I’ve just started playing the actual story of this game and something about it just makes me… Nervous? Anxious? I’m not sure what the right word is really cause it’s not like it’s in my face all the time.

I’ll be running around playing with animals and scanning plants and naming worlds and then… A fallen freighter with its glowing core ripped out whispers to me of voids. A lonely, barren planet’s horizon is broken only by the pulsing diamond of a stranger’s grave. It tells me stories of the creature in a search for… SOMETHING. Lost audio logs on planets of acid oceans and never ending lightning beg me not to follow, but pray they can be found before they’re lost forever.

My own home, my own settlement I’ve invited in strangers. A Gek overseer who knows me, knows my children was once a comfort. A friendly quest giver unlocking greater pieces of technology and lore I could not on my own. A Korvax scientist bursting with excitement, just coming of age to explore the endless universe ‘alone’. My home and my supply a perfect safe haven for this tiny part of something bigger to grow…

Yet… The very moment I get them settled within my home something changes. Amid the simple tasks of building and gathering there is something… Wrong. Ramblings of the Gek on my destroying of planets thrown in at the end of dialogue. The need for weapons. The command of hunting out Sentinels to gather ingredients from their destroyed parts. Gone is my exuberant Korvax excited for the future. It it’s place something new and wounded. A part of the whole that has been cut off entirely… Because of me. Because it drew too close to a Traveler… it is now being punished through no fault of its own.

I am left to only do as told to progress. Slay the Sentinels for the Gek. Offer what little comfort I am able to, to the Korvax I stunted by providing false hope… Providing them with a paultry replacement of tools speaking with one another. It… Leaves me uncomfortable. I know something is wrong. I know that I do not have grasp of the full picture and… I am reluctant to push forward.

Who else will I harm if I do? Because I have done harm. My ignorance, my blind faith in friendship and kindness lulled me into a sense of safety. I forgot, amid the exotic plants and beautiful animals that I am… Apart. Something that does not belong here. And it leaves me feeling bad. Guilty over the resources I’ve stolen and planets I’ve plundered.

I cannot tell if this game is good, or bad. But what I can tell is that there is much more going on than I first thought. And that is… Worrisome.

There are a number of player formed civilizations in NMS, but the game itself doesn’t have any kind of system for forming and joining civilizations. Given the current state of multiplayer, with most players having access to the same universe, now would be a good time to implement such a system. Not entirely a new concept, but some features might include:

• The ability to form a civilization and recruit other players. Civ names can appear next to players’ gamertags/usernames that are members of a civilization.
• A governance system where players can create ranks that have different privileges.
• Players could create custom flags for their civs.
• Claiming starsystems and planets as part of a civilization.
• co-ownership and management of bases, settlements, and freighters.

Now a system like this would probably go hand in hand with a major settlement overhaul, as part of the same or separate update. Settlements could act as the hearts of civilizations as players work together to grow, maintain, and defend settlements across their civs. A settlement update might include:

• More freedom over where a settlement is established, what players can build in a settlement, the layout of settlement specific buildings, and the number of settlements a player (or civ) can own.
• Settlement requirements like food, water, hazard protection, life support, power, and housing.
• Implementing the existing farming, mining, power, and cooking mechanics in the game.
• The ability to establish trade routes via frigates between settlements and bases. Trade routes may need to be defended against pirates from time to time.
• Settlement building that serve specific functions and can be damaged or destroyed during sentinel attacks.
• Set up defenses against sentinel attacks.

What do you guys think? Is this an update you’d like to see at some point? Are there any other features you’d want implemented in a civilization update?