No other game in recent memory has been the subject of such critical and consumer backlash as No Man's Sky. Some of the game's biggest supporters prior to the title's release in August are now its biggest critics, with numerous fans complaining about missing features and false promises made by Hello Games and creator Sean Murray. The game currently sports an "overwhelmingly negative" user rating on Steam.
Amidst all that backlash, Murray and the development team have been largely silent. They've issued smaller patches for No Man's Sky to improve performance and squish bugs, but they've never made any statement on what's next for the game or how the negative reception has changed the studio. That looks to have finally changed, or at least it did on the surface.
On Friday morning, the official Hello Games Twitter account wrote the following tweet: "No Man's Sky was a mistake." The tweet was retweeted and liked more than a thousand times before the tweet was deleted and the Hello Games Twitter account made private. The real question is who is the tweet from?
Many assumed it to be from Murray himself, but that might not be the case. Multiple outlets have reached out to Murray and Hello Games and received conflicting reports as to what exactly happened. Polygon reached out to Murray via email and says it received the following response from a person identifying themselves as Sean.
"The tweet is from me, but somebody from the team took it down," he wrote in the email. "We have not been coping well."
However, Mashable reports that the tweet came not from Murray, but from a disgruntled member of the No Man's Sky team. When Mashable reached out to Murray via email, they received the following response from the creator.
"The tweet came from a disgruntled employee," Murray is said to have written. "We're currently trying to solve the issue internally."
Curiouser and curiouser, but it appears the real answer to the mysterious tweet is far simpler. Murray's personal Twitter account, which hasn't been active since Aug. 18, says a hack is to blame.
"Server hacked," Murray tweets. "We're binging Mr Robot Episodes as quickly as we can looking for answers. Ep05 is a cracker."
The initial "No Man's Sky was a mistake" tweet seems to have been sent from the Hello Games Linkedin account, which may be the original source for the breach. It seems the Hello Games email account may also be compromised, which would explain the various emails received by the press when asking for clarification about the tweet.
Given vocal and largely outraged No Man's Sky fanbase, it's hardly surprising Murray and Hello Games are the subject of a hack, though it is still unfortunate. Hello Games may have let down plenty of players, but it's still no excuse for making the lives of Murray and the game's development team even more complicated than it already is. We'll update this story with more information as it becomes available.
