Being honest, when I first launched, I had a small hiccup with graphic-settings, where for some reason it had an issue when I went to restart the game, in switching to full-screen mode. Ended up having to edit the settings file in the Steam-dir to make it borderless windowed. Was able to play the game for, according to Steam, an 11 hour stretch, without any real issues and everything was excellent, fun, interesting, explorative... this is not only the definite game I've been wanting to play for ages... but even the game I've been dreaming of for the past 20 years. When I was a teenager and used to be more into coding, I used to have ideas of games that could just render, on the fly, procedural-code and functions, to make a gigantic game without much need of mammoth-space and resources to make it work... this is more or less exactly what I would have imagined... starting in space and working down to the planet-level, rather than the other way around.
Devs are already working on updates and additions to the game, which is GINORMOUS! To give an idea of the SCALE of this game: Before buying the game, I was SO excited for it... and found myself watching some PS4 gameplay videos on YouTube... kind of had a semi-idea of places to tighten up on that I'd see other players slip on, or stuff they'd pass by... or so I kind of thought. I had noticed in the journal-screen or whatever, that a lot of planets gave a few hundred thousand units, or more, if you discovered everything on the planet. Well, the planet I started on was awesome... which again, after the above-listed tiny graphics issue I had at first and flipping through some options, I found that if you exited and restarted at the very beginning you can re-renderer everything about the planet you start on. Since I was actually squared away, launched the game, and ended up on a freezing snowing planet... yeah, having grown up most my earlier years in the snow, I was good on that, restarted... and the planet I have now is lush, it's pretty, has neon-green grass with purple-ish and orange like landscape, the creatures are neat looking, the drones are there but only attack if provoked (and sometimes go into attack mode when I mine, which is odd), and findings are plentiful.
This is where the scale comes into play, because I'm not sure if the amount of stuff per planet is semi-set or if it's procedural, but OMG, the first planet I'm on is SO HUGE with SO MUCH TO DO! As I said above, I noticed in videos that if a planet is completed there's a big pay day, and having an enjoyment of being a completionist, I thought I might start off completing the first planet or two. WOW! I can tell you now, the whole 11.5hrs listed up to this point has all been spent on THE FIRST PLANET! I have my ship repaired and ready to shoot into space... but I wanted to try to get everything on the first planet to have the few hundred thousands of credits starter-funds going into the cosmos; which I'm coming to find, with the found junk/sell-loot [like daggers and cubes and such] sold in a decent amount, can make just as many units, and perhaps for that reason, I'm feeling a nudge to move on with the game and maybe come back later, BUT... and this is the critical part...
There's SO MUCH TO FIND... this game is an EXPLORER'S DREAM come TRUE! On just the first planet I've managed to upgrade my ship to a slightly nicer upgrade (another slot, a few more pre-installed functions/weapons) that was found in "downed ship" or whatever map-marker. I've also upgraded my multi-tool TWICE, and I think it's a 12-slot now (looks like an MP5), with a bunch of cool mods, that I crafted onto it. Also learned a TON of tool mods and ship mod (+several language words)... still can't access some of the materials yet to build them... but looking forward to huge mutli-slotted tools/ships that can be loaded to the teeth (it kind of reminds me a slight bit of Kingdom Hearts and the Gummi Ship with its upgrades & such).
But seriously, after 11.5 hours, I'm STILL finding new stuff, on THE SAME STARTER PLANET! And I've barely made, in comparsion I'd imagine, a reasonable dent in the surface of the planet... when I think about how far I've traveled and what I've seen... I can't say that I can recall going in one direction, then realize coming back around the other side as in going all the way around... the planets are HUGE!!!! Which is a GREAT THING! This game is a UNIVERSE-SIMULATOR if there ever was one!!!
From what I've seen in the videos, there are space-stations, there are "space bars" it'd seem, and everything in between... for any that grew up on the classic-game-series "Space Quest" by the *original* Sierra On-Line you OWE IT TO YOURSELF to try this, and be patient with it.
The beauty of this game, is it's the perfect mix. Sure, unlike Empyrion you can't custom-build a ship from scratch (which who knows, that might still be an option later in the game for all I know), and Star Citizen and Elite Dangerous may have quick jaunts through space... but this game finally FEELS RIGHT. As much as I like Empyrion, it always felt sometimes a tad too hands on. I get the premise is being stranded, and having to build the base from scratch... but having to build a ship from scratch, all the way down to the individual tiniest of blocks!?
This game... takes the idea of "virtual-world" and makes it "virtual-universe". I don't even know where to begin... I mean, I'm happy that this game is single-player... but imagine down the road the concept of using the same sort of engine to make a virtual-world/universe... even if not for combat, just for exploration, casual stuff, themed stuff, etc. But I digress, back to where I said feels right. Unlike Empyrion, you don't feel as burnt out having had to find all the materials, grind them all down, craft them back into blocks, then having to make sure you have every component to build a ship, fuel the ship, stock your food and air, and then take off. This feels like a 3D "Space Quest", like when in Space Quest 1, freshly off the Sarien ship, you crash down on the barren planet, to finally make your way to the Monochrome Bar, to also find the cheesy used-ship lot. I mean, don't get me wrong, this game is realistic, so it won't have all the funny/silly stuff that Space Quest had obviously... but with only a tiny bit of imagination, it's really like a 3D version of that series. You come across ships and think to yourself, "yeah, this looks good, this could work", toss your stuff on, do a couple small repairs, fuel 'em up, and off you go!
Also, this game plays the closest to Empyrion I'd have to say. Except the planets here actually do feel alive, feel like the scale of what a planet in a game should feel like, and aren't just a quick few minute or so flight all the way around (the planet I'm on, the Thallium9 or whatever that mineral is, is limited, and it's what fuels my big boosters on my ship, so I've been kind of cruising along at propulsion-speed along the planet, and trust me, IT'S HUGE!)... and unlike Empyrion, it's not like you just whip to a planet, zip around it to see what's worth grabbing, and then have drones and guns that just shoot at you for the sake of shooting at you. In this, you come to each planet, that feels alive, feels large... and you can't just "quickly summarize" everything on the planet, you actually have to scout around, take a look around, feel the planet, take in the beauty, take in the majesty, see what's over the next rise, endulge yourself when you get up over a hill and see something mind-blowing off in the horizon and find yourself going, "WHAT THE HELL IS THAT!?", let your curiosity run wild when you see a plant or animal that you've never seen before and want to scan it, or want to snag a certain mineral to build with.
The universe is your stage in No Man's Sky! ^_^
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