biggest comeback" stories to rest for a moment and focus on constructive criticism and discussion as to what is needed to make the game not just good or serviceable, but also great. These issues are largely overshadowed by the aforementioned praises and many times excused because Hello Games is an extremely small team.
I would say they are also a small team that proved they CAN. The number of features included and their admirable patching schedule point to a capable and passionate group of people. Because of this, we should be 100% comfortable in being stricter after these 3 years in order to push for the biggest possible quality in a title we own and/or love. Thus, I wanted to make a topic to present both the technical and design issues we expect to realistically be resolved (without the procedural cities, giant worms nonsense). I will start with the following:
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Day 1 PS4 player, over 600+ hours recorded in various game modes.
What I want to do is put aside the "rags to riches" and "biggest comeback" stories to rest for a moment and focus on constructive criticism and discussion as to what is needed to make the game not just good or serviceable, but also great. These issues are largely overshadowed by the aforementioned praises and many times excused because Hello Games is an extremely small team.
I would say they are also a small team that proved they CAN. The number of features included and their admirable patching schedule point to a capable and passionate group of people. Because of this, we should be 100% comfortable in being stricter after these 3 years in order to push for the biggest possible quality in a title we own and/or love. Thus, I wanted to make a topic to present both the technical and design issues we expect to realistically be resolved (without the procedural cities, giant worms nonsense). I will start with the following:
1. MORE VISUAL VARIETY AND BETTER EXPLORATION: The biggest problem for me personally is the lack of a bigger variety of assets to procedurally generate and the same-ness of a lot of biomes (hot and winter ones in particular). Exploration is supposed to be one of the biggest draws to the game. I don't like the feeling of scanning for a planet, seeing it's "cold" and knowing pretty exactly what it will look like, what trees it will have, etc.
Atlas Rises introduced some cool new freaky planet types which was completely different to what we have seen before (including the awesome color-grading "glitch"). but aside from Abyss, no others went that same distance (even though Abyss and Visions did do good).
We need MORE color variety. MORE assets to put around. MORE freaky, sci-fi stuff to uncover. MORE substantially different biome types. A LOT MORE fauna/horror types. MORE than one look of a building (for example, different looking trading posts). MORE surprises in every corner and on every planet. A game this big shouldn't have the "I've been here before" feeling as much as it does. Even something simple as repurposing existing assets can go a long way. Like, taking the hot planet cactus, allowing to change color to blue and have it uncommonly spawn on a cold planet would do a lot of good for that "huh! that's interesting" feeling. Or imagine if you met and fought horrors on an abandoned space station as a rare find.
In other words, WE NEED A BIG-ASS EXPLORATION BASED VISUAL UPDATE.
2. TECHNICAL STUFF (non-VR): Pop-in, load lag, orbital clouds being visible through the freighter/Nexus, uploaded discoveries not registering or being overwritten, Freighters sometimes changing colors in different systems, etc. Long term issues such as these need to be decisively addressed.
3. MENUS, MONEY, INVENTORY AND HUD: Giving us more inventory space and inventory QoL features is great, but the inventory system itself needs a massive overhaul to not be a pain.We STILL cannot enter the exact buy/sell amount in terminals. The amount of units, nanites or items received for doing quests many times isn't worth the effort given their length/complexity (Nexus ones in particular).
A MAPPING SYSTEM is also non-existent. You can rename and upload landmarks, but cannot hotlist them in the discovery menu for easy travel.
Old valuables such as Vortex Cubes, Sac Venoms and the like are listed as top tier rarities, but are worthless compared to things like bones or indium. Even scanning with a few upgrades is a bigger money hoard (and the upgrades aren't hard to get).
4. THE STORY: It is decent and well written, but the implementation within the game itself needs work. A lot of people don't even know it's there. Some even said "the game is just sandbox, no story" because the main quest isn't as focused as it could be, which is a shame because there are some awe-inspiring moments (like portalling for the first time).
The game also had a very good ARG called Waking Titan which explained a lot of the game's lore and setting, but the same plot is only marginally important in the game itself. I want to see the Emily, loop-16, Atlas Corporation, WARE etc. stuff matter more in-universe. I want it to "wow" me a bit more with these twists instead of just focusing on the feeling of existential pessimism.
After watching BurkeBlack play through the Artemis/Main Quest scenario with his voice gadgets, I am also convinced that voice acting for Traveller/Atlas interactions would do the story a great service, along with a bit of a tweak in the story progression itself.
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Day 1 PS4 player, over 600+ hours recorded in various game modes.
