No Man’s Sky

[mwynn]

No Man's Sky: Echoes - Official Update Trailer - YouTube

[Zivouhr]

Still no main story mode?
I still have No Man's Sky installed on my PS5, and it's great to see Hello Games took the millions the game earned to offer free DLC for almost 8+ years now as their full time job. But it's still missing a main story line when you reach the menu screen. I want to be able to click on "Campaign Story" or something similar, "Story", and get a full-fledged story for the game to give it more life. I would like a Star Wars kind of story or something, with Stormtroopers to battle against, tie fighters, etc. Something! In the main game, you randomly face off against sentinel robots once in awhile and try to reach the center of the galaxy while learning some odd clues (last time I checked, having the game since 2016's launch on PS4).

What happens now, is I land on a very, very generic looking planet and then have no ambition to mine for materials, which is really the main theme of this game to build and keep your ship running IMO. And where you land looks pretty much like the entire rest of the planet. No ecosystem variation per planet really like desert, forest, icelands, tropical all on the same planet, like Earth. Mostly just similar land and water with one theme per planet.

Creative Mode still broken:
Creative mode still has the never-acknowledged glitch/issue to where your warp drive is disabled, along with your jet pack capacity without any clear acknowledgement by the game itself or the developer for many years now. I don't understand why they weakened the player for creative mode, never able to get your jetpack to achieve the extended flying that is possible in normal mode (last time I checked anyway). MY ship's warp drive can only jump short distances, despite having the full range icons in my ship set up.

Now Starfield from Fallout 3's creator's is hitting PC and XB September 6, 2023 finally, and hopefully will have much more interesting planets to visit and explore. But time will tell.

EIther way, No Man's Sky definitely carved a new path with its endless galaxy that no one person could ever visit all of in one life time, despite most of it being very generic and generated by the computer.

[NARMAK]

From where they started with an overhyped and underbaked release, i think it's been a night and day transformation in what you'd expect them to have done. So i applaud them for that.

In terms of a single player game, story etc. I do believe way back when it was announced that it wouldn't really have a story per se. It was about the journey and trying to reach this "centre" which was infinite.

Eventually they realised people wanted a bit more variety in their gameplay and so on, and they added it in an MP support, but alas, still no "Main Story" as it was and in a way i'm fine with that. You sort of get to create your own story this way with the much more expanded variety of what you can do.

Also, not to forget i believe the PS5 upgrade was free for PS4 disc/digital purchases and the only new income is through the sales of new games with them to my knowledge not making any paid DLC which given the game they created could have become a microtransaction hell.

[Darkex]

It's awesome that they still provide new free updates for this game. I only played it when it was released. Never had time to play it after that.

[Vincanws]

It’s a pretty major res and detail update for PSVR2 making it now one of its best games apparently.

The latest additions looks kind of insane as well with added space trench runs like in Star Wars and huge destructible space Freighters and battles. I’m not sleeping on this one will be jumping into the game for the first time soon in vr.

[emailking]

I'm going to have to download this and play it on a separate profile or something. Really don't want the PS5 trophy list to show up but I wanna try with the VR2!

[Zivouhr]

I played this last night, before finally getting Starfield installed on PC.
No Man's Sky is the clear winner for interplanetary random exploration.
Starfield is cool, and I prefer the gun battles and story, but it pales in comparison to the freedom of flight you have in No Man's Sky to my surprise.

In Starfield, you use a chart to get around to other planets at first, though I'm sure warp drives will play a role soon. But you see the planet, then select a landing point, then a cutscene takes you there. Not quite as seamless as NMS.
The maps are big, and like NMS and Mass Effect 1, lots of barren landscapes with not much to see or do.

[Steelmaker]

Originally Posted by Zivouhr

I played this last night, before finally getting Starfield installed on PC.
No Man's Sky is the clear winner for interplanetary random exploration.
Starfield is cool, and I prefer the gun battles and story, but it pales in comparison to the freedom of flight you have in No Man's Sky to my surprise.

In Starfield, you use a chart to get around to other planets at first, though I'm sure warp drives will play a role soon. But you see the planet, then select a landing point, then a cutscene takes you there. Not quite as seamless as NMS.
The maps are big, and like NMS and Mass Effect 1, lots of barren landscapes with not much to see or do.

NMS is on another level in VR. I've been playing it the last few nights and...holy shit! Immersion just about doesn't get any better than this!

[dyne]

Originally Posted by Steelmaker

NMS is on another level in VR. I've been playing it the last few nights and...holy shit! Immersion just about doesn't get any better than this!

What happened in the last two months since saying this?

Originally Posted by Steelmaker

I have TRIED and TRIED to get into NMS over the years but ultimately I get bored every time, no matter how many updates they make to it. I finally just had to admit defeat and say these kinds of games are not for me.

[Zivouhr]

Okay, having played 20+ hours of Starfield PC on release weekend/Labor day weekend, I can say 100% that No Man's Sky's handling of warping to solar systems and then finding and landing on the planets is much more immersive than with Starfield's clunkier set up of selecting the system in the menu, then warping, then seeing a planet with your ship, then having to go BACK into the menu again to select your landing spot or planet, then it finally shows a cutscene landing on the planet. No Man's Sky, once you're in the Solar System, you look for the planet you want with your ship, boost to it, and then land in real time. Really nice for immersion.

No clunky menu other than for going to other solar systems.

Starfield is great, but like No Man's Sky, it's often a miss for most of the planets you land on. Out of 50, maybe you'll find 2 that are really great and truly unique IMO, in both games.

Starfield is more realistic looking for the planet surfaces, and I found thick forests too, as well as planets with different eco systems, desert, forest, ice.
But No Man's Sky lets you not only walk, but also ride vehicles, animals, and fly your ship over each planet.
Starfield requires you to get in your ship, then access the map to land in a different spot, though the areas are giant to explore.
Starfield has a good story, and tons of great action gameplay.

Originally Posted by Steelmaker

NMS is on another level in VR. I've been playing it the last few nights and...holy shit! Immersion just about doesn't get any better than this!

Cool. Good to hear.
I bet it looks way better on PSVR2 than PSVR1 also. I only have it for VR in PSVR1, but it looks and plays better than I was expecting. They did a nice job with it.

[NARMAK]

With how modern games have access to NVMe drives, it's even more impressive that seamless transition from space to landing was accomplished with regular HDDs.

[Steelmaker]

Originally Posted by dyne

what happened in the last two months since saying this?

psvr2. Lol!

[Zivouhr]

I'll just say that Starfield copied quite a few of the ideas from No Man's Sky, which surprised me. At this point in Starfield, if I'm not following the story, the game's exploration gets boring pretty fast as with No Man's Sky for the vacant, bland planets of which there are 75% compared to more interesting ones.
Starfield does have really good Fallout style gun combat which helps a lot though.

[mwynn]

Originally Posted by Zivouhr

I'll just say that Starfield copied quite a few of the ideas from No Man's Sky, which surprised me. At this point in Starfield, if I'm not following the story, the game's exploration gets boring pretty fast as with No Man's Sky for the vacant, bland planets of which there are 75% compared to more interesting ones.
Starfield does have really good Fallout style gun combat which helps a lot though.

The only thing that bothers me on No Mans Sky is the constant resource mining. I am close to having an armada, I wish someone else could gather resources. It is always the simple stuff like fuel for jumps.

[NARMAK]

Originally Posted by mwynn

The only thing that bothers me on No Mans Sky is the constant resource mining. I am close to having an armada, I wish someone else could gather resources. It is always the simple stuff like fuel for jumps.

I haven't played in a while, but i honestly would have thought that NMS would have implemented a more robust NPC based economy system to participate in now with all these updates. Like you said, you have an armada but need to physically land on a planet and mine for fuel instead of being able to build up an automated method that runs itself to supply you, whoever else is needing it (i haven't played in a long time tbh) and selling excess on to make credits or whatever.

I think there's Star Citizen Online which has a much more robust player influenced economy. Maybe taking some elements from there would help.

I read a piece on Starfield basically using a different fast travel method because they have a 1000 unique systems or whatnot, but i still don't truly believe all 1k are going to be that unique.

[mwynn]

Anyone try Spacebourne 2 yet?

SpaceBourne 2 Announcement Trailer - YouTube

[Zivouhr]

Originally Posted by mwynn

The only thing that bothers me on No Mans Sky is the constant resource mining. I am close to having an armada, I wish someone else could gather resources. It is always the simple stuff like fuel for jumps.

I agree. That reminds me of Minecraft, and No Man's Sky wanting to fill that genre of mining games, being the primary goal of No Man's Sky probably, as reaching the center of the galaxy requires lots of resources.

In creative mode, mining can be completely skipped, but the ship and jet pack have been completely nerfed, so they don't operate as they should even after upgrading, and are severely underpowered. Hello Games never acknowledged this clearly in the game, and it lets you have power parts in the sections, but they don't actually work to full power, which is frustrating.

[heyadol]

Originally Posted by Zivouhr

I agree. That reminds me of Minecraft, and No Man's Sky wanting to fill that genre of mining games, being the primary goal of No Man's Sky probably, as reaching the center of the galaxy requires lots of resources.

In creative mode, mining can be completely skipped, but the ship and jet pack have been completely nerfed, so they don't operate as they should even after upgrading, and are severely underpowered. Hello Games never acknowledged this clearly in the game, and it lets you have power parts in the sections, but they don't actually work to full power, which is frustrating.

You two just made me realize why I can’t get into this game, it’s like Minecraft. I don’t know how I missed that connection. I follow this game because it looks amazing, and this thread is tempting me to try it in PSVR, but I’ve never been able to get into it.

[Zivouhr]

Originally Posted by heyadol

You two just made me realize why I can’t get into this game, it’s like Minecraft. I don’t know how I missed that connection. I follow this game because it looks amazing, and this thread is tempting me to try it in PSVR, but I’ve never been able to get into it.

Thanks. Yeah, I think those who enjoy digging games will really enjoy No Man's Sky. It's kind of like a cycle, where they cash in on their work, and then repeat the process over and over as part of the process.
I can understand it, though I rather be fighting bad guys, then scavenging their gear, weapons and items like in Starfield. But even that's not as fun as earning their gear and then using it to repair my own stuff like in the classic Fallout 3.

This was a nice addition to PSVR and PSVR2 probably looks much better.

[mwynn]

No Man's Sky: Omega Update Trailer - YouTube