this post was submitted on 19 Nov 2023
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It's not. I personally love the game, but it has a lot of flaws and that number seems about right to me. I think it's a better game than Fallout 4.
Some of the storylines are fantastic, but they're pretty disjointed from the rest of the world. Some of them feel like they have loose ends that didn't get finished in time.
There are several game systems that are neat, but unfinished, and superfluous.
I really don't understand the dog pile this game has gotten.
It's similar to the situation Cyberpunk 2077 faced. When expectations are set extremely high, nothing can meet them, and Starfield fell far short of the immense hype it generated. And frankly, the mistakes Starfield made are the same issues people have been criticizing Bethesda for since Fallout 3, and even earlier with Oblivion, depending on who you ask. Combined with Fallout 76's disastrous PR and release, this has left many people frustrated with Bethesda. Consequently, there's a strong wave of negativity surrounding the game.
For what it's worth, I'm a big fan of Bethesda's formula, and I genuinely enjoyed Starfield. However, I'm not surprised by the negative reactions. In fact, I'm somewhat glad that people are expressing their disappointment because Bethesda has a unique style, and I don't want to see them stay stuck in this creative rut. If they finally genuinely listen to the complaints, there are a lot of valuable suggestions they could benefit from.
This will sound weird, but I believe these complaints stem from a place of love for Bethesda's games. People know that Bethesda is capable of so much more, and that's why they are so passionate. Other game companies don't inspire this level of passion. Hence why I feel it is reminiscent of the negativity that surrounded Cyberpunk 2077. Both games were genuinely good, but they felt generic, safe, and they were overhyped and well below the potential of their respective developers.
The negativity doesn't make it a bad game, it really is a lot of fun. But it is warrented all the same.
P.S. I agree that some of the story lines in Starfield were fantastic, especially the faction quest lines.
Edit: Someone replied to this and then deleted it saying something to the effect of, "Cyberpunk's biggest issue is that it tried to run on old consoles, while Starfield's biggest issue is that it feels old and outdated".
Which in a lot of ways is very true. In adding my 2 cents regarding the "complaint dog pile" on Starfield, I only intended to compare the two games hype and lack of quality compared to what fans expect from their respective publishers as a way to explain why Starfield (and Cyberpunk) got more vocal hate than worse games.
I realize that my comment makes it sound like I'm saying both games have similar design issues, which I do not believe to be the case. Fwiw, I think Cyberpunk was a much more enjoyable and polished game than Starfield.
I am fine with most of the game. It's basically what I expected from a Bethesda game.
Two things stand out for me in different ways:
That no maps thing really got me. It is so stupid.
I encountered like 10 more shops after I thought I already explored New Atlantis completly. And then it turns out there is an entire sewer system full of people.
After so much time and so many iterations Bethesda hasn't improved much on the things they suck at. This is just fallout in space with all the issues previous games have.
30 of those 70 hours were spent on loading screens. Seriously though, it takes time to give the game a chance and with all they hype behind it, I thought I was missing out on something and kept telling myself “maybe it’ll start getting good after this mission” …I wasn’t missing anything, it was the game that was lacking
There have been plenty of games over the years where I got hooked on one aspect that was fun or compelling, only to tire of it much later and realize the overall game was actually mediocre and just happened to scratch the right itch for a while.
Open world RPGs tend to make up a lot of that list since they have repeated content that draws you in the first time you encounter it, but wears out its welcome by the hundredth. It sounds like Starfield had this problem, combined with a terrible fast travel system that gutted exploration and threw the samey content into the spotlight. Once the new game shine wore off a lot of players were like "is this it?"
(I'll note that I haven't played the game yet, this is just the gist of the complaints I've read)
To me, beyond being very generic (freestar collective and united colonies, had to regoogle them to remember), the very basics of the game felt not fun; from tedious resource collection to the world's first joint loading screen and fast travel 'space exploration' system. I felt like I was missing something, but it really was just a worse no man's sky. When the very basics are this boring of course a large amount of people will have something negative to say. I don't want to explain how quickly I was done with the crafting systems, both for weapons and colony building, which they somehow made less fun than I had in fallout 4.
Like cyberpunk I got this game for free and I still felt ripped off. But unlike cyberpunk I wasn't hyped, so now I'm left standing just wondering where all the time spent on this went.
As for cyberpunk, after the completely botched release it actually found its stride somewhat. The phantom liberty expansion is a lot of fun and the accompanying update has revamped a lot of lacking systems.
Supposedly the game is now in the state it should have been in during launch. It’s still not perfect, but very enjoyable in my opinion
When fallout 4 was in development, Bethesda had to crunch and have non-developers who had little to no experience in the engine (like writers) work in the creation kit to flesh out the rest of the game. This led to many quests being implemented entirely separate from each other with little to no input from other teams or staff members and is a major reason why fallout 4 base game feels so disjointed once you actually start exploring it.
It wouldn't surprise me if they had to do the same thing with starfield.
I'm in the same boat. I feel like most new games that come out that aren't a clever indy title or on par with Witcher 3 need to be perpetually shit on. People were kinder when Fallout 4 released, while it was buggier than starfield at launch, and also has disjointed mechanics und a subpar story. I personally enjoyed Starfield more as well but both are more than ok games.
It's how hyped it was and expectations set by Skyrim. Starfield was seen as the next step on from Skyrim in terms of game scale, and Bethesda hyped it up as their biggest and best game ever. It's neither of those things.
Also frankly in terms of RPGs, it feels dated. Witcher 3 set a new bar for what an RPG should be, but Starfield doesn't seem to have learnt those lessons. Baldurs Gate 3 has also set a high bar for RPGs this year, and Cyberpunk 2077 (for all its own flaws) also set a high bar for RPGs.
Starfield is an ok game but when it's hyped as it going to be the greatest game ever from Bethesda and going to be biggest game of the year, I'm not surprised it's being shat on when it turns out it's not.
But hopefully Starfield will be an important bump on the road for Bethesda. Bigger is not necessarily better and hopefully that lesson will carry in to Elder Scrolls VI.
Witcher was also bug riddled and still is. The combat was sloppy as shit, but the story was great and it wasn't a pain to just stick to it, so the game worked overall. Starfield is just an expanse of nothing with a subpar plot and nothing to do but build on empty moons. Bethesda should have took the time to either adopt/adapt/create a new engine, I don't know how much longer they can go just patching the creation engine.
Witcher 3 had boring slow combat and an awful magic system.
To me that is more important than a good story.
Plus, it wasn't an RPG the same way Tomb Raider isn't one. Because you aren't playing a role.
Witcher 3 is an open-world adventure game, not an RPG.
I agree, couldnt get through the game myself, ended up watching it on the side. Was just trying to be fair to it (but I secretly think it was very overrated).
Fallout 4 is fun to explore. I can still get lost in its world. There's nothing interesting to find in starfield and it's all locked behind the same sequence of jump drives, loading screens, and barren landscapes.