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Starfield - what are your thoughts?
For those of us who caved and got the Early Access, what are your thoughts on the game so far? Please remember to tag spoilers!
And for anyone looking forward to it coming out on Wednesday, got any plans for a build or character?
**My own two cents: **
I’ve sank 24 hours into it this weekend alone and barely scratched the surface. It’s a great game, with a solid story and decent voice acting (which for a Bethesda game seems to be a feat).
There’s a few ‘shames’, the big one being no space flight between planets. As people are digging into this more it looks like something that could be fixed with mods. The procedurally generated content is, like in No Mans Sky, a bit disappointing at times.
minor spoilers
I can’t believe the people on the moon don’t reference the fact they’re on the _moon_, they just repeat generic npc outpost dialog.However the combat is the best it’s been, and I love that it’s slower to build than in Skyrim or Fallout. Skills take longer to earn and plot lines are much more drawn out in greater depth and detail.
Overall it’s a cracking, fun and time consuming game and the negatives are definitely way overblown online (as is tradition), but it wouldn’t be a Bethesda game without missing the mark in small ways. Can’t wait for modding!
Not sure if you've seen some of the articles and maybe this isn't exactly what you meant, but you can target other planets if you're in your ship and fly to them without opening the map. Been doing this since I heard about it yesterday and it makes the game feel more contiguous.
Really? The AI is really basic and the shooting feedback feels weak... I don't understand how anyone can enjoy the combat in Starfield
Idk the feedback is a big step up from fallout 4. The animations and sounds are great. Gore is really the big thing missing. AI kinda sucks I agree.
But the skills really work well with the combat. Love the new movement capabilities like mantling, combat slides, jetpacks.
I also love how enemies use the jetpacks. It's not horrible by any means and I've found it very fun as an avid fps player.
I'm curious, do you play first person or third person?
I've found that the character feels really stiff in first person. It makes sense with the spacesuits, but third person has a better overall feel... I just can't actually play in third
Couldn't agree more, the combat and AI is mediocre to say the least. Halo: Combat Evolved was in released in 2001 and had/has way better AI and shooting feedback. The enemies in Starfield feel like bullet sponges and the weapons are just not satisfying to use.
Saying "It's a Bethesda game" is not a valid argument.
I disagree, since that is precisely the reason I'll pass on the game.
May sound cynical, but I don't trust Bethesda games to give me a worthwhile experience. It always ends up being far more shallow than its contemporaries. Even the first comment, praising the game, ends with saying that it wouldn't be Bethesda if it didn't have some oddities.
Bethesda used to make some fairly deep games IMO (well maybe not from a combat perspective), but everything since Morrowind has been more and more streamlined and casual. I haven't played Starfield yet as I know Bethesda enough to wait for a few patches, but I expect Fallout in space aka a larger Outer Worlds. And honestly, that's OK as long as you temper your expectations. Skyrim was fun, but it certainly was good enough in my eyes to justify the decade of milking Bethesda gave it.
Your last sentence is unclear to me, did you mean wasn't or did you indeed think it was good enough?
Now the success of Skyrim speaks for itself even if I don't like it. And therein lies the problem, I feel like Bethesda games just aren't for me and despite the setting speaking to me, Starfield isn't different enough to make me want to play it.
I did mean wasn't, sorry that typo really through off the meaning didn't it?
I worry that you're right on the money and that their games aren't for me anymore either. I LOVED their earlier games, but as they made them more casual and fun for the masses, the magic (no pun intended, though I truly miss the custom spell making of the earlier games) just isn't there anymore. I think Skyrim was the last game they released that was even enjoyable to me. Falllout 4 just wasn't good or fun for me, and the less said about Fallout 76 the better. I'll probably just wait a couple of years on Starfield and pick it up during some big sale to play during a lull on releases of games I'm interested in.
I always felt like Skyrim was supposed to be the new bench mark for what their games are going to be but then they retroactively decided that Skyrim was their magnum opus and they were just going to cut corners and sell games based off their brand name being associated with Skyrim.
You could be right. Maybe Skyrim was more successful than their publishers/owners anticipated and their accounting department decided that the smart move was to remaster the hell out of it.
Man I hear you on <spoilers>. I also went straight into there and found that there's no handmade content for it.
That's a shame about the flying. It's the part I was looking forward to the most tbh
What about bugs? How is the performance of the game this early? I've heard it's the best/least buggy of all Bethesda launches which is fantastic to hear.
I ran into two gameplay bugs - one needed me to reload and do something to prevent the loop from repeating, the other was just a nuisance thing that didn't change anything.
Performance is mostly fine. I've had some stutters, but minimal. At about 45 hours played, I'm getting some sound related issues (sounds cutting off, then suddenly catching up). It doesn't happen at the same time as anything else,so possibly just a sound thing, or a Windows thing (or me having other sounds going on the pc)
I play on 1440p, windowed full-screen, on a 3080. Most settings defaulted to high/ultra, I disabled dynamic textures, motion blur and depth of field. Some areas had pop-ins (mainly terrain stuff like grass), no other noteworthy graphical issues
I disagree with the first comment saying it is very buggy. My experience is you will be able to reminisce about buggyness in Bethesda games but it still is a notable step up in being less buggy (but you'll get a few bugs that feel very Bethesda lol. Like my char has chameleon gear and sometimes she stays invisible in third person). I mean it feels a little more buggy then I'd expect an open world game to be (But I expect any open world game is going to have some bugs... especially the more sandboxy they are. The only one I've ever played that didn't have at least a few bugs is Zelda BotW. And TotK was amazing with how much it allowed and being able to count bugs on one hand). So I'd say it's not much more than the usual buggyness you would get in any open world game (people don't seem to come down as hard on other companies for it but in my experience all open world games I've played have been at least a little buggy. Bethesda just usually has more than most and has some honestly hilarious bugs that stand out).
As for how well it runs, I can't say. I'm happily one of those people who just don't notice frame rates and such (I notice stuff like pop in and there is a little bit).
I will say this, it has less annoying bugs that made me have to restart the game cause otherwise I couldn't play than Baldur's Gate and I haven't even reached act III which I hear is kinda bad about that.
The game itself hasn't had bugs as far as broken quests and such in my experience so far. However, it's been crashtastic. I can only go about 2-3 hours without CTD. This is with a 7800X3D and a 7900XTX (I got a surprise check back from something and splurged over the 7800XT I was going to get), and I've been monitoring my temps and power and everything's good there. Not sure if the crashing is SF specific or AMD driver quality issues though since I got the XTX and immediately started playing SF...
Interesting, I also have a 7900xtx, haven't had any issues with any other games, so I wonder how it would run. I'm probably going to end up picking Starfield up within the next week or so, so I'll see I guess haha
So fwiw, I'm currently leaning toward the problem being a hardware problem - specifically, I did not realize quite how much power everything was drawing and I'm hitting the bare edge of what my 760w PSU can handle, even as a high quality/efficiency one (Corsair AX760i). It's a smart PSU with USB reporting so I started graphing the power usage and I was averaging over 550-600w, with spikes higher. I'm guessing the spikes were occasionally putting it at the 12v rail limit and causing the voltage to go out of spec, especially given that the Windows event log was reporting ACPI errors. We'll see for sure tomorrow when the 1000w replacement shows up.
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Nope, power made no difference :(
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Success! It was of all things a monitor problem. Vsync and Freesync were fighting. So many guides said to enable Vsync to fix problems that I never tried actually turning it off, but when I turned it off and instead switched to using the AMD Adrenaline Chill frame limiter (since I have a 60hz monitor), it's been smooth sailing.
In my experience on my beast of a rig, performance has been good and I have had no crashes yet. I'm only in about 8-ish hours. I'm seeing over 100fps most of the time on a 13900kf with a Radeon 7900xt on ultra 1440p. One thing that could potentially get a bit annoying are load times, though. I have a crazy disk array setup so my load times are around a second or two, but for comparison my XBox Series X takes 3-5 times as long and over a play session does get a little annoying if I'm doing a lot of zone hopping. That'll probably calm down though if I keep playing and learn where things are better.
Performance-wise on an XBox Series X, the framerate holds 30fps most of the time, but it'll have occasional dips. I haven't tried any gun battles on XBox yet -- I just did some shopping -- but I would expect they would be fine and hold steady at 30 the whole time. Graphics quality is obviously cut down, though. A hazard of the Zen 2 architecture and 16GB of total system memory I would suspect. Still, equally enjoyable as my PC I would say and definitely playable. Also I experienced no crashes here either.
For giggles I'll probably also try the game on a 13400f with an Intel Arc A770 16GB in the coming days. Should prove interesting.
Edit: It's unplayable on a ROG Ally on low 1080p. In the lodge I get a VERY inconsistent 10fps. Once leaving the lodge I get a crash to desktop.
You've probably heard that from die-hard Bethesda fans. I've played the game and the performance is atrocious, constant frame drops, uneven frame pacing, constant stutters, and overall low FPS despite playing on 720p at 50% upscaled resolution with FSR, RTX card btw. It's also very buggy, my character got wedged in a small opening and was stuck. AI can get stuck. Lots of small issues.
None of this would have mattered if the core gameplay was fun, but it's really not. The combat is really boring and unsatisfying. Even Skyrim did this better.
You're definitely having a worse experience than I, and I was going into it looking for problems.
I didn't pay for it to be clear, it's free on Game Pass, but even still I'm surprised at how not bad it's been. I'm playing on low settings in 1080p on a mobile 3060, and it's not had any problems after building shaders (which took like 3 minutes when launching).
I'm not enthralled with the game, it definitely feels a bit hollow to me so far - but combat is fine in my experience, and there's enough character customization that I do think people who enjoy it can get a ton of play time out of it.
Overall, I'm just kind of, "meh" on it. Would've preferred Elder Scrolls VI.
You are having much worse problems then me. I also really don't understand why people hate the combat so much?
Like it's not amazing or anything but it's pretty good fun. AI is pretty bad but Skyrims and fallout 4s was worse
Ok, your 2 cents is indeed your 2 cents, no one can take that away from you so I'm glad you are having a good time with it!
But there's one thing you said that is not completely right. The voice acting is often what a good Bethesda game carries together with the writing of the interesting characters. Fallout 3, Skyrim, and New Vegas (does F-NV count?) all had big names in the cast that had very good deliveries. The problem with Bethesda games is that the performance is often terribly hindered by the stiff facial animations. But if you can see past that there's nothing wrong with the voice acting in most cases.
I think this is exactly the problem, one they seem to have remedied with F4 and Starfield.
Previously, they spent a tonne on big name VAs for some roles which did amazingly then cheaped out on other roles, like having one single voice actor act all the guards and downs of NPCs in Skyrim, which killed immersion.
NV had decent voice acting, but I guess that would be down to how Obsidian handled it. They did a great job with Outer Worlds VA too.
I've had time to sink about 14-ish hours in since early access dropped. I don't have much to say about the game iteself that hasn't already been said, I'm having a great time.
It has made me realize how deeply nostolgic Oblivion, Fallout 3, and even Skyrim, are to me from my childhood / early adulthood and this game is completely warping me back into being in middle school, leaving the sewer and exploring Cyrodiil for the first time, it's pretty wild.
It, for sure, has a lot of issues but I'm even having fun looking around for mods to fix them, which I haven't done with a game probably since Skyrim first dropped, which is fun/nostolgic in itself oddly enough.
The discourse around the game has been really weird to watch though. Peoples expectations of space sims, state of the art graphics, or whatever were so astronomical, it's leading to people not seeing it for what it actually is, which is just a really solid Bethesda game. If that's all you're expecting, it is probably the best they have made and you will definitely enjoy it.
The entire point of a space game is to explore space. If you're confined within sandboxes, it's not really a space game. All you can really do is fast-travel to other planets, but they could have literally had all the cities and locations on the same planet and it would have been essentially the same game. Also, the space combat is terrible. Even games like Ratchet and Clank did a way better job at this.
Yeah I guess I don’t know, Im really enjoying it! I haven’t had issues with either of those things.
I think a certain demographic of people were maybe banking on it being a Star Citizen killer. SC being a game which, whether people will admit it in polite company or not, has raised a lot of bars in terms of technical achievments and immersion in the space genre.
People take it for granted now the way we often do with innovation, but then there's still no one else actually combining all those same features under one title the way SC is, so it creates a kind of weird dissonance. People know that a lot of things are possible now, they've experienced it, but they've also been told SC is a scam for years and is taking longer than it should. And then a large studio like Bethesda drops a big space title but still has to compromise on a bunch of stuff.
The reality is, as you say, the expectations for Starfield are probably unfair. I don't think they were ever dishonest in the way they marketed the game. I just don't think there's any putting the cat back in the bag when it comes to expectations now, even if those expectations are unfair. Once you've played a space game where you can walk around inside your ship, seamlessly land anywhere, load vehicles in and out of eachother, EVA between ships etc. it feels a little like going back in time a bit to do fast travel and landing cut scenes and stuff.
This isn't a jab at Starfield at all, but more just a commentary that we're at the edge of a new era of games, and the expectations of players are maybe out ahead of where most of the industry actually is currently because the technical challenges of delivering on these new concepts for games are mind-meltingly huge. It makes one wonder where it will end, how big companies will have to become to be capable of delivering next-gen content that feels properly next-gen to most people.
I don't think we can claim they've "raised the bar" until they actually ship a real world product with these features. Making a tech demo or vertical slice is one thing. Building these systems into a complete and polished product people will pay $70 is a whole other level of difficulty.
It has delivered on all those things I listed though. I think tech demo is maybe being a little disingenuous if you've actually played SC, it's not a criticism that really applies anymore, it's very clear that it's shaping up as an actual game.
But my point regardless of all that though, is that Starfield has more or less demonstrated that the feature set in SC, even as it is right now, has raised the bar of people's expectations whether you want to call it a tech demo or not. That was my larger commentary in response to the original comment as to why the response is so weird and mixed in some ways -- anyone who has played SC and had the experience of leaving atmosphere is bound to be disappointed on some level with a cut scene, even if they hate SC.
Star Citizen is not a complete product. They haven't shipped it yet. I can't go buy it for $70 and get a complete game yet. They have not delivered on their promises until they have a product on shelves. If people are basing their expectations for all AAA games on an unreleased game that has so far cost $600m and 12 years of active development with no end in sight, that is on them. I think any other AAA developer would be foolish to follow in their footsteps. The expectations they have set are wholly unrealistic.
But even if Star Citizen was a finished game, I'm not sure comparing the two would provide any real value. Starfield never billed itself as a space combat sim any more than Fallout 3 billed itself as a tactical military sim.
I feel as if you're maybe side-stepping the point I'm making in favor of trying to level criticisms at SC (many of which I would describe as inaccurate). The feature completeness of SC isn't really central to what I'm discussing, but I don't think we're really going to have a productive conversation about this so I'll say good night.
I think that situation would end with a lot of dissapointed consumers, most likely. If a developer wants to make another space game, they almost definitely are not going to have/spend the money to build up a new engine from scratch for 10+ years, so that they can include every feature Star Citizen has. So either they compromise on what they will implement, or just don't make that game.
I'm hoping there aren't tons of these hypothetical consumers out there who think like this, because it is so far out of touch with how the game development cycle actually works.
It'll be interesting to see. Star Citizen development is glacial, but like a glacier it just keeps grinding forward. As you say, it's a complete anomaly in terms of how games "should" be developed according to industry rules. The direct funding model that made SC possible is not something that can probably be replicated again, it was a confluence of all kinds of weird factors. I think it will stand alone as a monumental oddity sort of mocking the industry for a long time, until such a time that technology allows for fewer people to accomplish the same thing with less R&D.
From the looks of it though, the industry is doing fine regardless; Star Field will be a financial success despite any moping and griping from people who set their expectations too high, it has a momentum now that will carry it even if it had a ton of issues.
They've been in development for 10 years. Star Field has been in its planning stages since at least 2015, so it has taken a similar amount of time. And, to my larger point, it still lacks many of the features that SC has so kind of stands as living proof that SC has not taken an exceptionally long time it's simply a matter of one game being in open development (while maintaining a live environment and developing a singleplayer campaign) and the other being out of sight during its also long, glacial development.
I'm really mystified by people's inability to discuss this topic without resorting to hyperbole and insults, even on a forum like Tildes. I would expect this level discussion on reddit but it's unusual here.
Starfield has been in development for 10 years by a game company that also was finishing other large games in part of those 10 years (Fallout 4). As you said, part of that time is planning stage (and btw , 2023-2015 is 8 years, not 10). It has been completed in those 10 years and I'll bet it has more hand made content (not even counting the many planets you can visit) then SC done in those 10 years.
Also, people only had to pay 70 dollars or a monthly game pass fee to play it. No one has spent thousands of dollars to play the game (not to mention tons of money for ships that aren't even done yet).
Starfield didn't ask for anyone's money until they had a complete product, they weren't stringing people along asking for more money constantly (SC's budget has been way more than any of these AAA games and still can't put out a full game yet).
I think maybe you're unfamiliar with Star Citizen. You can pay $45 and get access to the game, and nearly all the ships are available to purchase in-game with in-game currency. No one is forced to pay for anything else, there is no subscription for access to the universe or gameplay, if you do so it's made very clear that it's to provide additional support for the continued development of the project.
Bethesda is an establish studio with a bank roll and investors of their own, the only real difference is that CIG started a studio from scratch and the backers themselves are the voluntary bank roll.
What did Starfield cost? ~250 million dollars over ten years. Now what is CIG developing by comparison? An MMO and a single player campaign, and they're maintaining a live version. So to make an honest comparison in terms of budget you would want to double what was budgeted for Star Field, which comes out to a similar amount.
But all of this is kind of why it's so pointless to try and discuss this, people have a complete misapprehension based on third-hand information filtered through all kinds of bad faith misinformation. Half the discussion is just untangling what people have misunderstood (or misrepresented) before anything real can be discussed.
I definitely agree there is some real vitriol in this thread. Interesting to see as I haven't seen much discourse here that wasn't exceedingly polite, but this thread is full of people talking down to to each other and being a lil rude. Guess people just get real passionate about video games, no matter where you go.
I think the problem is we may want a game like SC, but it's just not a feasable project with the scope they are trying to do. Sure, SC is trying to do it, and look where that has gotten them so far... Not to mention I'm pretty sure some fo the stuff SC tries to do could be cut out and it wouldn't kill the experience that much but they keep getting sidetracked into doing it (like for a recent example is it really going to be that much a game killer that bed sheets don't have the right physics?).
Basically SC is trying to do too much and it's just not feasable to do that and actually come out with a complete project. And I honestly believe they've realized they can make a ton of money just being in alpha all the time so while I'll say it may not hae started out a scam, I'm not unconvinced it's not one now.
Yeah, SC is a dream game (well for me Squadron 42 is, I really hate pvp) but it's just not a feasable project. At least not without removing some of the "realism" so they can finish the actual game. I mean dream game says it right there, it's a dream. Doesn't mean it's a feasable project IRL.
And no, a game that has problems all the time with servers and you can't keep your progress and keeps getting reset is not complete. Not to mention has sold ships for hundreds of dollars that haven't even been released yet.
Yeah, it is a modern Bethesda game for sure, and I don't know what anyone else expected. It will be worth the wait!
This isn't a valid argument. Not everyone is a die-hard fan of Bethesda. Plus, why is it acceptable for a gaming company to have low standards? You're paying full price for what's supposed to be an "AAA" game.
Do you actually consider this acceptable? Would you have the same attitude if this was an EA game? If you bought the game, you essentially paid the developers of Bethesda, but you expect an amateur to fix the game for free in their spare time? In other words, privatize the profits, socialize the work.
Bethesda is a known quantity. You know what you are getting when you buy a one of their games. By Bethesda standards, Starfield is the least buggy launch they have ever had.
Part of the package of their games is their embracing of the modding community. There are no other AAA games that have the same level of modding support that a Bethesda game has. Skyrim and Fallout are still played and culturally relevant because most people aren’t playing vanilla, they are playing modded. It is absolutely a selling point to their games.
I feel like its perfectly reasonable to excuse a developer who makes games where the positives out-weight the negatives, that doesnt seem controversial to me at all? I feel that way about any developer who can give me 100+ hours of fun for $70, regardless of bugs. If its playable and enjoyable I dont understand the hostility or why it matters. A fun game is a fun game.
Bethesda games are just different. No one else makes a game like them. Sure, there are things I wish they would do better... but anytime I try another game it just doesn't hit the same. There is a reason Bethesda has die hard fans and it's not cause the fans have low standards. It's just that no one else makes a game like them, period so yes we give them some leeway. And they are enjoyable, flaws and all. And honestly, when it comes to how buggy the game is, I'd rather the bugs than them remove stuff that no one else does that for me really adds to the immersion (and fun silly crap you can do like drop buckets on people's heads or hoard a bunch of stuff in your house/ship). I'd not trade a smoother running game for getting rid of the stuff that helps makes their games unique (and also tends to make it harder to be bug free). I don't want another game like any other game maker makes. There are plenty of those and I enjoy them too but Bethesda doesn't need to also make them. I want a Bethesda game.
Bethesda wouldn't be able to "get away with this" if lots of people didn't find their games fun. Hell, there are people like me who will bitch up a storm and yet they make my favorite games (I find myself defending them in one thread and comiplaining in another).
Bethesda games by definition have low standards, so in turn the fans also have low standards. You said it yourself that "no one else makes a game like them". In this game, the story, soundtrack, graphics, and even the core gameplay are all mediocre to say the least. The story is really bad, it's the most generic space story ever, a magical artifact found in space is way overdone. The characters are dull and forced. The soundtrack is almost non-existent. And what is up with the graphics? In some areas it looks good, in others it looks like a muddy, desaturated mess.
Skyrim was way better than Starfield. That was the only game I could forgive for being "a Bethesda game".
Starfield was overpromised and the fans didn't care because it's essentially a cult.
This isn't true, the reason people find their games fun is solely because of the mods. Sure, there's a small population that enjoys their vanilla games but the majority play them for the mods. If it wasn't for the mods people would criticize the story and gameplay, and rightfully so as they're usually bland and uninspired.
Again, Bethesda has a cult following.
Starfield does nothing new. Bethesda essentially releases the same games, but with different themes, and people praise them for it.
It's fine for people to enjoy Bethesda games, but they try to force their cult opinion onto others by saying ridiculous things like "Starfield is game of the year" when it's objectively not true.
One, objectively is not a thing when it comes to if the game is the most fun to you. Sorry, that is very subjective.
Two. I really hate it when people decide people only like a game cause they are a cult. Maybe, just maybe, they see something in a game you don't. Maybe cause that isn't what you want out of a game or doesn't fit your playstyle at all. But Bethesda games don't get that popular just cause "it's a cult". Fuck off with that shit (basically you are just downplaying anyone who doesn't agree with you as having no mind of their own). I mean it's fine to say you don't like/understand Bethesda games, they aren't for you and you find them mediocre. But just cause some people really do like them doesn't mean it's only cause they are a cult. They find something to the game that they enjoy doing (For me no other game lets me actually pretend I am in the world so well).
And btw, plenty of people enjoyed them on Playstation and xbox before mods so, no, it's not cause of mods they like them. The games would have failed on consoles if that were true (maybe if you are young you dont' remember there was a time they sold well and mods were not allowed on consoles period). I loved them before mods (but after getting a PC I can understand why not to play without mods, it's spoiling to be able to add stuff and fix small issues to make the game even better).
Just admit you don't understand the like for them. But quit chalking it up to people just being in a cult. That's just downright insulting, downplaying anyone's opinions who don't align with yours, and wrong. The only thing that says is just that you are incapable of understanding anyone's POV except your own. And your opinions don't mean anyone else who enjoys the games and finds them great are wrong (They are wrong for you, just like your opinion is wrong for them).
This wasn't my point and I even said that it's fine for people to enjoy Bethesda games. Objectively, the story is uninspired and bland, the gameplay is bland, the graphics are bland, and etc. Even the sound effects and music are bland, though this is mostly subjective, but if you compare it with say Skyrim there's a very noticeable difference. None of these are acceptable for a game released in 2023.
For instance, the NPCs all say the same thing when you talk to them. They walk aimlessly. There's no life to the game. It's using the same exact game design it has since Oblivion, but with some variations obviously. Again, it's fine to enjoy it, but to say that this is a great game is a blatant lie. It's the same game reskinned and reshipped, with no attempt done to improve it whatsoever. It's actually a downgrade when compared to Skyrim.
Yeah, no, it is a cult and your anger proves it. You're taking this very personally. Once again, it has nothing to do with enjoying the game. It has everything to do with how people are painting the game. Using your logic, it's a Bethesda game, it's nothing new, nothing special, just a rehash of their formula. But from a technical standpoint it's pretty bad. The game is very poorly optimized, has washed out colors presumably due to a color filter, has endless bugs, the most generic shooting gameplay, and goes out of its way to kill immersion. I guarantee you if this was made by another studio, even with the same exact Bethesda formula and actually even if it was the same exact game, it would have received massive criticism, much like Cyberpunk 2077 did.
The game doesn't even give you the option to change your FOV...in an FPS game. Modders are already fixing the game for Bethesda, a multi-billion dollar company, for free mind you. And you sit there vigorously defending their poor production quality. If you weren't in a cult, you would have criticized them for their subpar quality and rightfully so, while still being able to enjoy the game.
For the record, I like the game so far. But it's most definitely nowhere near close to being game of the year, only a person in a cult would think that. And Bethesda doesn't deserve the ridiculous amount of money they're asking for it so I got it for free from a fit friend.
I haven't really gotten into a Bethesda game since Oblivion (despite trying) but so far I'm having a blast with Starfield. Games with a big scope have bugs - the ones in Starfield aren't that gamebreaking in my (limited) experience so far.
Quick point to mention that at least on PC, you can definitely open a lot of containers by selecting the "transfer" option. It took me about 20 minutes to realize it since I was just grabbing everything in sight for a while.
I'm not enamored with the game, but since I didn't pay for it I'm not offended - though I was definitely disappointed when I selected the Ronin class only to realize that the early part of the game makes it almost impossible to stealth kill with melee. So my badass build was immediately taken out back and shot in the head with the guns the game clearly wanted me to use.
It's fine though, nothing exceptional in my eyes, but it's not egregious in my experience either. Though I seem to be the only person in that camp.
Ohhhhh, yeah I get what you mean. I did notice that and it bothered me a bit too. Even if most of it was useless and empty anyway, it was always nice to have the option to open a random thing.
As far as immersion goes, I kind of agree - there are some weird things with the food and drinks but honestly I'm willing to just let it go, they did put fresh apples in ancient unopened crypts in Skyrim.
It's honestly the worst Bethesda game I've ever played, and the most worrying thing - it's the worst Bethesda game at the one thing Bethesda usually does right - exploration. There's none of that.
Here's how travel works in this space exploration videogame:
This is repeated forever, because there's a thousand of empty procedural planets for you to explore, and a few handcrafted cities with barely enough in them to compare them to something like Whiterun. Bethesda dipped their toes into procedural generation just enough to not have enough hand placed stuff, but not enough for it to actually be cool like something in No Man's Sky.
People will also tell about how it's "the best gunplay it's ever been", and, yeah, but it's still bad. Guns aren't fun, enemies are VERY dumb and are basically bullet sponges. The quests aren't good either, secondary or main. Here's a few examples:
Oh, but there's a bigger one, check this out:
Main quests are worse. At some point, someone said "starborn" and I just gave up. It's the most sterile Bethesda game, it's the most sterile sci-fi game, it's just a bad game overall. The only things good about it are some designs of science thingies like ships and guns. The performance is straight up atrocious. It is the most bugfree Bethesda release, I guess, but the rest is so depressing it made me very pessimistic about TES 6.
It’s just fallout four in space, or so people say. I tried it on steam, and I think I would agree. When fallout four is on sale for $10, and it’s modding community is active, I don’t see why I would need starfield. But that’s just my opinion.
It's uh... well it's a different game. That's why
I don't understand how this point of view can exist at all. Fallout 4, with all it's drawbacks, is a handmade experience, start to finish. It's packed. Locations are handmade, paths between locations are handmade, Fallout 4 is dense to the point there maybe it shouldn't be, but it's still a designed experience, straightforward and continuous experience. Starfield is anything but continuous, it's jugged, separated and, honestly, empty. The only things in common between Starfield and Fallout 4 is gun-based combat. And junk.
I feel like you're being uncharitable. The package quest is quite possibly the very first non-mainline quest in the game, and it sends you across multiple zones, using both the local transit which shows you that there's multiple districts and an elevator where you get clued into the fact that elevators can let you access multiple floors with various NPCs and offices. You can sum it up as "go to place, talk to person, go to other place, get thing, drop off thing," but you're missing the point of the quest as an easy starter quest to get people going and exploring.
The bigger one is placed specifically on the main path between your ship and the main quest hub/bedroom. It's there to give something of interest on the section of terrain that you're likely to cover more than any other walkway in the game. Each stage asks you to explore further afield. First the city, then the city interiors, then other planets. Again, it's there to get people off the beaten path. Saying that the twist is purely flavor is saying that the quest writing was good and framing that as insufficient unless you get a special reward on top? I'm really not sure why you have an issue with it.
So, Starfield came with my GPU, and it was even the Premium Edition so I got early access!
I’ve got around 10 hours into the game so far and I’m really enjoying it.
There are, however, some quirks. The UI is pretty horrible, to exit the menu you have to either hold down the escape/tab key, or press it multiple times—there’s no functional difference between escape and tab. This wouldn’t be such a big deal if you didn’t have to use the menu all the time—I’ll get to that.
I haven’t figured out a way to quickly switch weapons, so every time I run out of ammo (or the weapon is ineffective against the enemy) I have to pause the game and select a weapon. [Read edit]
Space travel is kinda crappy. At first I was speeding up trying to get to another planet before realizing that was not going to work (apparently it is possible though, if you want to leave your ship in-transit while you’re in bed). So to travel you have to—yep—go back into the pause menu and go through the map there.
Weight management is of course a pain-in-the-ass. I don’t really have all that much, but the moment you go over you’re unable to walk without depleting your oxygen.
Speaking of oxygen, the only way to get anywhere on these planets is to walk. Everything is a kilometer away, and that takes a while without running. And there’s only one place you can land your ship. Space rovers would have been nice, and it’s not like they didn’t think of that—I saw a perfectly unusable space rover sitting on a planet as decoration.
Health is way too difficult to manage. You do not replenish health and you can get far into a no-return mission without any additional access to health. I almost had to go back to a very old save because I couldn’t find any health.
Oh, and I remember people complaining that there are no maps. It’s not true, there are maps, they’re just utterly useless. This isn’t a big deal to me though.
As many complaints as I’m laying out here, I’m really enjoying the game and am surprised by how massive and lively_ it actually is.
Edit:
I’ll try to update any quirks that actually had a solution. There are 0 tutorials in this game. Right at the beginning it tells you to use WASD then throws you to the wolves.
So, I found out you can switch weapons by pressing Q. I pressed many buttons trying to figure it out, but apparently I didn’t press Q? You can also assign them to your number keys. I had thought maybe, but didn’t find it when I tried.
Regarding your edit, I have also had suprisingly many instances of wishing there was some quality improvement, only to realize that it is already in the game, just never telling you.
Auto unequipping suit in cities, being able to get up from chair while in free flight, weapon hotkeys, landing without entering map. Just to name a few I can remember.
The big issue I think is that there's not much to get at between the walks. It doesn't feel like Skyrim, it feels like No Man's Sky. First thing on my list is probably to get speed-enhancement buff production going to make it less tedious.
Also you never know if you're running into a proper quest or an auto-generated one and that really pisses me off so I've been avoiding exploration for the most part. Are there even "proper" quests found by walking around? I remember the devs saying they sprinkled them into the autogenerated planets. Maybe it's because I've only been to regular planets so far (just N-Atlantis, Mars, and the Moon)
I've had some radiant quests found on locations (go somewhere else on the planet to do something) and 1 case of going to another planet to deliver something. No big quest lines yet
The walking. I've read that the disinclusion of rovers wasn't a programming issue, but an active design choice. Is there anyone who's landed in a random spot on a random planet, seen an unknown landmark 800 meters away, and hoofed it there multiple different times? I landed roughly where I live in earth, did that once, and found a cave with a single piece of duct tape or something in it. Never again.
Somewhat unrelated but GPUs still come with game bundles? I'm wondering where I can find any of those anymore these days.
There are currently two promotions going on that I’m aware of, Starfield with an AMD GPU, and Assassin’s Creed: Mirage & Nightingale w/ a Intel ARC and CPU.
I bought an AMD RX 6750XT a few months back, and it came with a code for The Last of Us, about a month before that game released. That was a pleasant bonus.
My brother recently bought a new premade computer; the GPU came with a free copy of Diablo IV. He almost didn't get it because the computer was so delayed that he was right on the cusp of missing the cut off.
I'm not sure what brand of video card they installed in that, though.
lol thanks I too didn't know about pressing Q. I was resorting to assigning guns to favorites
They is so boring, bug filled and just poor gameplay mechanics that I got a refund off Steam. The people on Consoles have it a bit better than those of us on PCs.
Some the worst combat in a game.
Endless cutscreens.
Horrible console only controls.
Empty planets.
Why am I sitting on the ground watching my ship takeoff into space which I am sitting in?
I shoot the ground around NPC’s and there’s zero reaction.
My NPC companions just run around and random directions. The worst AI.
I tried flying away from a planet in my ship and when I turn around I’m still sitting at the planet.
inventory management hell.
every generic NPC says the same thing
https://youtu.be/ZbLQuXxvBGI?si=g40pPLVRKNoLu6g2
I played it for about an hour and a bit and found it pretty mediocre. Navigating the menu is terrible, travelling through space is incredibly boring, ship combat is dull (I found NMS' ship combat to be kinda mediocre but better than Starfield's) and on-foot combat is meh.
The third chapter of Sim Settlements 2 for Fallout 4 is out so I might go play FO4 instead.
30 hours so far. Very much enjoyable, and I barely feel like I've scratched the surface yet.
The whole travel immersion issue is something I very much recognize. For example after the first time landing at a city, you can never land there again. Only fast travel. The game really expects you to get bored of the travelling much faster than I actually do. I dont expect free flight outside of planet orbit, but they could definitely have done more to make travel more immersive. Having said that it is not close to a deal breaker or anything, just a bit of frequently reminded annoyance.
As for combat, it is fine though I am not a fan of bullet sponge games. The only shooters I usually play are realistic ones where getting hit even once can be a death sentence. I find the combat in starfield super easy to the point that I have actually sold some of my medpacs since I had over a hundred as I rarely use them. Probably because I play more like its a realistic shooter than a casual one.
Even added mods which gets rid of hit markers and reticle. Also tried one that removes enemy health, but I dropped that after running into an enemy that took forever to kill, which makes it worse when you cant see its actual health.
The ship designer is very fun. I just wish I could design and save my designs without actually modifying my ships.
It's not a revelation, which I had expected, but I'm enjoying it all the same.
I didn't really pay any attention to Starfield and wasn't really aware of it coming out, until about a week ago when I heard it was about to release, which surprised me. Out of curiosity, I took a look at it on Steam and said to myself, "$70? Hah. No way", then looked at the minimum requirements; my computer was below them. Not surprising, given I rarely use my gaming computer and generally play older and indie stuff on my laptop and Steam Deck, but something broke in me that day and I suddenly needed to spend $500 upgrading my gaming PC. Now I'm the owner of a 6700 XT, Ryzen 5600 and Starfield Premium (from the video card) and I've been playing every day since release on Thursday.
I've now got about 14 hours with it and it's what I expected; mediocre writing for the most part, but some fun and interesting quests here and there. Combat is probably the best it's ever been in a Bethesda game (Been playing them since 1996) and the world design is pretty neat; I'm enjoying just existing and pottering about. The game looks pretty good, though maybe not as good as the specs seem to suggest, but as a person who isn't a slave to graphics, I think it's pretty great. The character models and facial animations are the best they've ever been in a Bethesda game and I feel like the characters have a lot of nuance to their facial expressions as they speak.
All that said, with only 14-hours, I feel like I haven't even scratched the surface at all, so I'm not really sure what my complaints about it will be in the future. So far, I'm enjoying myself and I want to keep playing, which is enough for me right now. I don't often find games that I just want to continue playing and thinking about these days, so that's nice to have.
I'm only 10 hours and 3 planets in, but so far I've been loving it. The procedural stuff is... I wish they just stopped trying to do that. It has not worked in any of their games since Skyrim and they keep trying it for some reason.
But the rest? The rest is great. I've done a quest on Mars that i thought "oh it's just a delivery" and then it spirals into this super long questline of corporate shenanigans and then opens into like two or three more questlines that take you everywhere. If all the questing is like this I'll be a happy spaceman for a while.
I also love the ship interior aesthetics. Sci-Fi ships usually look super pristine like Star Trek, but ships in this game were clearly designed to look like modern spacecraft, so everything is labeled up the wazoo, there's tons of stuff on nets and other holding spaces, there's instruments EVERYWHERE, and there's this feeling of cramped space whenever you're inside. It looks... pretty much how pictures of our current spacecraft do.
No spoilers but the other quest lines are definitely like that. I've only had like maybe 3 side quests that where fairly straightforward
Disclaimer that I love Bethesda games, (300 hours in F3, 100 in F:NV, 60 in F4 and 100 in Skyrim) and I've spent about 40 hours so far this weekend with Starfield.
I'm enjoying it a lot! Definitely not a perfect game by any means but to me it feels like a more modern Fallout game with better graphics.
A couple of gripes first: I immediately turned down a bunch of color settings in the settings menu because the game looked super washed out with some of it's default settings. I dunno if I got used to it or it's more bearable now but turning down color filters and motion blur and some other lighting settings really helped.
I don't like how a couple of the main quests basically just require you to check in back at the quest giver. It's pretty annoying for that.
But overall to me it's like Fallout in Space. for some that might be bad but it's exactly what i'm looking for. I like that I can follow the questline all the way and they're pretty interesting with some interesting decisions (even though they don't seem to affect the overall world too much yet, though it's added some dialogue options to other, semi-related quests). It would be cool if going down a certain storyline locks you out of other ones but I can see why bethesda didn't go that way.
I spent a lot of time customizing a ship last night, it was a bit finnicky but after it worked i was super happy with it!
So I have not played the game, which makes my opinion less valid. But I've watched an hour or so of gameplay on Twitch and YouTube from people that are decently far into the game. It looks like Bethesda has saved me $70 by releasing a mediocre game. To be fair, it's possible that the way I play the game would make it more enjoyable for me than how most people play it. But my initial impression is that Bethesda has grown too large and is failing to maintain their famous level of game design quality.
Skyrim was built by around 100 people, Starfield by over 400. The issue with corporations of that scale is that human social psychology is not built to scale beyond 100 people. That means a corporation that runs fine with 100 people needs to pass through the Great Filter as they go beyond that scale. Some make it through unscathed, others do not. One common way to keep a large group of people organized is to have a simple goal that you all work towards - something that can be summarized in a few words. Starfield looks like it has been failed by that approach. I assume internally it was pitched as "Fallout in Space" or "Skyrim in Space". And that's exactly what this is - and no more.
I want to give credit to the art teams. I've seen a lot of beautiful locations in the game. There are good bits here and there. But it's pretty much the most straightforward adaptation of previous Bethesda games into a Space world. As if you asked an AI to perform style transfer onto Skyrim.
Spoilers?
The game even has you play as a messiah character called Skyborn. Sounds a little too familiar.A brand new IP is an opportunity to rethink things from the ground up. And technology has developed significantly since Bethesda's masterpiece releases. We could have had a truly 2023 game instead of a polished up 2010 game.
Me neither have played the game, but it seems I would need an immersion mode option, where:
I don't see the word XP.
Don't see enemy levels or names like "Pirate", but something like "Unidentified Human" unless they broadcast ID or show symbols etc.
Travel cuts are done in 1. person.
Rather than a huge "Location Discovered" which is VERY gamey, show something like "Location ID Detected [New]" in the corner.
Bethesda is also notorious for giving away the exact direction of all enemies. Part of the "minimap problem" of many modern games.
I've taken a liking to the MGS V and Death Stranding approach where they put all the notifications into a scrolling feed at the side instead of cluttering up the center of the screen.
I've had a situation where I had to maneuver to avoid colliding with another ship after jumping into a new place because that giant notification was in the way and was taking its sweet time to fade out.
I haven't been able to play it in account that it was broken on arc gpus. This has now been fixed so I'm looking forward to giving it a shot after work today.
I have watched a number of videos on it, and I think the thing that will probably annoy me the most would be the number of loading screen, specifically between buildings and your ship. I'm not sure what to expect for the procedurally generated areas for places you have already visited (do these get regenerate?).
From what I have seen it seems like Bethesda have nailed the atmosphere and sound design of the game.
Out of curiosity, what inclined you to go with an arc GPU?
Price. GPU prices are ridiculous. My old card was a RX480 and was showing its age. I wanted something to get me by a little longer until I was ready to get a high end card. The a750 was on sale for sub $400 AUD which made it significantly cheaper than the 3060 at the time.
I can't blame the guy. I bought a used 1660 super that was great, but also obviously an ex-mining card. It was good while it lasted but started having random crashes after a long time of playing but would then send the card's fans into overdrive. Those times got shorter and shorter until it effectively died and was hard to diagnose.
I replaced it with a 6500xt that everyone said was the best bang-for-your-buck GPU. I've been able to get it to work for most games but it was a headache to accomplish this goal. I had to undervolt it because most games wouldn't play for more than half an hour without a driver crash. I found out that this is EXTREMELY common for GPUs of this era for both Nvidia and ATI. It such a problem (Google 6500xt-6700xt, 2060-2080 plus 'crash after 20 minutes playing fix' and you'll probably be shocked by the results). Nvidia has apparently at least acknowledged it and told people how to work around this, but ATI has straight up never done that or tried to fix it. You pay a premium for Nvidia but at least they support cards after they're released. ATI has lost my support because they don't fix legitimate problems.
I'm on board for the Intel GPUs and it's a bad time to buy a GPU anyways . They have decent results, and Intel has the best support to try to get their products to work. They are desperate to get people to buy their products and it shows. Every time someone complains that 'I can't play game xxxx with my GPU' it's fixed within a short time.
I have a feeling that a lot of people will approach this game with the expectation that you can just wander wherever your fancy takes you and run across interesting adventures like in Fallout or Elder Scrolls. This is not the case with Starfield (most planets only have procedurally generated content) and trying to play like this almost led me to give up after the first couple of hours. Once I went back to the hand crafted content, I began to enjoy the game a lot more.
The good:
The actual hand designed locations and quests are a lot of fun and on par with the better quests in Fallout / Elder Scrolls. There's a good variety to the locations and the sorts of role playing opportunities available to the player.
The intro is really short! You can get through it within an hour and be doing whatever you want (although it'll likely take several hours more to really get to grip with the game's systems, even if you've played Bethesda games before).
There's no level adjustment for enemies or zones, and all zones and enemies are clearly flagged with their challenge level. I'm a sucker for trying to find ways through high level areas before I'm ready, so I loved having that option.
The ship building is pretty fun (although it does have some weird quirks on what ship designs it'll allow). It's also mostly skippable if you're not into it (more on this below), as you can just buy the upgrades you want directly or steal a better ship.
The bad:
The portion of the game spent physically flying your ship around is really small and essentially boils down to being dropped into an instance which is often empty, but occasionally has some other ships you can either shoot or talk to. Most of these encounters can be resolved in minutes by doing one of those two things. There's no exploration or flying around required. The rest of the space travel (flying between planets; landing on a planet; flying elsewhere on the same planet) is wholly menu driven. I'm personally fine with this as this isn't what I'm looking for from the game, but I can understand why the people looking for something more like Elite or Star Citizen are disappointed.
The menus are clunky (often requiring you to go several layers down to get where you want) and the tutorial on how to use them isn't great. It's far from unusable once you learn how it works, but given the sheer amount of menuing you need to do in this game, it's unfortunate.
The local map (planet level) doesn't show anything other than quick travel markers, so it's basically unusable as a map. I didn't really care about this either as I don't aim to explore 100% of everywhere I come across, but I can see why this is maddening to the people who do.
The encumbrance situation is kind of brutal as the game expects you to pick up a ton of resources and spare parts in addition to your usual loot. You can store stuff on your ship (and upgrade your ship's carrying capacity), but there are so many different types of resources and components that I'm constantly running out of space. The game also gives you an infinite storage container early on, but having to quick travel to dump stuff into it is a drag and it's also not hooked up to your crafting / base building menus, so you have to actually go back and get the stuff you need if you want to leave all your stuff there.
I've heard a lot of people say they enjoy the gunplay better than Fallout 4. Coming from the perspective of someone who constantly used VATS in Fallout and melee in Elder Scrolls... I guess it's fine? It never feels like you're missing when you should be hitting, but many enemies are absolute bullet sponges with multiple health bars and constantly running into these guys leaves the guns feeling a bit lacking in impact to me.
Overall I'm having a great time and finding myself staying up late to play like I did with Tears of the Kingdom. It just took like 10 hours to feel out how the game worked and reach that point.
My only complaint is the reliance on fast travel. It reminds me of Daggerfall in that scale is a setpiece, not a stage you get to traverse as in, say, No Man's Sky. The inter-system travel makes sense but you can't fly planet to planet or even in-atmosphere which was honestly a major complaint many people had concerning even later reveals. I also understand why this wasn't done, basically because it's an RPG with solid exploration, not a full space flying game like NMS. This is minor but honestly my only major complaint. On to the positives.
I like the new experience and skill system/model. The Fallout per-task XP system is better for this context. The challenges lend a sense of purpose to how you do things, like looting or simply using ballistic weapons.
The interactions are early Fallout 3D game style with lists of great, or wild, options so you can get a wide range of responses. The random quests can be so mundane as getting somebody a cup of coffee, which I found to be a cool immersive touch. I like the Oblivion style of overhearing things to get quests as well.
I expected more jank and breakage. The only crash I've had was caused by Proton on approach to a station, that didn't repeat in Windows. This has been a solid run so far. We just need a bunch of optimization, especially in the cities, which apparently even choke more powerful rigs.
I also enjoy the setting and story. There is no apocalypse, no doomsday to prevent. In fact, humanity has persevered after doomsday. It feels like a breath of fresh air to have a story with some gravitas, but without an albatross around your neck.
Follower spoilers
Adoring Fan is great. Even as high-labor fan service he keeps the game grounded, in a way. So far I think he's just hilarious to have around.
Yeah I really enjoy how the stakes of the story are high. But not world ending high. It makes it fucking off and doing side quests not so stressful.
NMS is one of my all-time favorite games, and has been that way before, after, and during all of its many patches. It's always clicked with me on a deep level. Heck, I even actively followed Waking Titan. So, naturally, I've been thinking of biting the bullet on this one, but it seems too combat-heavy for me. My favorite part of NMS is scanning the local flora and fauna and just... walking around. I'm wondering how much of that I really could find in Starfield. Some combat doesn't bother me, but if it's front and center all the time, I don't think I'll be able to justify how expensive it is.
Can someone speak to how much that kind of exploration figures into it?
Hey! So about 24 hours in myself, and I can say that the game is really what you want it to be. Most systems are entirely optional if you want to engage with them or not, and the same is absolutely true for most types of combat. A majority of those 24 hours have been just doing dialogue, exploring, and building (though I am really enjoying the combat). I haven't gotten too much into surveying and outpost building yet, but from what I have done you can spend a lot of time completing a scan for a certain species of flora or fauna. The game is gorgeous so you'll have plenty of eye candy to look at planet-side as well. When you get into missions and side-quests you'll inevitably have to interact with combat, sort of a no-brainer but thought I'd mention.
You can't really travel between planets like you can in NMS or Elite: Dangerous, landing and interplanetary travel is all done through Mass Effect-like cutscenes. For me that cuts out a lot of tedium I have a problem with in those games, but for some it can take away from the experience. Obviously Starfield is also limited to about 100 systems and 1000 land-able planets/moons so there's not that infinite space either, but plenty to sink a lot of time into.
The game does have a slow start, and you'll have to play ball until you complete the first quest, but after that you're pretty much set free to do anything and go anywhere. Star systems also gradually get harder, indicated by their recommended level by their description on the universe map, but it doesn't stop you from going there, and you do get XP from scanning, building, exploring new locations, all that good stuff aside from combat.
So the short form is that, if you want then combat can absolutely take a backseat to exploration and with the tone of the game I'd even say Bethesda encourages that!
Hope this helps!
Yeah I'm actually quite glad that I don't have to spend several minutes jumping from system to system to go return a book or something to an npc. NMS I found very boring, elite dangerous I pick up and put down when I fancy something grindy.
Maybe I could be sold on the concept that the first time you go to a system or planet you have to manually jump there and manually land, but I would actually hate the game if it made me go through the whole "frameshift drive charging", "deploying fuel scoop", "fuel scoop complete" loop of travelling anywhere in elite.
Adding elite style navigation might be a little cool at first, but it wouldn't really elevate the game in my mind. It would very quickly become a chore.
Elite doesn't really hide how repetitive and grindy its game loops are. Aside from doing those corkscrew approaches, there's also nothing to do in supercruise whether that's a 5 min trip or 30. In Starfield at least you can get out of the seat, organize your cargo and talk to crew or something.
Elite style immersion yes, but it doesn't have to be a wholesale copy. To me I'd prefer a middle ground where the ship autolands but from your perspective like that cutscene of the landing animation that plays once. Maybe it's a loading/streaming thing with this engine is but I liked how Jedi Survivor did just that. Maybe do some tricks like putting up giant walls around the landing pad or have the cockpit facing empty land instead so they can hide how the game is streaming in the rest of the city.
For in-system travel, have the ship point to the target and do some smoke and mirrors to shift the skybox around as an immersive replacement of the loading screen. Scaled to the loading time at least so it doesn't turn to fixed durations that happen with the shimmying through cracks or lifting up doors type versions. This would also make that navigation computer slightly more useful and mirrors real-life air travel where autopilot is engaged for the bulk of cruise.
At the very least I want the choice of the illusion of travel even if it's just for a few seconds (while still providing the fast travel option) without turning it into Hutton Orbital. Maybe have the ship computer tell you that you arrived at your destination once the loading "screen" is done.
It definitely has a decent amount of combat but it's not front and center. The story and RPG stuff is more the focus. Along with exploration which is very similar to No Man's Sky I felt. Albeit with much more handmade content.
I got almost 40 hours played over the weekend, and I love it!
The world feels alive, the surveying is fun, the combat is great.
The procedural generation has some issues, but I'm hopeful for future updates and mods to add enough variety that you want stuff to repeat.
Inventory management is a pain... But I'm a hoarder, I'd struggle even with 5 times the space. And you get tools to deal with it in the game, it just takes time.
Only ran into a couple of bugs - one of which was a softlock that I had to reload for. Very much issue-free playing, which wasn't my experience with the early days of Fallout 4 or Skyrim
I'm not that far into the game, but I'm enjoying it so far! Starfield is my first Bethesda game so there were a few things I had to get used to, like NOT picking up everything I see.
My only big complaints are that the map is utterly useless in cities and various small performance/gameplay issues like the clunky UI and weird mouse aiming, but the latter issues have been fixed with mods already.
Ironically the not picking up everything you see thing is unique to Starfield - most other Bethesda games are hoarding games!
I highly recommend playing Skyrim SE if you’ve not played any others, it’s my personal favourite game of all time.
I'm enjoying it. Starfield has pretty much all the same flaws and qualities Skyrim and Fallout 3/4 had, and I spent a lot of time in those games. It hasn't overdelivered like a lot of people seemed to be hoping for.
Yeah that's my take-away, too. It's exactly what I expected it to be, a far more modern Skyrim-in-space. With all the flaws that brings with it, but also all the strengths.
(Personally, am happy I didn't buy it, playing it a few hours at a friend and then watching them play more confirmed to me that it's not my kind of game)
I'm about 25 hours in now, and I just love it. It's taking me back to playing Skyrim, Fallout 4 for the first time again. I'm obviously a really giant Bethesda fan and I love everything about the way they make their games so I'm admittedly biased, but this is hands down my GOTY. The combat is great, what limited I have done with ship-ship combat has been really fun. Building my own ship is really comprehensive and gives me a lot of freedom while still requiring me to level up to get the good stuff.
Some of the writing has been fuckin fantastic so far (I'm doing the SysDef questline right now and it's pretty phenomenal), while other parts have been kinda lacking. For example I found the motivation for my character to be joining Constellation to be pretty weak and not super well emphasized, but doing the faction quests is really where the game has been shining.
The game is also gorgeous, seeing rings around a planet for the first time, or seeing the wind-blasted rocks of an alien moon, I've had so many jaw dropping moments. And the world-building too, great stuff. It feels lived in, dirty, and logically thought out all at the same time. Cydonia is one of my favorite cities so far for it's history alone.
And the best part is that I feel like I've barely even begun. There are so many systems the game has that I just haven't touched yet because I haven't had the time. Outpost building, piracy, ship hijacking, crew management, a giant pool of research to do, scanning flora and fauna for every planet with an inkling of life, they just give you so much and the ability to create a really unique roleplay through it all.
I don't know what else to say, it lived up to the hype for me!
Edit for context: Playing on Xbox Series X, and got the game through Gamepass so it's not like I've thrown down $70 to play it.
I've only been playing Starfield since the general release yesterday, so I'm only a few hours in. I haven't been paying attention to any of the hype, so it feels like just another Bethesda RPG to me, albeit one with more polish and scope than usual. I'm enjoying it a lot so far, and haven't noticed any bugs yet. I'm already slamming into the carry-weight limit repeatedly, which is kind of annoying. The first time I got to a trading post thing I offloaded a LOT of stuff. I was also irritated by the tiny storage capacity of the locker on my ship. My ship has a fucking cargo hold that I can't store my junk in, what the hell?
TL;DR Starfield is good but not perfect, lots of performance issues and about as shallow as most Bethesda RPGS. Still having lots of fun with the game but know what you're getting into before buying, it's not FNV in space so don't expect that. 7-8/10. Play The Outer Worlds if the RPG side isn't good for you or play Elite Dangerous/Star Citizen if the space sim side isn't as you'd like.
I've played lots of Starfield lately, and it's been a very fun experience. But there are some gripes I have with it.
It's very clearly designed for XBOX Series X first, the graphics options are laughable. I have a 1440p with an RTX 2060, I don't expect to run new games at 1440p 60fps or anything so I'm fine with playing at 1080p. Except, Starfield doesn't give you the option of fullscreen at a resolution lower than your monitors native resolution for some reason, and you can have the exact same settings as someone else and have wildly different performance, just because the monitor is different.
For example, if you wanted to use FSR2 (or DLSS through mods) and set the scaling to 50% you'd have worse performance than someone with a 1080p monitor because you're running it at 1280x720 while they're running it at 960x540. This would be fixed if you could just lower your resolution, but because that wasn't a problem on console they never thought to include it.
So I download a couple of performance mods and DLSS, and I'm finally able to play at a decent 30-40fps. Fine by me.
Getting into the game I was very much immersed in the world and was surprised by the quality of the dialogue compared to most Bethesda games. It was quite fun going on side-quests and doing odd jobs just to upgrade my ship and see the cool sights the world has to offer.
I can't recall a time when I was taken out of the game because of something a character said or did, it all seemed to make sense within the world.
I think I'm in a somewhat unique position to enjoy this game, I have hundreds of hours in Elite Dangerous which is a much more immersive and "realistic" space sim, but ultimately I lost interest in it because of the lack of any real goal or reason to keep playing.
There are a few things Elite does better, mostly ship HUD and combat mechanics. Being able to look over at a panel and set a course without ever having to open a menu is really cool and the power management system for your different modules and weapons was much better in Elite too.
Being able to walk around your ship in Starfield is awesome though, and the on-foot mechanics are way better (probably because Elite was never designed to have them).
Haven't experienced any game-breaking bugs so far and the few bugs I have seen were minimal.
Overall, it's what I expected. A Bethesda RPG that you can immerse yourself in the world of and sink tons of hours into side content really fleshing out your character and who you want them to be.
Not a 10/10 masterpiece or a 1/10 buggy mess as some people have said. I'd give it a 7 or an 8.
If you want a Bethesda-esque RPG in space that isn't procedurally generated and has unique NPCs for each planet as well as more in depth choices and consequences... play The Outer Worlds. It's by Obsidian and was a better RPG than Starfield has been for me so far.
I haven't bought the game and probably won't buy it, but will still offer an opinion as someone who's played most of Bethesda's titles. I played every Bethesda game up to Fallout 4, and never put more than 10-20 hours into any of them nor finished them. Their games are just....shallow? Like yeah there's a lot of content and a story and blah blah blah, but it just loses its luster extremely quickly. Elden Ring, on the other hand, always felt gratifying, mysterious, and wonderful to explore. It rarely felt stale. The combat felt rich, impactful, and fun. I know it's not an FPS, but it's a rare example of an open world game that feels absolutely spot on.
Having said all of that, I've watched some let's plays and reviews, and this feels like the same experience as above to me. The shooting mechanics and combat look absolutely underwhelming. They are still using basically the same engine from Skyrim and it really shows. They need to make a new engine from scratch very nadly. I honestly don't know why so many people are enjoying this game other than the rich modding community.
Anyway, to each his own and I'm glad people are enjoying themselves 👍
Ive played 5-ish hours and I don't think I'm going to keep playing.
The start of the game is kind of dumb and rushed. The NPCs are flat and the UI is extremally clunky. The indoor locations have a gray/brown tint and it seems like the game design philosophy was to cram as much useless clutter into as little space as possible which makes it impossible to see what can or should be looted.
The robot companion always get in the way. And the combat isn't very satisfying, every fight is only "shoot gun until enemy is dead".
I can see that they were trying something with the UI, but I can't tell you how many times I've accidentally opened up my ship menu when I wanted the map.
After Fallout 4, my gut reaction was to loot everything. I wish I didn't have to look it up online to find out that all the random trash lying around is literally just useless junk. It's not even worth picking any of it up to sell–save that weight for enemies' weapons, which sell for significantly more than any tablets or picture frames.
I'm okay with there being useless junk to make a place feel more alive. It wasn't a big deal in Skyrim or Oblivion. I just wish there wasn't so damn much. They can't just have Fallout 4 style base building and equipment modding and then have Skyrim style useless garbage.
I can live with the combat because I'm here for the story, but they really could have done more improve the gunplay. I wanted to snipe, but I'm like 16 hours in and haven't found a gun that's accurate enough past 10 meters. I know 16 hours means I've barely scratched the surface of this game, but that's a bad thing. I cannot imagine beating the story and then making a new save file where I try a different build.
Don't get me wrong I'm still enjoying the game, but there are some serious issues that need to be made right in updates.
I'm still less than ten hours in, but I have very much enjoyed it.
At first, the game caused some serious motion sickness for me even in third person, but then I found that it's possible to increase field-of-view though an ini file, and that has helped.
I haven't really done much, other than walked around a city, observed the many little stories that play out in front of you, and bought better looking clothes. Oh, and I had a very nice cappuccino with an older gentleman while watching a sunset.
I must say that I'm not a fan of the combat. It's not difficult on the normal level, but it's very tedious, so I'm considering switching to the easiest difficulty level to make the mandatory fights pass quicker. I'm there for the world, the story, and whatever minor narrative puzzles the game throws at me. There are better shooter games out there. I miss VATS.
There is VATS! Just... not on foot. But there's a pseudo-VATS system during ship combat.
I love it.
Combat is pretty fun. Weapons look, sound, and feel great. Enemy feedback less so. And enemy ai sucks.
I feel like people aren't talking enough about the improvements to movement. Mantling, combat slides, the jetpack. It all feels really good.
My main thing I love about it is the cinematic aspect. It super itches that Mass Effect or Fallout New Vegas feeling of doing things you would do in movies.
Like infiltrating a casino, hijacking a ship, high stakes poker game, rushing to your wedding, killing and putting on the suit if a guy to get into a bad, Indiana Jones shenanigans, etc.
I love that shit. And the game is almost entirely that. It all feels very immersive and cinematic. I feel like an E3 panel using those buzzwords.
I'm definitely enjoying the jetpack a lot more than I expected to. It feels like a small thing, but functionally it's a double (even triple) jump which opens up all sorts of different ways to reach a destination or maneuver in a combat encounter.
I also discovered completely by accident that there's a cover system (the game doesn't advertise it at all) which does a fair bit for improving the immersiveness of the combat.
You just press jump when you're in the air to activate the boost pack. If that isn't working, it might also require you to follow the main quest line and receive the first pack at the Lodge (and also for the pack to have some of type of boost pack mod, which most do).
There are some guns which come with scopes (or you can invest in the feat that allows that mod, research it and mod on the scope onto the gun yourself), but using melee definitely feels like something better suited to a challenge run as the levels and enemies don't feel designed around it (i.e. most of them have guns and start shooting from really far away).
You need to unlock the skill as well.
It's good that it is effectively uncapped, but I can see having analysis paralysis going in empty. I had a strategy when I started which made it simpler for me, but that doesn't make the system simpler.
I feel they tried to strike a balance towards the more constrained Fallout method of creating a build with the flexibility of bbeing able to unlock everything, even if it's impractical.
Yeah this is probably the main thing I'd like to tweak with a mod or something, progression is just a bit too slow for me personally. I'm not grinding exp, I'm playing through the side quests and missions with a tiny bit of bounty hunting and exploring on the side.
After almost 50 hours in and I'm only level 24. There are some very important skills to invest in like security, boost pack, persuasion, commerce. Throw in my desire to build ships and ships and ship building take up a bunch more skill points. There's still so much game content I'd like to play around with like outposts and modifications during this playthrough, it's going to take me a long time to get there. Various QOL skills like combat, leadership, etc will be waiting a very long time before I put skills into them.
I suppose having such an expensive levelling progress keeps you feeling like you're incrementally progressing for a long time, and leaves open room for further progression during NG+, but it's so much slower than oblivion and fallout that ATM it's causing me a fair bit of anxiety when deciding what to level up next.
Maybe my playstyle isn't what the levelling system was intended for. Supposedly manufacturing things with outposts is a good way to grind exp, or terminal bounty hunting missions. I don't want to grind just for exp though, I would have thought after all the quests I've done that I would have progressed more by this point.
If there's a mod where you get 2 skill points per level that would probably be just about right for me. A mod which quadruples or octuples the challenge requirements but automatically upgrades skills when you meet them would also be fairly balanced (possibly also combined with reducing the frequency of skill points, one every other level or something?). I'm playing on Xbox so it might be a while before mod support lands, so it's out the window for this playthrough.
All in all absolutely loving the game so far. The level of salt about not being able to walk for hours in a straight line on a barren planet is very confusing to me. This progression pain is my only major complaint.
I think it's just rather boring, the dialogue and loading between everything detracts significantly from the fun of the missions.
The main quest gets better as it goes. It's more of a tool to bring to all the locations with the faction quests and awesome side quests