Hi Folks

I have been thinking of taking advantage of No Mans Sky being on offer at the moment. I wasn't going to buy this out of principle based on how it released. It now looks to be in a fairly good state so just had a couple of questions...

1. Can I play this with no internet connection?
2. Is the game fun to play as a single player game?
3. I adore Elite Dangerous but would like a more casual space sim with planetary landings. Is this the game for me?

Any other opinions would be very welcome :)

1. Yes, it works without an internet connection. However, it also means you can't connect to the database and you're unable to see the names of planets that other players have named. And obviously you also can't play online with others. Just typing this because this is not a hotseat game to play with friends (it would honestly be kind of fun, kinda like a do-it-yourself Battle Engine Aquila game.)

2. Yes if you enjoy games like Minecraft then this game really is perfect for you. There are quite a lot of people who consider this game superior to Minecraft. However, this game is also a bit grindy and takes some time to get really into. If you like looking at pretty planets, foliage and animals of all sizes then this game is perfect for you. You can basically do the same things like you can in Minecraft but theres also space. The universe is your oyster my friend.

3. While I don't quite understand this question in relation to question 1, the game automatically makes you adjust and land your spaceship with the press of a button. You don't have to manually adjust anything in order to land. So landing is very relaxing and doesn't require any effort. You can also land everywhere on the ground, even if the surface isn't 100% flat. The game makes it really easy to show landable places. Its very intuitive that even someone like me understood the controls within seconds :>.

EDIT: Hopefully this helped to answer your questions.

Hell, I have the game firewalled off the internet just to make sure no other players wander into my game. I've never been a huge fan of online interaction.

It's a fun little game, though not the greatest thing ever made. Just a good way to kill time between other games or watching sports or whatever.

Yes, for like 99%. There is one (optional) mission series, that currently can't be unlocked without either going online once, or hacking the savegame. It's a very much disputed issue.
But at the core the game is a single-player game, MP was added later. And MP is seamless, meaning you can turn it on and off mid-game. Even if you enable MP, my guess is that you'll spent most of the time on your own, only occasionally teaming up with other players. Or you can ignore this feature completely.
If it's fun depends very much on your tastes, and what you expect. It's a very slow game - don't expect to jump in and quickly achieve a lot.
If you have fun exploring, scanning animals, plants, rocks, gathering resources while you're at it (that's why I don't find it too grindy), listening to the gibberish of hundreds of aliens to learn their language and watch you base, your ship, your equipment slowly grow more powerful and complete - then the game might be for you. NMS is really light on any "sim" part, and - it may surprise you - it's actually rather light on the "space" part too. Space is really just a transition between planets. The is the odd discovery, some dogfights too, but most of the time you'll spend on planets, scanning, exploring, gathering, and dealing with their different environmental conditions.

I personally love the game, but I don't play it too often, because it's simply so time consuming. One run can easily take hundreds of hours, depending on ambitions to look for rare species, to expand your base and fleet and stuff like that.