Introducing Update 1.3
Update 1.3, Atlas Rises, brings a brand new and overhauled central storyline, portals, a new procedural mission system, trade improvements, system economies, joint exploration and more.
This update marks the one year anniversary of No Man’s Sky, and a lot has changed. Please see Pathfinder and Foundation for previous major updates. This is the next step on our journey.
A new story
- In the Atlas Rises story, the fabric of existence is starting
to falter. - A mysterious new interdimensional race have appeared.
- Glitches are causing ancient portals to activate.
- Our story brings a new context, quest system and branching narrative to No Man’s Sky.
- 30 hours of new story content.
- Double the lore and interactions of the existing game.
- Discover the truth behind the Abandoned Building logs, the World of Glass, the Sentinels, the Redemption of the Gek, and the meaning of sixteen…
- After Waking Titan, Atlas Rises.
Galactic regeneration
- A regenerated system adds wealth, economy and conflict levels to star systems.
- To control this the Galaxy Map has been overhauled, improving navigation
and providing access to key information. - Install galactic technology to be able to filter the map by lifeform, wealth and economy.
- Improved waypointing, and navigation allows you to see your journey so far, from beginning to end.
New worlds
- The variety and visual quality of planetary biomes has been improved.
- Explore rare new exotic planet types as you journey toward the galactic core.
Crashed Freighters
- Discover and scavenge lost cargo from gigantic crashed Freighters on planetary surfaces.
- Use the terrain manipulator to excavate buried resources in the region.
- Complete Salvage missions for Guild rewards.
Mission System
- Visit the new Mission Agent in Space Stations to pick up unique and rewarding new tasks.
- Missions are constantly generated, and cater to all play styles (scanning, trading, combat and exploration).
- New NPC guilds have been introduced, each with standing and objectives.
- Build your standing with numerous NPC guilds and unlock more difficult, more rewarding missions.
Interstellar Trading
- New economic variables bring new depth to trading between star systems.
- Star systems are now classed based on their economic strengths and weaknesses.
- New trade goods have been added. Meet supply and demand by purchasing goods at a low price, and hauling them
to economically favourable systems. - A tiered crafting system allows increasingly valuable products to be crafted by combining harvestable materials.
- Gas harvesters have been introduced, allowing explorers to extract valuable elements from a planet’s atmosphere
to use in crafting. - Combine crafted products to create increasingly valuable items that can be sold on the Galactic Marketplace.
- New maintenance interactions have been introduced for all harvesting equipment, bringing more depth to farming, mining and harvesting.
Analysis Visor
Analysis Visors have been re-calibrated to show more information and offer better rewards for scanning.
Analyse resources before harvesting for to gain alternative resources from mining.
See more information about each discovery.
Scanning Flora and Fauna now yields increased rewards.
Specialised analysis visor upgrades can be equipped to further improve effectiveness.
User interface
A new mission log allows you to view your pending missions, and to decide which to track.
The discovery page gives a clearer and visually improved view of your journey.
An in-game guide has been added, offering numerous gameplay explanations and tips, for new and returning explorers.
Journey milestone page has been updated to show progress toward guild specific milestones.
Visual improvements
Depth of field has been added as an option in photo mode, as well as NPC interactions.
Numerous environmental props and assets have been improved with high resolution textures, making environments seem more high fidelity.
Terrain Editing
Transform the ground beneath your feet using the new terrain editing Multi-Tool enhancement.
Add or remove terrain to mould the landscape as you see fit, anywhere on any planet.
Choose from a number of materials, shapes and sizes to sculpt your unique creations.
Form terrain around your base to make it feel like part of the environment.
Portals
- Ancient portals can now be activated. Revisit previous planets, others bases or jump randomly to new worlds.
- Learn the language of portals by unlocking mysterious glyphs as you journey through the universe.
- Interact with a portal and input a specific combination of glyphs to quick travel to a specific planet.
- Share glyph combinations with the community to help others travel quickly to specific planets and points of interest.
Space Combat
- A number of improvements have been made to space flight and combat.
- Enemy artificial intelligence has been overhauled, and new difficulties have been added.
- Ship manoeuvrability has been improved, bringing more skill to dog-fighting.
- Devastating rockets can be equipped to ships and upgraded for even greater firepower.
- A new HUD has been introduced to improve the experience of space combat. This includes a communicator, which can be used to advance mission steps, or even to hail pirates before they attack.
Low Flight
- Atmospheric low flight assist now allows players to cruise above the terrain.
- Low flight and improved flight control make in-atmosphere dog fighting more lively and exciting.
- Warning: crashing into obstacles will cause damage to your ship. If your ship is destroyed, you’ll need to repair it before leaving the planet.
Joint Exploration
- Glitches in the simulation have begun to appear.
- Visualised by strange floating orbs, up to 16 players can see and communicate with one another, and explore the universe together.
- While interaction with others is currently very limited, this is an important first step into the world of synchronous co-op in No Man’s Sky.
- While interaction is very limited, VOIP (Voice over IP) allows proximity based voice chat with other nearby explorers.
- Use portals to quickly travel to more populated planets, or to meet up with friends.
New Ships
New Class S ship designs have been introduced, and can be found roaming the galaxy. Interact with their owners to view, and offer to buy their ship.
Wealthier systems have more expensive, higher class ships.
Quality of Life
- Temperature measurement has been converted from Celsius to Fahrenheit based on locale.
- Summon your ship from anywhere on a planet’s surface using your quick menu.
- Specific Technology and Cargo inventories have been added to improve inventory management.
- Playstation 4 players can now adjust their field of view via the options menu.
- Jump between systems from the comfort of your Freighter. Just interact with the hologram on your bridge, and select a location to travel to.
- Landing your ship no longer auto-ejects you from the cockpit. Take time to survey the planet before exiting.
Patch notes
Generation
- Increased variety in weather, planet and structure names
- More base building parts have unique names
- Prevented trees spawning on sheer cliffs
- Improved object placement on slopes
- Improved grass placement and density
- Changed the default starting ship model
- Regenerated galaxy to remove differences between survival, normal and creative game modes
- Improved building distribution
- Increased distribution of heridium deposits
- Improved generation of beaches along shorelines
- Repositioned player bases to accommodate generation changes
Exploration
- Improved balance of hazards between planets
- Improved settings for hazard damage and strength
- Reduce cave hazard recharge times
- Added Shielding Shard to the starting player inventory
- Limited the depth at which buildings can spawn underwater
Gameplay
- More tech available in tech shops
- Balanced tech shop standing requirements
- Standing lights have a proper name when you interact with them
- Increased robustness of systems for locating buildings
- Increased number and types of objects which can be scanned
- Increased information available about scanned foliage and creatures
- Improved planet resource lists
- Craftable products now sorted by most recent use
- Improved differentiation of weapons
- Fixed pinning product recipes and technology guides
- Continued story unlocked through abandoned buildings
- Added interactions and dialogue options for many structures and characters
- Overhauled secondary character interactions
- Joint exploration has been introduced allowing 16 players to see visual representations of each other in game. Joint exploration does not require PS Plus, and is not currently available on GOG Galaxy.
Trade and Farming
- Alloys, farm products and new gas products now form separate branches of a larger craft tree
- Added new valuable higher tier craft products
- Added new harvester to harvest atmospheric gases
- Added new trade specific products
- Added new farmable “Star Bramble” plant
- Added larger 4 plant hydroponic tray
- Increased contrast between picked and unpicked resource plants to more easily tell them apart
- Balanced priced of alloys, farm products and gases
- Improved distributions of resources on planets
- Improved scan ranges for resources on planets
- Added scan markers on more smaller plutonium crystals to aid resource gathering
Freighters
- Balanced freighter prices
- Fixed collision on freighter bridge
- Added freighter classes
- Added ability to warp in your freighter
- Fixed floating turrets on capital freighters
Space
- Improved space heavy air
- Added requirement to scan planets in order to reveal their names
- Improved planet name display as you enter orbit
- Fix for massive carve radius when mining asteroids
Galactic Map
- Updated galactic map UI
- Improved galactic map controls
- Improved star names gathered in galaxy map flythrough
- Improved distribution of different coloured stars
- Added interstellar scan events
Starships
- Added ability to summon your ship from the quick menu
- Refined ship reticules
- Added new holographic cockpit HUD elements: mini map, pulse drive warning and target ship
- Added new ship technology
- Balanced space combat
- Balanced ship weapons and technology
- Updated ship weapon projectile effects
- Updated ship hit direction markers
- Improved flare graphics on ships
- Improved loot containers dropped by AI ships
- Improved effects on damaged AI ships
- Balanced crashed ships broken slots and repair costs
- Added a more convenient swap inventory button for moving items between new/crashed ships and storage units
- Updated design of Atlas pass icons
- Added ability to look around the cockpit when landed
- Allowed player to remain in ship cockpit after landing
- Improved spawning and distribution of AI ships
- Improved ship altimeter
- Added in-ship communicator
- Added button prompt for ship zoom
- Fixed a bug where your ship could become invisible by visiting the galactic map
- Improved Pirate systems including the ability to negotiate or call in support
- Added low flight mode
- Improved landing code
UI
- Divided options menu into several pages
- Revised Journey page
- New Gek, Korvax and Vy’keen medals
- New medals for the merchant, mercenary and explorer guilds
- Revised log page
- Fixed animation on markers as they are removed
- Improved binocular UI
- Updated journey milestone icons
- Overhauled discovery log
- Added cardinal directions to compass
- Added distance markers to compass
- Fix for “redeem content” showing twice on Steam menu
- New trade and product icons
- Revised combat ship markers
- Improved ship tracking arrows when flying away from targets
- Overhauled conversation interface
Graphics
- Improved HBAO filtering around edges
- Improved TAA handling of grass blade edges
- Introduced depth of field effect during interactions
- Added LOD meshes and imposters to various props
- Fixed texturing on the buildable door
- Reduced HBAO shimmer
- Reduced shadow acne
- Fixed artifacts with imposter shadows
- Improved double-sided normals for foliage
- Improved terrain texturing and texture blending
- Improved grass colour blending and integration with terrain
- Improved grass and leaf materials
- Improved colour palettes across several biomes
- Improved planet night skies
- Fixed z-fighting on small glowing plants
- Various graphics optimisations and fixes
- Visual improvements to Atlas stations
- Replaced all terrain textures with higher detail and quality variants
- Added new higher detail foliage variants to several biomes
- Upgraded textures on several cave props
Audio
- Four new sets of soundscapes by 65 Days of Static
- Reworked space combat audio
- Reworked space explosions
- Added new ship weapon sounds
- Added weird biome soundscape
- Added new music and sound effects for story mode
- Lots of new UI sounds
- Minor mix changes and optimisations
Language
- Various minor language fixes and improvements