No Man’s Sky 4.0 Waypoint Update Overhauls Game’s Design And Balance

No Man’s Sky was by no means an easy undertaking for Hello Games. The game promised a universe and mechanics the likes of which had never been seen before, consisting of eighteen quintillion planets (18000000000000000000 for us regular folk), interplanetary travel, each planet having unique flora and fauna thanks to procedural generation, survival mechanics, trading, and so much more.

However, it seemed that the developer had promised too much to be able to produce a good product. Following its launch, No Man’s Sky received bad reviews from all around.

Over the past 6 years, the developer has delivered quite a lot of updates and polished the game, which has raised its standing in the gaming community. The most recent update, named Waypoint, has the community buzzing, as it may not have added much new content, but has overhauled the game for a much better experience for old and new players alike.

Major Takeaways:

• A Custom Game mode has been added allowing you to alter even minuscule parts of your gameplay.
• A seamless auto-saving system has been added, while manual saving is still available.
• New Relaxed game mode, additional difficulty tweaks, and customization options.
• Trade Rocket for automatic selling.
• Inventory redesigned, capacity expanded.

Hello Games previously stated that the Waypoint update would be the “biggest generational jump so far” and judging by the patch notes, they are not wrong.

In addition to No Man’s Sky finally releasing on the Nintendo Switch, a host of changes has been added to the game that makes it much more customisable and playable for not just new players, but old returning and regular players as well. Some of the larger ones are:

1. Custom Game Modes

Tailor every aspect of the game to your unique playstyle with custom game modes. Launch into the action quickly with an existing difficulty preset, or tinker with everything from the economy to combat challenges to survival difficulty to perfect your experience.

2. Seamless Auto-Saves

A new continual auto-saving system allows you to fully immerse yourself in the journey without ever needing to think about saving your progress. Manual saves remain, giving you full control when needed.

3. Trade Rocket

Load and launch a personal trade rocket to automatically sell items on the Galactic Trade Network. Summon the device from anywhere on a planetary surface, then fire it off to the local Space Station for profit!

4. Relaxed Game Mode

The new relaxed preset provides an accessible, laid-back experience of No Man’s Sky. Perfect for players who want to experience all facets of gameplay, from story to survival to combat, with reduced danger and minimal grind.

5. Dynamic Difficulty

Nearly all difficulty settings can be tweaked and adjusted at any time, so you can continue to refine your play experience during the journey. Players with existing saves can adjust their settings to take advantage of new survival challenges or the simplicity of relaxed mode and continue to change back and forth as they wish.

6. Inventory Redesign

Inventory specialization has been clarified. Upgrades are now confined to technology slots, allowing more space for items and creating more interesting decisions about which upgrades to use. To accompany this, inventory capacity has been dramatically expanded, with storage increased across all inventories from Exosuits to Freighters.

7. Survival Challenges

Hardcore explorers can test their mettle in a new ramped-up Survival Mode, featuring a greater breadth and depth of challenges to overcome.

In addition to quantitative balance settings such as fuel consumption and hazard intensity, explorers must take care to repair their technology from damage, and rely on their own harvesting capabilities, rather than shops, to acquire key survival resources.

No Man's Sky Endurance 💪

🚀Freighter Overhaul
👷Vast Bases
🛰️Improved Hangar
🧑‍🚀NPC Crew
🔭New Bridge
👀External Windows
🛸Teleporter
🪨Huge Asteroids Fields
🤯Exterior Walkways
🌌Space Atmospherics
🪐Polestar Expedition
🐋Living Frigates
👽Combat Missions

Free and Out Now 🙏 pic.twitter.com/g0sSpbRE3Z

— Sean Murray (@NoMansSky) July 20, 2022

8. AMD FidelityFX 2.0

AMD FidelityFX™ Super Resolution 2 (FSR 2) is a cutting-edge open-source temporal upscaling solution that provides high image quality and improved framerates. Learn more on the AMD site.

All PC players, including those running integrated graphics, can enjoy increased performance from this new technology regardless of their graphics card.

9. Drop Pods

Interacting with damaged Drop Pods on planetary surfaces will now generate a marker and guide mission to assist the repair process, allowing players to find their way back if they need to gather materials.

Drop Pods can now be found directly with Exosuit Upgrade Charts, rather than having to feed data into the signal booster.

10. Crafting Trees

The detailed steps for crafting complex products can now be visualized as a tree, allowing explorers to collect and prepare sub-components in advance.

11. Quality Of Life

Scanning with the Analysis Visor has been accelerated, making the discovery, especially of fast-moving creatures, more efficient.

Movement upgrades for the jetpack have been made more powerful.

Procedurally-generated technology modules now stack in the inventory.

Waypoints are now highlighted with an icon in the Analysis Visor.

Traveler graves will now manifest memory fragments, offering important technology upgrades to aid living Travellers on their journeys.

12. New Faction Milestones:

The alien race and guild factions have issued a new set of challenges to explorers, encouraging a broader and deeper play experience.

These are all the major updates that have been introduced into No Man’s Sky. The official patch notes give us a detailed look at all the changes that have been made in the Waypoint Update.

Similar Reads: Starfield Could Launch With Ray Tracing Integration.