You May Not Want To Claim Your No Man's Sky Pre-Order

Amid all the controversy surrounding the launch of No Man's Sky, there's one thing that you may not want to do even though you pre-ordered No Man's Sky: claim the bonus ship. There's a very weird but good reason as to why you shouldn't claim the ship.

According to VG 24/7, if you recover the pre-order ship for the PS4 or the PC version of No Man's Sky you'll automatically have a hyperdrive. That doesn't sound like a bad thing at all, but it is when you consider that if you redeem the ship with a hyperdrive you'll automatically skip through the tutorial phase, which teaches you how to build a hyperdrive.

While most hardcore gamers are probably scoffing at having to play through a tutorial, the reality is that you'll need that tutorial because it will guide you through the steps to get a blueprint in order to build your own hyperdrive system. Why is this important? Because you'll need that drive in order to explore other solar systems. Without a hyperdrive you won't ever be able to complete the game.

The No Man's Sky tutorial at the beginning of the game teaching you how to build the drive will help you throughout the rest of your journeys. Some players who retrieved their pre-order ship and skipped the tutorial are now taking to forums and discussion boards to lament being stuck in the solar system and not being able to escape because they don't know how to build a hyperdrive.

Given the design of No Man's Sky, it's completely possible to scavenge a planet, put together some resources and eventually happen upon a hyperdrive blueprint, but it's all up in the air.

As explained on the Reddit thread, the pre-order redemption message will stay in the corner of the screen of the game until you finally redeem it. If you redeem it before the tutorial phase is finished, then it will skip the tutorial and skip the phase on acquiring the blueprint for the hyperdrive system. In result, you won't be able to build the drive and you won't know how.

Now typically most people might say "Well, the pre-order ship already has a hyperdrive, so what's the big deal?" Well, as explained in the Reddit thread, the user who didn't have a hyperdrive ended up making enough money to buy an upgraded ship... only, the upgraded ship did not come with a hyperdrive system. After getting the new ship he realized that it had no hyperdrive and thus, he was stranded in that solar system with no way out.

Some players are calling this a No Man's Sky bug, while others are curious if this is just the game being random. Those in the Reddit thread who are suffering from the bug want to bring it to Hello Games' attention in hopes of getting it fixed.

If the multiplayer worked as intended, potentially someone with a spare hyperdrive system could travel to the location of the stranded player and give them the drive. At the moment, there's no telling how players suffering from this bug will be able to overcome it, but perhaps Hello Games will step in and offer a fix for these No Man's Sky players.