The Endless Quest: Exploring All of No Man’s Sky
In No Man’s Sky, players embark on an astronomical journey, exploring the infinite vastness of space to discover new planets, strange creatures, and untold riches. But how long would it take to actually explore all of No Man’s Sky’s vast galaxy? To tackle this behemoth question, we need to first consider the scale of the universe and how it was built.
The Infinity of No Man’s Sky’s Universe
No Man’s Sky boasts an astounding 18 quintillion (1.8 x 10^16) planets. Yes, you read that right! To put it into perspective, this universe is bigger than all of the estimated 200,000 visible stars in our own galaxy, the Milky Way, combined.
| Dimensions | Size (approx.) |
|---|---|
| 255 galaxy clusters | 500+ light-years in diameter each |
| 100 trillion+ individual stars | Averaging 3 to 7 light-years from each other |
| 18 quintillion (18,000,000,000,000,000,000) planets | Inhabiting each galaxy’s habitable zone |
Imagine the thrill of landing on a lush, newly-discovered world, surveying its stunning landscapes, mining its rare resources, or encountering new alien life. The scale of this world is a testament to its creators, Hello Games’, dedication to crafting a comprehensive and realistic universe.
Exploration Time Estimates: A Deep Dive
As we gaze out into this boundless expanse, we might wonder, Just how long will it take to explore all of these planets? Estimating the exact time would involve calculating numerous factors:
| Factors Affecting Exploration Time |
|---|
| The number of planets with rare, valuable resources |
| Each planet’s size and accessibility |
| The presence or absence of alien life or structures |
| Exploration frequency and skill level |
Conservatively, if you were to spend approximately 1 minute per visit to a planet (neglecting the immense computing powers required), you would reach:
- 43,000,000 planet visits per second, assuming one minute per planet.
- 16,125,000 minutes per hour (at 43 million planet visits per second), or
- 1.07 million days or approximately 2.92 years**) to exhaust the available galaxies.
Assuming 0.05% of all planets would have unique properties, it would still be an absurdly massive figure:
1,040,000,000 unique planet properties per person, spreading the effort amongst the total population (~4.8 billion)
Breakdown the time:
In 0.16 trillion years (4,800 years per human visit), 1 human lifetime would reach approximately 42,100 unique planets,
In 1,720,000 years the entire current human population (>4,800 billion billion) could explore one universe.
For a solo individual, attempting to manually play (gameplay is not parallel-processable without significant computation optimizations) or recorder software (see, also manual play or recording). There are not enough computer’s processing capability to create realistic simulation data.) might take eons: The estimated duration would increase infinitely, while the amount of data processing would never satisfy the data storage capacities due to the impossibility to use parallel data processing technology **without computational optimization).
What does it mean?
Simply put: There Is No Feasible Manual Exploration
Pragmatic Explorers Need Not Fret
These calculations can be quite astounding, leading to understandable shock and pessimism. You might have already grasped the essence: with limited resources (time and technological capabilities) and human perseverance, attempting to exhaust every planet and resource will most likely span an incredible lifetime.
There is still another way.
Harness Power of Simulation and Algorithms