Final Fantasy XIV 1.0 to A Realm Reborn.

Granted, expansions after that were sold, but still, that one update turned the game around and allowed it to turn a multi-million dollar failure into a multi-million dollar success.

Homeworld 3

Oh no wait that's the opposite...

Issue with that is I pre-order the game before release based on false information. Gave up playing after 6 months because it sucked. When they finally got it to what they initially promised. It became almost unplayable by the amount of grinding that had to be done to even earn enough to by a freighter. Again gave up playing. So now sits on my shelf part of my collection.

Oh almost forgot when they updated they corrupted my save file so I lost all the progress I made in that 6 months. So that pissed me off as well.

A lot of games have made things better with paid updates/expansions, but NMS really seems to be the only one where the free updates have fixed the game. Hell, there were jokes going around with the last big free update that people wanted to pay them more for all these free updates.

If you like the style of gameplay, it is nothing like it's original launch state.

The promise of the original game was never fulfilled but the game we now have is good in its own way.

Don’t expect “lone space adventure” and you’ll be ok. The game is a survival game at its core and requires you to gather materials . . . In space!

Some people (me) can’t stand games that are just well-disguised work, no matter how pretty.

If you’re wondering if the game was made any deeper and more engaging then no. But they have added a great many new side activities to do. The game was built upon horizontally rather than vertically.

So if you had the game at launch and lived every second of it and just wanted more, you’ll be very happy.

If you had the game and launch and were let down by the lack of depth the game offered, you’ll won’t get much out of it today either.

It's decent. Exploring and collecting different things and upgrading gear is kinda nifty. Late game stuff like settlements and fleets are time gated and annoying. Planetary vehicles confused the hell out of me. Building a vehicle pad and summoning it is much more effort than just using the literal spaceship I just parked. Combat feels... Bad honestly. There's a ton of weapon attachments but only like 2 feel viable but maybe that's just me.

I remember space travel feeling pretty good. It's not bullshit like starfield (where you load screen instead of actually taking off or landing) and not complex like elite dangerous (where entry has to be planned to land near your target), but a nice arcade-y feel with sick visuals.

If you can pick it up for 20 or 30 bucks I'd say it's worth if you're looking for a moderately chill game. There's a ton to discover but it gets samey after a while.

I bought it on release day and got bored quickly.

I picked it back up two years ago and I played all the way through to the end.

Now I don't have much to do but play the expeditions and hunt for my favorite ships.

Currently I'm spacing bases out across each galaxy. It's still quite fun, and if you didn't complete the main story I think it's worth the purchase.

It's basically a different game from the original. The gameplay loop is similar sure, but it doesn't even resemble the original.

Everything they said (lied) about being in the game at launch has now been in the game for a while, and they just keep going with new content. And always free.

I just recently started it for the first time.

If you're into this sort of game, it's really good. I haven't exactly played a ton of similar games to compare it to, but it's pretty hard for me to imagine a game that would do what it does better. I think if it had launched in the state it's currently in it would have absolutely blown peoples minds when it launched a decade ago.

Also since it is, at its core, a decade old game, it runs really well on my computer which is mostly made up of 10+ year old components (and on linux! I did have a little audio stuttering issue that was fixed by just adding a launch option in steam, pretty sure that was just a quirk of my particular hardware)

The story is a little weird, not bad, just maybe not what I would have chosen if I was the writer, and the story is secondary to the building and exploration in this kind of game anyway.

I could nitpick some things about the UI if I really wanted to, and the usual issues with procedurally generated content where you have a big universe to explore but it feels kind of empty (which is also kind of the point) and some of the planets start feeling kind of the same after a while.

I platted the original on PS4. Platted it again several years later on PS5. I am now playing again on PC.

Today's version is the best version.

Complaining about something free and optional is wild

The great thing is that you don't have to interact with it if you don't want to. And I'm not sure you can call a game who people have played for over a thousand hours shallow.

I mean, they absolutely did at the time. They atoned for their transgression and redeemed themselves several times over though.