Gaming Week In Review is a column in which Emerald writer Mathew Brock covers recent gaming news and releases. Read the last column here. 
After a thorough investigation by the Advertising Standards Authority, No Man’s Sky will not be pursued for the use of deceptive advertising practices by the media regulator.
If you’ve heard of Hello Games’ space exploration game No Man’s Sky then you’ve probably also heard about the volatile controversy that surrounds the ambitious title. To sum up the many voices of the twisting amalgamation that is the disgruntled gamer community of the internet, many people claim the developers lied about what the game really was and used false advertising to sell roughly 840,000 copies of the $60 game.
In light of these allegations and the 23 official complaints regarding the game to the Advertising Standards Authority, a United Kingdoms based independent media advertising regulator, the ASA opened a formal investigation into whether or not the highly anticipated title had used intentionally deceptive or misleading promotional ads to promote their product.
The ads in question were primarily located on the game’s Steam store page, which featured two videos from the game’s development process, 11 images and a text description of the game, all of which were subjects of the 23 aforementioned complaints.
The ASA released a ruling detailing their analysis of the situation and the justification for their decision not to pursue a false advertising case.
“Twenty-three complainants, who believed that some of the game content was not as depicted or described, challenged whether the ad was misleading,” the ruling reads.
During their analysis, the ASA contacted Hello Games to provide sufficient proof that each advertised element was present in the game in one form or another. While many of the features advertised were not 100 percent accurate to how they were portrayed in the advertisement, the ASA felt that all features were adequately present within the game. Additionally, the ASA acknowledged that many features — specifically the overall design of the user interface and the game’s aesthetic — are subject to change within the game’s development process and therefore the advertising of those elements was not meant to be deceptive.
The ruling’s final verdict reads:
“We understood that the screenshots and videos in the ad had been created using game footage, and acknowledged that in doing this the advertisers would aim to show the product in the best light. Taking into account the above points, we considered that the overall impression of the ad was consistent with game play and the footage provided, both in terms of that captured by Hello Games and by third parties, and that it did not exaggerate the expected player experience of the game. We therefore concluded that the ad did not breach the Code.”
Following this announcement and the game’s latest patch, which features base-building, it seems that things are finally looking up for Hello Games.
At the very least, the controversy has inspired many game distribution platforms, like Steam, to change their guidelines when it comes to promotional material.
You can check out the Emerald‘s review of the game here and the trailer for the latest patch below.

Counter-Strike: Global Offensive now features skins for gloves in the game’s latest update.
Collectable cosmetic skins in online games can be a serious matter. Certain skins for the popular first-person-shooter Counter-Strike: Global Offensive go for well over $1,000, with the highest reported sale being $23,850 for a rare virtual knife.
Now you can deck out your virtual gunman with more than just camo pistols and bright pink heavy machine guns covered in banana stickers. The latest patch features the game’s first non-weapon item drops: a wide array of cosmetic gloves.
These gloves are community designed and are already going for as much as $400 on the Steam Community Marketplace. They can currently be obtained from in-game crate drops that are opened with a purchasable key.
To read more about the CS:GO skin trading market and its recent gambling controversy here look here.