No Man’s Sky is coming to iPhone and iPad
Hello Games is bringing No Man’s Sky to mobile, with the science-fiction adventure scheduled to launch on iPhone and iPad on 28 October. Pre-orders are open, and the release includes the updates added during the game’s first decade.
The port will run on phones as old as the iPhone 11, while iPad support starts with the third-generation iPad Air. The complete game will take up less than 5 GB, an impressive target for a large, constantly updated adventure.
Development began roughly three years ago, around the time Hello Games released the Mac version in 2023. Studio founder Sean Murray described the mobile project as an “impossible” challenge, given the scale of the game and the performance limits of phones.
The result includes almost the entire No Man’s Sky experience, including the September Cosmos DLC. Settlements and multiplayer are the two notable omissions at launch. Both features were also missing from the game when it first arrived on Nintendo Switch, and Murray suggested that community feedback could determine whether they are added later.
Touch controls and iPad features
The iPhone and iPad editions use full touch controls alongside menus redesigned for mobile screens. Controller support is included, while iPad players can also use a mouse and keyboard.
Years of optimisation work have helped make the port possible. No Man’s Sky originally launched on PlayStation 4, so Hello Games has spent much of the game’s life refining performance across different platforms. That work has also helped the studio reduce memory demands and improve efficiency.
Some of the newer optimisation came from Light No Fire, the studio’s upcoming multiplayer survival game. Both titles run on a shared engine, allowing technical improvements developed for one project to benefit the other.
How Light No Fire helped
Announced at The Game Awards in 2023, Light No Fire is a procedural-generation-focused multiplayer survival game. Very little has been shown since its first teaser, but it has still become one of the top wishlisted games on Steam.
Work moves between the two projects as priorities change. Technology developed for Light No Fire can be adapted for No Man’s Sky, while testing those systems in the established game helps Hello Games refine the newer project.
The Voyagers update provides one example: technology developed for the newer title helped enable ships that players could fly around in within No Man’s Sky. The same shared development process contributed to the performance improvements required for mobile.
Release details
No Man’s Sky launches for iPhone and iPad on 28 October for $19.99. Players will be able to try the game before buying it through a free trial. Light No Fire still has no announced release date.
The port is another reminder that software optimisation can matter as much as raw hardware. That principle also applies when planning a home arcade setup: RETROCADE’s arcade machine buying guide explains the practical decisions involved, while the arcade news and features section follows wider developments in gaming hardware.
Readers comparing compact gaming options can also browse bartop arcade machines or explore arcade parts for controls and displays.
Leave a Reply