Honestly, I’ve played Facebook “City Sim” games with more depth and interactivity.

They bring literally nothing to the table except a time and resource sink with no real return or fun.

Nothing you build can be interacted with or do anything unique, except the “Starports” which require you to pay materials to build a roof, but then just turn out to be a single “Alternative” landing pad that random ships can land on, and have no roof in sight

Nothing you build creates related items that can be harvested, or sold. Markets are completely empty and don’t house traders. The hazard control building is literally just an empty 1×1 box that doesn’t do anything or cause your settlement to act differently if their are hazards. Every building is filled with storage items and nothing else. No unique living quarters.

All the buildings are literally just made from the players base building kit and are incredibly uninspired and pop up with no structure or thought to pathways and lane flow. Citizens just amble around doing absolutely nothing except looking at data pads, hovering 4 feet above the places they try to sit, and have the least inspired Sims style mood indicators that also cant be changed or interacted with and have no actual meaningful purpose.

The output materials your base generate are randomized, un-customizable, and have nothing to do with the building you build or the citizens you hire and they accrue incredibly slowly at rates that make worthless for selling or building.

My base has a Jelly Donut Farm as a status modifier. Is there a farm? No. Is there a restaurant? No. Is there a chef npc somewhere I can talk to to buy donuts from? No. Does it switch Settlement production rewards to donuts for me to sell or eat? No.

Settlements are ugly, hollow, shells that sit around and wait for arbitrary decisions that cost you both resources and hours of your life as it can take up to 4 hours per tier of a building to complete, with each building having 3 tiers. 12 entire IRL hours and decent amounts of resources to build a landing pad that isn’t even a unique asset, that I can plop down in 6 seconds in base building mode for like 25 pure ferrite.

It feels so under-baked, it’s basically raw.

But thanks for the base building overhaul I guess… even though its incredibly buggy now, it was a semi-thoughtful overhaul but still left the base building at “Pretty much pointless after a certain progression and lacking decorative assets.

Below are a few popular questions that we’ve received from our past FAQ thread. As always we ask that everyone be respectful and we welcome everyone’s contribution so have fun!

Q- I’m keen to start a new passive money making pursuit. What are some good ideas or guides post-Waypoint?

A#1-Gold farm, then take that stack and sell it at a terminal (not traders) in systems that sell gold. Sell all your gold to the terminal and crash the economy. Then buy it all back at 80% off discount. You just got free money and keep all the gold. All this takes is an initial investment on a gold farm, then you carry all that gold with you and just sell/buy back when you get to another system that sells gold. With 50 stacks in my ship’s cargo hold, I can make somewhere around 150 million units in each system I do this in.

A#2-Start a Farm, Fusion Igniters or Statis Devices Farm which will increase your profits to 100- 200 mil fairly quickly and you can even send out multiple freighter missions which will help you get aronium, magno-gold, Enriched carbon and more which will increase the profits even more.

A#3-Quickest way I’ve found to make a TON of units: Harvesting Storm Crystals. Find a VERY hot planet that has frequent fire storms. DURING STORMS ONLY – you can see the bright white light from Storm Crystals if you fly around low enough. Fly to them, land, quickly harvest them, get back in your ship and fly to the next before you burn up.

Q-How do I get the Advanced Mining Laser? I don’t have the option to craft one, and the multi-tool upgrade vendor at the space station doesn’t have the blueprint for sale.

A-In order to get it, you have to look for the blueprints in crashed ships or abandoned facilities. You get it from the main story (awakenings) or you can buy it on the anomaly.

Q-What do I actually do in the game? I finished the tutorial, is there anything else beside gathering stuff, building a base and repeat?

A#1-It’s really whatever you want, there’s a base story, (assuming you haven’t completed it already), follow the quest log and you’ll figure it out, but things You’d want to do for end game? You can collect multiple multitools, ships, built a fleet for your freighter, etc.

Q-Is there a planet that is populated by many players, and they built their base close to each others like a city?

A- Yeah its the Galactic Hub Project, Its a place where many people have bases and each day the numbers grow. Please help yourself. There are many factions in NMS that do this, even NMS Pirates Hub.

Q-I’m still pretty early into the game, just making my way to the center of the galaxy, what should I be spending my credits on?

A-Go hang around a outlaw/pirate trading post. Cheapest S-class start at around 8-8.5 million without a trade-in. I recommend Vikeen pirate, as then you have two good and 1 remote chances at high-maneuverability S-class: fighter, solar, exotic.