Yes, no, kinda, and sort of. There are multiple galaxies that people are spread over, Euclid probably being the most populated. You can turn multiplayer off as well (well worth doing unless you specifically want to play with others) which goes a long way to making things easier to work with. In the normal game you play in your own instance for that vast majority of the time with only certain systems being designated as community systems where you will find other people. The Anomaly space station that you can call into any system is also a community hub and you will see others in there (unless you have turned off multiplayer of course). For the expedition stuff, these will all take place in community systems so things can get a little crowded and doing things like placing a base or geocraft bay can be a little difficult, again turning off multiplayer can help here. It's a bit of a shame as the expeditions are meant to be a community event, it's just that the distribution of the starting points over the plant surface has not been done that well this time around, but that's mainly because there is a need for base building this time. If there was no need to do that then it would have been a LOT easier. But in general gameplay, you will be quite lucky to run into another player unless you are on a community planet (some main game quests lead you there), or if you are on the Anomaly.
The modes create different instances, so if you found a system you really liked in Creative mode, built some stuff, took note of the co-ordinates, and then made a Survival save and went to the same place - you wouldn't see any of the Creative mode stuff you'd built. However, if you found somewhere cool in Normal mode on Steam, for example, built a base, then got on Xbox (for example, again) Normal mode and went to the same place, you would see what you'd built (assuming you'd uploaded it). There are still some weird issues with the instancing though, like on Steam I have a base on a planet that's super chill and 20C most of the time, gets a bit nippy at night, but otherwise great. When I visit on my Xbox account it's an actual Hell world with almost non-stop storms... It's such a shame you have to turn off multiplayer for Expeditions to be playable because the first one was really fun seeing people and bases everywhere. But I started that one straight away and soon enough had to switch mp off. Mainly for the message boxes, there were SO MANY messages on Exp. 1!
Ah yes, the message beacons.... So much fun.... Actually I found them to be quite useful on the 2nd and 3rd expeditions as the change in game mechanics where you don't actually get given coordinates, but rather a general location where you then have to land and scan only to find out that you have another 1ku of distance to slog in that general direction over there, meant that some folks had dropped a message beacon near the actual point, or even a base with a handy landing pad or two meant that you can find these places a lot easier.
A 7.8GB update came through for the Steam version last night, although I think that might have been another experimental build rather than a full patch. I have not had a dig through the patch notes just yet, but I am really hoping that it fixes the buried construction terminal bug that I am still having. I cannot build anything at my settlement as the last building that I tried spawned it's building location with the terminal inside some raised ground. The problem being that the terrain manipulator cannot be used within a settlement so I can't get at the terminal to build and there is no way to cancel the build or move it elsewhere. So, until I can either move it, cancel it, finish it, or until the hill moves (it has lowered a bit over the past couple of weeks) then I can't build anything at all. I can do the other stuff like make decisions and welcome visitors, but I can't expand anymore. Although, sod's law says that the next building will just be another landing pad, I already have 4...
I read your updates in this thread sporadically, jusy fyi. I suspect others do too. In case the lack of visible engagement discourages you. I only revisit NMS occasionally but when I do, I check in here to see the state of things, so thank you for posting these informational bits.
No worries, this isn't the most active thread, but that's all good. I think the crossover point between the circles that are No Man's Sky players and People That Still Use Forums is pretty small.
Expeditions 4 has just started up: Giant friken' sand worms!!!!! (and you get to have one as a pet as the final reward...) Fingers crossed that mistakes from number 3 have been learned and improved upon... And I just happen to have next week off.... Don't think I will need it though as number 2 and 3 have only taken me just over 5 hours of gameplay each.
So I managed to make a pretty good start on expeditions 4 last night, getting through the first 2 stages and a little into the third before being tapped on the chest by a small cat wanting cuddles... So far, I am very impressed, it is a LOT better than the third one was. You actually feel like you are getting somewhere quite quickly as you take off and warp quite early on in the first stage. The huge worms are awesome (aside from the screen shake...) and they are not too hard to take down once you find a nest (each stage requiring taking down one nest, the whole thing being sort of a hunt themed affair with a bit of a twist) as you can generally tank the worms that are popping up out of the ground. There are a couple of annoying parts such as the distance needed to be warped between the systems that you are visiting. These will require multiple jumps so you will need to be making quite a lot of warp fuel. Oh, quick bit of advice for one of the sections in stage 2, you are required to survive travelling 3000u during a heat storm for one of the badges. You have to be on foot and running, not jumping, not using your jetpack, but actually on foot. I found a trading post on a hot planet, landed and waited for a storm. Then I just ran laps around the landing pad for 3000u. Took me a storm and a half to do it and I never went far from my ship. Another badge requires that you get hold of 4000 nanites, if you have enough gained from damaged machinery, refining goop into mould and then into nanites or just from selling the upgrade modules that you get given then you can simply buy upgrades at a space station then immediately sell them back and it counts as receiving nanites. Some of the rewards seem good fun as well, such as the fireworks that shoot out slime and flesh blobs or the slime trail for your jetpack. So far, so good. Definitely enjoying it better than the third and it seems to have more meaning and story to it than the second.
Sounds a bit like Lost Planet. In fact I just clocked that there's a lot of Lost Planet's DNA in NMS and it explains why I like NMS so much.
Right then, just finished Expedition 4 and I have to say that I was a little disappointed. Still well worth doing mind you as the whole giant flying worm thing is very cool (especially after being able to ride once once you are all done, and they really are HUGE - Dune Sandworm huge). In the trailer, the expedition was being touted as the first one to have a narrative to it with some lore for the worms and a cult and stuff. Meh, just a data entry when you went to a planetary archive and that was about it. I was hoping for something that might include a settlement and having to talk with cult members, that sort of thing. OK, so the data entry was worth reading and it did give a good bit of background colour, but I don't think it is going to add anything into the main game once you are all done and back on your primary save, but we shall see. I have also been poking around my settlement again and expanding it as much as I can, and I have started to notice a few bits and pieces that I think could do with some attention. For example, the game tells you that you can go around and talk to the residents, great, you can do this, but for what reason? It does nothing other than to have one say Hi or something equally impactful (or not). Also a lot of the small buildings that you can construct (did a generator room today, had a atmospheric monitor building yesterday) are empty when built, there is no indication of what they are actually meant to be used for, no generators or scientific equipment, just seems a little pointless and empty other than adding another building to your settlement that once you have had your initial nosey inside will never go in again. The settlements are a great addition to starting to make the planets seem a bit more alive, and I hope that things will grow into having large cities on them at some point, but at the moment, they look great from the outside, but largely pointless.
Quick heads up for anyone who is interested, the expeditions are all coming back. Starting today (I think) with the first one. Each one being available again for 2 weeks:
The timetable for the Expedition re-runs: Expedition 1 (Pioneers): 24th November - 7th December Expedition 2 (Beachhead/Normandy): 8th December - 21st December Expedition 3 (Cartographers): 22nd December - 4th January Expedition 4 (Emergence): 5th January - 19th January I got the first couple done on Steam, one done on Steam & Xbox, and the last one only on Xbox. So I'll be trying to get them all on both now so I can use all the cosmetics in either place
I just missed out on the first one so I shall be cracking on and getting that one done over the next week or so. There have been a few little updates pop up recently as well, nothing like the multi-GB ones that we have had over the year, just a couple of 50MB ones here and there with some small fixes and turning the expedition back on. Still wondering (like everyone else) about the station override console though. We did get an override code as a reward in the 3rd expedition (I think), but it looks like that feature had been disabled, probably a issue with it or something. Meh, oh well, we shall see what pops up over next year. There are still a lot of things that people are calling out for, with things like more customisation for our ships, being able to scrap ships and get blueprints or parts for building or working on a "project" ship. There is still a long way to go with the settlements, especially with things like the interaction with the settlers - currently speaking to them does nothing other than a bit of dialogue that has no effect. I am personally hoping that they lead to a way that large cities can be integrated. Personally I would also like to have pre-built or pre-designed blueprints for a base layout. Everything that I have built so far has been built as more of a necessity than as something that looks decent. Personally, I would prefer to have my base and workers all in areas of my freighter and "live" a life that is purely space-bound with planet visits being just that, visits.
I finished Pioneers on Xbox at the last minute, signed in on Steam to see which ones I had to do there, and noticed I can no longer claim some Expedition things as it thinks I didn't complete them now. I definitely did! It looks like a bunch of stuff now says I need to just do Phase 5 of each expedition. So I guess I give up on trying to get it all on both platforms. RIP my Steam NMS account I'm wondering if it's going to make me do them all again and it's going to just remove any that I did the first time around. I don't have the time, or desire, to do each one twice AGAIN. At least it's this way around though, I can always use a save editor on PC. I'll just re-do everything on Xbox to make sure I keep them all there. I also can't play on PC at all because the controller config is absolutely screwed and I cannot fix it. I've tried applying all sorts of configurations, but when I try and use them everything's backwards. Very frustrating! Never mind, think I fixed it! Deleted the 'Input' folder and had NMS re-download it.
I was just going to mention the save editor that's available for PC. The latest version allows you to change just about everything, including the rewards that are tied to your account such as the expedition and Twitch rewards. Definitely useful if you have a problem like that. I used it to add in the rewards from the Pioneers expedition before I knew that they were coming back like this, worked perfectly like they had always been there.
Well, I bit the bullet and did Expedition 1 yesterday on PC again I was really regretting it at midnight when I only had Explorer's Guild and Storm Crystals left (really weird that I managed to avoid all the Extreme Weather planets on this save, and yet I found an uncharted abandoned system really fast!). I just wanted to go to bed, I was really bored of warping around between Korvax systems trying to find Explorer's Guild stuff that wasn't killing cute animals. Ended up getting the last 3 as kill 15 animals and just apologized to each one and got all 3 done at the same time!
Oh boy, we got another update!! Tweet— Twitter API (@user) date It looks pretty incredible! I won't be able to get on until muuuch later tonight as I have to download it on PC and Xbox and my Internet is sloooow.
