No Man’s Sky portable support slowing
Hello Games' recent work on the Worlds updates is taking longer for handheld platforms—the studio and reporting say Switch and Steam Deck engineering now takes about two to three times longer due to memory constraints. (games.gg) The game has had roughly 40 major updates since launch, with 14 in the last two years cited as part of the maintenance burden on portable versions. (thegamer.com)
No Man’s Sky updates now take Hello Games about two to three times longer to finish on handheld hardware than on its other platforms. (games.gg) Hello Games engine programmer Martin Griffiths said on April 13 that Nintendo Switch 1, Nintendo Switch 2, and Steam Deck consume a “disproportionate amount of engineering time” on every update. He said part of the team spends “2-3x more time” making those versions work like the personal computer, Mac, and console builds. (steamdeckhq.com) The bottleneck is memory, which is the working space a game uses while it runs. Griffiths said the studio keeps hitting “impossible memory constraints” as No Man’s Sky keeps growing, especially on portable systems that have tighter hardware limits. (steamdeckhq.com) That extra work lands on a game that has not stopped expanding since August 9, 2016. TheGamer counted more than 40 major content updates since launch, including 14 in the last two years alone. (thegamer.com) Hello Games’ own release log shows how constant that schedule has become in 2026. The studio shipped the Xeno Arena update on April 8, then followed with patches on April 9, April 10, and April 15 after the earlier Remnant update cycle in February. (nomanssky.com) Portable support also means chasing feature parity across a game that keeps changing shape. Recent updates have added creature battles in Xeno Arena, a gravity-and-salvage overhaul in Remnant, and earlier overhauls such as Worlds and Voyagers that reworked planets, visuals, and ship systems. (nomanssky.com 1) (nomanssky.com 2) Nintendo Switch players have had an official version since October 7, 2022, and Hello Games’ current release pages list Nintendo Switch 1 and 2 alongside personal computer, PlayStation, and Xbox versions for several 2026 updates. That means each big patch now has to be tested and tuned across a wider spread of hardware than the game had at launch. (nomanssky.com 1) (nomanssky.com 2) Hello Games has also kept shipping platform-specific fixes as it goes. The Remnant 6.24 patch notes in February listed memory optimizations for Nintendo Switch 2 alongside memory work for Xbox One, Xbox Series, and PlayStation 5. (nomanssky.com) The studio’s public line is not that handheld support is ending. Griffiths said the work is “a delight” because it lets players keep using portable versions even as No Man’s Sky enters its tenth year. (steamdeckhq.com)
