Hello Games Tweets: 'No Man's Sky Was a Mistake'

That's no mans sky 2 nailed for release then.

I just hope they're quietly making the game awesome so I can go back to playing it. It seems like it could be the foundation of something really special.

I really feel for the guys personally. The way I see it (and I may be wildly wrong) is that they started crafting something pretty awesome. Sony jumped in with big boots and a massive PR campaign, made promises that the little indie team couldn't fulfil and left them to struggle once it launched...whilst the money poured in. Like I say, I may totally wrong but that's my take.

I may also add that I didn't buy it so don't have anything to feel disgruntled about. If I'd sunk £50 into it I may not have been quite as understanding

@get2sammyb you may well be right, just my take. I just get the feeling that they got swept up with the 'wow this is awesome, its gonna be bigger than anything else ever!' that they were hearing everywhere and have become a victim of their own success.

If the account was hacked, that's the most boring use of a hacked account ever. Why even bother? NMS was a mistake. Booooorrrrrr-iiiinnnnnggggg zzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

I'm going with inside job. 1 of those, what was it, 3 guys, is just having a bad day. Who hasn't tweeted something they instantly regret? If you haven't, you aren't doing it right.

@get2sammyb
I honestly don't think Sean's the kinda bloke that can enjoy his millions knowing everyone and his mom pooped all over his brainchild.

I myself would look at NMS's message boards in my huge mansion laughing my ass off, just before taking the Lambo and driving off into the sunset, but I somehow don't think he's taking this very well... or he's the best damn actor in the world and deserves every penny for this elaborate scheme!

@KratosMD they must be absolutely crushed...by the weight of all that cash!

Seriously, though, it;s so hard to know what to think about it all. I doubt Murray will ever truly acknowledge the accusations being hurled their way. Maybe one day he'll say that, yeah, maybe it wasn't quite what they were pushing, but I think it's more likely they'll stay quiet and move on to something else. Most people tend to stick by their guns in these situations. All they have to do is say, 'well I guess it just wasn't your kind of game!' and put it down to taste rather than the perceived lack of features (though it seems pretty obvious from all his vids that they definitely bailed on promised features).

OT, I doubt this is a disgruntled employee. No one's been fired from the dev team right? So what's there to be disgruntled about? It doesn't make sense that you'd tweet something potentially damaging to your employer because other people didn't like what you made. A hack by a disgruntled player seems most likely. Or a cry for help from Mr. Murray perhaps....

Sounds like Murray got blasted on some high priced liquor and had a moment of clarity.

Putting the money to one side, I feel really sorry for hello games. They are clearly passionate about what they do. Maybe they got overexcited in the lead up to NMS, but the pressure must have been enormous on such a small team with all the hype that developed around the game. Personally didn't buy NMS because it always looked exactly what it turned out to be from early videos in my opinion. That said, having not played it, I am not in a position to judge whether gamers were misled or not.

However, I really enjoyed their work on Joe Danger and its sequel, and they always seemed like good guys. Hope they are all doing OK, because some of the fallout from NMS has been horrendous.

Wow wasn't expecting this... I always felt the game was interesting and with awesome tech behind it. It's more what people wanted / believed it to be that hurt its perception. Sony made a big deal out of it after the reactions at E3 but Sean's interviews really overpromised and did no expectation control at all. I am glad the game exist though, it sparked an awesome debate and will surely pave the way for titles fulfilling some of the expectations people had.

Also, for anyone after this sorta game, Osiris New Dawn just launched and it looks insane! Kinda NMS on cattle grade steroids... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GxpSz2CzOko

@get2sammyb ''I mean, I'm upset if I work hard on a YouTube video for an hour and it gets a dislike. I can't even imagine what it must be like for a small team to shoulder what's happened with No Man's Sky.''

I mean, that is fair, but you didn't ask us to pay for you video and you didn't make promises that weren't true. I think that the response from the gaming community was deserved. Whether they're fine with or not is a completely different issue altogether. I hope it's a good lesson to any developer to make any promises that you can't deliver. Or hire a PR team!

Anyway, I think their account got hacked. Can't imagine someone tweeting something like this, regardless of how they feel about the situation.

If this is actually from Hello Games then they NEED to get over themselves, they made many mistakes, but now is the time to rectify those mistakes, bring out expansions add what was promised include new mechanics and the such bring it back to what was imagined by the Devs initially.

What a mess.

Oh and what rsco6969 said. Their silence prior to today has done them no favours at all.

@fullyilly Sony didn't promise anything, they showed off what Hello Games showed them, the game sold gangbusters and so sony did their job, Hello Games are to blame for any false claims.

Sony must be well happy, you know....

They have just released the ps4 slim with U4, DC and NMS as pack in games. Way to go Hello games.

@get2sammyb

Now would be the perfect time to use the most versatile word in the English language, but alas, I've learnt my lesson.

He either was hacked, had been drinking or is just really depressed. I personally didn't buy the game, but a friend of mine purchased it and we both thought it just had no direction, no story...I think the Devs made a brilliant game world with nothing to do but collect minerals and such to travel to another planet and collect more materials. If they had incorporated some kind of actual gameplay other than just monatony, they would have had a cool game. Give us a story with something to fight or anything and they did hype this game up massively. Murray went on all the late night shows and showed off the game, which I don't think I've very seen for a video game. So, I do think they robbed some people's money so to speak.

@get2sammyb @Neolit

They could still fix all of it, and then some, by adding free VR to the main game. Not some tacked on mini game, but the full game in VR. I still can't believe that Sony didn't put their best engineers and some millions behind it to make that work; NMS VR would not only redeem Hello Games instantly, it would be PSVR's Wii Sports.

@Neolit Well said. I can understand some of the vitriol aimed at them, the game and Sony, and compiled Youtube clips don't exactly look great vs what we got. Do I regret buying it? No. Did I enjoy it? Yes. Am I still playing it? No.

VR please.

I don't feel bad for them. It's not like they just happened to release an ambitious but lousy game and that made people bully them. If this was another Mass Effect 3 situation, where gamers were just acting like entitled brats because they didn't like the direction the game went, I would feel very sorry for them. But Murray lied through his teeth about multiple major aspects of the game. If this happened in any other industry, people would call it for what it really is: fraud and false advertising.

Well damn. 😕

He really needs to go on a PR course.

@Stonefate I think you might be on the money with the second option. Considering the story is everywhere now, a jokey answer like binge-watching something probably ain't the way forward.

@Ralizah exactly.

I dont ever like seeing people lose work, their art ridiculed and the like, but thats not whats happening here.

You cant expect to lie about integral and fundamental aspects of a product, sell that product on false hopes and such and not recieve criticism.
I mean, a perfect example being "if two people have the same coords, they can play with each other"
Which was subsequently proven false, to which they had no legitimate reason.
Because they are a small developer, they are not exempt from the same standards and criticisms of anyone else.

Lets hope they can resolve its issues and win back some favour.

@Neolit Yup, would be very good. I mean, I love EVE Valkyrie, but sometimes, I just wanna fly in space.

@ToOGoodOfAPlaya To be fair, or not, that WAS written on the original box sleeve, then covered up. So it's likely that when he made the statement, it was in the game. That said, they never clarified and we are back to ground NMS. PR!

A simple hacked tweet may not be much for most people but for a small studio that has already lost plenty of fans from a dishonest release, this could be shattering. Hopefully they recover.

@Neolit thats true to an extent.
I paid for the product based on what I was told to expect from it by those that created it.
Which is an informed decision based on information received at the time.

If that information is in fact falsified to ANY degree, I have still already purchased the product based on information I believed to be true.
It not being so is NOT my fault, and I should only shoulder the responsibility of believing said information.

Unless you are suggesting I should ignore all information ever given to me about a product?

My purchasing the game does not absolve those that misinformed me of any wrongdoing.

I throughly enjoyed my time in NMS (well over 50 hours and the Atlas path finished) it's not the greatest game ever made the exploration was good and the space battles were a blast. i know its not to everyones taste but the hate it got was massively undeserved imo.

@Neolit
Agreed, look at young uns having kittens and foaming at the mouth about Tomb Raider because they had to wait for the final product, fully patched with all DLC, then they moan when they pre-order a game and get burned "because it isn't finished".

@RPE83 Right! I bet I'll have a lot of fun with NMS sooner or later. I can wait. Everyone can wait. I waited months and months before buying most of my games and the only result was that I spent less money for better games.

I still think it's an inside job, the pieces don't fit otherwise for me.

First post is bad, gets taken down.
Email response saying, yeah it was me, PMS day.
New joking tweet saying we were hacked.

If the first tweet got taken down, doesn't that mean they either regained control of the tweet or shut it down? And the timing of the email and the 2nd tweet would mean somebody who hacked into both twitter and their email account would have to be pretty on the ball to keep a con rolling along like that over 2 accounts in a timely fashion. That's not just on a whim.

I think the email and tweets are from the same inside guy and he's having a nervous breakdown. Sad but true.

@Rob_230 Thing is, I bought into the hype, I preordered the game. Yes I know, Shame on me for not waiting. I liked it initially, but it wasn't the game we all were promised or waiting for. Look at the interviews less than few months from release vs the actual game. They lied and cheated all of their fan base and have since gone dark. There is a BIG F U to the gamers when you reach the center of the universe.

@rjejr Good point re timing of events here.

I still don't understand why people fell for the NMS hype. It was never going to hold up.

Say what you all like about Hello Games. I got far more than my £50 worth out of the game. It passed the couple of weeks I expected it too. I didn't get burned and the game released worked better than most AAA titles I've bought. Would like some updates etc like anyone else but this bad mouthing is uncalled for imho.

@Neolit No. I'm sorry, but you're very, very wrong. The developers lied about very basic aspects of the game. On multiple occasions. That's fraud. It's not childish to call fraud what it is. He doesn't get a pass because Hello Games is a small developer.

That's not "black and white" thinking. That's not "childish." That's common sense.

Please keep in mind that I'm not talking about the way the media and gamers generated hype about the game. I don't care about that. I'm talking about the developers very specifically lying about key features of the game.

I must be in the small silent minority's on this game. I really like it, and it's exactly what I was expecting. It the perfect change of pace for me after hours of Destiny, Uncharted, Tomb Raider and my VR. But, I also didn't follow every post and update on the game, so I didn't know what all was promised versus what all was delivered. I hope they add VR support at some point, but until then, I'm happy with whatever updates they put in the game. Cheers to Sean and his staff at Hello Games....I know they worked hard in this and I'm sure they will be fine and come back again with another great game.

@Bad-MuthaAdebisi I'm just glad I didn't get it.

Game should be on the 3rd or so update by now...
Being a small team is no excuse anymore! They didn't add ANYTHING or talked about it since almost release date.
No wonder after so many sales the number of players is low low low...
Shame!
And then Sean Murray only talks about the hack...pahahahahahah! That's making fun of people that spent 60 euros for half a game.
I was having fun with it and I defended Hello Games because I knew the updates were coming....but now, no more! They deserve to get the hate...

@Neolit I agree with you in some things but please...Sean Murray LIED! Check youtube videos about it...NPC space battles you can join, he said yes, not in the game. Dinosaur-like gigantic creatures, not in game. Fly to any direction, have you seen what happens when u fly to the edge of a galaxy? I don't know, so many things he said YES to that are not in the game...at least he could answer 'well, we are trying' or just 'maybe'...but he said yes to basic things that are not in game. That's a lie...

@Ralizah I agree with you 100% man! The lies are just gigantic!

@Chris0160 yeah to be fair, I read up on the center of the universe stuff and it is pretty insulting. I really hope my comments didnt come across as smug in any way because I didnt buy into the hype, and I do sympathise with the gamers who feel misled. I think my point is more that ive been horrified at how a small minority of people on the Internet behave. I believe hello games had death threats and all sorts. I do appreciate that the game was mis-sold and can understand why people were upset though

Sean Murray says they were hacked, but honestly who can believe a word of what he says anymore?

I enjoyed it. Bought a hard copy. Got the platinum and traded it in for half what I paid for it. Nothing earth shattering but then I didn't expect it to be. Think the sheer amount of hysterical hyperbole about the game is somewhat overblown. Molyneux never got savaged like this and he has committed far worse hype crimes.

Just saying they knew what they put out . Made the cash and ran.

The hacker also deleted the patch that was going to add a lot more content too right?

@Rob_230 Smug? No, it doesn't come out as smug. They had a few death threats which is way over the top. It became so bad at one point the subreddit for the game was temporarily shutdown, due to all the hate the gamers had for them. There is also another subreddit dedicated trying to get the portals working. It's still an ok game but, not much to do.

I enjoyed No Man's Sky. Paid £50 for it. Don't regret it one bit.

I would assume the radio silence prior to this tweet, was them going back to their roots. Just go back, work on this badass update and make sure it works on all platforms Day 1.

People need to drop the hate. Just let those of us that enjoy the game enjoy it and move on.

haha stupid kids and teens who are hyped about this episode can suck my a**!! im just enjoying this failure tbh

@hieveryone Such edge.

@Chris0160 yeah that was my fear. Everything i saw leading up to release suggested that there just wasn't enough to do in the game. The tech is so clever, but to me I was never clear what the point was. And it seems that the reason for that is that there wasn't anything to show. Such a shame. Hopefully this will be a lesson to devs about how to market their games in the future

@get2sammyb I like your youtube videos sammy.

But Sean Murray was on everything with his vague answers the game comes out it's like the bearded one never existed.

NMS looks like it'd be a fun little indie game at £10 or £15. At least it has gameplay in it, unlike those painfully hipster walking simulators that everybody goes to the rapture over. At a reasonable price people would probably think fondly of it, like they did FTL, which was also procedurally generated and repetitive.

But for the AAA price they're still asking - no furring way! I don't spend £46 on anything but top quality games. That's the price of 100 packets of Sheba!

@shafedog247 it's not a small minority, it was/is an ace game. What isn't ace is that is wasn't a 14.99 game.

@neolit spot on mate. If you HAD followed it, and had a brain, and still CHOSE to be offended by the final game, you are your own enemy and a part of this sad generation :/

I had fun with NMS, just accepted it for what it was. Can't really complain. Worth paying full price, to me. That said, I think the game was EXACTLY what was advertised, a procedurally generated universe about exploring and cataloging. I don't know why people saw the advertisements and thought anything else.

I do think they had - and clearly continue to have - a shamefully painfully terribad PR problem.

Also, what @neolit said

For a hacked tweet, something far more problematic could have been posted. "No Man's Sky was a mistake," is seriously weak.
Lucky for them it wasn't worse.

http://www.forbes.com/forbes/welcome/?toURL=http://www.forbes.com/sites/erikkain/2016/10/28/that-mysterious-deleted-no-mans-sky-tweet-wasnt-a-hack/&refURL=&referrer=#5f4b48bc35ef

Still seems a bit fishy to me. Don't know if they were hacked or not, but they even handled this poorly.

@Ralizah Read the back of the case before you buy. It says 1 player and i heard them say it's a singleplayer game multiple times. You know games change in development.

@LieutenantFatman Well if you see what happens now i think it's a smart thing.

@hadlee73 If you haven't noticed internet people have two modes.
1: "omg, this is gonna be so awesome. I'm super hyped/ this was the best game ever"
and 2. "this is garbage. Worst game ever".

There's usually nothing in between. So when hey hate on something, they hate passionately. And they hold a grudge because they want to blame someone else for their mistake (would it have killed them to wait a week before buying a new IP?).

Not sure if it's a thing of our time, but they sure do remind me of children. Just because some people grow older, doesn't mean they are growing up. They're even incapable of having a civil debate.

@Orpheus79V Then don't believe him. How does that change your day in any way? I don't believe a single word that comes out of the mouth of that Xbox guy so I completely ignore his statements.

I think anyone who put money down on this game or has an interest in making the gaming community a better place has a right to voice their displeasure over everything that has gone on with this game. I see so many people defending what has gone on with things like 'games change in development'. Yes they do, but given how vocal Murray was about the features in the game, but didn't say a word when they were removed shows a definite favouring of sales over openness.

With the multiplayer thing he was still being vague just after release, not giving a definite answer. The reason for this is the Steam version was still to release and they feared it might hurt sales. You can argue they made mistakes, but the truth is those supposed 'mistakes' drove expectation and therefore sales.

The way they have gone silent since release is also a kick in the you know whats for people who bought there product. Going from being in the media and tweeting all the time to nothing only allows rumours to circulate. A simple 'hey all, we're still working on new features' once a week would at least reassure those people still hoping they'll get a decent game at the end of this.

These tweets are just another nail in the Hello Games coffin.

"Hacked."

@Neolit I agree with your comments. I too followed this game from the beginning and got exactly what I expected. I still enjoy the game. When I get bored I move on and come back later. Did he mislead? Maybe a little, but it's like a political ad, some truth but if you want to know the whole truth do your own research.

I like to believe the tweet was meant to be a direct message to someone, but it accidentally got tweeted into the public domain.
No man's sky was a mistake. A grand idea that when realized, turned out to be nothing more than an endless, meaningless, cosmic grind.
The 'Mistake' is the waste of time making it.
Seriously, I'm not trolling. I followed the developments and update and videos when news first came out about the game but I lost enthusiasm as time passed., I even pre-ordered the limited edition from game.co.uk then cancelled

When's this game hitting Plus?

@Dichotomy I agree completely.

Promised features were not delivered and no clarification made by anyone involved with the game, even now after the money has been made. This isn't a slight or a complaint against the game that was delivered but, as a consumer and a member of the gaming community, people deserve explanation as to what wasn't delivered.

I don't think anyone should troll Hello games or give people hassle and the hack is deplorable. I would love to find out what actually happened with the games development. There is no doubt an amazing story behind it all and I think Hello games deserves kudos for the released game but at the same time, the controversy needs discussion because broken promises should not be tolerated.

@naruball
You just hit the nail on the head like Negan.

My problem is that this all sounds like a scam. The hype lead to excitement and when people didn't get what they were promised and called the devs out on it they disappeared. The game was mediocre at best but the biggest problem is the total lack of anything from Hello Game. The irony is that their last tweet is all about Customer Service and now they have all but disappeared. If this wasn't a scam they should have issued a statement about being sorry for over promising and outlining REALISTIC plans for future updates. I 100% regret buying the game on launch day (the $70 special edition no less) and I have learned my lesson to never preorder games like this again (i.e. $60 indie games with no reviews).

1 There's no excuse for the extreme behavior seen by gamers. We all know how ugly they can get, and there's never any excuse for that kind of behavior.

2 Murray does need to shoulder blame. He lied, plain and simple. You can say people should've done research and you can say it's people's fault they didn't get what was expected, but at the end of the day nothing justifies his deceit. There are people who scam on eBay by putting a pound note upside down and claiming it as rare. Just because people don't do their due diligence and fall for the scam doesn't mean it's all their fault. If a person lies, regardless of whether someone was dumb enough to fall for it, they are to blame for acting deceitfully. And he lied. All the sugar coating in the world can't hide the fact.. And it wasn't just one thing to where you could argue it wasn't unintentional- it was multiple lies concerning multiple things.

3 A simple apology acknowledging his mistake, along with a commitment to update the game to the best of their ability to at least add some of these features promised, would go a long ways in people moving on. The game was never going to be so much more amazing then it turned out. But its the principle of the matter. And I think people wouldn't be so hostile if they saw a clear effort on the developers part to make things right. If they did this, then anyone harboring discontent would definitely need to let it go.

4 This looks like he was in despair, tweeted out and even responded by email, then backtracked and came up with a lame excuse. And then sent out long wordy emails to gaming sites to prop up the hack story and make it seem real. @rjejr Your theory is dead on. I'm not buying this for a second. Like you said, if he was still hacked then how was the email removed? And why did the first email confirm it was him in a short email, but then after the whole "we got hacked" excuse, long wordy emails were conveniently sent out to other publications making it a little too obvious.

The guy was sulking in his corner, tweeted it was a mistake, confirmed tweet via email, then whether by the team convincing him or buy a sudden stroke of clarity he decides this could be bad press, and then creates a scapegoat by quickly sending out lengthy, overtly obvious emails pretending to be hacked to prop up the story, and then tweets "are you guys still hacked" to prop it up further.

You don't need to be all that bright- even Inspector Gadget could figure out what's going on here.

@Neolit
"They expressed themselves in a way that only people high on their creation would. They overpromissed, overspoke etc etc."

I think you're spot on there. They are a small indie team, the hype snowballed, they couldnt believe they were realising their dreams, they didnt know how to downplay it so just went along with it. You can see the moments hesitation before Murrays answer to questions regarding the games features.. such as "will the wildlife eat each other?" & "can you play with your friends?" he just says what he thinks people want to hear, like a rabbit caught in the headlights. Not realising the hole he was digging for himself & his team..

@JaxonH Don't see you get worked up like that too often, I'm very happy too write. I didn't follow this game that closely to know all the nuisances, but it did seem like Sony was making it the main stay of many presentations - for me it was the game that just wouldn't go away, I kept thinking it was out but it never was - and a reason to own a PS4. I know they had that flood that wiped out their stuff, which was a major cause for delay, but I don't think this game was ever meant to live up to the hype Sony was heaping upon it. Should have been a little $15 indie game you read about 2 months before it releases, like Journey or the Unfinished Swan (I never played Journey, but US was genius for $5), then if it got popular, make a full blown sequel. But a 3 guy team should start small, not at the top. The industry has done in entire established companies the past few years, I think Sony built this one up beyond sane expectations and they hype buried these guys more than the flood.

@rjejr
Well ya. Had NMS been $19.99 or heck even just $39.99 it wouldn't have received such backlash, because expectations would have fallen in line with a $20 or $40 game.

When you sell a game for $60, people expect $60 value. And nowadays you're getting some pretty spectacular games for $60.

And it's not even a budget thing because I've seen a lot of lower-budget games sell for $60 no problem. But randomly generated games almost NEVER warrant a $60 price tag. For $60 every ledge, pit, rock and plant better be designed with intelligent thought put into its placement. If you're going to fall back on an algorithm to generate everything for you then the price needs to reflect that. And had this game not been randomly generated it would have been a whole lot better because planets wouldn't have been so monotonous. Along with that comes the fact that it would require a whole lot more manpower and development hours to accomplish, but, that's exactly what is required to be worth $60. Just randomly generated worlds isn't worth AAA price.

The only way a randomly-generated game could perhaps pass for $60 is if it had everything else people wanted and a whole slew of awesome features to offset the randomly generated short cutting. And I think people realized that. So when he was being asked if the game would have all these features and he's saying yes yes yes yes yes yes yes, people took him at his word because they probably thought "well it has to have all these other features because how else are they going to get away with charging $60 for a randomly-generated game".

He was too afraid to tell people no. This game doesn't do everything you can imagine. Every time someone would ask him if such and such would be a future in the game, he'd say "yup"... "yup"... " you can do that too"... never actually taking a truthful stand in telling people what they don't want to hear.

But again, the price really played into that. Had it been priced at $20 - $40 people would have had more realistic expectations, or at the very least an inclination to not believe everything that was coming out of his mouth. Certainly at $29.99 people would have been a little more suspicious