Sony Exec Responds to No Man's Sky Controversy

"We've learned that we don't want to stifle our ambitions. We don't want to stifle creativity."

... ... ...

"Oh, and we don't want to deliver mods for Fallout 4 on time, because all of my statements only apply to this one product, and I'm a massive hypocrite. Bai!"

Sounds like a guy who actually understands the hardships of game development. I wonder how many of the people pouring out hate on Hello Games and NMS have actually published a game...

"something that had never been done in gaming" Uhhhh, minecraft? And there are other games that have made use of procedural generated content so that wasn't a new concept.

Too bad they get to keep your money with absolutely zero recourse when they "don't quite make it all the way there"

The sense of entitlement to our money that software developers and publishers have is what is going to ultimately drive this industry into oblivion. There is very little incentive to create a good game as long as you hype it up and refuse to give refunds on the garbage they release.

Corporate speak for "thanks for the money....sucka"

This is why I wait for reviews. I don't care too much about scores, but I do like to know what's included in the final product. I honestly don't care about what happened with No Man's Sky and I would never be nervous about buying any other Hello Games title. I wasn't affected by any of this "controversy". For their next game, I will just wait for reviews to see what's included in the box/download.

I was so excited about No Man's Sky, Mafia 3, and Dishonored 2 this year. I'm still just playing Overwatch, because No Man's Sky isn't what I wanted, Mafia 3 has too many problems to count, and now I have to wait even longer to find out what's going on with Dishonored 2. I just rather let other people get disappointed instead of me. I can wait and maybe play broken/incomplete games when they're super cheap, and they'll probably be in better shape further down the road anyways.

Fingers crossed for Dishonored 2. I won't be playing unless it's worth my money/time.

The medias are at fault for promoting this walk simulator.

I'm calling BS

While I genuinely like NMS, I really don't believe it was worth the premium price that was charged for it. If it had the features that were suggested, hinted at and outright promised, it might have been, but as it is, it's a $30 indie game that was priced like it was a AAA game from a major developer. Sony sitting there and telling us the developers had a great vision doesn't help the matter. Lots of people have vision. We don't pay for having a vision, we pay for the delivery of a vision. And NMS does not deliver, however grand the ambition of the developer.

While I won't dispute most of what the exec says, I think most of us who felt so let down was a result of being promised features that were never in the final product. I'd have no issue at all if hello games had released it for the slightly lower price and had clearly stated that what murray said IS NOT IN THE GAME ON RELEASE but will hopefully be added later. This at least would've been honest. Sure I'm a complete sucker for preordering and it's a lesson well learnt I assure you!

What now adds salt to thewound is the sheer lack of any comments from hello games, let alone sean murray. I'm well aware the game still has a relatively large fan base still and they believe that NMS will one day be everything we were told, it just baffles my brain when we try to positive about the whole issue when it really, truly feels like those of that played simply got played ourselves. I will not be purchasing anything from this company again, even when they no doubt rebrand themselves eventually and after all the NMS controversy is swept quietly under the carpet.

I platinumed the game and enjoyed doing it. It was different and a relief from the sequelitis that permeates the industry. Wasn't the greatest game ever made, but not as bad as the haters on Reddit made it out to be.

No Man's Sky is a descendant of a genre of games involving starships, acting as traders, mercenaries, or explorers. That genre began with Star Trader in 1974. But the most influential game in the history of the genre, featuring 3D graphics and procedurally generated worlds, was Elite, in 1984. You could play it on a Commodore 64.

So the very features the Sony exec described as unprecedented are among the oldest game design techniques there are, and was present in more sophisticated games thirty years ago.

And, to reiterate what others have said, it's absurd to talk about Sony's hopes about what the game may eventually become. It's a published game with almost none of its advertised features, not a disappointing pilot for a new TV show. This is far beyond a few missed features that can be filled in with some DLC.

so they wanna sell "an ambition" of six with 59,99? how much for a finite product?

Well, as a King Astronaut Doctor, I like to command my subjects to make grilled cheese sandwiches for me. It's a complete rip off to pay for bread with crust on it when it's just going to be cut off and thrown at commoners. Ewwwww, crust.

The hacker was right. No Man's Sky was nothing more than an attempt to make a quick buck without earning it by scamming gamers.

To me, the fact that they charged $59.99 for it shows that they knew it wasn't going to work. This should have been a $19.99 game. I know some will say even that's to expensive. Regardless, that's what it should have costed.

Too little, too late. I hate you Sony and Hello Games. You took a perfectly good thing and ruined it due to impatience and greed.

I just don't care anymore. Relationship is dead. I've moved on. Lets not be just friends...

it wasn't a very good game, there were bits missing.

The entire answer is beside the point. This is acceptable if the question was "Everyone had high hopes for No Man's Sky, why did it got canceled?".

The point is, game wasn't ready. It was arguably at half of it's development cycle. When Sony got involved they should've brought their dev power into the team, increased the budget, get more people and finish the feature set. It didn't have to be perfect but it certainly had to be much fuller and richer than it was.

Instead it was an empty shell of a game that was sold as a full game at a very high premium and worst of all, it was ADVERTISED as such.

So, to come back to the article, this answer is unacceptable. Spin city all over.

What's the big deal. Ubisoft continually releases crappy games created by an army of developers. Six guys coming up a little short on their first attempt seems forgivable.

Like I said before, Sony is using Hello Games/Sean Murray as scapegoat for the bad decision making. Is not Sean Murray's fault that they were pressured into releasing this game

This Sony D-hole speaking in circles to not fully come out and say, "the game was garbage, but i'm contractually obligated to say it was great". Do you think they'll ever get the correct number of people who helped make the game? This guy says 6 people, and others have said ranges from 12-20 (I think SM said it was 15 if i'm remembering correctly). They seem to lower the number each time to maybe make us feel bad for them and their discrepancies.

And as a car salesman, it's perfectly acceptable to sell a car without air conditioning after telling the customer there is air conditioning.

No Mans Sky will be remembered by gamers for all the wrong reasons. It's going to take more than some base building dlc to fix that shit.
My only regret is not refunding when I had the chance. Expecting the updates and dlc to come in hot and heavy. Now I shake my head when I see the logo.

Bottom line is that this game should never have retailed at 60 bucks. It just isn't worth that kind of asking price for what you're getting.

No Mans Sky unfortunately, will be remembered for all the wrong reasons. Ranking as one of the biggest hyped cons in video game history.

It doesn't matter what your job is. The foundation of trust are promises that come true. If you promise your customers something and sell them that thing, then they better get it "as advertised".

One of the biggest insults I find to gamers is that the E3 trailer is still a video on display on their Steam store page!

i just find murray's lack of communication so insulting. i can't think of another company that hasn't at least attempted to mitigate damage in some way.

"Nobody in development wants to say that they can't do a thing, right?"

But you can't say you'll do the thing in your advertising and not do it. No matter how it feels, you shouldn't mislead consumers.

Speaking as a senior indie developer, I can't disagree with Layden more. My team try our best to keep the projects within scope, budget and schedule. I remind my guys repeatedly not to overhype, and when we try something outlandish, it would be in the form of a prototype and not production code of a $60 game.

If dreams and visions are what you have for sale, may I suggest the real estate or the snake oil industry?

**** this guy. Murray was never talking about a vision. He was asked "Does that exist" and he said yes. He said there are features in the game that never were. He didn't state that it wass planned, a vision or anything. So **** the Sony guy trying to protect Hello Games

The game was fun for some people. But for most, they lost interest after a couple hours, and that is a rip off for the crazy 60 dollar pricetag they put on this game. Not to mention the really bad crashes that happened on both the console and PC versions.

If they had charged 10-15 dollars for this game, there would be no controversy. The last couple weeks i've finally got around to playing Batman Arkham Knight, and the game is long as hell and is filled with content, and yet costs the same as no mans sky? I'm only around 60% done the game and put in over 25 hours so far and haven't even done the DLC or most of the optional missions...

If a person buys something and gets no fun or gameplay out of it, thats the problem with no mans sky. It has nothing to it, it has no storyline, bad gameplay and it costs the same as much much better games.

If they didnt lie about it, we wouldnt be having this conversation or if they weren't lying, they certainly were bending the truth slightly and the bent truth sold them a LOT of copies of the game.