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Angry Joe No Man's Sky review
- Thread starter Saucycarpdog
- Start date
I think the game would've been so much better without the pseudo lore and center "objective". It looks great and the procedural generation is cool but I can't help but feel totally confused and put off by the lore/"story" aspect. It's not intriguingly confusing like Dark Souls, it's just plain weird imo. Would've allowed more resources to be attributed to the actual game mechanics too.
Also I totally agree that the earlier footage looked much better than anything I've seen of the game so far. From planets and creatures to space interactions etc.
A real shame the game is just a husk of what was promised.
Also I totally agree that the earlier footage looked much better than anything I've seen of the game so far. From planets and creatures to space interactions etc.
A real shame the game is just a husk of what was promised.
thecosmicfly
Banned
Having spent most of my gaming time yesterday with NMS, warping star to star and using dozens of black holes, dealing with numerous crashes and making what felt like no real progress, I just had to check if there was something, anything worth seeing at the centre of the galaxy. A unique planet. A sinister space station. A full on cutscene. Anything, ANYTHING new. Finally seeing what happens in Joe's review has just broken any lasting hope I have for the game.
I'm tapping out now. I'm buying another game new and carefully slipping the wrapping around NMS and sending it back for a full refund, because I'll be damned if I ain't getting my full money back god I'm livid.
I'm tapping out now. I'm buying another game new and carefully slipping the wrapping around NMS and sending it back for a full refund, because I'll be damned if I ain't getting my full money back god I'm livid.
Air Zombie Meat
Member
Whats frustrating is that they have the foundations of something good but they made so little out of it. They made all these pie in the sky claims and then made a game about exploring in space where every single ship is functionally identical. I mean, at least get that fundamental right. Cutting content because it ended up proving too much for them is one thing but not even delivering stuff that should have been a given is another.
adversarial
Member
No game publication has tried to interview Mr. Murray yet or have they and he's just declining?
I'm glad I found this out from a PS4 player a day before PC release. I was so disappointed and yet at the same time it was exactly what I've been saying to friends for ages, that my gut feeling was it was never going to deliver. Glad I saved myself the money.
Leafhopper
Banned
Not sure why people keep bringing up the flood incident when even after that and they recovered, they still showed showed stuff that was still not in the final game.
No, I don't hope that for Hello Games
Bloodporne
Member
Hahaha...what!? That's the fucking ultra-hyped, ultra-secretive 'center of the galaxy'!?
Someone should've pried Sean Murray from his own booty hole somewhere along the line and reminded him he can't just say whatever grand thoughts pop in his head without actually delivering them later down the line.
I'm sure he had good intentions but talk about massively failing at your cool-on-paper vision. A shame.
a post-mortem would be nice but apprently they're super busy trying to deal with the issues of the game right now. probably working on some major patches.
Yeesh.
Yeesh all you like, it's fact.
I am interested in the reception from people outside of the microcosm that is GAF and the games media.
I seriously doubt that. All he has to do is lay low for a while till it chills out and people will move on.
Leafhopper
Banned
?
Yeesh is an agreement. Like "wow that's bad".
Man.
Even people I've spoken to who aren't "hardcore" gamers agree that there just isn't enough in the game. They like it but go "you really run out of stuff to do". Spoken to about 7-8 disparate people who have echoed this, none of them GAFfers or serious enthusiasts.
Sorry for taking your post in a negative light, but to be fair, it could have been either.
adversarial
Member
Devilgunman
Member
Possibly the worst $60 I've ever spent. I'm 15 hrs in and couldn't see myself go on any more. The game becomes so fcking boring. Every damn planet is the same thing over and over.
Bloodporne
Member
cleveridea
Member
Another great review
Totally agree with his comments, and thats as someone who loves the concept and the alien world landscapes. but it just doesnt feel like a finished game at $60. I think sean is lucky there weren't reviews below 5/10 since IMO the core gameplay mechanics are quite terrible.
As an alien planet generator I think its amazing, and for that alone I dont regret buying it. But the actual gameplay here is incredibly limited.
Totally agree with his comments, and thats as someone who loves the concept and the alien world landscapes. but it just doesnt feel like a finished game at $60. I think sean is lucky there weren't reviews below 5/10 since IMO the core gameplay mechanics are quite terrible.
As an alien planet generator I think its amazing, and for that alone I dont regret buying it. But the actual gameplay here is incredibly limited.
Chezzymann
Member
I think for some people its a big problem. I personally wanted to see the planets rotate around the sun and fly around the solar system, maybe going to the outskirts of it and seeing massive asteroid belts. The feeling of knowing that it's day not because of a timer but because the planet is actually pointing at the sun would be awesome. Hell it would be cool to have the planets closer to the sun be hotter. But instead all you can do space sim wise is go between planets/moons and see clusters of asteroids. I don't have the game but the hours of streams I've watched made it not feel like space at all.
Basically I wanted more out of the actual solar system experience than just a glorified hub world
habithipster
Member
In Elite Dangerous, I loooved zipping past the sun while going from planet to planet within a solar system. It really gave me that feeling of travelling space. In NMS there is no solar system at all, just a number of planets clumped together inside a foggy skybox. It didn't work for me.
Or they could make your ship go faster?
Why are, in gameplay terms, planet-sized planets more important?
It's the nature of games trying new concepts. There's so many new problems to solve ('What if a planet generates a cave too deep to get out off?', 'How do we get AI to navigate this procedurally generated, complex terrain?' etc) that it is inevitable it would be much closer to being a tech demo than to realizing the full potential of the concept. So much of the time and effort that would be put into making the game fun would have been put instead into making the concept work.
I don't think they cut any content, as much of the content they spoke of probably never existed. I'd wager that they had to narrow their scope to match what they thought they could accomplish as development progressed, which is common in games. Hello Games' mistake (or perhaps not; the game did sell well) was to increase the promises as time went on, instead of reigning them in.
Like it used Spore, at some point a game will use No Man's Sky as part of a more solid game. That might even happen in patches for this game.
paragonpro
Banned
Serious spoiler for the center:
What the actual fuck there's nothing? I cant belive I was defending this game, or giving sean murray the benefit of the doubt even after i had seen that the game wasnt living up to expectations. Im sure hello games is very talented, and they are a small team but that doesnt excuse hyping up shit and showing shit that doesnt exist in the game so close up to launch, thats no better than randy pitchford lying out of his teeth about colonial marines! Did they design anything for the center? Is it coming later as DLC? God fucking damnit, I dont know if I want to keep playing, im so mad right now. Do the planets get any cooler after you've hit the center like you were brought to a different galaxy? Is that where the planets that were in the pre release trailers were?
Τhe extremely spiteful comments astound me...
Wth is wrong with some of you guys? Yes the game is disappointing, yes false promises were made.Game deserves the bad ratings and it should be noted that it completely under-delivered.
But wishing these guys pretty much end their careers or their games bomb, or their next creation fail is way too much...
Wth is wrong with some of you guys? Yes the game is disappointing, yes false promises were made.Game deserves the bad ratings and it should be noted that it completely under-delivered.
But wishing these guys pretty much end their careers or their games bomb, or their next creation fail is way too much...
This part sucks since I got the physical copy just with the intent of playing it to the center and then likely trading it in later... I'll be lucky if I get $5 credit for it.
AdventureMike
Member
This is a feeling that I have echoed ever since seeing the PC Gaming Show at E3 this year. If you were to rewatch that conference, take note of how many games are sounding very grandiose similar to how NMS did. There are a lot of developers attempting high-concept things soon that I'm feeling tepid about how they are going to end up panning out.
spindoctor
Member
Games publications are not in the business of asking devs/publishers any hard questions. At best you'll get a retrospective/post-mortem in a few months where Sean Murray will say that he's sorry that people misunderstood him instead of saying he's sorry that he consistently misled everyone until the very end. Perhaps he'll complain about how game development is hard. Don't expect anything else.
SuperBanana
Banned
Yeah, you're right. I hope they earn millions from their lies and encourage more developers to bullshit for people fork out full price for an early access indie game.
The biggest problem for this game to me is that for all the talk of procedural this and that, there is no real design that makes a game out of it. No emergent systems that make things interesting when the game combines different procedural elements. No cool combinations of anything really besides occasional blue grass and weird AI monstrosities. It's actually just pretty poor design IMO, and seeing how they didn't nail the ending or moment to moment crafting or the promises that they made, it unfortunately deserves the hate
Jacksinthe
Banned
Our own Kotaku press sneak fuck reached out IIRC and Sean declined.
I imagine silence moving forward.
TheDinoman
Member
At least when you make it to the center of the universe in SPORE, they give you a little doohickey that lets you instantly terraform planets. So it's something I suppose.
NMS gives you nothing lol
Yeah, procedural games can only really succeed when the random chance of things being placed next to each other leads to interesting, emergent gameplay.
In Spelunky, that might be a golden statue (with trap) next to a shop. You take the statue, you trigger the ire of the shopkeeper. Everyone who has played that game has probably experienced that one but as you play on there are hundreds of way Spelunky objects can interplay to create interesting obstacles and choices.
In don't starve, maybe a walrus pond gets place near a pig village. Maybe to get to a forest with plenty of lumber you have to pass by 3 spider's nests place right next to each other. The proximity of different 'objects' always leads to interesting conundrums and gameplay. In No Man's Sky, this simply doesn't happen. The procedural generation dictates nothing but the scenery you'll see and which rare mineral appears on a planet. Nothing more.
perfect !
I bet he did.
family_guy
Member
Technically it kind of did work out for them. They made bank and got exposure they never had before. So good for them, maybe not for the consumer.
Expected, but still disappointing.
I imagine he'll lay low for the next year or two.
https://twitter.com/NoMansSky/status/763270259080097792?lang=en-gb
why is this tweet on Sean Muray's twitter account when its false?
why is this tweet on Sean Muray's twitter account when its false?
EdibleKnife
Member
Not just shields but engines as well, I believe.
Necromanti
Member
The way it is worded is incredibly opportunistic, deceptive, and diversionary. You can see how many people take it literally and he never elaborates on or corrects his statement.
Portugeezer
Member
The found eachother... they just couldn't see eachother. Lol.