The state of No Man's Sky & Hello Games

[xZoneHunter]

With Hello Games being investigated for false advertisement and Sean Murray going radio silence since the release of the game. It's normal for players to ask themselves what the hell is going on with the studio. Nevertheless, the company has plans for DLC and is still releasing patches, with their last one being on September 19. Geoff Keighley also recently said in his live show that Sean may come on stage for an exclusive interview. Whether or not that will come true remains to be seen though.

 

No Man's Sky was a huge success in sales, with it being the #2 top-grossing game in august, despite being butchered by fans and critics alike for good reasons. Two months after its release i think it's important to ask, Where does No Man's Sky go now? Should they issue an apology? Try to salvage their game by releasing patches and more content? Would you even still care at this point? 

 

Apparently, according to Reddit, it seems that Hello Games took the money and ran with it. 

 

Hello Games' producer and community manager suddenly left the company, - Reddit

 

 

If you look at No Man's Sky "contact us" page on August 8, 2016 and then again on October 7, 2016 you will notice that two names are missing, and three names are new (all new names are developers). The two names that are missing is the Producer and the Community Manager.

The Producer in this case also acted as Sony's PR liaison, approved messaging for Sony's PR machine and set up the marketing (according to their linkedin).

The Community manager also left shortly after the game was launched to work for eurogamer.

Timeline:

• Sept 2nd both names were on HG's site
• Oct. 5th both names are gone from HG's site
• September 23rd was the last tweet from HG

 

On top of that their office seems to be more or less abandoned, 
 

 

 

 

While of course it's unlikely that Hello Games would just pack up and leave, it would be pretty hilarious.

 

Edited October 9, 2016 by xZoneHunter

[Redgrave]

Is that seriously their office now? If so then that gif has never been anymore appropriate than now.

 

Otherwise at this point it really sounds like they are just making it worse on themselves. If they really are hiding then they need to just come out and face the music otherwise it's going to look even worse on them further down the road.

 

Edit: As far as getting the game myself, I'm not even going to get it if it's free at this point.

Edited October 9, 2016 by Redgrave

[Undead Wolf]

I've said it in other threads, but the best thing Hello Games could do is issue an apology. No skirting around the issues like they normally do, but come out and say "We misrepresented the game and that was wrong. The game doesn't live up to your expectations, and we apologise". Then they should pledge to continue supporting the game with free updates, and make it clear they won't be charging for any DLC. This would be a way to make good on that apology. Is it too late at this point though? They seem to be taking the Sean of the Dead approach right now...

 

 

I also read an interesting article the other day saying how No Man's Sky has damaged the reputation of other space sim games. A space sim called Dual Universe is on Kickstarter, and the devs talk about how nobody has faith in it thanks to the fine folks at Hello Games. It makes for an interesting read. http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2016-10-07-building-a-space-sim-in-a-post-no-mans-sky-world

 

Now then, I think we have one important question to ask...

 

Edited October 9, 2016 by Undead Wolf

[TheYuriG]

While I never buy games on launch and it sucked for who did, I hope the game is perfect by the time I get my own copy. The whole concept was very insteresting. In case by then the game is still shit, I'll buy second hand, enjoy what I can without giving the company a single cent.

 

EDIT: Just wanna mention that Bungie (Destiny's developer) fucked up their game for so long and denied all mistakes for months and months when the playerbase was clearly pointing out their lies and bullshit. If Bungie kept doing it for so long, why wouldn't Hello Games be able to do the same?

 

Edited October 9, 2016 by TheYuriG

[damon8r351]

Don't care what anyone's been saying about it, I enjoyed the game.

[Remilia Scarlet]

This is funny.

[punkrockrobot98]

Judging from the photo of Hello Games' studio, it looks like they took the money and ran. Jokes aside, I feel like they should issue an apology as it's the right thing to do. They basically scammed thousands of people out of their money and most likely intentionally misinterpreted the game to get even more money. Another way to patch things up is to just fix the game and make it what they promised. *cough cough* Addmultiplayertothegame *cough cough* 

 

I myself will probably never play No Man's Sky unless it's free for Playstation Plus members. 

Edited October 9, 2016 by punkrockrobot98

[DaivRules]

No, they shouldn't apologize. It doesn't change what happened.

 

People should just remember all this and stop falling for hype on games.

[skateak]

I played the game at a friends house and loved it. I would buy it now if my backlog wasn't so insane already. If people got hyped to the point that they wouldn't even accept the game for free, that is a problem on your part honestly and shows some sense of entitlement  I don't think they should be hung or harassed out of development for having too big of ambition and not being able to deliver exactly what was mentioned or even promised in some cases. I guarantee that happens to every developer. The reason it is a problem for HG though is because they showed off too many proofs of concept instead of internally showng that stuff and figuring out if it can actually be done from there. That is the benefit to having a publisher. They give you a PR agent that won't let you stick your foot in your mouth. A empty office means nothing. I could also easily speculate and say that after years of grueling development they took a vacation and might possibly even be looking for a larger studio to expand their team due to the success of No Man's Sky.

[thegirlruka]

No, they shouldn't apologize. It doesn't change what happened.

 

People should just remember all this and stop falling for hype on games.

Why not both? They lied. Lies should be apologized for. While it doesn't change what happened, they can still take responsibility for their actions.

[Dr_Mayus]

No, they shouldn't apologize. It doesn't change what happened.

 

People should just remember all this and stop falling for hype on games.

 

The second E3 rolls around people will be creaming themselves over another prerendered trailer and will be salivating at all the empty promises that are being delivered. It will never end

[AJ_Radio]

The very last game I bought at launch was Grand Theft Auto V for the PS3. At the time GTA Online was not available just yet so people had to contend with just the single player game. When online was released at the beginning of October 2013 it was rife with bugs and controversy from the players. Considering that I paid over $59.99 for that game three years ago, I realized that hype usually isn't as grand as people make it out to be. So I've basically stopped buying at launch altogether.

 

I may possibly buy Duke Nukem 20th Anniversary World Tour right when it becomes available. It's only 983 MBs and contains all the classic episodes from 20 years ago plus a new episode made by one of the original Duke Nukem 3D developers. I just hope that Gearbox didn't fuck things up because $19.99 is a bit steep for a 20 year old game.

 

I bought the gold edition of Assassins Creed Syndicate days after release but since it already contained the Season Pass it was too good to pass up. Fallout 4 I got a few days after release and I already knew first impressions from other gamers online. Batman: Arkham Knight I got for free since it was bundled with my PS4, Uncharted 3 came for free as well when I bought my PS3 back in the beginning of 2013.

 

I don't see the point in buying at launch anymore. In the old days when you bought on day of release that was pretty much it. If it was good it was money well spent, if it was bad then you just wasted it. I hate companies and developers who lie to the public and then decide to charge too much for DLC, or the game itself is so buggy and glitched that you have to download several patches in advance before it becomes playable.

 

This is also why I'm not buying Playstation VR nor the PS4 Slim or PS4 Pro. I've been a gamer for 25 years and have seen my share of bad consoles or systems that really weren't that great. When the systems themselves get firmware updates to make them easier to use and if they're really worth the price tag, then maybe I'll consider. Playstation VR looks like motion sickness central to me, since I tend to get it whenever I read on a moving car or plane.

 

Wait it out, then buy it after all the patches and DLC packs have already been added. Sure in some cases you might be the only one who cares about that game at that point, but at least it saves you more of your wallet.

 

I won't be buying No Man's Sky until all patches have been released with it along with any DLC that might be worth looking into. Then again Call of Duty Infinity Warfare might just as well topple No Man's Sky since a good portion of that game takes place in outer space, which was not the original intention of the franchise.

[nyonmyan]

I think that every gamer needs to waste his money at least once to learn to not get hyped for shit and not pre-order games in new franchises.

 

Some people are never going to learn though.

 

That said, refunds should become a thing in PS store. Steam did it, it's time for Sony to step it up.

[BIOHAZARD-R-US]

I don't understand how people can blame gamers and the hype train. The game had a ton of features that were promised, shown in depth and discussed in countless interviews, so anyone would expect that these features would be in the game at launch. What gamers were shown, told and promised was not what the final product was, and that's false advertising. Gearbox got sued and lost big time because of false advertising with Aliens: Colonial Marines, and they just put out an E3 trailer which looked more than 20x better than the game actually did. Hello Games told lie after lie, showed video after video after gameplay footage after trailer after gameplay footage after video, Sean Murray did interview after interview and now they seem to have disappeared with their massive amounts of cash. That is in no way any gamer's fault.

[nyonmyan]

I don't understand how people can blame gamers and the hype train. The game had a ton of features that were promised, shown in depth and discussed in countless interviews, so anyone would expect that these features would be in the game at launch. What gamers were shown, told and promised was not what the final product was, and that's false advertising. Gearbox got sued and lost big time because of false advertising with Aliens: Colonial Marines, and they just put out an E3 trailer which looked more than 20x better than the game actually did. Hello Games told lie after lie, showed video after video after gameplay footage after trailer after gameplay footage after video, Sean Murray did interview after interview and now they seem to have disappeared with their massive amounts of cash. That is in no way any gamer's fault.

False advertising is a common practice, Aliens was just an extreme case. Destiny and Witcher 3 comes to mind, as big games that had false advertising without repercussion.

[AJ_Radio]

I think that every gamer needs to waste his money at least once to learn to not get hyped for shit and not pre-order games in new franchises.

 

Some people are never going to learn though.

 

That said, refunds should become a thing in PS store. Steam did it, it's time for Sony to step it up.

 

Been there done that.

 

Given Sony's reputation in customer service and having a spotty network in recent months, I don't see them giving out refunds.

 

I don't understand how people can blame gamers and the hype train. The game had a ton of features that were promised, shown in depth and discussed in countless interviews, so anyone would expect that these features would be in the game at launch. What gamers were shown, told and promised was not what the final product was, and that's false advertising. Gearbox got sued and lost big time because of false advertising with Aliens: Colonial Marines, and they just put out an E3 trailer which looked more than 20x better than the game actually did. Hello Games told lie after lie, showed video after video after gameplay footage after trailer after gameplay footage after video, Sean Murray did interview after interview and now they seem to have disappeared with their massive amounts of cash. That is in no way any gamer's fault.

 

I am buying a game that is copyrighted by Gearbox, hope I won't be disappointed.

 

Sean Murray proved himself to be a piece of shit scumbag.

[Dr_Mayus]

I am buying a game that is copyrighted by Gearbox, hope I won't be disappointed.

 

Sean Murray proved himself to be a piece of shit scumbag.

And you are going to buy a game by Gearbox? Randy Pitchford is one of the biggest con men in the industry.

[MRR---OFFICIAL]

Was definitely disappointed... Though I live in Australia and returned it for a full refund so yeah whatever lol  

[AJ_Radio]

And you are going to buy a game by Gearbox? Randy Pitchford is one of the biggest con men in the industry.

 

Never bought a game by Gearbox before, but it's the upcoming Duke Nukem game I'm looking forward to.

 

Honestly even with all the bad rep No Man's Sky still looks pretty okay. It's more to do with failed promises, but again like I said I will wait until a price drop and if there is going to be any DLC.

[BlindMango]

I'm glad I never overhyped myself on this game, throughout the entire process of its announcement and all the way up to release I had very realistic expectations on what this would be based on how the game was said to have worked (one huge algorithm basically), I thought it was impressive such a small team could pull it off but never expected to make it anything far beyond one big algorithm - I think a lot of people expected a lot more than I did from this game. That being said, Sean Murry is partly to blame for that because he did promise a lot that wasn't at all there, I think it would be a good idea if he apologized for doing that at the very least.

 

As far as their office, they probably all decided to take off for vacation. I imagine development (as with any game) and the attention they got after it released was rough lol.

Edited October 9, 2016 by BlindMango

[AJ_Radio]

I'm glad I never overhyped myself on this game, throughout the entire process of its announcement and all the way up to release I had very realistic expectations on what this would be based on how the game was said to have worked (one huge algorithm basically), I thought it was impressive such a small team could pull it off but never expected to make it anything far beyond one big algorithm - I think a lot of people expected a lot more than I did from this game. That being said, Sean Murry is partly to blame for that because he did promise a lot that wasn't at all there, I think it would be a good idea if he apologized for doing that at the very least.

 

As far as their office, they probably all decided to take off for vacation. I imagine development (as with any game) and the attention they got after it released was rough lol.

 

Personally I've been impressed with what some people are able to do. Dust: An Elysian Tail was mostly done by one person, whereas Orc Slayer was a steaming pile of crap made by a small team.

 

What Sean Murray has done is common with CEOs and executive teams of giant corporations. When the criticism hits them they turn off and deny wrongdoings even though the evidence is sitting right in front of them.

 

Politicians do this crap all the time. Somebody on a small team doing this is just sad, since they don't have the resources or the finances big companies like EA and Ubisoft have. Both of those companies have been criticized for bad games and rep over and over but then they can just buy their way through lawyers and others who are corrupt.

[DARKB1KE]

No, they shouldn't apologize. It doesn't change what happened.

 

People should just remember all this and stop falling for hype on games.