No Man’s Sky: Atlas Rising

I wasn’t sure if I’d ever play No Man’s Sky again following my review back in January. But since then, we’ve had two major content updates, the most recent of which is Atlas Rising. So I decided to hop back in and give it a spin. And I have to say, I’m impressed with how No Man’s Sky has evolved and improved since that disastrous release.

This update includes numerous smaller fixes and quality of life improvements to various aspects of the gameplay and UI. The most substantial addition is a new story campaign to serve alongside the previous Atlas Path quest. It incorporates elements of the previous base building expansion as well as the new faction system. But is it any good? Well, what I played of it was okay, but I didn’t actually finish it for reasons I’ll explain later.

I started a new game with this update to see these changes from the start. I said in my review that it was important for No Man’s Sky to include micro-goals on your journey through the stars. The base building was a key part of this, but the new faction / race reputation and mission system is another important step forward.

Yes, missions. These are randomly generated from one star system to the next and involve a fairly basic rotation of destroying things or delivering things. There’s no complex multi-system/stage missions which could be another potential expansion in the future – further to travel, but greater rewards.

The missions will gain you reputation with new guilds and the existing alien races. And reputation now serves an important purpose, as you must now purchase various technology upgrades from vendors based on your reputation level.

Ships are now defined by class and type with bonuses to shields, damage and hyperdrive range based on their quality. You can also finally rename your ship too. There are new technologies to discover, new materials to harvest and new items to craft. The base building quests have been tweaked and improved and they’ve even added an entirely new ‘exocraft’ facility so you can drive about worlds and harvest on the go.

All of these fixes, improvements and additions both large and small go a long way to making No Man’s Sky the game many always wanted it to be. But it’s not quite there yet. These are all good steps forward, but there’s still plenty of room for improvement.

Most notably, planet terrain and life really needs to be extensively expanded and overhauled. I said in my review that the limited assets mean you’ll see pretty much everything No Man’s Sky has to offer when it comes to alien terrain and life within a matter of hours – and that still hasn’t changed.

So would I recommend No Man’s Sky in its current state? Probably. I put another 30 or so hours into it before I grew rather tired of the repetitive gameplay loop of land, scan, harvest and repeat. Because despite these additions, you’re still going to be doing a lot of tedious grinding for resources in order to continue on.

But I had fun with it, for a time. And I’ve now put 80 hours into a title many considered a disaster upon release. Part of that is because I like my space stuff. And another part is that sometimes you just want a mindless time sink to keep you busy – and No Man’s Sky is a decent option.

That said, I’m pleased No Man’s Sky has kept on going and is slowly winning people over. It was an ambitious title that fell flat on its face but now seems to be picking itself back up. Slowly. One step at a time. It’s nice to see.