The third Expedition in No Man’s Sky starts off pretty simple. You’ve got all the stuff that you’d do in the game organically anyway to complete, so there’s nothing mental that you need to do. However, soon after the initial phases, you’re plunged into the realm of absurdity. I’ve been having a pretty tough time completing certain Milestones because they’re categorically nuts. I love this game, but some of the stuff I’ve done in this third Expedition is stuff I’ve never had to do in No Man’s Sky before, and probably stuff I’ll never have to do from now on either.
There are multiple examples of this, but the one I’m stuck on now is navigating across the planet in search of alien structures. Each time I use a beacon to try to find one, I’m sent off to something that vaguely resembles one and is a full day of walking away. To get there faster, I need an element that I can’t find on the planet or craft, and it’s infuriating. Hello Games has really hit the nail on the head with it though because there’s so much you can complete while you’re pursuing these mad objectives that you’ll only need to do a couple of things once you arrive at your destination to be done.
The theme with Expedition Three: Cartographers seems to be forcing players to do things in a certain way. There’s not much that’s open for players to work around and do in their own way because multiple blueprints and plans are locked behind Milestone completions. I like this because it forces me to engage with the Expedition more, but I hate it because I feel like a lunatic trying to do all of these things at once.
If you haven’t tried this Expedition yet, you’ve got plenty of time. It’s a fantastic little adventure in the world of No Man’s Sky, and it’s slowly becoming my favourite playthrough ever. There’s just so much going on that it feels like a full game in itself, even though it’s just a short Expedtion set inside a much bigger game.