No Man’s Sky gets gigantic update with new modes, features, fixes and more

A huge, free update for No Man’s Sky has gone live, adding a ton of content to the space exploration game. Version 1.1, also known as the Foundation Update, introduces three different “rule sets,” the ability to build bases, save points, new technology and other important items, cargo freighters and a plethora of smaller additions and improvements to the base game.

An overview video, above, breaks down these hefty changes over the course of six minutes. The game’s website also goes in-depth on everything that’s part of the Foundation Update, but here’s a sampling:

• There are now three different game modes: Normal, which is the original gameplay experience; Creative, which promises an unlimited universe and big bases; and Survival, which ups the challenge and tests explorers’ endurance.
• Players can now establish home bases, which are used for shelter, storage and alien technology research
• Players can farm crops, including new plants and resources
• Players can add save points anywhere they want
• Messages can be left for other explorers at communications terminals
• Freighters can be bought and manned by aliens for added storage — and overall storage capacity has been increased in inventory slots as well
• A streamlined quick menu is available to make looking through inventory easier
• The PS4 version has a photo mode, while the PC has several bug fixes and visual improvements

In short, the patch notes detail a lot of new stuff. So much stuff, in fact, that the game’s notoriously quiet lead designer Sean Murray has broken his silence on social media to hype up the patch:

That’s his first tweet about the game since Aug. 18, just after it launched. As the team at Hello Games mentioned when introducing the Foundation Update earlier this week, the weeks that followed were filled with backlash and drama.

No Man’s Sky received scorn for what many saw as a dearth of promised features upon release. Disappointed players directed their ire at Hello Games specifically, culminating in a hack of its Twitter account, as well as an investigation into the developer’s possible false advertising of the game.

The Foundation Update — the first of what Hello Games says is “many free updates” to come — may please some who wished for a more substantive set of things to do in No Man’s Sky, which was touted as a gigantic space adventure before it arrived in August.

Update: The Foundation Update is now live on PC as well. We’ve edited the article to reflect this.