I still think it's a remarkable success story and they can and should be incredibly proud of what they've built. But this vision of what is meant by cosmic depth and expansiveness seems to tragically miss the point.

Compare it to even our own solar system where even so much as a new high-res photo of the hexagon storm on Saturn comes with stunning new and specific detail, or the "heart" on Pluto, we're practically ambushed with novel configurations of atmospheric dynamics and geology. It's frustratingly rare for games to truly activate that feeling of wonder.

I think NMS is still an unbeatable deal for what it is as a game but it's a frustrating near miss flyby of what I think people want a true space exploration game to feel like.