Not really a walkthrough. More of an outline of events. There have been so many questions about the missions and it is so difficult to remember the sequence of events. I decided to start a new game and try to make a guide .
Let me know what you think. Forgive the mistakes you may find. I am playing through the game twice. Once for note taking and a second time using the guide to double check it, It is a work in progress so use with caution.
It’s a nice guide. Thorough, and well thought out.
It works well for people experienced in earlier versions, and converting to NEXT.
For new starters, though, I think you might need to flesh it out a bit. There are things that are clear to long-term players, that aren’t necessarily obvious to newbies.
Imagine yourself as a totally new player. Understanding nothing, and with no guidance, or instructions.
Would you understand your guide? And if not, why not?
Please note - this is not an attack, or an adverse criticism. I think you’ve put a lot of work into a good guide. But if your target audience is new starters, then I think they need a lot more information and hand-holding.
Perhaps we could make it a joint project. Perhaps you could be the project leader for a high qualitty NMS Wiki (not monetised, obviously).
Yes. I understand what you are saying and I agree. My inspiration is taken from those who have been playing but find that they missed something along the way or can’t get a mission to trigger and the reason ends up being because they simply forgot something else or didn’t highlight the mission, etc…It gets messy and I would like to see an order established.
Let me get through the thing once completely and then we can see about going back and fleshing it out.
I have found other wikis rather scarce on mission details and that is usually what I am looking for when people ask questions.
Thanks for taking a look at it. Perhaps you can be thinking of ways to flesh it out, . Of course, that means you really need to … START OVER…
Oh God, how many times have I done that? And you want me to do it AGAIN???
You know, you’re right. The 20 or 30 hours at the start is when the game is fun. So I will. I’ll start a new game (or two) But really, the end of that is also where the game falls down. It doesn’t matter how many technical fixes Hello Games throw in. Ultimately, when the game runs out of story, it’s got nowhere to go.
Base building, space battle, money making and exploration only make sense as long as you’re working towards a goal. The open-ended exploration based version of No Man’s Sky has long gone. If Hello Games are going to rely on the current version, then there has to be more, and deeper, story.
Hello Games - advance the story!
In the meantime, the rest of us can occupy ourselves by drumming up a decent guide.
Ageed. We puny humans bore easily. We need direction so we can run like lemmings to our fate.
I do enjoy the building aspect of NMS but it needs more actual carpets and curtains which they actually did add to some of the Vy’Keen outposts.
As you stated, the story line part of the game is the best and I don’t like people getting stuck and then frustrated.
I loved that game, back in the day. One of the most innovative games ever created. It was the basis of much of the modern games industry. EVERYBODY stole their ideas.
Psygnosis, the part developer/part publisher (based in my home town, Liverpool), unfortunately got bought up by Sony, and crushed as a creative force. Corporates can’t handle new ideas -that’s why we need indies. There are some who think Sony also came close to destroying No Man’s Sky. I couldn’t possibly comment.
The other half of the development team (DMA Developments) eventually became Rockstar. And they’re still going, and have made a great deal of money. And some may think that’s because they didn’t get bought up, and shut down, by Sony.
Sony are, in many ways, the successors to Disney. The corporate home of bland, safe, boring (but profitable) culture.
So it’s perhaps ironic that Disney were responsible, in 1958, for the movie that informed the world about lemmings’ tendency to periodically commit mass suicide. A movie, it later turned out, that was entirely faked, staged, and based upon false information.
Well, I’m not a U.S, citizen. So it’s not really my place to comment on American internal affairs. And God knows, my own country is having its own problems with right-wing seperatists.
But when I see Donald Trump on TV announcing that all people coming from South America are criminals bearing disease, and I see whole mass rallies cheering him on, I have to wonder where the source of fake news lies.
Tabloid politics. Paparazzi politicians. People who are angry.
I try to avoid all of them.
Before we go too far off the rails… I derped myself with my own guide last night. I could not hire the Scientist and it didn’t help that new missions kept popping up. I finally realized I failed to place a Science Terminal at my base…added that bit of info to the guide,
It actually worked out well though. The first warp introduces you to Nada and Polo. The second warp garners you a Freighter. After 2 warps, you can then use the Teleporter so going back for the Scientist is simple. My stupidity was a small stroke of genius…
Some things to note as you play through…again… Blueprints and any other items of interest that are discovered at various buildings, in broken machinery and any supply crates. Especially the blueprints.
As you suggested, I have started a new game. I’m recording video of the whole thing, so I can play it back, and grab the details.
It’s quite illuminating. There are a number of subtle changes since I last played a NEXT startup.
Unfortunately, I have started on a fairly toxic planet, which means I have limited time to do things. I suppose I could have re-started (perhaps multiple times) until I got an ideal starter planet, but that feels too much like cheating. So I will soldier on.
The early parts of the current game are much harder than they were at first release. I can well imagine how new players would struggle to survive.
And the instructions, such as they are, are extremely poor, and very confusing. Yes, most people will eventually work it out after they’ve died 3 or 4 times - but I wonder how many new players have given up , and/or refunded, by that point.
So I think a good quality, comprehensive guide is a really necessary addition to the game.
I will make suggestions for your guide, as I become aware of things.
My daughter has had a very difficult time with NMS. She has never completed the story lines. She used the fist part of the guide and was off the planet in 30 minutes. She was elated!
She is part of the reason I am doing this. She has gotten lost and stuck so many times…and yes, she stopped playing because of it.
When I started new, even I was lost for a moment. Not being able to find my ship was harrowing…
I think you will always start on a nasty planet and I think it will always storm on you as you run for the hermetic seal. I am not positive on this. It would be nice to know.
In the release version of NEXT, once you had found your ship, you were sent to find a hermetic seal to repair it. When you got to the site of the hermetic seal, you discovered that you didn’t have a compass or scanner, so you couldn’t find your way back to your ship. Well, not without a lot of difficulty, and that particular section of the game was obviously designed to make it that way. The developers deliberately led you a long way off from your ship, on a hostile world, and left you no obvious way to get back.
Thing was, the original NEXT game sent you to a set of two side by side habitation units. In one unit you found the hermetic seal. What the game didn’t tell you was that in the other habitation you could find the blueprint for the analysis visor, which (when you made carbon nanotubes to repair it), enabled you to find your way back to your ship.
This has now changed. In the latest version, you already have the analysis visor, and you already have the blueprint for carbon nanotubes to repair it. All you need to do is harvest carbon (from plants) to fabricate 1 carbon nanotube, and repair your analysis visor. Then you will have a working compass. You will be able to find your ship, and you will be able to perform basic scans of creatures, plants, and minerals.
This ia a good example of what I was talking about earlier. The puzzle to find the visor was good game design, but spoiled by poor instructions. The fix was worse - rather than improve the instructions, the developers just removed the puzzle.
I have been watching your conversation with interest, as I myself was considering doing a ‘getting started’ playthrough.
I chose not to as each massive update alters everything.
However;
I think a NEXT based guide would be surely benifit a newer or confused player. I’m 100% supportive of your efforts.
I would suggest that perhaps it could be written as a brief explanation of what each step requires and why you are doing it, plus a listing of amounts of resource required.
In particular a quite detailed ‘Survival Manual’ for the first ‘Get Launched’ part of the game.
An introduction to what is about to happen after you first Initialise might be nice.
Maybe you could include little tips such as:
Explaining that each planet has one of 4 hazards which wear out your suit shielding and that oxygen & sodium are vital to your survival. Mention how to find them.
Quite detailed playthrough step by step directions for those first few vital minutes when you are at your most vulnerable.
On the Hermetic Seal fetch quest, just after start-up, you always have to go a short distance to trigger the storm, then retreat to your ship (or handy cave).
Varying your direction of travel while doing the Hermetic Seal quest, increases your chances of finding life-saving resources or crates with goodies.
*Laser mining smaller objects/plants while moving forward allows you to gain resorces while reducing time spent standing still as your suit drains.
Hitting objects/plants saves carbon use & is the only way to acquire carbon if you run your multitool dry.
and later
Explore the system first, before sellecting your 1st base computer location so as to hopefully start on a friendlier planet.
Placing a first base near an NPC Minor Settlement, (with its convienient free-launch landing pad & Galactic Terminal), will help reduce grinding early on.
Avoid sellecting a new multitool until _after- the Armourer missions, to avoid giving away your hard sought upgrades when forced to change weapons. This involves not installing the boltcaster until you actually require it for base missions. (Shortly after, you recieve the damaged but easily fixed multitool and after that you are free).
Explain the module upgrades, the use of nanites and how to aquire them (including a list of possible resources and amounts required).
I’m happy to join in and contribute if you want a third source of input & tips. I recently started a new Permadeath save and nothing gets you quite as nervous as knowing all your hard efforts can be lost in a simple mistake.
Yes. My son pointed this one out to me. He told me I messed up, but I chose to leave the AV until the story prompts you to install it since it makes more sense that way. It is kinda funny when you find you have been doing what you were told to do and then you suddenly realize you can’t find your ship. It adds to the suspense.
It is a work in progress so use with caution.
. Of course, that means you really need to … START OVER… 
Blueprints and any other items of interest that are discovered at various buildings, in broken machinery and any supply crates. Especially the blueprints.
