Warning. Thermal protection falling.

“What? What thermal protection? Where? What am I supposed to do?”

Warning! Thermal protection offline…

“Offline? That can’t be good. Where?!” I blundered through options… multitool… exosuit… starship… The screen suddenly went black. A poetic sniglet about death appeared. And then, like the movie Groundhog Day, the scene reset. What the …?

No Man’s Sky doesn’t make a fetish of user onboarding or tutorials. No level-one training scenario. No help screens. Hell, I’m not even sure it’s a game.

What it is, is a Juche-level journey of self-reliance, isolation, and death.

The next time I heard the warning, I jumped back into my ship which seemed to afford me some protection and recovery. But I couldn’t stay there forever.

The ship was a wreck–literally. It was my job to rebuild it with my pea-shooter multitool and the planetary resources at hand. I needed plutonium…whatever that was.

So I left my disabled ship by the big rock… and wandered away in a straight line toward the rising moon. It would be easy to find it again. I’d just turn around and walk in a straight line. But first, I’d use the multitool mining beam to harvest a few jagged red crystals that my inadequate scanner had identified as plutonium. Night was beginning to fall so I needed to get a move ... Warning! Sentinel drones activated!!

Within moments three furious flying lunch boxes began shooting at me. My multitool kept overheating. My hands were shaking as I tried in vain to defend myself. “F*$#@ it! Run away!” I screamed and took off. That straight line-big rock-moon thing dissolved into panic. Night enveloped me. I couldn’t find my ship. At that point I hadn’t even noticed that tiny inverted crescent moon at the top of the screen–the de facto No Man’s Sky compass. (Something that important should maybe be, um, a bit bigger… just a thought.)

I wandered in the dark. “There sure are a lot of big rocks on this planet… I wonder what happens if you can’t find your ship?” I mused nervously. My first No Man’s Sky personal crisis.

Warning. Thermal protection falling.

Death was fast and furious in the early days. Usually right after I said something like, “what’s this shiny thing?” Sentinels killed me, but if there were none around I killed myself. Walking into radioactive water… upsetting cave crabs… being whacked by plants... My specialty was landing my ship atop the only jagged rock, tree or Heridium spire for miles. I’d step out of the cockpit and plummet 50 feet. Life support falling.

I repaired that first ship slowly, stupidly… learning how much iron, carbon, plutonium or whatever was needed to fix the defunct hyperdrive. Scavenging the local wilderness with my entry-level multitool. Approaching and scanning rocks and crystals. Aluminum? Did I need aluminum? Well, better safe than sorry…

No free slots in suit inventory.

“Okay, !*#$ aluminum…” I’d empty my pockets. I’d never learn all these damn elements. I was having flashbacks to high school chemistry class.

Time passed. The beam was weak. Mining took forever. Always dashing back to the ship before I was killed by drones or the sun went down. Not exactly Star Trek.

Eventually, the hyperdrive was fixed, I took off. Space! The final frontier! Lush planets. Dinosaurs! This was going to be great. The universe was my…

Warning! Hostiles approaching…

Moments later I died at the hands of space pirates. I never even saw them. Another sniglet of death poetry. Another black screen. I reincarnated at a local space station. I realized a few things. Once humanity ventures beyond our own solar system? It’s going to be a lot like No Man’s Sky. Blundering death at the hands of inexperience. Over and over.

It’s also lonely in space. You play the role of traveler in No Man’s Sky. There is no sidekick. No massive multiplayer environment. You have to learn the language of the Gek, Korvax and Vy’keen word by word in order to communicate. You can’t even see a reflection of yourself. The only signs of human life the rare renamed planet or star system. Or a note that says, “Discovered by…” I found myself asking, “what does it mean to have the entire universe to explore if you have no one with whom to share that?”

Why live? Why go on? It was my second personal No Man’s Sky crisis.

Aren’t games supposed to be fun? Oh sure, there are Milestones to achieve and Atlas Stones to gather. Interesting flora and fauna to scan and upload for credit and units–the currency of No Man’s Sky. But after I spent hours hot-footing it across a smoldering planet to find and scan that one last animal–a flame-retardant field mouse of sorts hiding in a steam vent, I found myself asking, “is this why you wanted to travel into space?”

We have mice at home.

No Man’s Sky has no sidekick. In over 40 years of gaming, I tend to favor games with sidekicks. Ratchet and Clank. Jak and Daxter. Even Pac•Man had Ms. Pac•Man. I felt utterly alone. I barely spoke Gek. The Vy’keen were brutes and the Korvax kept breaking my stuff. My mood darkened. I obviously needed to upgrade my thinking.

This is where my real life sidekick, proved to be more valuable than a 24-slot fully-upgraded multitool with plasma grenades. A research librarian, she was the one who figured out the tiny compass. And Atlas Pass v2 and v3. And a thousand other questions. She joined me on my Sunday morning journeys, providing incidental help at first and full-consulting over time as she was drawn into the game. Should we try a black hole? Visit the center of the universe? Where can we find sac venom?

Over the next few weeks we explored planets, scanned critters, mined goodies, learned the language, and spent a lot of time with the Gek. I like the Gek. They’re business people–like myself. Journey milestones rolled in and it started feeling like a game again.

Slowly I gathered technology blueprints and Atlas Stones. I upgraded my ship to a functional model that looked like a minivan crossed with a commercial refrigeration unit. It wasn’t pretty, but I got a great price from the Gek trader and it had more storage. Storage is everything in No Man’s Sky. The Korvax had sweeter rides, but I’d never have that kind of money…

And then I discovered Vortex Cubes.

Vortex Cubes are worth a lot of units at your local trading post. The glowing red variety comes with a full offense of sentinel drones and robot attack dogs, but the silver Vortex Cube won’t set off a single alarm. You are free to gather them up by the armful, stuffing them into your exosuit pockets and ship storage. To make more room, I basically stripped out everything but a block of plutonium to fuel the ship. I’d arrive at the trading post with just under 600,000 units worth of vortex cubes every half hour. There was just one catch…

Vortex cubes are often found in caves. Big caves. Tiny caves. Deep, dark, twisty caves where it’s easy to get turned around and lose your bearings. Caves filled with scuttling, aggressive cave crabs.

My third personal No Man’s Sky crisis.

As it turns out, I am deeply speluncaphobic. Do yourself a favor. Do not Google “No Man’s Sky lost in caves.” I only ventured into “big happy caves” during the light of day. I would walk in a straight line… (after all, it had been such a successful strategy before) and only a few feet in. Constantly looking over my shoulder for the patch of blue sky or sunlight that marked the opening. Inevitably, cave crabs would attack. They are small, so I used my plasma grenades… kind of like killing a spider by burning your home to the ground. The dust and rubble would clear and I would be hopelessly, if momentarily lost…usually at the bottom of a deep hole with the remains of one cave crab thanks to the plasma grenades. I could hear my heart beating in my ears. I would start to gasp for air. Breathe. Breathe!! Inevitably I would emerge, stumbling into the night air, with only half of my sanity–but a dozen vortex cubes.

I managed to make over 30 million units in a couple of weeks of panic-attack-fueled cave expeditions. I was going to get a new ship, damnit. And never go into another cave again.

We went shopping at a local space station one Sunday morning and upgraded to a much cooler, fire engine red ship that I bought off a Korvax trader. 37 slots for around 14 million. Worth every unit!

The “Radicchio,” as I call it. You really should be able to rename your ship… just a thought.

An upgrade spree followed. All ship technology. All exosuit technology. I strolled around toxic, hostile planets that were virtually on fire, frozen solid, or dripping with radioactive rain. My sidekick, Janet, discovered that killing sentinel drones yielded titanium–necessary to recharge all those suit upgrades. So much for picking zinc flowers one-by-one like some hippie. I went from pacifist to soulless killing machine without blinking. When space pirates picked a fight? It was their last.

Just remember, you started it… I think.

My earlier “oh look, an ancient ruin,” philosophy morphed into, “no exotics? We’re outa here.” I turned to the dark side. So much for Star Trek. I had an Empire to build.

Only one thing eluded me. That damn Atlas Pass. Atlas Pass v1 was easy to acquire. But every planet facility and every space station cheerfully rebuffed me with blocked exits: “Atlas Pass v2 Required” or “Atlas Pass v3 Required.” I was like a cat on the wrong side of a locked door. Janet googled. We followed every promising lead. I shlepped from Space Anomaly to Anomaly trying to impress Specialist Polo with my record of survival in extreme environments. Apparently, at 6.8 Sols I hadn’t suffered enough. How about my collection of scanned zoology? I have a very cool flame-retardant field mouse I’m pretty proud of.

Each time instead of the elusive Atlas Pass, I’d get the same lame blueprint for “Cannon Damage Sigma” or “Beam Coolant System Theta.” You know, if you’re going to call it a Space Anomaly? Maybe it shouldn’t spit out the same blueprint every stinking time. Just a thought…

I visited operation centers. Lots of them. Success–it seemed–was random. My frustration level grew. Until a rainy Sunday when I finally got one of the two magic question scenarios and this time, answered correctly with “Open Comms,” thanks to Janet’s intel. It wasn’t just the Atlas Pass v2, but the blueprint for version 3–which opens all doors. We both cheered.

As the saying goes. Dying is easy. Living is harder. Atlas Pass v3 … nearly impossible.

Does the game freeze and crash occasionally? Oh, sure. Do those unlocked doors reveal incredible stuff? Not really.

Atlas Pass v3: Server Farm for Hello Games?

Atlas Pass v3: Intergalactic Salad Bar.

Is there an utterly pointless tedium to playing? Um, yeah. I guess. But Mr. Bourgeson, my tenth grade science teacher, would be proud to see the way I now casually sift, sort and sell oxides, isotopes, and silicates … but never plutonium. Or titanium. Always keep a stash of both. You’ll thank me later.

No Man’s Sky generated a ton of pre-release hype and hope. Many feel it hasn’t lived up to its promise. But I see this game as something of a masterwork. You can literally play it forever and never visit the same solar system twice. (Even if you want to, as it turns out, but that’s another problem.) Creating a single warp cell requires four levels of know how and crafting. As a programmer, I love trying to crack algorithms of game play. High security? Deserted planet? Many trading posts? There has to be something here worth a lot of units… probably gravitino balls. (To be fair, it’s always gravitino balls.) I love the diversity of life. The nasty weather. The thrill of finding iridium arches or chrysonite. Even the field mice. But not the cave crabs.

And even if I am one of only 400 people still playing the game it’s easily worth the 60 units I paid. It’s been a long journey across the galaxy and deep within my soul. I survived. I’m stronger now…upgraded, if you will, and I’ve got the blueprint to prove it: Traveler Juche Theta.

I’ve learned a few important things. Always be gathering plutonium. Even if you don’t think you’ll need it. I won’t even land if I don’t see plutonium from the sky. And keep some in your ship and your suit. Don’t even think of caving without plasma grenades. If you land at an unmarked trading post? Buy or sell something–anything–to put it on your map. Oh, and keep your extra warp cells in your suit when you travel between planets, and in your ship once you land.

Finally, exploring the universe is better with a sidekick. Find one if you can.

And now, if you’ll excuse us, we are on a new quest to find a planet with Sac Venom. Mama needs a new ship and there’s no way I’m going back into the caves.