No Man’s Sky is the epitome of a feel-good story of game development, a better redemption arc than Boromir. The now-iconic space game was a mess at launch, riddled with bugs and boring gameplay. However, developer Hello Games knuckled down and got to work improving things. After a lot of hard work, the game slowly brought players back on board. Once the base game was interesting, the team started expanding the experience. More vehicles, mechs, aliens, mechanics, bases… more everything, really. No Man’s Sky went from being a punchline to a legitimately good game that you can while away hours in without even realising, and now it’s celebrating its ninth birthday with some aliens that you can bring into your own home.
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