Daggerfall in SPAAACE - Starfield

Verisimilitude is a real thing. And Starfield does a very poor job of it. It's biggest sin so far to me is trying to sell it too hard. Spelling out that oh yeah all these outposts were set up during the Colony War and then just abandoned... for some reason... and now all these designated bandit factions are taking them over... because I guess there are literally more spacers than the population of either actual country... just draws attention to it and screams yes this is a thing that is actually happening, it is not just a matter of scale or protagonist syndrome sending you to just the interesting places and none of the boring ones. It makes it worse than you if you just didn't point it out. Or like how every other guard is like man those spacers sure are worse than the literal pirates, so don't feel bad about just slaughtering them by the dozens.
 
I am not sure why everyone uses New Atlantis for benchmark. New Atlantis runs OK for me, but moment I go to Akila City my frames just die.

I go from solid 45-50 to 15 FPS whenever I am in Akila City.
 
I will say that I am genuinely amazed it shipped with the error I am constantly experiencing - where the game starts minimised and is impossible to maximise without going into the Task Manager.

(Oh, and I'm still crashing like every 20 minutes at the moment.)
 
God, tracking resources suck. It is literally a de-evolution from Fallout 4's tracking system. You can't track individual items and there's a bug where the blue magnifying glass doesn't dissappear (so be sure to untrack a project before you complete it) . I am absolutely giving up on outposts. It's literally Fallout 4 but worse. In fact, a good chunk of this game is Fallout 4 but worse.

BTW, you can use steam's note taking overlay of you want to track to make a list. Thanks, Gaben. No thanks to you, Todd.
 
Spelling out that oh yeah all these outposts were set up during the Colony War and then just abandoned... for some reason... and now all these designated bandit factions are taking them over... because I guess there are literally more spacers than the population of either actual country..
You're talking about two very different things here.

The abandoned outposts are a lore decision, a reasonable person can think it's bad writing (I personally do not but there is room for subjectivity) but it is not the same thing as the spacer numbers. The latter is a gameplay conceit, it's no different from how you can be shot to almost death one moment and then slap on a medkit and go back to full health.

If you want to argue that it's dumb the militaries would abandon perfectly serviceable outposts then by all means but nitpicking about the excessive number of spacers from a lore standpoint is silly. Bethesda (probably rightly) decided that having an unrealistically high number of human enemies makes for a more fun game then one where they're only something you see once in a blue moon. This is what Ford means when he says that it's a video game. If you can't suspend your disbelief from the existence of a common RPG trope then that's your right but it's hardly a game problem.
 
'Why are there so many bandits?' 'Why doesn't this match real world populations numbers?' 'Why are the locations themed?' It's a video game.

There's not enough bandits. I'm wanted, I've got outstanding bounties in UC and Freestar, I paint all my ships crimson. Where the fuck are all the Eclipse goobers coming at me? Where are all the Spacers? I can count the number of times dudes tried to jump me in space on one hand.
 
You're talking about two very different things here.

The abandoned outposts are a lore decision, a reasonable person can think it's bad writing (I personally do not but there is room for subjectivity) but it is not the same thing as the spacer numbers. The latter is a gameplay conceit, it's no different from how you can be shot to almost death one moment and then slap on a medkit and go back to full health.

If you want to argue that it's dumb the militaries would abandon perfectly serviceable outposts then by all means but nitpicking about the excessive number of spacers from a lore standpoint is silly. Bethesda (probably rightly) decided that having an unrealistically high number of human enemies makes for a more fun game then one where they're only something you see once in a blue moon. This is what Ford means when he says that it's a video game. If you can't suspend your disbelief from the existence of a common RPG trope then that's your right but it's hardly a game problem.


Suspension of disbelief is not something that just happens, or that the audience should be entirely responsible for. Both design and writing decisions can help or hurt, and Starfield's hamfisted world building is working against it.
 
I feel like this game is two step forwards one step back compared to FO4.

The improvement in storyline quests is great, they feel more in line with other RPGs like Cyberpunk.
The cities also feel a lot more alive and denser, probably because every location is more vertical due to the boost pack.

The exploration, however, is a lot less. There is no going from point A to point B and get distracted by object C in the distance.
It's either setpieces during missions with no deviations or empty planets with outposts every mile but nothing actually interesting.
I haven't done a single of those outposts, because the ship mechanic means you need to land at your destination so why would I go the opposite way just to kill some spacers?
 
If you want to argue that it's dumb the militaries would abandon perfectly serviceable outposts then by all means

Honestly, this I have no issue believing. Allies abandoned a lot of outposts after WW2, often just leaving them as they were, only destroying critical stuff. I could imagine most outposts were more or listening posts or such, rather than any sort of serious attempts at staying.
 
Honestly, this I have no issue believing. Allies abandoned a lot of outposts after WW2, often just leaving them as they were, only destroying critical stuff. I could imagine most outposts were more or listening posts or such, rather than any sort of serious attempts at staying.
Yeah if these are the space equivalent of a bulldozed patch and some Quonset huts it's not weird to have just abandoned them in place.
 
Yeah if these are the space equivalent of a bulldozed patch and some Quonset huts it's not weird to have just abandoned them in place.

Honestly, they look like one. Very simple design, has only the basic amnesties. More often than not they seem to be bare minimum to support a group of soldiers and that's it.
 
Yeah if these are the space equivalent of a bulldozed patch and some Quonset huts it's not weird to have just abandoned them in place.

The handwave excuse is "prefabs", yes. Which has been used in many other games to explain similar situations of identical-layout buildings plopped down everywhere (Mass Effect comes to mind).

The Argos Extractors mining complex we start the game in was set up in under a day (eighteen hours), according to Lin.
 
You know, it's funny how people keep on giving my character credit for dueling the Hunter during his attack on the Lodge.

I however, was far more impressed by Walter, the elderly man who, upon seeing a cloaking mysterious enemy with strange abilities, repeatedly tried to punch him in the face.

Aggressively punching him in the face. I had to shoot the Hunter a lot to make him break away so that Walter would start running away again, now that the Hunter was gone. Then the Hunter would pop up again, only for Walter to square up and punch him again. In the face.

Damn dude.

I can only remember the news reports discussing two unknown individuals having a running gunfight across New Atlantis, but now with the CEO of Stroud-Eklund also participating, repeatedly punching one of the gunmen.
 
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Classic Todd/Bethesda scam. Make a half-baked game and let the fans cook the fixes....
 
The stealth missions are just bad. In fact, I suspect they are all bugged as I've been alone, with high stealth and drugs in a vent and somehow been immediately found a bunch of times on pretty much every single one.

Also for the love of Todd, give me some kind of vehicle or a prolonged burn flight pack so I can play out my Mando cosplay because the exploration is not good enough. Main and side quests are generally a pretty big improvement on F4 which is nice and I refuse to bother with the outpost system.

It would be nice to be able to decorate my ship or at least have proper captains quarters - I am genuinely surprised that wasn't included as it feels like a giant missed opportunity.
 
Todd said in an interview hat vehicles would clash with the game's vision or some other bullshit. If a bunch of modders can put in working vehicles in GAMEBRYO this bazillion dollar company can put working vehicles in Starfield. A fan made a superior UI in less than a week.

Also the best r/starfield I've seen atm is someone arguing humanity wouldn't save cats and dogs and bring them into space. Humans brought along cats and dogs over extremely long distances. Humans have divorced over mistreatment of pets. Humans have immortalised pets with statues. Humans have worshipped cats. Give me my Dogmeat.

And having dogs in game would have another enemy type, since every enemy in the game is either "wild alien animal" or "space raiders". I cannot believe this game came out with less enemy variety than Fallout 4. I cannot believe I am missing ghouls and super mutants. Making the setting grounded and "realistic" was a bad choice because Bethesda's strengths is making things fantastical.
 
Also the best r/starfield I've seen atm is someone arguing humanity wouldn't save cats and dogs and bring them into space. Humans brought along cats and dogs over extremely long distances. Humans have divorced over mistreatment of pets. Humans have immortalised pets with statues. Humans have worshipped cats. Give me my Dogmeat.

They're both very silly (many people would absolutely literally murder another human being to get their pets offworld) and just really stupid, as it's not like the Earth went bye-bye before humanity was colonising the rest of the galaxy. There were 50-odd years of offworld colonisation and you can bet your arse people would have brought all sorts of animals out to colonise with them. Dogs, cats, cows, pigs, sheep, horses, and chickens to name but a few.

(Also are alien animals halal or haram? Is this strange not-sheep thing kosher? All questions you don't need to answer if you just bring your livestock with you instead of relying on random luck to have edible animals on the planet you're colonising.)
 
(Also are alien animals halal or haram? Is this strange not-sheep thing kosher? All questions you don't need to answer if you just bring your livestock with you instead of relying on random luck to have edible animals on the planet you're colonising.)
Muslims would have a feast on Alien ocean just fine. Because it would be easy to take the "everything from the sea is Halal".

But land animals, almost certainly used earth animals as a guide. Carnivore bad. Doglike bad. Piglike bad. Reptiles and amphibians are "Why are you liking this lol" (Most reptiles are carnivorous too).

Alien herbivores = slaughter
 
(Also are alien animals halal or haram? Is this strange not-sheep thing kosher? All questions you don't need to answer if you just bring your livestock with you instead of relying on random luck to have edible animals on the planet you're colonising.)

Gayatri already gave a succinct answer. Now, how you're supposed to split the space beef during Eid El Adha is another thing entirely. Also, seeing as we can see a bunch of dead landmarks on earth, I wonder where the Kaabah is atm. Muslims would 100% take the Kaabah with them. Hell, we'd take the entire mosque with us. Medina too.

Speaking of faith, I haven't chosen any of the three faith related traits (which honestly should be a seperate thing from traits IMO but whatever), but are any of y'all enjoying them? Apparently, the Snek religion is considered the best one mechanically, but House Va'arun seems to be underwritten, and you don't really have a chance to roleplay as a Snek person. I wouldn't know, but that's what I heard from the grapevine.

I understand why Bethesda absolutely refuses to touch real world religions but the lack of it is just weird. Even Fallout does more with it, which isn't much but it's something.
 
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