Some flash, a lot of filler.
The most excited I was for Starfield leading up to its launch last year was when a Phil Spencer quote started floating around correcting the common guess that Starfield would be "Skyrim in space." Spencer told IGN that the game is "more Oblivion than Skyrim" and that he already had over 200 hours played prior to release across multiple playthroughs.
The idea of a modern Bethesda taking a run at Oblivion's vibe with Skyrim's quality of life sensibilities all in a new, unique universe sounds so thrilling! You can be a cowboy! An explorer! A corporate spy! No sanded off edges, baby. The galaxy is your playground!
The reality? You can uhh... be in a menu mostly I guess.
On paper, the universe of Starfield is technically the most expansive that Bethesa has even presented (just hang with me for a second, Morrowind truthers). In execution, it's the dev's emptiest, most disconnected series of rooms yet. Most of my time was spent tinkering away in clunky menus to find the best, most direct fast travel paths to mission objectives. The result is that I know the names of maybe 3 locations from my playtime and they have no meaningful relative positioning to or from one another.
I hear you. "Don't use fast travel if you don't want everything to feel so trivial and disjointed." Sure, great idea for the majority of relatively open world games. But Starfield is the furthest thing from an open world game. Here's a quick example: relatively early on you're presented with a gameplay loop of leaving your team's headquarters, going to an orbital watch station, taking on a research mission, and collecting the item found by that orbital beacon's search. With no fast traveling to optimize your path, the process I just described takes you through eight (8) loading screens.
What's worse than the inordinate amount of screens you have to wait through is that the game just isn't fun to play. The recent patch that brought target 60 FPS to consoles is huge but nowhere near what the game needs to feel polished. Combat is loose and inaccurate. Imagine Fallout 3 without a VATS system and it's only a tiny bit better than that. Traversal largely consists of you running out of oxygen and getting any number of debuffing ailments depending on if the current planet is too hot, cold, or irradiated.
Starfield is not especially fun. But it is often beautiful.
Stand completely still somewhere in the game--in Neon, aboard your ship, near some ancient alien monoliths--and you'll see what I mean. Admittedly the game is often bland but when the right moments come together, things are gorgeous. The game smartly focuses on these visual design choices in the very late game offering a moment or two that I could see making someone downright emotional.
Very thankful I didn't pay money for this game specifically. Gamepass came in clutch. I think I'm done with this one for a long time unless something big happens.
The most excited I was for Starfield leading up to its launch last year was when a Phil Spencer quote started floating around correcting the common guess that Starfield would be "Skyrim in space." Spencer told IGN that the game is "more Oblivion than Skyrim" and that he already had over 200 hours played prior to release across multiple playthroughs.
The idea of a modern Bethesda taking a run at Oblivion's vibe with Skyrim's quality of life sensibilities all in a new, unique universe sounds so thrilling! You can be a cowboy! An explorer! A corporate spy! No sanded off edges, baby. The galaxy is your playground!
The reality? You can uhh... be in a menu mostly I guess.
On paper, the universe of Starfield is technically the most expansive that Bethesa has even presented (just hang with me for a second, Morrowind truthers). In execution, it's the dev's emptiest, most disconnected series of rooms yet. Most of my time was spent tinkering away in clunky menus to find the best, most direct fast travel paths to mission objectives. The result is that I know the names of maybe 3 locations from my playtime and they have no meaningful relative positioning to or from one another.
I hear you. "Don't use fast travel if you don't want everything to feel so trivial and disjointed." Sure, great idea for the majority of relatively open world games. But Starfield is the furthest thing from an open world game. Here's a quick example: relatively early on you're presented with a gameplay loop of leaving your team's headquarters, going to an orbital watch station, taking on a research mission, and collecting the item found by that orbital beacon's search. With no fast traveling to optimize your path, the process I just described takes you through eight (8) loading screens.
What's worse than the inordinate amount of screens you have to wait through is that the game just isn't fun to play. The recent patch that brought target 60 FPS to consoles is huge but nowhere near what the game needs to feel polished. Combat is loose and inaccurate. Imagine Fallout 3 without a VATS system and it's only a tiny bit better than that. Traversal largely consists of you running out of oxygen and getting any number of debuffing ailments depending on if the current planet is too hot, cold, or irradiated.
Starfield is not especially fun. But it is often beautiful.
Stand completely still somewhere in the game--in Neon, aboard your ship, near some ancient alien monoliths--and you'll see what I mean. Admittedly the game is often bland but when the right moments come together, things are gorgeous. The game smartly focuses on these visual design choices in the very late game offering a moment or two that I could see making someone downright emotional.
Very thankful I didn't pay money for this game specifically. Gamepass came in clutch. I think I'm done with this one for a long time unless something big happens.