It feels like the hype for No Man’s Sky has been as seemingly-infinite as the space exploration game’s often-touted 18.4 quintillion unique planets, ever since the game was announced at the 2013 VGX awards. However, it seems as though a new delay means that fans will have to wait even longer than the game’s previously-scheduled June 21 release date to see if the PlayStation 4 console-exclusive can live up to the hype.
This rumor comes courtesy of a Kotaku report which cites multiple insider sources, including a Gamestop employee who received instructions to update the game’s release date on promotional materials to “Coming Soon.” This news has yet to be confirmed or denied by developer Hello Games or Sony, but Kotaku’s sources say that the game shouldn’t be expected “until at least July or August.”
Frankly, this comes as troubling news for the much-publicized game. No Man’s Sky has managed to captivate gamers for the past three years with a slew of trailers highlighting its beautiful procedurally generated worlds, and has even been featured in many non-gaming outlets. However, this potential delay would confirm many suspicions that the game is having a troubled development, with many critics comparing it to the infamous Spore, the 2008 game by Maxis that also featured procedurally generated space exploration and rode high on pre-release hype, but which ultimately (and unfortunately) lacked any truly substantial content.
Personally, I believe that the game won’t be as great as what has been promised by all of the hyperbolic marketing material, but it also won’t be as bad as what the cynical online critics would have us believe. The game didn’t even have a hard release date until March of this year, so it definitely is concerning for it to be pushed back less than a month before it was due to be out.
Although, due to the relatively short length of this delay, it is likely that this decision was made to give the small team at Hello Games a few extra weeks of bug-fixing, rather than to indicate some greater problem with the project or studio. Realistically, the game will probably fall somewhere in between the two anticipated extremes, and will still be a fun, but not life-changing experience. Until then, fans will have to wait even longer before they can jump into their spaceships and blast off to new orange-tinted worlds.
[Images sourced from Hello Games and Kotaku]
