In the over eight years since its initial release, No Man’s Sky has become a legendary success story in the world of gaming and stands as proof of what developers can achieve with hard work and passion. Following the massive Worlds Part 1 update in July, the game has just released the Aquarius update, introducing fishing mechanics to the space exploration title.
In a message from Hello Games, fishing in No Man’s Sky is billed as a “uniquely relaxing experience,” as players can either embark on the activity alone or with friends. There are over 160 varieties of fish, and fittingly, new recipes have been added.
Players can also find messages in bottles from players who have fished in the areas before, and a new Aquarius expedition is now available to enjoy for the next six weeks.
Check out the full patch notes for the Aquarius update for No Man’s Sky below:
- Players can now install a Fishing Rig in their Multi-Tool, enabling them to cast their line into any body of water and begin fishing. Purchase Fishing Rig blueprints aboard the Space Anomaly.
- Over 160 varieties of fish are available to catch. Finding each fish will require exploration of different planets, fishing at different times of day and during different weather conditions, and trawling across a wide range of depths.
- Your catch history, including weight records, is recorded in the new Fishing section of the Wonders catalogue.
- Craft specialist bait and apply it to your Fishing Rig to lure in specific fish.
- In addition, any edible item can be deployed as bait. Experiment with different cooked products to find the most effective bait for your fishing feeds.
- A large range of new seafood recipes have been added for the Nutrient Processor.
- Those who do not wish to consume or sell their catch may release their fish back into the water.
- Occasionally, inanimate objects may be retrieved from the water instead of fish. Such objects include procedurally generated messages in bottles and water-damaged technology upgrades.
- Automated Traps are available to research in the Space Anomaly. These self-sustaining units are an alternative to manual angling, and will attract fish as appropriate for the water conditions in which they are placed.
- The Exo-Skiff is a new piece of deployable technology, summoned from the Quick Menu after its interface is installed in the Exosuit. Research the appropriate blueprints aboard the Space Anomaly.
- The Exo-Skiff hovers just above the surface of the water and reacts to wave movement to create the perfect deep-sea fishing platform for those looking for deep-water fish.
- The skiff comes with a dedicated Cold Storage inventory, allowing players to conveniently store their catches.
- The Exo-Skiff can be recoloured via its own internal customisation interface.
- Fishing is fully compatible with first and third person play, and has unique casting mechanics for VR players.
- New music tracks have been added to accompany the fishing experience.
- Expedition Fifteen, Aquarius, will begin shortly and run for approximately six weeks.
- Rewards include new posters, decals and titles; a deep-sea diving suit customisation set; the unique Lost Angler’s Rig fishing rod; and the exclusive Aquarius Flightpack.
- Water reflections are now enabled for PSVR2.
- PCVR now supports reflections on the water while running with reflections set to Ultra.
- Fixed an issue that could make it difficult to interact with some space station objects while in VR.
- The jetpack effects used while underwater have been improved.
- Fixed a number of rendering artefacts related to water.
- Fixed a number of issues that could allow ships to spawn with the wrong landing-gear state.
- Fixed a visual issue with icons when switching pages in the Catalogue.
- Fixed a minor visual issue with the Liquidator mech.
- Fixed a rare issue that could cause items to be transferred to a deprecated inventory when Quick Transferring to a full Exosuit inventory.
- Fixed an issue that could cause mineable objects to incorrectly display a STEEL label.
- Fixed an issue that prevented the Left / Right Handedness option from being immediately applied to the third person camera.
- Allowed the Multi-Tool to remain unholstered when in Photo Mode in a multiplayer game.
- Removed the deprecated Shutter Door base part from the Catalogue.
- Fixed a number of water rendering issues with some specific base parts.
- Fixed a number of water-smearing issues when playing in VR.
- Fixed an Xbox-specific texture rendering issue.
- Fixed an issue that could cause black speckling in depth-of-field effects while playing with screen-space shadows enabled.
- Fixed a rendering corruption issue with starship cockpit screens.
- Fixed an issue that could cause graininess on PS4.
- Fixed an issue that could cause ship juddering during warp.
- Fixed a crash related to dialogue interactions.
- Fixed a PS4-specific memory crash.
- Fixed a PS5-specific crash related to shader loading.
- Fixed a crash related to explosion effects.
- Fixed a number of issues related to the loading of freighters and frigates.
- The messaging around some Vulkan-based GPU compatibility issues has been improved.
- Fixed a stall/hitch when switching between inventory pages.
- Introduced a number of optimisations while accessing the inventory.
- Introduced a minor planetary rendering optimisation.
No Man’s Sky is available on PC, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S, and Nintendo Switch.