No Man’s Sky is a game that will go down in history as one that promised too much, and then delivered far too little. During the leadup to launch, developer Hello Games promised numerous things for the title. A universe to explore, numerous things to do, and then, in an interview with a late night TV show host, the head of Hello Games, Sean Murray, noted that the game would have multiplayer. But, when the game launched, it didn’t, and players actually went to great lengths to prove this.
So the question is, what happened? Why did this promise fall flat? And if it was a miscommunication, why didn’t they just come out and say it? Well, given the recent update to No Man’s Sky, Sean Murray talked with The Guardian and revealed that multiplayer was supposed to be in the game, but it was scrapped before launch:
“A very light multiplayer was envisioned for launch, and we fought right up until the end to add it, but it was immensely challenging and we knew it was something that only a handful of people would experience due to the size of the universe.”
On one hand, he does have a point, the universe of the game was huge, and it would be hard for gamers’ to play together. However, as the gamers proved, it was not impossible. Which is why Hello Games tried to make up for it with two updates, the latter of which came out this week:
“We later added a version of it for the Atlas Rises update, and it was nice, but not hugely impactful to people’s enjoyment. What players really wanted was the kind of multiplayer we are adding now.”
It will have to be seen just how well the new multiplayer feature works, or if it’s as good as they promise.
