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A polite discourse amongst friends on the importance of MP-elements in No Man's Sky

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Ferrio

Banned
It would make the whole universe feel more real and physical. And the sun is an essential part of every solar system, of course would I want to take a closer look.

Agreed, the sun bit is disappointing but being upset that you can't fly between solar systems manually is mental.
 
I'm sure it's already been said by others (sorry but I can't go through 134 pages of comments) but this just seems like a situation where they planned on including some type of multiplayer-ish mechanic but just weren't able to implement it in time for release. That would explain covering the online-play icon with a sticker on the box (they cut it late and couldn't reprint) and also Hello Games' recent "Hey guys, this is a single player game" messaging.

We see this all the time. Games evolve during the dev cycle, devs encounter roadblocks, shit happens. They probably figured that because of the extremely low odds of players encountering one another that it made more sense to focus their development resources elsewhere rather than try to power through the problem just to implement a feature the majority of players would never use. Maybe the extra MP functionality is going to be implemented in a future patch? Either way it's easy to see why HG may have hit a roadblock too big for their small team to overcome and decided to put the resources towards making a better overall game experience.
 

alexbull_uk

Member
Distance from sun to earth: 149.6 million km. Distance from earth to venus: 261 million km. If you can reasonably expect to go from one planet to another, you should reasonably be able to go to the main star of a solar system in this game. Going to a star in some solar systems is easier/quicker than to a far planet.

In NMS, do you actually fly between planets? If so then yeah, it's totally fucked that you can't fly to the nearest star.
 

Uthred

Member
I'm glad we've found something else super important to be outraged about, I feared the thread was ebbing. I too wanted to dedicate the rest of my life to flying between systems manually and am scandalised that I cannot.

Oh, I wonder where that AI stuff went:

Well, I mean users in the OT and the review thread said theyve seen that behaviour, but theyre probably liars.
 

Irminsul

Member
Remember it's not a simulation and never was pegged as one.
Sure, but it was pegged as a game with real physics:

“With us,” Murray continued, “when you're on a planet, you can see as far as the curvature of that planet. If you walked for years, you could walk all the way around it, arriving back exactly where you started. Our day to night cycle is happening because the planet is rotating on its axis as it spins around the sun. There is real physics to that.

Oh, I wonder where that AI stuff went:

The creatures are generated through the procedural distortion of archetypes, and each given their own unique behavioral profiles. “There is a list of objects that animals are aware of,” Artificial Intelligence programmer Charlie Tangora explained. “Certain animals have an affinity for some objects over others which is part of giving them personality and individual style. They have friends and best friends too. It's just a label on a bit of code—but another creature of the same type nearby is potentially their friend. They ask their friends telepathically where they’re going so they can coordinate.”

While the basic behaviors themselves are simple, the interactions can be impressively complex. Artistic director Grant Duncan recalled roaming an alien planet once shooting at birds out of boredom. “I hit one and it fell into the ocean,” he recalled. “It was floating there on the waves when suddenly, a shark came up and ate it. The first time it happened, it totally blew me away.”

Man, that article is great:

For instance, Duncan insisted on permitting moons to orbit closer to their planets than Newtonian physics would allow. When he desired the possibility of green skies, the team had to redesign the periodic table to create atmospheric particles that would diffract light at just the right wavelength.

And it definitely never was pegged as a simulation:

“Because it’s a simulation,” Murray stated. “there’s so much you can do. You can break the speed of light—no problem. Speed is just a number. Gravity and its effects are just numbers. It’s our universe, so we get to be Gods in a sense.”

Source: http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2016/02/artificial-universe-no-mans-sky/463308/
 
Sure, but it was pegged as a game with real physics:



Oh, I wonder where that AI stuff went:



Man, that article is great:



And it definitely never was pegged as a simulation:



Source: http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2016/02/artificial-universe-no-mans-sky/463308/

3o7TKp0MA1j33JrU1a.gif
 

Gestault

Member
Right on man, the ability to spend the rest of your literal human life watching a black screen while you fly to another star system in real time is clearly important to you.

Is anyone here listening to themselves? The game isn't a simulation. Sure, maybe they promised this stuff a year or two ago, but they clearly realised - rightly - that featuring this stuff was a waste of energy and probably a waste of computing resources.

Having a game capable of those things helps "sell" the immersive illusion of the whole thing. And the pitch that got a lot of people excited for the game specified that it was different from how other games were put together. An important point of game design is to hide the gaps in how things are put together. If you can't relate to that, it's fine, but don't act like it's unreasonable to be disappointed.

You sound outwardly upset that others feel that way.
 
If you go out into space and shut off your engines so that you have no movement relative to the sun, what happens after an hour?

Do planets turn? Do they move in their own orbit?
 

Kinyou

Member
I'm really not out for blood. Sean still seems like a nice guy, but I'd really like to hear him come clean and explain what has changed since these interviews and why it didn't make it into the game.
 
Ouch...

“The physics of every other game—it’s faked,” the chief architect Sean Murray explained. “When you’re on a planet, you’re surrounded by a skybox—a cube that someone has painted stars or clouds onto. If there is a day to night cycle, it happens because they are slowly transitioning between a series of different boxes.” The skybox is also a barrier beyond which the player can never pass. The stars are merely points of light. In No Man’s Sky however, every star is a place that you can go. The universe is infinite. The edges extend out into a lifeless abyss that you can plunge into forever.

That article is half a year old. By then they should have known they weren't delivering this right. Because I can't believe that last minute they decided: throw away the infinite universe, make it exactly like I said it wouldn't be.
 

SomTervo

Member
You have an excuse for everything, don't you?

This game was promoted as an open universe with quintillions of planets when in facts it's several planets at one time and that's no issue? They don't even orbit around their star, ffs.

It's not about excuses. Sean definitely needs to own up to what he's been facetious about.

What it's about is the experience. I have No Man's Sky booted on my PS4 right now. I can pan the camera and look at the stars. I can press a button to go to the galactic map, go select one of those stars, and warp to it. The star's system is simulated as much as it needs to be to be fun. And beyond a minute or so's warp time, we don't need to simulate the journey or space between stars, because that isn't fun.

And orbiting around the star would be cool - I reckon it's very likely they'll patch that in, they're committed to adding gameworld and game system improvements like in Minecraft - but again, it's not 100% necessary for the experience of flying between planets and seeing worlds. You can still have all your fun in the game without this happening.

Well, No Man's Sky's main draw is the vastness of space, exploring celestial bodies. It would be nice to be able to fly at least near a star, watching the glowing hot surface and large fiery eruptions being blasted into orbit. In Elite: Dangerous you could do that, even if you don't stay long enough to destroy your ship like in this video. In NMS there's only a texture. Kind of a disappointing.

I understand that, but here's the thing:

I've played loads of Elite. Tens of hours. It's a really good game, I really like it. It captures the magnificence of space and systems brilliantly.

But No Man's Sky does it just as well. Well, except for space stations, which I think are lack lustre. But in terms of planets, the 'vastness', the size and scope of celestial bodies? Captures it all just as well as Elite.

Do you know if you can move at light speed like in Elite? In elite the limitation of using hyperdrive to move through systems was actually disappointing because many systems were reachable within ~5 minutes when you begin moving at light speed.

Hmm well in NMS you use a Faster Than Light drive to travel between systems, and it takes 1-4 minutes depending on how many systems you 'hop' at once. I think it's a realistic span of time.
 
Right on man, the ability to spend the rest of your literal human life watching a black screen while you fly to another star system in real time is clearly important to you.

Is anyone here listening to themselves? The game isn't a simulation. Sure, maybe they promised this stuff a year or two ago, but they clearly realised - rightly - that featuring this stuff was a waste of energy and probably a waste of computing resources.

This really isn't a hard concept to grasp.

NMS has been built up to be a groundbreaking game in terms of organic, emergent gameplay. The very opposite of organic gampeplay is faked elements, such as the fact that each system is in its own discrete skybox and suns are all part of said skyboxes.

If you sell a game based on the organic vastness of space, obviously people will feel disappointed when they walk two steps to the right and start seeing the puppet strings attached to everything.
 

SomTervo

Member
Not facetious. Stars (which are suns) are not in the game, they are images and light sources on a skybox around each solar system of some planets and moons. Which means all planets in a solar system are on one side of their shared sun, do not orbit, and do not change their relative positions.

I never said star in my post mate. I said star system.
 

alexbull_uk

Member
You absolutely do fly from planet to planet within a solar system, in NMS.

Yeah that's pretty disappointing that you can't get to your solar system's sun then.

I get not going between solar systems, as the distance involved would be huge, but it's such a missed opportunity to not be able to go check out the sun.
 
That article is half a year old. By then they should have known they weren't delivering this right. Because I can't believe that last minute they decided: throw away the infinite universe, make it exactly like I said it wouldn't be.

Absolutely. And if they changed their vision for the game they could / wanted to deliver, that's totally fine and it's their prerogative. But when you're selling a product for a not-insignificant amount of money, you should be clear that your vision has changed and you're no longer offering what you promised earlier.
 

Sounder2

Member
If people ever complain about why we get 12 Assassins Creeds, 7 Halos, 4 Uncharteds, 8 Forzas, 15 CoD, 4 God of Wars, 15+ Final Fantasies just point them to this thread. Because when someone actually comes up with something relatively different the internet just shits on it completely. They nitpick every single thing instead of enjoying the game.

Note to self never create something for people to enjoy.
 

SomTervo

Member
This really isn't a hard concept to grasp.

NMS has been built up to be a groundbreaking game in terms of organic, emergent gameplay. The very opposite of organic gampeplay is faked elements, such as the fact that each system is in its own discrete skybox and suns are all part of said skyboxes.

If you sell a game based on the organic vastness of space, obviously people will feel disappointed when they walk two steps to the right and start seeing the puppet strings attached to everything.

But driving into nothingness for real-life decades isn't 'organic, emegent gameplay'? It's not even gameplay!

The game has loads of dynamic and emergent gameplay, but you would never find it flying at cruise speed between star systems.

I feel like one of us doesn't know what that word means.

Sorry, I meant disingenuous.
 

Gestault

Member
If people ever complain about why we get 12 Assassins Creeds, 7 Halos, 4 Uncharteds, 8 Forzas, 15 CoD, 4 God of Wars, 15+ Final Fantasies just point them to this thread. Because when someone actually comes up with something relatively different the internet just shits on it completely. They nitpick every single thing instead of enjoying the game.

Note to self never create something for people to enjoy.

Do you think people's criticisms are rooted in the game playing differently from other games? Or maybe something else?
 
It's not about excuses. Sean definitely needs to own up to what he's been facetious about.

What it's about is the experience. I have No Man's Sky booted on my PS4 right now. I can pan the camera and look at the stars. I can press a button to go to the galactic map, go select one of those stars, and warp to it. The star's system is simulated as much as it needs to be to be fun. And beyond a minute or so's warp time, we don't need to simulate the journey or space between stars, because that isn't fun.

And orbiting around the star would be cool - I reckon it's very likely they'll patch that in, they're committed to adding gameworld and game system improvements like in Minecraft - but again, it's not 100% necessary for the experience of flying between planets and seeing worlds. You can still have all your fun in the game without this happening.
Some people find other things interesting and fun. Some want that feeling of that universe being real and there. And that is OK.

And if they are going to patch all that major stuff in, they should lay out a roadmap for the next year or so, so people know what they'll get when buying the game. But honestly, then they should have said so before.

If people ever complain about why we get 12 Assassins Creeds, 7 Halos, 4 Uncharteds, 8 Forzas, 15 CoD, 4 God of Wars, 15+ Final Fantasies just point them to this thread. Because when someone actually comes up with something relatively different the internet just shits on it completely. They nitpick every single thing instead of enjoying the game.

Note to self never create something for people to enjoy.
Wondering what happened to features that were talked about for years is not nitpicking. And people can still enjoy the game while those things are discussed.
 

Arment

Member
If people ever complain about why we get 12 Assassins Creeds, 7 Halos, 4 Uncharteds, 8 Forzas, 15 CoD, 4 God of Wars, 15+ Final Fantasies just point them to this thread. Because when someone actually comes up with something relatively different the internet just shits on it completely. They nitpick every single thing instead of enjoying the game.

Note to self never create something for people to enjoy.

Looks like you already started.
 

SomTervo

Member
Having a game capable of those things helps "sell" the immersive illusion of the whole thing. And the pitch that got a lot of people excited for the game specified that it was different from how other games were put together. An important point of game design is to hide the gaps in how things are put together. If you can't relate to that, it's fine, but don't act like it's unreasonable to be disappointed.

You sound outwardly upset that others feel that way.

As I mentioned in the other post - I'm upset that many people are popping by, seeing this bad press, and writing the game off 100% because of that. When they might enjoy the game great and still get the expansive, majestic experience they're looking for.

I'm not upset about the fact that Hello have been misleading about various game systems - well, I find it irritating, because it's definitely some bullshit.
 
2. Why would you want to fly into the sun anyway?

I think the real question is... Why the hell wouldn't you want to fly into the sun? Because doing ridiculous shit in sandbox games is exciting.

I still think the game is very enjoyable, but it's a huge letdown from the expectations Sean Murray and Hello Games set the last few years leading all the way up to release. And I still can't believe they are ignoring their consumers. I do hope for a NMS sequel that gets these failings right, but unless they turn around their community relations I won't be giving them another dime anyway. I'm not big on being misled and then ignored after they have my money.
 

elyetis

Member
Well, No Man's Sky's main draw is the vastness of space, exploring celestial bodies. It would be nice to be able to fly at least near a star, watching the glowing hot surface and large fiery eruptions being blasted into orbit. In Elite: Dangerous you could do that, even if you don't stay long enough to destroy your ship like in this video. In NMS there's only a texture. Kind of a disappointing.
So you can't have result like that either ? Landing on the second closest planet orbiting Betelgeuse
 
If people ever complain about why we get 12 Assassins Creeds, 7 Halos, 4 Uncharteds, 8 Forzas, 15 CoD, 4 God of Wars, 15+ Final Fantasies just point them to this thread. Because when someone actually comes up with something relatively different the internet just shits on it completely. They nitpick every single thing instead of enjoying the game.

Note to self never create something for people to enjoy.

The exact reason people are sharing their disappointment is because Hello Games promised something unique and different but it's turning out to be more like those other games you mentioned than what we imagined.
 
If people ever complain about why we get 12 Assassins Creeds, 7 Halos, 4 Uncharteds, 8 Forzas, 15 CoD, 4 God of Wars, 15+ Final Fantasies just point them to this thread. Because when someone actually comes up with something relatively different the internet just shits on it completely. They nitpick every single thing instead of enjoying the game.

Note to self never create something for people to enjoy.

Note to yourself : Never lie about something you're creating.

Lots of "differents" games are well received by the way.
 

~Cross~

Member
First of all it's Solar systems, second that's not how space works. Asteroids and dead planets reside in solar systems, anything outside a solar system is dead space.

People should really play elite if they want a realistic sense of scale in their space games. Even going at thousand times the speed of light it'll take you days or weeks of travel to get from one system into another. AND THERE IS NOTHING IN BETWEEN
 
As I mentioned in the other post - I'm upset that many people are popping by, seeing this bad press, and writing the game off 100% because of that. When they might enjoy the game great and still get the expansive, majestic experience they're looking for.

I'm not upset about the fact that Hello have been misleading about various game systems - well, I find it irritating, because it's definitely some bullshit.
Then Hello Games should have been clear about what that experience would be.
 

Gestault

Member
As I mentioned in the other post - I'm upset that many people are popping by, seeing this bad press, and writing the game off 100% because of that. When they might enjoy the game great and still get the expansive, majestic experience they're looking for.

I'm not upset about the fact that Hello have been misleading about various game systems - well, I find it irritating, because it's definitely some bullshit.

People sometimes miss out on something good because they buy into a sense of negativity around it, and that is a bummer. I totally get you there.
 

D4Danger

Unconfirmed Member
If people ever complain about why we get 12 Assassins Creeds, 7 Halos, 4 Uncharteds, 8 Forzas, 15 CoD, 4 God of Wars, 15+ Final Fantasies just point them to this thread. Because when someone actually comes up with something relatively different the internet just shits on it completely. They nitpick every single thing instead of enjoying the game.

Note to self never create something for people to enjoy.

"nitpick"

like asking if features they went on national tv to promote are even in the game

At this point I hope it really is just server load and bugs because the countless quotes people are digging up are making this look really bad. It's definitely going to sour any future games from them and others promising similarly ambitious projects.
 

SomTervo

Member
Sure, but it was pegged as a game with real physics:

Planets do rotate. They don't orbit each other, but they do rotate. It's dislocated from day/night cycle, probably after they found out 50-hour nights weren't fun, and they had to tweak the rotation after playtesters didn't like it (they're on record saying that) but they do rotate.

Oh, I wonder where that AI stuff went:

Nothing I've seen in the game contradicts what he says here. I've seen animals grouping together, travelling in certain particular directions together, and even engaging in 'food chain' type behaviour.

Man, that article is great:

Nothing problematic there? Planets are closer than they would be IRL. That's how they are in the game.

And it definitely never was pegged as a simulation:

You got me on that. I never said they were saints! Just trying to filter out some of the bullshit on both sides
 
But driving into nothingness for real-life decades isn't 'organic, emegent gameplay'? It's not even gameplay!

The game has loads of dynamic and emergent gameplay, but you would never find it flying at cruise speed between star systems.

I disagree. Way back when I was first experiencing open-world games, the "vastness of space" was one of the things that was blowing my mind. I travel on foot from one side of the map to the other, not because it was "fun" in a video-game-y way, but because it was awe-inspiring to be able to see the game seamlessly simulate the space in real time. For as long as "vastness of space" was a big awe-striking thing for me back in those days, I would ensure to devote at least a gameplay session or two doing just that, manually walking across vast distances just to truly grasp the scale of what I was doing. Again, not fun in a gameplay sense, but certainly fun in a "holy shit the game is really this massive" kind of way.
 
If people ever complain about why we get 12 Assassins Creeds, 7 Halos, 4 Uncharteds, 8 Forzas, 15 CoD, 4 God of Wars, 15+ Final Fantasies just point them to this thread. Because when someone actually comes up with something relatively different the internet just shits on it completely. They nitpick every single thing instead of enjoying the game.

Note to self never create something for people to enjoy.

There are plenty of original games out there if you're willing to look outside AAA, with the bonus that they actually live up to their promises. "Being original or being truthful to advertising" is a false dichotomy. Worse, this game isn't even that original in its individual elements; its largest claim to fame is the scope and variation it promised. Without that, what's left?

Still, I find it kind of sad that Starbound's thread has less than a half of the pages of this one and less than a third of NMS's OT. But yeah, I get it, pixel art, yadda, yadda.
 

Sounder2

Member
Do you think people's criticisms are rooted in the game playing differently from other games? Or maybe something else?

I think its a lot of things. I think people are upset they can't see random people in the game. Which is fine he said you could play with others its was just unlikely. He shouldn't have left that window open.

I think people are wrapped up in the hivemind and are just complaining for the sake of complaining. I mean why would you want to travel between systems without warping. It would literally take you years so I'm not sure why this is feature to be wanted.

I get wanting to see the sun but in reality it's just going to kill you if you get to close. If this is really labeled as a simulation as some in this thread have tried to prove your ship would melt before you even got close enough to give it a good look.

People like what they know. HG PR leaves a lot to be desired but I can still fly planet to planet without loading. I can fly to another system with minimal loading. I have fucked up animals all over the place. Poisonous atmospheres. Poisonous plants. Animals who attack. Giant dinosaur looking things. Storms. Water planets. All of these things are in the game right now and all people want to do are focus about the smaller things that in the larger picture FOR MOST PEOPLE just don't effect the game all that much.
 

Irminsul

Member
That article is half a year old. By then they should have known they weren't delivering this right. Because I can't believe that last minute they decided: throw away the infinite universe, make it exactly like I said it wouldn't be.
Funny you should say that...

"With our game though, you give someone a controller, they land on a planet, they see an alien creature, and if it’s their first time playing, they will probably shoot it even though they have just gone through a journey to get there. What I really like though, is that nine times out of ten, people suddenly feel bad that they’ve done it. You don’t get points for killing. There are no gold coins. You chose to do that.”
I mean, I don't really have to further elaborate on the bolded, do I?
 

Purkake4

Banned
So, by normal indie standards this is a very ambitious and good looking indie survival game. Normally it would be a welcome surprise (a non-early access survival game? wow), the dev would get lots of feedback and adjust the game over a period of time, creating an innovative game that would stand out as one of the best indies of 2016.

Now what happened was that NMS was uplifted to AAA status, slapped with a $60 price tag and the dev was let loose with no communication strategy. This resulted in expectations quickly passing any sense of reality and led to disappointment being the only viable outcome.

I hope other devs can learn from this.
 
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