No Man’s Sky Updates Take Triple the Work for Switch and Steam Deck

Bringing a procedurally generated universe to handheld hardware is a feat of engineering that often pushes silicon to its absolute limit. For the team at Hello Games, the ongoing effort to maintain No Man’s Sky on Nintendo Switch and Nintendo Switch 2 has develop into a significant technical undertaking, requiring a level of resources far beyond those needed for traditional home consoles.

The challenge lies in the sheer scale of the game’s ambition. As a title that evolves through constant, massive updates, ensuring that every new feature works seamlessly across varying hardware specifications is a grueling process. According to the developers, the engineering effort required for mobile-adjacent platforms is substantially higher than for PC or high-end consoles.

This technical friction is most evident in the recent rollout for the Nintendo Switch 2, where the studio has likewise provided a free upgrade path for players who previously owned the title on the original Switch hardware. Whereas the new hardware offers a leap in performance, the underlying architectural hurdles of handheld gaming remain a constant variable for the development team.

The Engineering Cost of Handheld Portability

Martin Griffiths, a programmer at Hello Games, has shed light on the specific burdens associated with these platforms. He noted that maintaining parity across the original Switch, the Switch 2 and the Steam Deck requires an “unproportionate amount of engineering time” during every update cycle. In practical terms, this means the workload for these specific versions is often two to three times greater than the effort required for the PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X, or PC versions.

Las plataformas móviles como Switch 1 y 2, junto con Steam Deck, requieren una cantidad desproporcionada de tiempo de ingeniería con cada actualización que lanzamos. Muchos de nosotros en Hello Games dedicamos entre dos y tres veces más tiempo para que estas actualizaciones funcionen a la perfección, al igual que en las demás consolas, PC/Mac, etc. Es un verdadero placer superar constantemente las limitaciones de memoria, que parecen imposibles, en un juego en constante evolución, para que la gente pueda seguir disfrutando de No Man’s Sky.

Switch No Man Steam Deck

From a software engineering perspective—a field I navigated before moving into reporting—this “triple effort” usually stems from memory management and optimization. In a game like No Man’s Sky, where the environment is generated on the fly, the available RAM and GPU bandwidth on a handheld device are precious commodities. Every new feature added to the game must be meticulously “shrunk” or optimized to fit within the strict memory budgets of a portable device without causing the system to crash or the frame rate to plummet.

Comparing Hardware Constraints

While the Switch 2 provides a more robust foundation, it still operates within the constraints of a handheld form factor, which differs fundamentally from the power-draw and thermal ceilings of a living-room console. The following table illustrates the general performance hierarchy the developers must navigate when pushing updates.

Hardware Performance Tiers for No Man’s Sky Updates

Platform Category	Engineering Effort	Primary Constraint	Performance Target
High-End (PS5, Xbox Series X, PC)	Baseline	Thermal/Driver Stability	Ultra/High Fidelity
Handheld (Switch 2, Steam Deck)	High	Memory Bandwidth	Balanced/Optimized
Legacy Handheld (Switch 1)	Highly High	Strict RAM Limits	Minimum Viable Performance

Overcoming “Impossible” Memory Limits

The struggle Griffiths describes is a common theme in the “porting” world, but it is amplified by the live-service nature of No Man’s Sky. Most games are ported once and patched occasionally; No Man’s Sky is essentially a new game every few months due to its massive content drops. Each update introduces new assets, complex AI, and expanded planetary physics that the original hardware was never designed to handle.

The “impossible” memory limitations mentioned by the team refer to the hard caps on how much data can be stored in the system’s active memory. When a game exceeds this limit, it doesn’t just slow down—it crashes. To prevent this, engineers must engage in “aggressive optimization,” which involves reducing texture resolutions, simplifying geometry in the distance, and rewriting how the game loads data from the storage drive to the RAM.

For the Steam Deck and Nintendo Switch users, this means they get to experience the same galactic exploration as a PC user, but the “invisible” work happening behind the scenes is vastly more complex. The fact that the game remains playable and visually impressive on these devices is a testament to the team’s willingness to absorb that extra development time.

The Impact on the Player Experience

For the end-user, the primary impact of this engineering struggle is a slight disparity in performance. Even with the advancements of the Switch 2, the experience will not mirror the raw power of a PlayStation 5. Although, the goal for Hello Games is not perfect parity, but “functional parity”—ensuring that a player on a handheld can access the same quests, planets, and social features as anyone else.

Switch No Man Hello Games

The decision to offer a free upgrade pack for original Switch owners is a strategic move to maintain the community’s loyalty. By removing the financial barrier to the newer hardware version, Hello Games encourages a migration to the Switch 2, which—while still challenging to develop for—is significantly more capable than its predecessor. This migration potentially reduces the “engineering tax” over time as the team can lean more on the newer hardware’s capabilities.

As the game continues to evolve, the team at Hello Games remains committed to these platforms, viewing the challenge of breaking hardware limitations as a point of professional pride. The ongoing cycle of updates will continue to test the boundaries of what is possible on a portable screen, ensuring that the universe of No Man’s Sky remains accessible regardless of the device in the player’s hand.

Future updates will likely continue to focus on stability and memory efficiency as new features are integrated into the handheld builds. Players can look to official Hello Games communications for the next scheduled content drop and hardware-specific patch notes.

Do you play No Man’s Sky on a handheld, or do you prefer the power of a home console? Let us recognize in the comments and share this story with your fellow explorers.