An official release date has been finally announced for the unbelievably large space exploration game No Man’s Sky.

The game was first unveiled back in 2013, and it astonished many. We’ve seen various peeks at the game since then, each one making us giddy with hope that it would actually be what it promised to be.

In addition to a release date being announced, it has also been revealed that the game will be getting a physical retail version for you gamers (me, me!) who still prefer to be able to hold the games that you own in your hands. You can read the full announcement from Hello Games’ Sean Murray and check out the game’s cover art below.

From the PlayStation Blog:

Hello PlayStation.Blog! I’m Sean Murray from Hello Games, part of the team making No Man’s Sky, with some exciting news for you: No Man’s Sky is launching on June 21st!

We’ve been a little quiet since we showed the game last year at E3, and it’s because we’ve been heads down and hard at work on development. It’s been a hectic but really exciting time for the team. Finishing a game is incredibly hard but lovely to watch as the pieces fall into place.

In No Man’s Sky you can trade, fight, explore, and survive in a boundless, computer-generated universe. It’s a vast, open game, and always a hard one to demonstrate quickly, but recently we let some people from the press loose in No Man’s Sky.

We pulled a few all-nighters this week in preparation! It was incredibly scary for us, but the moment we saw people start claiming discoveries, shouting and laughing at each other’s screens, we knew the hard work was paying off, and could collapse contentedly in the corner.

They got to see new features like how to survive on hazardous planets and how to learn alien languages, and for the first time we showed off some alien races you will be able to communicate with.

We’re excited for you all to play too, and we have some news a lot of you have been guessing at already. No Man’s Sky will have a full blown Blu-ray retail version! Sony has a history of working closely with indies, and this feels like some sort of culmination of that story. It means more people will have a chance to join us in exploring the universe than ever before. I can’t really imagine what it will feel like to walk into a shop and see our game on a shelf.

I remember when I sat in the audience and saw Sony putting LittleBigPlanet on stage for the first time, I knew that it no longer mattered how many people worked on your game, and that not every game had to start with a 10-minute CGI cut scene. I can’t believe we’re about to follow in their footsteps as an even smaller studio with their game in real, actual shops.

Most importantly, it gives us the best chance possible to keep supporting the game for free after it is released. No Man’s Sky will launch as a complete game in June, but there’s a lot we’d like to add post-launch, if we can.

Thank you, as always, for everyone’s support and patience as we head towards the home straight. We can’t wait for everyone to start their own adventures!

All the best,
Sean

You can pre-order No Man’s Sky for PS4 (Physical l Digital Code) now.

Cover Art