Ever heard of Joe Danger? That's okay, you're not alone -- most folks haven't heard of the motocross-based platformer, despite it receiving glowing praise from critics and earning healthy sales from gamers. That said, if you followed last week's annual game industry trade show, E3, you've likely heard of No Man's Sky. The same small team of scrappy Brits that created the cartoony Danger series, Hello Games, are applying their years of game industry experience to a much more ambitious project in No Man's Sky. This is how Hello Games lead Sean Murray described the game at Sony's E3 2014 press conference:
"We've created a procedural universe. It's infinite, and it's one that everyone can share. We're gonna start every player on a different planet so no two people will have the same experience. This universe we've created...it's so vast, it's so boundless, it's actually infinite, and we don't even know what's out there."
So, how in the world did a team of four game developers transition from indie hitmakers to triple-A rogues? We asked Hello Games just that, late last week in an evening demo session for No Man's Sky.
" I couldn't picture myself turning around and working on a game that's the same scale of Joe Danger."
The last time I saw Sean Murray and David Ream, they weren't quite so serious. The previous games from their 10-person studio, Hello Games, are great in their own way, but not anywhere near the scope or scale of No Man's Sky. Not by a longshot. Let's run a quick comparison, just so you're clear. Here's Joe Danger for PlayStation 3:
James Potter