Unless you’ve been living on another planet for the past week (which is quite possible), you probably know that No Man’s Sky VR is coming this summer. You also probably know that VR support will arrive on PS4 and PC as a free update to anyone that already owns the game. That’s a generous upgrade for those with VR headsets, but developer Hello Games made an interesting observation about that fact.
Speaking to UploadVR the team’s Sean Murray noted that No Man’s Sky could well become the most-owned game with VR support overnight. “Last year, [No Man’s Sky] Next sold the kinds of numbers that an AAA game would be happy with at launch,” Murray explained. “It did really well. I don’t it’s actually super important for games and I’m not trying to boast about it or talk in vague terms, we just can’t talk about [specific sales figures].
“But, what I wanted to say is, and this is a weird thing; we will be probably one of the few or the game that will be owned by the most people that has VR support.”
True, sales figures for No Man’s Sky have never been revealed, but Murray’s estimate could be on point. VR native games are held back by the relatively limited install base of current headsets. Sony’s PSVR has sold 4.2 million units, for example, which is considered (though not confirmed) to be the highest-selling PC or console-based device. In comparison, the PS4 alone has sold well over 90 million units worldwide.
There’s just one other flatscreen game that’s bound to have sold more than No Man’s Sky and has VR support: Minecraft. That’s guesswork of course but we doubt even No Man’s Sky’s sales measure up to Mojang’s behemoth. That said, Minecraft only supports PC VR, not PSVR.
“That is interesting, I think, at the very least,” Murray continued. “It will be really interesting to see what it does for people, whether they think “Well, I’ve already got this game. Maybe I’ll try it out with the headset.” Or “Maybe I’ll turn on my headset.””
Or, perhaps, how many potential headset sales could No Man’s Sky VR drive? That’s an exciting proposition indeed. We’ve been hands-on with the game and, to put it simply, it feels like a dream come true.
