For the record, I've been in the "lie" camp ever since it turned out that players couldn't encounter each other in game, even if they were standing at the same spot, at the same time, on the same planet, while talking to each other to help find that spot in the first place. There's a difference between a game where player interaction, and even PVP, is astronomically unlikely but still possible, and a game in which players can't interact with each other at all because that functionality wasn't ever in the game.
Laws vary between jurisdictions, but where I live, that would be a pretty clear example of advertising a game using features which not only weren't in the final build, but which weren't in any earlier build, either. Add to that the fact that Sean Murray and Hello Games have gone completely dark since this scam was discovered, and that a modder recreated the game as a Doom mod in less than month, and one is certainly justified in thinking that some hard questions really should be asked about where all that Kickstarter money went.
Well, if you're been waiting in breathless anticipation for Hello Games to get their comeuppance over No Man's Sky and its advertising campaign, then wait no longer, because the U.K.-based Advertising Standards Authority is apparently on exactly the same page.
From Polygon:
No Man's Sky’s promotional material has come under fire since launch, and it’s now the subject of an ongoing investigation. The U.K.-based Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) confirmed to Polygon that it’s received "several complaints about No Man’s Sky’s advertising," which angry customers have criticized as misleading.
"I can confirm we have received several complaints about No Man's Sky advertising and we have launched an investigation," the ASA told Polygon.
A representative for the ASA declined to comment on the particulars of the investigation, but a thread on the No Man Sky’s subreddit details some of the most prominent issues Steam users have with the game’s store page, which they passed on to the organization.
Screens and video on Steam suggest a different type of combat, unique buildings, "ship flying behaviour" and creature sizes than what’s found in the actual game itself. The store page overall has also been criticized for showing No Man’s Sky with higher quality graphics than can be attained in-game.Interestingly, both Hello Game and Valve appear to be on the spot here, but not Sony, who arguably contributed to the game's runaway hype. Apparently, the complaints surround the PC version alone, but not the PS4 version, in spite of both versions of the game being basically the same. I guess PC gamers just have higher standards.
In any event, I'm fairly sure that we haven't heard the last of this scandal, and I don't think that Sony are getting away clean, either, in spite of having thrown Hello Games under the bus.