No Man's Sky

[Cthulhu 2020]

Don't want to leave this system....

The planet I'm currently on is massive, like enormous, and has rare deposites of Chrysolite crystals, the only planet aside from my starter planet that I've found them on. In addition the caves are FILLED with vortex cubes. The problem? None of the outposts have trading terminals to sell them at, otherwise there's massive networks of these caves everywhere.

When I do find a "crashed" trade terminal that lets me sell, I pillage every cave nearby for every vortex cube and make a few million.

Once I'm done doing all of that, I may raid the surface, as there's giant hills like the one in your picture of GOLD everywhere.

This planet is literally a gold mine.

Did I mention it is absolutely massive?

I will touch down in an area and find one of those orange beam towers that lets you locate your choice of signals nearby. I'll look for drop pods and abandoned buildings (for ship wreckage signals) and then once I'm done with that area I'll pulse drive into space, look down, and the area which I was just at, which was quite an extensive area of running around for about an hour, is like looking at something the size of Hawaii on earth.

[Immitis]

also i forgot to mention that my first planet is also in perpetual sunset/dawn and seems to have two giant moons/neighbor planets and tons of giant floating rocks and grey rocks with glowing blue runes on them that kind of look like they could be old ruins or something

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i think i really lucked out on my first planet considering how many people seem to start out on lifeless or dangerous planets. mines just this really pretty red peaceful dessert

[Ifeanychukwu]

I found an almost 100% dead and barren planet, except for these strange bulbous plants everywhere with holes in them that when approached will release a graviton orb which are worth 27k each. It's also really easy to see buildings, ruins and drop pods as it really is extremely barren but with some really valuable resources on the surface. I've been skipping to solar systems only to stop and look for anything interesting or valuable, this planet has been my best so far despite how bland it looks to a lot of the others I've been to. I've also been naming all of the planets some variation of Ifeanychukwu, so that's fun lol.

[Selastan]

Any word yet on getting Hyperdrive blueprints to players who sold the preorder ship?

[Aoewy]

Any word yet on getting Hyperdrive blueprints to players who sold the preorder ship?

If you do the tutorial quests it willl lead you to the blueprint. It sends you to a manufacturing building and the blueprint will be the reward of it

[Selastan]

If you do the tutorial quests it willl lead you to the blueprint. It sends you to a manufacturing building and the blueprint will be the reward of it

I kind of didn't, that's the problem people are having. If you preordered the game, you can get a ship with a hyperdrive. This skips the story to the point of directing you to the next system, while you have never learned the blueprint to make it. If you find/buy a new ship, it won't have the hyperdrive and you are left on that system with no way (I know of) to learn the blueprint.

[Aoewy]

I kind of didn't, that's the problem people are having. If you preordered the game, you can get a ship with a hyperdrive. This skips the story to the point of directing you to the next system, while you have never learned the blueprint to make it. If you find/buy a new ship, it won't have the hyperdrive and you are left on that system with no way (I know of) to learn the blueprint.

Ah, i did pre-order and got the quest, at start it asked you if you want to engage the "tutorial" or if you want to skip and just go on your own. I choose the first option so even with the pre-order ship i did the quest... hope they fix it tho, it kind of suck if you cant aquire it without the quest.

[Kaleredar]

Except there are parts that are novel and exciting. The point you keep missing is that it has nothing to do with procedural generation. What you keep saying is a problem can exist with or with out procedural generation.

I'm not saying that everything made by hand is immediately amazing. Of course a game CAN reuse assets too much.

It isn't a problem that is inherent to procedural generation. The proper constraints and formula can generate something beautiful and amazing.

Yeah, theoretically, it CAN. But I haven't seen it do so. Repetition is something I've seen in all procedural generation I've seen in video games, whether that be in Spore, NMS, Minecraft, Elder Scrolls, diablo 3, etc...

I'm not saying that NMS formula couldn't use some work. But it has done a fair job of generate beautiful and different vista's.

I haven't explored any of the higher class star systems (don't have an upgraded warp drive) but I wonder if those systems have different constraints to make them better looking. They already have more rare materials and are supposed to be dangerous.

Then I'd be suspicious that the higher class star systems will start to look similar to one another, even if they themselves are different from the lower class star systems that came before them.

[rhorle]

I'm not saying that everything made by hand is immediately amazing. Of course a game CAN reuse assets too much.

You have continued to imply that the problem in relation to NMS is because of the procedural generation not being able to generate something beautiful and amazing. That isn't the case because you've admitted that it can be a problem with or with out procedural generation. Which is what I've been trying to get you to see from the start that what you are blaming on procedural generation is in fact not because of procedural generation.

Why wouldn't you be suspicious that something will begin to look the same when you do it so many times? That is true of every single game out there when you play it repetitively. Visual assets are not infinite so eventually anything will become repetitive. Again why is this somehow a bad thing for NMS when every game has this downside?

[Cthulhu 2020]

So I just had a creature ask me to make a choice whether I wanted a new multi tool, a multi tool blueprint, or a ship blueprint. The various options required a "rare" isotope - plutonium, a "rare" oxide - titanium, or a rare silicate chrysonite.

One of those things is excruciatingly common, the plutonium. It's anywhere and everywhere on every single planet. You can run 5 minutes in any direction and find some somewhere. And that 5 minutes is generous. Most of the time it's 10 seconds. But sometimes areas are pretty barren of plutonium.

Titanium is and is not rare. I've only seen it in crystal formations on a single planet, but then again if you find shooting drones down fun, it's everywhere and in great abundance, as drones will give you 40-50 titainium every time.

Meanwhile Chrysonite I've found on two planets, like the Titanium, but Chrysonite does not come from another extremely common source.

Also, I'm kicking myself for not staying on the toxic planet that had iridium deposits longer, as I now need a ton of iridium to craft something I want - but the planet was a huge drain on life support, outposts were sparse and hard to find, and there wasn't much in the way or rewarding stuff there, so I left it promptly. Just without stocking up on iridium. However at the time I was still having to be extremely frugal about inventory. Now I have 48 slots and the next time I see a planet with iridium or some other rare mineral I'm stocking up.

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You have continued to imply that the problem in relation to NMS is because of the procedural generation not being able to generate something beautiful and amazing. That isn't the case because you've admitted that it can be a problem with or with out procedural generation. Which is what I've been trying to get you to see from the start that what you are blaming on procedural generation is in fact not because of procedural generation.

Why wouldn't you be suspicious that something will begin to look the same when you do it so many times? That is true of every single game out there when you play it repetitively. Visual assets are not infinite so eventually anything will become repetitive. Again why is this somehow a bad thing for NMS when every game has this downside?

The one thing I will say is that they could have given planets more diversity within their generation algorithm. At least biomes such as tropics, deserts, tundra, etc. on a single planet. Even ice caps would have been nice. Also being a geologist, this distribution of minerals is extremely grating, but obviously built for people who know nothing of geology and just want to enjoy a game and find a giant glob of gold somewhere.

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So it appears the way this game's "upgrade systems" work as it were,

Every time you run across a drop pod (very easy to locate if you know how to look) you can buy one additional slot for 10k more than the last one cost, up to a total of 48 slots. My last slot cost 350k. I could have bought a 10m ship with all the money I dropped on my inventory plus what I ended up having left over in funds, but now permanently having 48 slots is VERY worth it. Where before I felt hesitant to apply personal upgrades, I've given myself a sprint, jet pack, and shields booster. In addition my multi-tool packs a punch, so fighting high level drones has gotten a lot easier.

With ships, you can find crashed ships that vary between -2 and +2 slots of your current ship. If you want to upgrade via this method, you can either get lucky and reach the full 48 slot ship in 10-20 ships, or you can spend days finding ships that are worse than yours (like me). Don't worry about the upgrades that come with them, most are useless anyway and you'll probably end up scrapping them for storage space. The only upgrades for my ship that I've found worthwhile are the ones that boost my FTL drive (don't have components for it yet but it says it can significantly boost my FTL range and efficiency), phase cannon damage and shield boosters. Powered up phase canons and high shields make attackers easy to take out. If you want to go the route of buying a new ship, almost every ship you come across in a space station will be a "grade" above yours in that it will have 6-10 more slots than yours currently has, but at a high price point. Unless you've accrued millions through some phenominally easy method, I'd advise against this method EXCEPT early on when ships are still cheap. You can upgrade your dinky 12-14 slot ship for a ~20 slot ship for not too expensive. Salvaging ships just requires a lot of iron really, and as you know iron is everywhere, and to get the FTL drive working, a component you can find pretty much anyone anywhere selling for about 20k.

For the multitool it seems to work largely in the same manner as the ship, although it can be hit or miss on whether or not it is good. You won't find the uber 24 slot multi tool if you're still sitting on 8 slots. The upgrades will be incremental, and pretty much demand you move up gradually.

[Zephyr Storm]

Hey guys if you like NMS you should check out this game!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nLtmEjqzg7M

LUL

Yeah, where is that game at? Because it sure ain't this one.

[Kaleredar]

You have continued to imply that the problem in relation to NMS is because of the procedural generation not being able to generate something beautiful and amazing.

It is

That isn't the case because you've admitted that it can be a problem with or with out procedural generation.

How is that not the case? Just because artists CAN fall short of making something look good (which, in good video games, they don't) doesn't mean that procedural generation is given some sort of free pass.

"Oh because a human can screw up, a computer is allowed to screw up too!"

Yeah, and when human artists screw up making a game look good and the game looks bad or boring or repetitive, it's usually seen as a negative for the game. And you know what? It's definitely a negative when a computer does it.

Which is what I've been trying to get you to see from the start that what you are blaming on procedural generation is in fact not because of procedural generation.

In this case, it is, because the procedural generation is what's PRODUCING the bland looking environments. Because that's all procedural generation will ultimately be able to do.

Why wouldn't you be suspicious that something will begin to look the same when you do it so many times? That is true of every single game out there when you play it repetitively. Visual assets are not infinite so eventually anything will become repetitive. Again why is this somehow a bad thing for NMS when every game has this downside?

Because for the umpteenth time, NMS' entire POINT is to be finding new things by discovering and exploring. So when all of that stuff just turns out being the same, what is the continued point of playing the game?

The reason we don't care (Usually) that bear models and certain armor models and whatnot get reused in WoW is because we aren't playing "explore all the different types of bears" or "collect all the types of armor." Those are aspects of the game if you count things like hunter pet taming and transmog, but there's also questing, PvP, raiding, dungeons, solo content, mount and pet collecting, crafting, and a whole slew of other things to do on top of those things. So reusing assets isn't nearly as much of a problem. ESPECIALLY considering the fact that Blizzard puts in new models for armor pieces and weapons and buildings and plants and creatures and and a whole bunch of stuff with every new content patch. Things that weren't just spat out by a computer; they actually went through a considered design process to fit into the game and fit a certain role.

And when Blizzard falls short of doing those things by introducing few new models or models that the playerbase doesn't like (see Dragon Soul) then people get angry about it, DESPITE the fact that WoW has all those other things still going for it.

[Zephyr Storm]

You have continued to imply that the problem in relation to NMS is because of the procedural generation not being able to generate something beautiful and amazing. That isn't the case because you've admitted that it can be a problem with or with out procedural generation. Which is what I've been trying to get you to see from the start that what you are blaming on procedural generation is in fact not because of procedural generation.

Why wouldn't you be suspicious that something will begin to look the same when you do it so many times? That is true of every single game out there when you play it repetitively. Visual assets are not infinite so eventually anything will become repetitive. Again why is this somehow a bad thing for NMS when every game has this downside?

It's bad for NMS because the entire game hinges upon exploring and nothing else. If everything starts to become repetitive and unexciting, then there's no reason to keep playing. And this is happening to lots of people who are playing the game. They are getting bored with the repetitiveness and blandness between the planets and activities and are just skipping entire systems that don't have anything of value in them. They're going straight to the end of the game, only to find out that the game wants you to do everything all over again. But at that point, they're bored as fuck with it and say screw it.

Other games can get away with this problem because they generally have more things to do in them. NMS just has exploration. That's it. So repititiveness, blandness, sameness, etc, etc become much more of a problem in a game like this. Because it has NOTHING else going for it right now.

I'm glad people are happy playing what should have essentially been a VR tech demo and paying $60 for the privilege to do so. Maybe if (not when, IF) all this other stuff gets added that the dev is talking about, NMS might become a decent game that is finally a full fledged game as well. I'll have to check back in on it in a year or two and see if the promises are upheld and they've finally delivered a compete game or if it all turns out to be smoke and mirrors because hey, they've already got your money.

[Selastan]

It's bad for NMS because the entire game hinges upon exploring and nothing else. If everything starts to become repetitive and unexciting, then there's no reason to keep playing. And this is happening to lots of people who are playing the game. They are getting bored with the repetitiveness and blandness between the planets and activities and are just skipping entire systems that don't have anything of value in them. They're going straight to the end of the game, only to find out that the game wants you to do everything all over again. But at that point, they're bored as fuck with it and say screw it.

Other games can get away with this problem because they generally have more things to do in them. NMS just has exploration. That's it. So repititiveness, blandness, sameness, etc, etc become much more of a problem in a game like this. Because it has NOTHING else going for it right now.

I'm glad people are happy playing what should have essentially been a VR tech demo and paying $60 for the privilege to do so. Maybe if (not when, IF) all this other stuff gets added that the dev is talking about, NMS might become a decent game that is finally a full fledged game as well. I'll have to check back in on it in a year or two and see if the promises are upheld and they've finally delivered a compete game or if it all turns out to be smoke and mirrors because hey, they've already got your money.

You are a glass half empty kind of person, aren't you? The game doesn't have JUST exploration. It has trading, rare item hunting, space battles and piracy, a small story, the ultimate goal of getting the galactic core, learning alien languages and discovering their history, the list goes on. The only thing this game doesn't have is constant balls-to-the-wall blast processing action that does what Ninten-won't.

[Zephyr Storm]

You are a glass half empty kind of person, aren't you? The game doesn't have JUST exploration. It has trading, rare item hunting, space battles and piracy, a small story, the ultimate goal of getting the galactic core, learning alien languages and discovering their history, the list goes on. The only thing this game doesn't have is constant balls-to-the-wall blast processing action that does what Ninten-won't.

I gotta hand it to you. You do a decent job of making such small and sometimes negligible parts of the game seem to have way more importance than they actually do.

Fact is, at the end of the day, NMS is basically all about the exploration. The scant few and shallow other systems in the game that go along with this are not near enough to make up for the fact that the game is simply too repetitive and lacking to keep the exploration aspect fun and engaging for a lot of people.

[Elim Garak]

Fact is, at the end of the day, NMS is basically all about the exploration. The scant few and shallow other systems in the game that go along with this are not near enough to make up for the fact that the game is simply too repetitive and lacking to keep the exploration aspect fun and engaging for a lot of people.

Oh the biblical people of lot strike again.

[stellvia]

http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfile.../?id=744335032
I think by far my best discovery yet. It looks pretty good in motion and everything considering its odd shape.

Behold, the five-assed monkey!

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You are a glass half empty kind of person, aren't you? The game doesn't have JUST exploration. It has trading, rare item hunting, space battles and piracy, a small story, the ultimate goal of getting the galactic core, learning alien languages and discovering their history, the list goes on. The only thing this game doesn't have is constant balls-to-the-wall blast processing action that does what Ninten-won't.

Aren't the languages and history basically randomly generated as well? So once you leave that system and move on, it doesn't matter and you start all over again. Trading is only trading if its between players, honestly.

[Deleted]

Hey guys if you like NMS you should check out this game!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nLtmEjqzg7M

LUL

This really pisses me off.

Yea we've seen trailers that embellish the final product a bit (Witcher 3 even), but this? This doesn't even exist in the game as far as I've seen. It's a lush planet with dynamic wildlife and feels alive. All I've found so far are planets that feel as dead as the soul of the guys who marketed this.

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Player bases are confirmed to be added in a future update.

If it's not a space base, then it doesn't make sense. This game is all about hopping planets, creating a planetside base only to leave it within the hour sounds pretty shit.

I do have faith in the game and am hoping that the devs will continue working on it (they're almost obliged to after the backlash). There's real potential here, just need to straighten it up and add purpose and depth.

[thenerdds]

So is NMS any good? Haven't played it yet.

[Deleted]

Any word yet on getting Hyperdrive blueprints to players who sold the preorder ship?

I managed to get it, and quite a few other "ship default" items like photon cannon, a few times off of the wall mounted consoles you scan for blueprints. I'm basically at the point where I get nothing new from those, though with a 48 slot multi tool fully maxed out it's not like I have much space for them anymore.

If anyone is still searching for multi tools that can contain more slots, then go to any system with vy'keen in them and they will throw new multi tools at you. Basically you'll get at least 2 more slots each time you upgrade your multi tool.