Starfield could be the best game I have ever played!

[Eji1700]

Yeah on topic I'm probably waiting until next year on this one. I've got BG3, AC6, a bunch of smaller stuff, and soon MK1. Bethesda's track record hasn't been anywhere near strong enough for me to just jump in. Figure i'll see where the dust settles and then if it's still worth trying give it a shot.

 

[fr stack]

Little todd relying on the modding army once again , shame

 

[kabelfritz]

starfield is theoretically kinda my dream game. i'm a fan of space operas like star wars and mass effect, also i'm a big bethesda fan since Morrowind. so things came together for me here - but obviously bethesda and the game industry as a whole have lost a lot of trust in the last years concerning release quality, especially in big games.

and now 40+ hours in, i find myself wondering before the screen: what timeline is this i'm living in? i'm playing a bethesda game with a great concept at launch and its actually good!?

yes, its technically not great, graphics dont look cutting edge overall. its mostly stable but new atlantis and planets with many animals stutter quite some on series s. i have a crash in loading screens about every 5-10 hours. behaviour of followers and enemies might be the weakest part of the game. but i've only had one single bug in this time (invisible enemy, no, not a feature). anyway, these are not THAT dramatic issues, many games have those and way worse at launch. starfield is by far the most polished launch bethesda ever had and it even stands out among some other recent releases which were basically betas or worse.

now with that out of the way, lets go to the main positive: the writing is really good! Bethesda have upped their game like by a 100% in this area. there are a lot of strong characters, stories and dialogues in the game, presented with stellar voice acting and impressive facial animation tech (its not mokap, its some kind of auto-generated lip movement and expressions afaik). i dont want to write a book here, so i'll just say everything else is fine as well. artstyle, crafting, combat, exploration (if you get used to the fast-travel-heavyness), it's all good.

i'm having a great time with starfield, thats all i can say. i am 100% sure though that if xbox hadnt stepped in and gave the game huge resources and another year of development time, this would have been a mess like the F76 or CP 2077 launch.

 

[Digestia]

Personally, I'm still waiting for the sequel to Morrowind. You can do it, Todd!

 

[Juxtapose]

no single story or sidequest they did was in any form interesting or engaging.

i see them more as a company who builds a nice looking world where people can then add things to it to give it meaning.

To each their own. The main Quest Line for Morrowind is excellent. The main Quest in Skyrim and Fallout 3 as well. The Dark Brother Quest Lines, Thieves Guild, Deadric Quests, etc. all good.

I've never installed a single mod in any of their games. Never needed them.

Which is a shame because fnv showed how good it could be.

Never played Fallout: New Vegas, as it was a mess at launch. My father enjoyed it though. That game also was not developed by Bethesda Game Studios.

Personally, I'm still waiting for the sequel to Morrowind.

They've developed 2 sequels in the franchise already, with another in development now.

 

[kabelfritz]

Never played Fallout: New Vegas, as it was a mess at launch. My father enjoyed it though. That game also was not developed by Bethesda Game Studios.

give it a shot. as much as i like bethesda, this is the best 3d Fallout. if youre on xbox series, you can play it at 60fps and upscaled resolution.

 

[Juxtapose]

give it a shot. as much as i like bethesda, this is the best 3d Fallout. if youre on xbox series, you can play it at 60fps and upscaled resolution.

I'll be passing only because I'm trying to get through lengthy RPG's from my backlog, not add more .

Currently have playthroughs of:

• Diablo II Resurrected
• Mass Effect 3: Legendary Edition
• The Elder Scrolls V: Skryim Special Edition

all on the go.

Also have a Gears Tactics playthrough I'm doing, which is also a long game.

 

[kabelfritz]

I'll be passing only because I'm trying to get through lengthy RPG's from my backlog, not add more .

Currently have playthroughs of:

• Diablo II Resurrected
• Mass Effect 3: Legendary Edition
• The Elder Scrolls V: Skryim Special Edition

all on the go.

Also have a Gears Tactics playthrough I'm doing, which is also a long game.

have fun, thats a nice collection. gears tactics isnt that long though, if you just play the campaign.

 

[Juxtapose]

Thanks, really enjoying the nostalgia trip from all these.

if you just play the campaign.

I'm actually doing Veteran missions right now. 19 more to get that Achievement, though there's 3 side missions in-between.

 

[Juggs]

Haven’t played it, but the game seems to be quite polarizing. Idk the last time I saw a game get this many inconsistent reviews. Some say it’s one of the best games they’ve ever played, some say it’s pretty good but has a lot of issues that need fixing, some say once the mods become available it’ll be a decent game, some say it’s one of the worst Bethesda game since Fallout 76, some say it’s one of the worst games at launch of all time (even worse than Cyberpunk), some say it’s just in general one of the worst big studio games either of all time or of the past decade or so, and it goes on and on.

What I will say is that it will always be incredibly obnoxious when people jump on a bandwagon of hate or love of a game without ever even playing it (the hate train is definitely worse than the love train though). And for a good % of those, they have hardly even seen much gameplay or much of the game at all. So many people these days seem incapable of forming their own conclusions based on their own first hand experiences.

I won’t be playing this game or really any other new game aside from MK1 for awhile. But it’s probably for the best anyway. Might as well wait until a lot of bugs are patched and all the kinks get ironed out. Especially since there seems to be a bunch of them in this game. But that’s literally par for the course with Bethesda.

Honestly, they should really think about starting to release demos or betas. I know the initial release is like a huge beta anyway, but they’d get a lot less negative feedback this way imo

 

[Jynks]

This thread kinda blew up so I can not speak to what everyone has been saying... but I do think

Combat is never the highlight of any Bethesda Game Studios game.

Juxt has a point here. Combat is not the focus of these kinds of games. I mean I think the combat it fine. It is a space sim thing, though more on the arcade side of things and a FPS. I am not sure it is fair to compare a game with wuch a wide focus to a game like Doom Eternal that is 100% about the combat experience and all the dev time is focused on that and that alone. Of course, it will be "better"

I do not play a lot of FPS as I find them really repetitive after a while. The last I played and enjoyed was Boltgun. I have played the original Doom reboot, but not eternal. Still for me Starfield's FPS combat is what I expect from such a thing. I point my fun and press the trigger button and things die. I am not sure what people are complaining about. It is a FPS and there is not really much to it. There are various weapon types, like energy for example, that work better on shielded opponents or stuff like that, but nothing to complicated like Doom Eternal's monster weaknesses and all that movement stuff.

The VAT system in Fallout was a legacy system from the amazing 2D games. That is why it is not in Starfield or the Elder Scrolls games. I do not think anyone expected VAT to be back in Starfield and I think they did the right thing to not include it.

def another bethesda game is really all I can say

This I think is worth stressing. IT IS A BESTHEDA RPG and plays like one. So if that is not your thing, then it is not going to really change your opinion of that much. All their games for decades follow a style, and so does this one. I actually think this is a good thing.

There is a funny joke among product engineers I heard at a conference once. "McDonnalds is high quality food". The joke here is that it is "bad" food, as in bad for you and "cheap" food as in cheap ingredients... but as a consumer you can walk into any McDonalds in any country in the world and order a BigMac and you know exactly what you are getting. The user expectation is completely fulfilled. You hand them money and you get back exactly what you paid for. The "quality" is assured.

This game is like this for me. I am a big fan of Bestheda games and played Morrowwind and Skyrim to death. I was deep in the Skyrim modding scene (as a mod make not just a user) and played that game for nearly a decade. I WANT the Bestheda experience. That is exactly what I paid for and Starfield delivered it.

 

[Eji1700]

Never played Fallout: New Vegas, as it was a mess at launch. My father enjoyed it though. That game also was not developed by Bethesda Game Studios.

Well aware it was obsidian, just a shame that they managed to knock the FPSRPG combat out of the park and no one has even tried since. The game, like many, is better with a couple of mods that either add a lot of content or QoL, but even as is it's just a much better concept than anything bethesda has ever done.

Short version is you have actual ammo for your weapons, which you can swap with a reload, and different armors have different Damage Thresholds. You might use AP bullets (which are rare and expensive) for something heavily armored, but for the unarmored enemies you might use cheaper stuff, or hollowpoints which suck vs armor but do extra damage when they do penetrate the DT. Really simple concept that works super well, and extends to energy weapons as well.

You can still have the +x% skills as well in this system, although those are also done a lot better in FNV. A favorite is cowboy, which ups damage on all shotguns, revolvers, lever guns, dynamite, and knives. Which is a hell of a lot more interesting than +X to pistols or whatever.

 

[Dankster Morgan]

This thread kinda blew up so I can not speak to what everyone has been saying... but I do think


Juxt has a point here. Combat is not the focus of these kinds of games. I mean I think the combat it fine. It is a space sim thing, though more on the arcade side of things and a FPS. I am not sure it is fair to compare a game with wuch a wide focus to a game like Doom Eternal that is 100% about the combat experience and all the dev time is focused on that and that alone. Of course, it will be "better"

I do not play a lot of FPS as I find them really repetitive after a while. The last I played and enjoyed was Boltgun. I have played the original Doom reboot, but not eternal. Still for me Starfield's FPS combat is what I expect from such a thing. I point my fun and press the trigger button and things die. I am not sure what people are complaining about. It is a FPS and there is not really much to it. There are various weapon types, like energy for example, that work better on shielded opponents or stuff like that, but nothing to complicated like Doom Eternal's monster weaknesses and all that movement stuff.

The VAT system in Fallout was a legacy system from the amazing 2D games. That is why it is not in Starfield or the Elder Scrolls games. I do not think anyone expected VAT to be back in Starfield and I think they did the right thing to not include it.



This I think is worth stressing. IT IS A BESTHEDA RPG and plays like one. So if that is not your thing, then it is not going to really change your opinion of that much. All their games for decades follow a style, and so does this one. I actually think this is a good thing.

There is a funny joke among product engineers I heard at a conference once. "McDonnalds is high quality food". The joke here is that it is "bad" food, as in bad for you and "cheap" food as in cheap ingredients... but as a consumer you can walk into any McDonalds in any country in the world and order a BigMac and you know exactly what you are getting. The user expectation is completely fulfilled. You hand them money and you get back exactly what you paid for. The "quality" is assured.

This game is like this for me. I am a big fan of Bestheda games and played Morrowwind and Skyrim to death. I was deep in the Skyrim modding scene (as a mod make not just a user) and played that game for nearly a decade. I WANT the Bestheda experience. That is exactly what I paid for and Starfield delivered it.

That seems like a fair assessment. I wasn’t trying to shit on Starfield and I recognize its merits. I think Cyberpunk after all the fixes is a good game and the combat is aggressively fine. When I have enough time to dive into a game instead of stealing a few hours here and there to play, I could even see myself getting really immersed in Starfield. I can see why you and seemingly a lot of other people are enjoying it so much, I’m excited to try it once I have the time to really get into it, because if I can get more immersed in it, the middle of the road combat won’t bother me nearly as much.

 

[Jynks]

With MK1 out in a week.. Time is going to be a issue.

 

[John Grizzly]

I am not a Bethesda game hater whatsoever. Skyrim is one of my absolute favorite games of all time. I still play it now and then.

Having said that....I find Starfield to be INSANELY boring. What am I missing??

 

[kabelfritz]

I am not a Bethesda game hater whatsoever. Skyrim is one of my absolute favorite games of all time. I still play it now and then.

Having said that....I find Starfield to be INSANELY boring. What am I missing??

depends what you find boring. i think the game can get boring if you dont talk to npcs, listen to their dialogue and do their quests. i know there are many players who just skip through dialogue and i think that can break the fun in starfield.

 

[Kal]

The game is so fucking mid it's unbelievable how much it's overhyped.

 

[xenogorgeous]

The game is so fucking mid it's unbelievable how much it's overhyped.

yep

Starfield = overhyped but underdelivered

Tell me lies, tell me sweet little lies, Todd !

 

[kabelfritz]

The game is so fucking mid it's unbelievable how much it's overhyped.

may i ask how many hours youve put into it?

 

[Juxtapose]

So many people these days seem incapable of forming their own conclusions based on their own first hand experiences.

Critical thinking has declined severely over the last several years. I strongly believe Soical Media is a major factor.

But it’s probably for the best anyway. Might as well wait until a lot of bugs are patched and all the kinks get ironed out. Especially since there seems to be a bunch of them in this game. But that’s literally par for the course with Bethesda.

According to Digital Foundry, the game is extremely polished on Xbox Series. They have yet to go over the PC version.

 

[Kal]

may i ask how many hours youve put into it?

25hrs or so.

 

[John Grizzly]

I know it was dogshit on release (I know because I pre-ordered it), but No Man's Sky just seems so superior to Starfield. I don't know. I'm going to play some more Starfield tonight. Maybe I have to push through the boring stuff or something. It's definitely not grabbing me so far, though.

 

[KiD INsAnitY]

I didn’t expect much as it being a Bethesda game. But Congratulations to you PC guys because this 30fps on console is fucking killing me. I would legit have no complaints considering it’s “Bethesda” ikno what to expect from them by now but 30fps??.. I don’t care about the bugs or any of tht honestly.. Feel like im on XB360…got it for free on Gamepass tho tho so it’s whatever.

 

[ImpostorOak]

I've played it about 2 hours. So, basically, I've created my character, shot 6 guys and 3 spaceships, and landed on another Moon.

I already love it.

 

[Digestia]

Requiring someone to spend 10+ hours in order to qualify for criticizing a game is the dumbest take of modern internet discourse. Like what you like, but don't impose your bubble on others.