2y ago

15 hours in, I'm loving it!

It's a Bethesda RPG in space. If you're looking for No Man's Sky, it isn't that. If you're looking for Elite Dangerous, it isn't that. But it is a BSG RPG, just like I've been playing since Morrowind, and it really scratches that itch. I like the characters I've met, I've enjoyed exploring, and I'm starting to get into the lore and history. The weapons feel great and the gunplay is good. I tried the ship building and was pleased with how smooth a process that is.

I've seen a few graphical glitches, but this really is the least buggy-at-launch BSG RPG I've played. It's definitely made for a controller, but that's fine, that's how I prefer to play these days.

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I’m waiting until a patch comes along that addresses performance on the steam deck. I am pretty flexible when it comes to graphics quality and frame rates and such, but the current reviews are not looking playable.
As a point of reference, I played hundreds of hours of Daggerfall with all the joys of getting stuck in a wall only to be killed by guards, and jumping over a pit in a dungeon only to fall into the Abyss Between Worlds. I’m a TES fan from the early days and I know how bad they can be on release. I just have a lot more to do in BG3 before I feel pressure to try something new.
- There is a modded Low ini available on Nexusmods that helps on Steamdeck. Hope that the performance gets better over time though.

I'm glad you're enjoying it, but this is sort of confirmation that it's gonna be a disappointment for me. "It's just like other Bethesda titles" isn't the selling point it once was ☺️
- Fair enough. I'm the kind of madlad that really enjoyed Fallout 4, although not as much as previous titles. I'd say this one beats FO4.
- Absolutely, if you don't want to play another standard Bethesda open world game, stay far away, but if you do you'll enjoy this one.

It’s been pretty fun so far, yeah. It’s just what I was expecting pretty much, an Bethesda game (and fallout 4 to a greater extent), in space.
Just wish they’d added a proper map instead of that scan line lookalike.
- Yeah the lack of city maps is frustrating. So hard to find your way to certain places without a mission to go there.

It certainly isn't elite. I keep waiting for some action but so far its just watching g a lot of cut scenes.

cries in Linux- and Playstation-only gaming
- Doesn’t unofficial Linux support seem likely seem likely? Though I’ve heard it only works well with AMD GPUs on Linux, is that right?
  
  Going by the previous games, should work eventually. Seems, however, that there is a bug in either proton or the game itself that makes it fail to launch at the moment in NVIDIA cards.
  
  It works through Proton on Steam. Not sure why that wouldn’t be available for OP
- runs on linux thru steam with proton experimental :D

It feels like Morrowind in space - with basically the same technical limitations - except exceedingly tedious and boring to me.
- My issue with it is that it really doesn't feel like morrowind in space to me. Morrowind had some interesting environments, and most places you found had some environmental storytelling going on. I loved morrowind because exploring felt interesting (but combat was bad)
  Here I'm finding the environments uninteresting, with a few exceptions there seems to be little in the way of environmental storytelling and exploration doesn't seem that compelling. I'm enjoying the combat more than the exploration, which is unexpected for a Bethesda game. It feels like they've gone for quantity over quality with environments, and things are so far apart in fairly uninteresting planets that I feel like it's just a bit of a chore.
  Maybe I've just been unlucky with the world's I've explored, and I'm enjoying it enough to keep playing a bit more in the hope it improves, but so far, it's not what I was hoping for.
- This is what I was scared of. They are just repackaging the same game over and over. Oblivion, Fallout 3 & 4, Skyrim... It's a joke.
  I'm sure the caves in Oblivion that became the caves in Fallout are also the same caves in Starfield. Even if the game didn't have planets they'd have put these caves in the game.
  
  Yep and each time Todd pushes them for even greater breadth at the sacrifice of depth. For example, stealth feels genuinely impossible and pointless in Starfield. I couldn't even stealth into the first room they present to you for that very purpose because every enemy instantly knew I was there. It's now just a shooty game with a bunch of loading screens and often ugly graphics with terrible performance.

What is "BSG" in this context?

~~I'm only 2 hours in and I'm liking it too. Some things aren't clicking yet for me like the space combat but with more practice I think I'll get the hang of that too.~~
The one thing I dislike is how my robot companion will run into me constantly or block me in a small passage. I had to reload a save because I was stuck with a glitched floating vosco that wouldn't let me jump around or even go underneath lmao. He's been glitched like that for the last 40 minutes.
I'm actually getting a refund now. This game ended up being too tedious for me. After trying to explore New Atlantis for over an hour with that fucking horrible topographic "map" I refuse to deal with this for the next 40+ hours. Hell even Redfall was able to capture my attention longer than this mostly because it actually has a FUCKING MAP.
- That’s exactly the kind of bug I’ve come to expect from their games. It’s usually a couple of patches in where they figure out that you bumping into your companion should get them to move, or you having the ability to tell your companion to move.
  I couldn’t count the thousands of hours I’ve logged on Bethesda games, but they’re the reason I have 200 gigs of save files every time I play an RPG.
  
  After another 2 hours I just gave up. This game is my least favorite Bethesda game I've played. I see how tedious it will get exploring. New Atlantis showed me the shortcomings of this game.

You're right that it isn't NMS nor Elite Dangerous; but God damn do I see bits of their influence in it. The exploration, base building and survey stuff is a bit like NMS. The aesthetics and how random missions fit in the game is similar to Elite. One of the ship builder companies named in Starfield gave me deja vu because it sounded like a knock off of one of the Elite starship companies.
I think if you like either of them, you might enjoy Starfield. Slightly more advanced than NMS, but not quite as hardcore as Elite. Pretty decent middle ground as far as space games go. The story missions have been rather dull, but the random "go out and have fun" shit is fun. I haven't even been beyond the first 2 star systems. There's so much shit to find just walking around on a dead planet like Earth.
I'm also surprised that it not only runs, but is playable even though I have an unsupported GPU. 30 fps most of the time, at low settings and 1080p res, but it's a consistent and smooth 30, and generally only in the large open areas. Inside it's pretty snappy. Contrast that with Fallout 4 which I got day 1, with the exact recommended specs they had listed, and it was pretty non-playable once you started approaching the city center.

I'll give it a shot after a pile of patches and a fit girl repack.
Honestly the most positive post I've seen for this game
- I'm loving the game, about 18 hrs in. A lot of the complaints are a positive to the right people like system tutorials are "hey this exists, have fun" rather than making you sit through long explanations, you can ignore tons of content if you want. Don't want to do outposts that's fine buy or mine yourself, don't wanna build a ship buy a premade. The game is a Bethesda RPG with a lot of area separate from the main quest, if you wanna explore there's 1000 planets, if not there's a handful of really cool ones the quests lead you to.
  Performance wise she's a hungry game. I'm at recommended and I get 50-70 fps, 1080p, medium settings, FSR 2 for most spots. Even when it dips into the 30s I only notice because I have an overlay counter. Few minor bugs and hiccups. If you liked Elder Scrolls or Fallout check it out. Some people will love it for years to come, others will hate it with a passion.
  
  The performance is really something they need to figure out. Granted it's not Fallout 4 with unavoidable micro stuttering, but it's absurd that I get better performance in something like Cyberpunk with ray tracing and high/ultra settings.
- It's not that buggy. I've had maybe half a dozen minor visual bugs at most in all the time I've played
- I'm just sivk of collecting clutter. Why?

33 comments