The sci-fi universe wandering game No Man’s Sky got a vocal and sizeable negative reception after a portion of players felt it overpraised with hype and pre-release advertising but didn’t deliver ultimately with actual gameplay. I genuinely liked the game, but it might be because I didn’t pay very much attention to the actual promises being made by studio Hello Games after the initial news of its existence.
Regardless of whether you did or didn’t appreciate No Man’s Sky‘s unique approach to console gaming, Hello’s announcement on Friday (via Engadget) that a forthcoming update will lay the groundwork for base building will probably come as welcome news. Base building will be introduced in what Hello’s calling “The Foundation Update,” which is coming this week for No Man’s Sky, along with detailed patch information.
The Foundation Update has been in development for nine weeks, Hello says, but don’t expect it to transform the in-game experience right away; the developer is setting expectations by calling it “the start of something,” rather than the fully-formed arrival of a whole new way to play.
Hello Games also took the opportunity to address negative feedback for the game, noting that they’ve followed the “intense and dramatic” discussion around their title but that they’re focusing on improvements rather than on wading into the debate.
Again, I liked the game and don’t regret buying it, but I will welcome substantial gameplay updates as a way to wind my way back into its expansive virtual universe.