This is like one of those “and finally” stories on the local news and we love it.
It’s been a long old week at E3 2019. Seems like an age ago that Keanu appeared from the smoke at the Xbox briefing and someone shrieked all the way through the Bethesda conference. But now it’s done. We get to go home and sleep in our own beds. It’s going to be bliss.
Our coverage is by no means done – we’ve got articles for weeks to come yet, like a well-stocked pantry – but sometimes it’s nice to bookend the week with something that isn’t E3-related.
Hello Games wasn’t at E3 this year. They’re working hard on the final updates for No Man’s Sky, and also on their next game, The Last Campfire. But the world doesn’t begin and end with E3. It’s easy to get FOMO and feel like you’re out of the loop if you’re not here, but interesting things happen in the world of video games (and entirely independently of E3) all the time.
Today’s story, the thing that has us feeling all fuzzy over our last-night-of-E3 drinks, is a Tweet from Sean Murray on the official No Man’s Sky Twitter account.
our community has bought the billboard outside our office to say Thank You
Oh. My. God.https://t.co/oGTjFI4WWG
— Sean Murray (@NoMansSky) June 13, 2019
We’re not going to re-hash all of the noise about No Man’s Sky and the reception the initial release received. We all know it was a bad time, and a vocal subset of the internet made life a misery for Sean Murray and the Hello Games team. But they continued working away at it, like the little engine that could, when no (reasonable) person would have blamed them for walking away from it all. In the end, Hello Games honed a strong concept into a spectacular game.
It’s nice to be appreciated, and it’s nice to be nice to one another. It’s not something we see every day in the video game world, but this wholesome gesture from the fans of No Man’s Sky is just the best.
Thank you, Hello Games, and thank you pleasant fans.
Update: June 14, 2019, 16:00 BST
In the good news story that keeps on giving, the reddit users who organised the billboard had so many donations they were able to arrange a few more treats. This includes plans to send the Hello Games team out for beer and pizza – “Someone mentioned that they were Domino’s connoisseurs?” – but even then, after the billboard and slap-up meal, there’s still money left over.
So, in an update on the r/nomansskythegame sub, they announced they’re going to give the rest to charity.
“Yesterday I decided that all excess funds would be used to buy games and donate them to disadvantaged/sick kids,” wrote reddit user, weedwhizard. “Well today I’ve been in touch with a local special needs school who I will be donating all the games/consoles to, I’ll be posting pictures and maybe a video or two on r/thegiftofgaming. I created that subreddit yesterday to hopefully continue the idea of giving disadvantaged and sick kids access to gaming experiences.”
They close by saying that they hope “people will use my subreddit not only to see an update on what I achieve with the funds but also as a place where they can share their own experiences on how gaming has helped someone or brought people together for a good cause.”
Well played, No Man’s Sky fans. Well played.
