The new Beyond update for No Man’s Sky brought more purpose to the alien creatures that players find roaming around the procedurally generated galaxy. Before Beyond, the creatures mostly served as cataloguing material, visual stimuli, or cannon fodder.
With the Beyond update came the ability for players to interact with the creatures in brand new ways. Players can tame them, ride them, and even milk them. As a result of this, No Man’s Sky developer Hello Games also added the ability to cook gathered resources in order to make food, which ties directly into taming animals.
No Man's Sky doesn’t ask for too much before players get to the point where they can hop on an alien or crouch down and squeeze out some of its milk, but it does require a little bit of preparation.
Get a Nutrient Processor
In order to tame aliens, players will need bait. Each alien prefers a specific kind of bait which players need to process from other ingredients. To do that, players will need a Nutrient Processor.
Players can acquire nutrient processor blueprints at the Space Anomaly, which they can call at any time from their quick menu when floating in space. Once players board the Space Anomaly, they need to go to the Construction Research Terminal and buy the blueprints.
The nutrient processor doesn’t require anything too crazy in order to build it. Players will need 25 sodium (which they can find in yellow plants on every planet), a hermetic seal (which is crafted out of condensed carbon which in turn can be made by putting carbon in the portable refiner), and two metal sheets (constructed from ferrite dust).
Once players have built a nutrient processor, they can carry it with them and plop it down to use at their leisure. The nutrient processor has a separate inventory that can hold ingredients which will stay with it if it gets picked up and brought along.
Find an Alien and Scan it
Once players have a nutrient processor, they need to go to a planet and find an alien that they want to tame. Players who plan on riding an alien must find one of medium or large size. If players just want to farm for milk, they can choose any alien they like.
After players have settled on an alien, they need to scan it with their visor and “discover” it. This will put a pop-up on the left side of the screen with information about the creature, like its name, age, and behavior. Players can ignore the alien’s “Diet,” that has nothing to do with the bait. Instead, they should look at the top of the list of traits for the bait highlighted in yellow.
Make the Alien’s Favorite Bait
The recipe for the specific bait will automatically appear in the catalogue section of the pause screen after scanning the alien. Players can then go in and see what materials they need to make the bait. Many of the cooking recipes require Faecium or Mordite. Players can find Mordite on planets, but would probably have better luck hiring a farmer or constructing a hydroponic tray. Players can acquire Faecium much more easily. They must simply construct creature pellets (the blueprints should have shown up automatically with Beyond) and feed the pellets to some aliens. The aliens will poop and players can collect Faecium from the feces.
Other ingredients usually occur more naturally. Some come from slaying aliens for meat and some come from flowers found in caves and in the wild. Finding the ingredients to make bait can take a little digging, but when players have collected them all, they can put them in the nutrient processor and it will pop the bait out.
Feed the Alien to Tame It
The bait should appear in the player’s quick menu in the same place they can turn on the flashlight or change the camera perspective. In order to use it, players should bring up the bait menu and hover over the one they want to use. They then need to slowly approach the alien they want to tame.
If the alien starts to run off, that’s okay. If players toss the bait out, the alien should get a little magnifying glass above its head and return investigate. If multiple versions of the same creature find the bait, they will crowd around it and chow down. Soon enough, a smiley face icon will appear above each alien. Players will get a notification that they have tamed the beast.
Milk it or Ride it
Finally, players can do whichever thing they have worked towards. When they walk up to the alien, they will see a prompt. They can press a button to milk it or a button to ride it. If players choose to milk the alien, they will see milk immediately added to their inventory. If they choose to ride the alien, they will hop on, and can force it to take them wherever they want to go.
Players should note that if they choose one of the options, they cannot do the other. If they choose to milk the alien, the ride option will disappear. The creature will hang around for a little while and players will have a chance to milk them again. Eventually, the alien will no longer be tame and will wander off. If players choose to ride the alien, they can ride it for as long as they want, but as soon as they dismount, the alien will not be tame and it will go about its business. Players can choose to throw out more bait to woo the creatures again.
Folks who have trouble finding ingredients for bait should take a look at the No Man's Sky wiki, which has a ton of information about where to find each material in the game. Otherwise, players should now know how to tame, ride, and even milk any alien they encounter.
No Man's Sky Beyond is available now on PC, PlayStation 4, and Xbox One.