Hello Games and Sean Murray claim "No Man's Sky was a mistake" tweet was the work of hackers

[midian182]

Another day, another No Man’s Sky story. This time it’s not about the game itself or its ever-dwindling player numbers, but a strange incident involving creator Hello Games’ Twitter account.

Both Hello Games and its founder, Sean Murray, have been incredibly quiet since the No Man’s Sky backlash reached its peak in mid-August. But on Friday, the company sent out a tweet stating: “No Man’s Sky was a mistake.”

This naturally caused quite a sensation. Was Hello Games actually admitting that NMS is flawed? It started to look as if this was this case, after a number of emails from both Murray and Hello games were sent to various publications verifying the tweet.

Murray’s email, which came with the subject line “An Official Statement from Hello Games,” placed much of the blame on Sony. The message alleged that the distributor forced Hello Games to release NMS early, resulting in key features being cut.

A different email, this one claiming to be from Hello Games, blamed the tweet on a “disgruntled employee,” which added to the confusion - was it talking about Murray? By this time, Hello Games’ twitter account had been set to private.

Eventually, all was revealed. It turned out that both Murray and Hello Games were victims of a hack. "Server hacked," Murray tweeted. "We're binging Mr Robot Episodes as quickly as we can looking for answers. Ep05 is a cracker,” he joked.

Server hacked. We're binging Mr Robot Episodes as quickly as we can looking for answers. Ep05 is a cracker

— Sean Murray (@NoMansSky) October 28, 2016

It seems that LinkedIn was responsible for the compromised accounts. "If anything was a mistake, it was using Linked In without 2FA," Murray said in another Tweet. An hour later, Hello Games sent out the following message: “100% not hacked anymore... obviously those mails and that tweet were fake. Back to work.”

.@NoMansSky 100% not hacked anymore... obviously those mails and that tweet were fake. Back to work ??????

— Hello Games (@hellogames) October 28, 2016

It’s slightly damning that the first communication from Murray in over two months came as a result of a hack, and that’s assuming we’re being told the whole story. After everything that’s happened, you have to wonder if some of Hello Games’ staff really do believe that No Man's Sky was a mistake.

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https://www.techspot.com/news/66865-hello-games-sean-murray-claim-no-man-sky.html

 

[mbrowne5061]

Yeah. I'm not sold. "depressed, drunk tweeting and emailing by Murray" is a much more simple explanation over "hacker [somehow] getting into an unspecified LinkedIn, that [somehow] got them access to official twitter and company emails". Because the only thing less likely than 1 hacked account is 2-4 of them.

I'm betting Murray got drunk, Tweeted and followed it up with an email. Then Hello Games, trying to do damage control, sent out the 'disgruntled employee' email. Now both are trying to make it look like the work of people whom have honestly moved on at this point. People have stopped playing, so they've honestly stopped caring.

 

[Lurker101]

Considering everything else Murray has said recently, does anybody believe him now?

 

[OutlawCecil]

Bull crap. I believe Sean Murray had a bad day and started being honest. Hello Games quickly shut him up and came up with a "We were hacked" excuse to ensure people would ignore everything that was said. Awfully nice of the hackers to respond to numerous emails, having really decent grammar and everything too. Why the heck would a hacker make up an excuse of "disgruntled employee"? OR Why would Hello Games say "disgruntled employee" then later say "hacked!". Most obvious conclusion is they spoke too soon saying "disgruntled employee".

 

[Uncle Al]

I'm just surprised with as bad the reviews are and the ever dropping number of players, they are still holding their price point so high! I'm guessing they are expecting a wave of mindless zombie's with credit cards to show up soon ......

 

[Panda218]

Yeah I don't believe it. The Hello Games twitter has been pretty much dead since the end of august, but before that they were tweeting on a regular basis about the game and whats coming next.

 

[JayT1803]

Never buy a game from a developer that looks like some creepy *** cave man.

 

[Uncle Al]

Never buy a game from a developer that looks like some creepy *** cave man.

But he was SOOOOO popular in all those Geico commercials! Did I spell that right? My damn caveman english again ... I should have stuck with grunts and belches!

 

[Trillionsin]

Who cares anymore, right? I've moved on, I guess... hope you all do, too!

 

[Evernessince]

I've seen multiple informed videos on this subject and it was indeed a disgruntled employee. It turns out that Sony did indeed sink significant marketing money to sell the game but mostly to sell Playstation 4s. They did this knowing Hello Games is a novice indie game company and they provided no help during development or after No Man's Sky had came out. What Hello Games said about their game was wrong but Sony should also take part of the blame for putting them on a pedestal to sell more consoles. Hello Games would have never had the budget to market and claim features they never had if Sony had not prompted them to do so.

Either way, nothing is new here. Sony is still as shitty as it's ever been and Indie devs constantly over-promise. Combine the two and you have a recipe for disaster.

 

[Nobina]

When a hacker steals your account and he posts more truth than you.

 

[Wendy Oltman]

Not being on picky or anything, but in coming times, people would get drunk or take their anger out on someone on their social media handles and then when back to sober self, would blame it on hackers

 

[Kibaruk]

Because the only thing less likely than 1 hacked account is 2-4 of them.

Well, let me tell you that in reality this is how it goes. After someone targets you, they aim for whatever they know is the weakest link, then they can get access to other accounts. For example, let's say they are trying to get into your "X"mail account. By brute-forcing it they will get nowhere, literally, they will probably get the account locked and that's it. Now, let's say this particular target has a forum account in "Y"spot, oh and he also has a youtube channel, look at his bio, oh my, he has a linkedin -remember the accounts compromised?- and look at that, a twitter account... now they know more about you, they start looking at those exposed passes, so on an so forth.

 

[mbrowne5061]

Well, let me tell you that in reality this is how it goes. After someone targets you, they aim for whatever they know is the weakest link, then they can get access to other accounts. For example, let's say they are trying to get into your "X"mail account. By brute-forcing it they will get nowhere, literally, they will probably get the account locked and that's it. Now, let's say this particular target has a forum account in "Y"spot, oh and he also has a youtube channel, look at his bio, oh my, he has a linkedin -remember the accounts compromised?- and look at that, a twitter account... now they know more about you, they start looking at those exposed passes, so on an so forth.

All stuff you can figure out by looking at the public profiles, you don't need access to actually see that stuff. But how exactly does having access to one grant you access to the others? Even in the tightest of integrations, they are separate services, run by separate companies. Only way that works is if you use the same password for all those accounts - and then it isn't 'one giving you access to others', it is 'you giving access to all'. These also aren't 'related' accounts. One was the official twitter, several official emails (from different people), and some unspecified LinkedIn (which no one ever specified, and no one seems to have seen. At all). The likelihood of them all having the same password, or even similar passwords, is near-zero.

No, an internal HR issue is more likely, and seeing how high level the accounts are, my money is still on 'alcohol + Murray = depressed, drunk tweeting and emailing'. It is a far more simple explanation.

 

[Kibaruk]

All stuff you can figure out by looking at the public profiles, you don't need access to actually see that stuff. But how exactly does having access to one grant you access to the others? Even in the tightest of integrations, they are separate services, run by separate companies. Only way that works is if you use the same password for all those accounts - and then it isn't 'one giving you access to others', it is 'you giving access to all'. These also aren't 'related' accounts. One was the official twitter, several official emails (from different people), and some unspecified LinkedIn (which no one ever specified, and no one seems to have seen. At all). The likelihood of them all having the same password, or even similar passwords, is near-zero.

Well now... let me tell you a small secret, there is information that trends to be shared among services, I won't spoil it for you so you can think about it a bit, but when you start requesting for "can't remember password" the different service providers will ask you something that normally they all have in common (If you are not careful of course), once you hit this, all the other doors will open.