# No Man's Sky - First star to the right, and straight on till morning
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-mans-sky-first-star-to-the-right-and-straight-on-till-morning/759701
**Category:** The Game Room
**Tags:** video-games-e-games
**Created:** [July 12, 2016, 1:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-mans-sky-first-star-to-the-right-and-straight-on-till-morning/759701 "2016-07-12T01:16:17Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 26
### Author:  [@Skywatcher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skywatcher)
#### Post date: [September 28, 2016, 9:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-mans-sky-first-star-to-the-right-and-straight-on-till-morning/759701/501 "2016-09-28T21:33:24Z")
Any of you have more than 57 posts in this thread? 🙂
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### Author:  [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)
#### Post date: [September 28, 2016, 9:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-mans-sky-first-star-to-the-right-and-straight-on-till-morning/759701/502 "2016-09-28T21:36:31Z")
> [@Skywatcher](#):
>
> Pretty much the lone voice here, though.
>
> We get it.
>
> Hell, we’re beyond getting it.I decided against using that phrase and replaced it with a milder one. Never meant for it to apply everywhere, just **Beef**. The non-player.
Different people are reporting different things for their own reasons. In fact, the only person posting the same _opinion_ over and over again that I can see is _you_.
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### Author:  [@Arrogance\_Ex\_Machina](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Arrogance_Ex_Machina)
#### Post date: [September 28, 2016, 9:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-mans-sky-first-star-to-the-right-and-straight-on-till-morning/759701/503 "2016-09-28T21:37:22Z")
Yeah, I think Skywatcher’s the lone voice here. Beef is right - the Rise and Fall of No Man’s Sky hype has been a big story in video game hobby this year and it’d be nice if it was taken as a warning example of what overhyping does and not as a shining example of how marketing can polish a turd so it sells way more copies at way higher price than it should.
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### Author:  [@BeepKillBeep](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BeepKillBeep)
#### Post date: [September 28, 2016, 9:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-mans-sky-first-star-to-the-right-and-straight-on-till-morning/759701/504 "2016-09-28T21:45:24Z")
I haven’t been posting because I don’t really care that much. I’ve concluded that for me the game isn’t worth getting unless it comes down in price by a lot. I’ll pick it up for $20 someday assuming it is still operating. I didn’t see any reason to make the kinds of posts SenorBeef was making. And to be honest, and I don’t mean this as a personal attack, but they did come across a little bit as “Neener neener I was right” and I can understand how that my rankle people who were enjoying the game. Honestly, I think the right think to do would have been open a new thread called “The No Man’s Sky Disaster Analysis” or whatever. Anyway that’s my view on it.
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### Author:  [@Idle\_Thoughts](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Idle_Thoughts)
#### Post date: [September 29, 2016, 2:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-mans-sky-first-star-to-the-right-and-straight-on-till-morning/759701/505 "2016-09-29T02:53:54Z")
**SenorBeef** and **Skywatcher** , take your fight to the Pit if you want to continue it. It’s getting a bit too heated for this forum.
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### Author:  [@Martini\_Enfield](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Martini_Enfield)
#### Post date: [September 29, 2016, 8:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-mans-sky-first-star-to-the-right-and-straight-on-till-morning/759701/506 "2016-09-29T08:51:58Z")
> [@SenorBeef](#):
>
> And I will say this: you have personally insulted me in this thread to a much greater degree than I’ve personally insulted anyone else.
Mate, I’m not diginifying any of your post with a detailed response. I’ve said my piece. Personally, I enjoyed _No Man’s Sky_. I am baffled at your continued “interest” in it and IMHO thinly-veiled disdain towards the game and, by extension, anyone who bought it.
There’s a lot happening in gaming this month - I count something like five AAA titles due out. We should all be looking forward to that; I certainly am.
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### Author:  [@SenorBeef](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SenorBeef)
#### Post date: [September 29, 2016, 9:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-mans-sky-first-star-to-the-right-and-straight-on-till-morning/759701/507 "2016-09-29T09:11:08Z")
As with other posters, your attacks are far more personal in nature than mine. You called me an entitled whiner, the epitome of what’s wrong with gaming today. Now you’re saying my post - which only contained arguments and no personal attack - is below you, and so you can’t respond to it.
What’s actually true is that you can’t respond to it. I told you why I was in this thread, and you told me that nothing I’d said in the thread conveys that, and then I quoted a post of mine which basically restated word for word what I had claimed my intent was. And so now you’re dodging that.
You then fell onto the standard “but you can’t criticize it if you haven’t played it!” logic, and I asked what would change if I did, and why is what I’m describing uncongruent with the opinion of the majority of people who have played and reviewed it. You’re refusing to answer that question.
I haven’t been personal in this thread. I haven’t called anyone an idiot for liking the game, nor begrudged anyone for liking it. And in fact I tried to defuse people taking criticism of the game personally:
> [@SenorBeef](#):
>
> That’s pretty much exactly what I’ve done. I’ve said that this game was a product of hype delivering preorders and then failing to deliver on the promises. I’m not getting personal with people. I’m not saying “you’re an idiot because you like this game” - but I am arguing against things I perceive to be simply incorrect like “oh we got everything we were promised, so there’s nothing to be disappointed about”
>
> …
>
> There’s also an issue where people don’t think “this is a product I like”, but rather “I’m the sort of person who likes this product” - it’s not specific to this game, it’s the weird tendency of people to become over-identified with their preferences. So people take criticism of something personally, because they’re not taking it as criticism of the product, but criticism of their identity.
In summary, I haven’t been personally insulting people in this thread. I have been personally insulted by people in this thread, including you. You attempt to silence me by suggesting I have no standing unless I buy it. I challenged you to tell me how my assessment of the game, which includes factual references to people who have played the game and their opinion on it, reviews, and video, would be dramatically changed by having actually played it, and rather than respond to those challenges (which you initiated by attempting to discredit my standing), you decide that my post is not to be “dignified with a detailed response”, which clearly suggests to me that you don’t have one.
It’s strange to me that the few hardcore defenders in this thread are labelling me as somehow cancerous and insulting, but that behavior has only been displayed against me, not by me. My suspicion is that I identified the root cause in my quote above - people identify too closely with a game they, by their own claims, moderately enjoyed, and take criticism of the game as personal insult.
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### Author:  [@SenorBeef](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SenorBeef)
#### Post date: [September 29, 2016, 9:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-mans-sky-first-star-to-the-right-and-straight-on-till-morning/759701/508 "2016-09-29T09:20:01Z")
In case it wasn’t clear, that was a reply to Martini Enfield’s post 506, not Skywatcher, who I am disengaging with as per mod instructions. I’ll probably still end up in trouble for some reason, though my post had no personal attacks of any sort.
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### Author:  [@coremelt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/coremelt)
#### Post date: [September 29, 2016, 9:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-mans-sky-first-star-to-the-right-and-straight-on-till-morning/759701/509 "2016-09-29T09:48:52Z")
> [@Martini\_Enfield](#):
>
> Personally, I enjoyed _No Man’s Sky_.
It’s great you enjoyed No Man’s Sky but do you feel it is justified in being a $60 AAA title? If it had been released as a $30 digital only indie title everyone would be (rightly) raving about it, and probably they’d have made more money as well from increased volume.
I’ll wait until it is $30 then I’m sure I’ll enjoy it as well, but yeah I’d be pissed if I had pre-ordered at $60.
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### Author:  [@Idle\_Thoughts](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Idle_Thoughts)
#### Post date: [September 29, 2016, 10:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-mans-sky-first-star-to-the-right-and-straight-on-till-morning/759701/510 "2016-09-29T10:03:46Z")
Let’s all just get back to talking about the game. Understand, everyone, that others might have different opinions than you…and if you really want to get into a heated debate over difference of opinion or any other issues with another poster in this thread, and/or what this means for the person having it… then again, let’s move the discussion to the Pit, please.
This note is for any and everyone involved in the hijack in here causing heated exchange of opinions.
TL;DR version: This topic is about the discussion of the game, let’s everyone quit the sniping at each other. Right now.
Beyond this post, people will start getting warnings if they keep up the heated bickering.
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### Author:  [@Martini\_Enfield](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Martini_Enfield)
#### Post date: [September 29, 2016, 10:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-mans-sky-first-star-to-the-right-and-straight-on-till-morning/759701/511 "2016-09-29T10:21:33Z")
> [@coremelt](#):
>
> It’s great you enjoyed No Man’s Sky but do you feel it is justified in being a $60 AAA title?
Short version: Yes.
Longer version: AUD$80 was probably a tad higher than it should have been, but I don’t think it’s outrageous either. I’ve played dozens of hours of the game; on cost-per-hour-of-entertainment basis it’s down at the “negligible” level for me.
> [@](#):
>
> If it had been released as a $30 digital only indie title everyone would be (rightly) raving about it, and probably they’d have made more money as well from increased volume.
I honestly doubt it; the sale figures were massive and even taking refunds into account, there’s no way they would have sold twice as many units at half the price.
My honest view: It’s not a bad game, it’s just not the game the internet wanted to get, hence the widely reported outrage and wailing and gnashing of teeth.
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### Author:  [@coremelt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/coremelt)
#### Post date: [September 29, 2016, 10:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-mans-sky-first-star-to-the-right-and-straight-on-till-morning/759701/512 "2016-09-29T10:58:39Z")
> [@Martini\_Enfield](#):
>
> I honestly doubt it; the sale figures were massive and even taking refunds into account, there’s no way they would have sold twice as many units at half the price.
:dubious: A lot of people (like me) held off on purchase because we were skeptical. At $30 I would have purchased it by now. Video games have a high price elasticity of demand, valve has studied this and generally found cheaper prices bring big increases in revenue.
> **[Maybe Super Cheap Video Games Are Helping, Not Destroying, The Video Game...](https://www.techdirt.com/2011/02/23/maybe-super-cheap-video-games-are-helping-not-destroying-video-game-industry/)**
>
> One of the early economics lessons you learn in any competent intro econ class is the concept of elasticity. The basic concept is how much does demand increase for a product if you lower the price.…
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### Author:  [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)
#### Post date: [September 29, 2016, 11:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-mans-sky-first-star-to-the-right-and-straight-on-till-morning/759701/513 "2016-09-29T11:37:29Z")
> [@Martini\_Enfield](#):
>
> My honest view: It’s not a bad game, it’s just not the game the internet wanted to get, hence the widely reported outrage and wailing and gnashing of teeth.
Was it the game they were promised, either through press releases, advertisements or (possibly misleading) examples of gameplay?
---
### Author:  [@Martini\_Enfield](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Martini_Enfield)
#### Post date: [September 29, 2016, 12:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-mans-sky-first-star-to-the-right-and-straight-on-till-morning/759701/514 "2016-09-29T12:22:55Z")
> [@coremelt](#):
>
> :dubious: A lot of people (like me) held off on purchase because we were skeptical. At $30 I would have purchased it by now. Video games have a high price elasticity of demand, valve has studied this and generally found cheaper prices bring big increases in revenue.
> [Maybe Super Cheap Video Games Are Helping, Not Destroying, The Video Game Industry | Techdirt](https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20110216/23141213139/maybe-super-cheap-video-games-are-helping-not-destroying-video-game-industry.shtml)
The game was available on PlayStation 4 too and in Australia was being heavily marketed as a PS4 game; there was absolutely no local support or promotion for the PC version and I had to do a lot of asking around before it was eventually confirmed that yes, it was coming to PC, but as a digital-only product.
Don’t get me wrong, I love cheap PC games and like most other gamers, I have an unplayed games list that gets longer everytime one of the major digital distribution platforms has a sale on; but at the same time, it costs a fuckload of money to develop a game on the scale beyond “a few mates from uni working in someone’s garage”. And that’s not including the promotional and distribution costs.
> [@Czarcasm](#):
>
> Was it the game they were promised, either through press releases, advertisements or (possibly misleading) examples of gameplay?
I saw most of the same promo stuff as the other folks on the internet and I more or less got the game I was expecting.
However - I’ve been following the games industry for a really long time now so I think I tend to have a pretty well-developed hype compensator.
Developers promising ambitious things and not following through on them isn’t new. It’s been a thing in games since before some of the posters here were born. It’d be nice if it didn’t happen but unfortunately it does and I suspect it pretty much always will.
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### Author:  [@Ike\_Witt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ike_Witt)
#### Post date: [September 29, 2016, 12:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-mans-sky-first-star-to-the-right-and-straight-on-till-morning/759701/515 "2016-09-29T12:44:35Z")
Just throwing a little fuel on the fire here: [No Man’s Sky is being investigated by the Advertising Standards Authority](http://www.pcgamer.com/no-mans-sky-is-being-investigated-by-the-advertising-standards-authority/).
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### Author:  [@BeepKillBeep](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BeepKillBeep)
#### Post date: [September 29, 2016, 12:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-mans-sky-first-star-to-the-right-and-straight-on-till-morning/759701/516 "2016-09-29T12:48:11Z")
> [@Martini\_Enfield](#):
>
> My honest view: It’s not a bad game, it’s just not the game the internet wanted to get, hence the widely reported outrage and wailing and gnashing of teeth.
I both agree and disagree with this. It is clearly correct that the Internet wanted although I would say though, to be fair, that it wasn’t the game they were expecting either due to marketing. However, I honestly think that if the game were legitimately good then after the initial gnashing of teeth people would have just got down to playing it. Since that didn’t happen, I don’t think the game could be called good (again in the general sense, I’m not saying that for you it isn’t good). I’ll pick it up when it is cheap and find out for myself.
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### Author:  [@Richard\_Pearse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Richard_Pearse)
#### Post date: [September 29, 2016, 12:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-mans-sky-first-star-to-the-right-and-straight-on-till-morning/759701/517 "2016-09-29T12:57:53Z")
It didn’t seem any worse to me than what Peter Molyneux has done promoting the Fable games. Perhaps what saved those games was that, even when stripped of the ridiculous promises, they were relatively deep with a story etc, while NMS was never going to be a deep game. I think that even if NMS had delivered on every little promise, implied and explicit, many gamers would have been disappointed as the reality of the promised gameplay would not have been as engaging as they’d imagined.
I suspect that may be partly what’s happening here. Gamers were expecting to be deeply immersed and many weren’t. Because the game suffered from some hyperbolic marketing it has been easy to blame that for their disappointment, but I think they would have been disappointed anyway.
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### Author:  [@Skywatcher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skywatcher)
#### Post date: [September 29, 2016, 3:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-mans-sky-first-star-to-the-right-and-straight-on-till-morning/759701/518 "2016-09-29T15:22:59Z")
> [@Ike\_Witt](#):
>
> Just throwing a little fuel on the fire here: [No Man’s Sky is being investigated by the Advertising Standards Authority](http://www.pcgamer.com/no-mans-sky-is-being-investigated-by-the-advertising-standards-authority/).
[Bit late there.](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=19661477&postcount=488) 🙂
---
### Author:  [@Skywatcher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skywatcher)
#### Post date: [September 29, 2016, 4:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-mans-sky-first-star-to-the-right-and-straight-on-till-morning/759701/519 "2016-09-29T16:58:32Z")
> [@Richard\_Pearse](#):
>
> It didn’t seem any worse to me than what Peter Molyneux has done promoting the Fable games. Perhaps what saved those games was that, even when stripped of the ridiculous promises, they were relatively deep with a story etc, while NMS was never going to be a deep game. I think that even if NMS had delivered on every little promise, implied and explicit, many gamers would have been disappointed as the reality of the promised gameplay would not have been as engaging as they’d imagined.
>
> I suspect that may be partly what’s happening here. Gamers were expecting to be deeply immersed and many weren’t. Because the game suffered from some hyperbolic marketing it has been easy to blame that for their disappointment, but I think they would have been disappointed anyway.
The thing to keep in mind is the denizens of today’s Internet, many of whom are reluctant to admit even the possibility of being wrong. About anything.
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### Author:  [@Skywatcher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skywatcher)
#### Post date: [September 29, 2016, 5:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-mans-sky-first-star-to-the-right-and-straight-on-till-morning/759701/520 "2016-09-29T17:36:25Z")
> [@Idle\_Thoughts](#):
>
> Let’s all just get back to talking about the game. Understand, everyone, that others might have different opinions than you…and if you really want to get into a heated debate over difference of opinion or any other issues with another poster in this thread, and/or what this means for the person having it… then again, let’s move the discussion to the Pit, please.
>
> This note is for any and everyone involved in the hijack in here causing heated exchange of opinions.
>
> TL;DR version: This topic is about the discussion of the game, let’s everyone quit the sniping at each other. Right now.
>
> Beyond this post, people will start getting warnings if they keep up the heated bickering.
Sorry, wasn’t thinking.
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