Prez wrote on Jan 14, 2024, 09:37:
the creation engine isn't even out yet

Creation Engine = Skyrim's game engine (Gamebryo core, released in 2011)
Creation Engine 2 = Starfield's game engine (Gamebryo core, released in 2023)
Creation Kit = Modding Tools for Skyrim, released in 2012
? = Modding tools for Starfield, not yet released or named

Prez wrote on Jan 14, 2024, 09:37:
I find it way too hard to believe that no one is going to want mod Starfield. That doesn't make any logical sense. There are already mods for it and the creation engine isn't even out yet. There is virtually zero chance there will not be mods for it. That's not how the PC gaming community has worked for about 30 years. You don't like the game. That's fine. Doesn't mean I am going to start believing hyperbole.

The smell of straw is strong here. I never said no one, I said modding teams are already giving up on it, and gave a very specific example of one that are. Of course there are already mods for the game, but the vast majority are them are simple as fuck mods like texture changes or very small tweaks done by individuals. The BIG mods that games like this are known for require groups of people working together, and if they can't fix the issues of the game that's preventing them from making the mods they want to make, how are they going to make those mods? Magic? Lol, no, they're going to move on.

I find it way too hard to believe that no one is going to want mod Starfield. That doesn't make any logical sense. There are already mods for it and the creation engine isn't even out yet. There is virtually zero chance there will not be mods for it. That's not how the PC gaming community has worked for about 30 years. You don't like the game. That's fine. Doesn't mean I am going to start believing hyperbole.

i found the game to be good. It was one of the better launches for playability, plenty to do and a good sandbox game. I enjoyed the relative lack of grind to play through and although bases were pointless I enjoyed setting them up and creating a supply chain - because I could.

overall it was enjoyable for me.

Prez wrote on Jan 13, 2024, 20:35:
I play the long game. There are still excellent mods being released for Skyrim. There's a great-looking mod coming out for New Vegas. I plan on still playing Starfield in 10 years. I don't really think about it now - it's not time to even worry about it for me.

The problem is that modding teams are already giving up on it. They tried to make it so that you could actually load in areas next to each other on planet surfaces, but the game would just crash soon after because the player's origin gets unloaded at that point. The game's logic can't account for a moving player origin, and reworking the entire engine to do so is something only Bethesda can do, and they're sure as hell not going to undertake that because it's a mammoth undertaking.

This is also related to the game's floating point accuracy issues that get very noticeable if you install the mod that lets you fly around the solar systems. Objects and physics start acting very weird the further you go out.

It's just nothing modders can fix, and it's 100% going to deter the modders that would have actually put out the big, tantalizing mods that the games are known for.

Slashman wrote on Jan 13, 2024, 17:55:
As I said...I'm wondering why people are so surprised. SkyUI was never going to be the catalyst for them to make UI changes. Just like all the mods for Skyrim never pushed them in a direction. This is what they do...they present a game world and make it serviceable. The rest is up to you.

Up to us, oh wait, some of us are console users, guess they're just fucked right? How come they didn't know that they're expected to finish Bethesda's games for them? That's so obvious! What a bunch of fools! lolkekwww

Donkey_Punch wrote on Jan 13, 2024, 13:00:
People just had ridiculous expectations. Some people overplayed it in too short of a time.
Yes, I agree it should have been delayed until they patched more, but the game design is perfectly enjoyable.

No, this is not Todd Howard's account. I really do like the game.

Sure, you can like mediocrity, but that doesn't stop it from being mediocre. Unfortunately SF isn't just mediocre, it's a flawed game all around. They didn't even have a design document made for it.

I thought this was their least buggy game so far? Why have all they done so far is fix bugs and add in features that should have been there from the start then?

Prez wrote on Jan 13, 2024, 20:35:
I play the long game. There are still excellent mods being released for Skyrim. There's a great-looking mod coming out for New Vegas. I plan on still playing Starfield in 10 years. I don't really think about it now - it's not time to even worry about it for me.

This is how I feel about the whole thing. The creation kit isn't even out yet. I will give it time and try it at my leisure.

I play the long game. There are still excellent mods being released for Skyrim. There's a great-looking mod coming out for New Vegas. I plan on still playing Starfield in 10 years. I don't really think about it now - it's not time to even worry about it for me.

Prez wrote on Jan 13, 2024, 16:40:

In other words.....its a great sandbox if you are into modding and want the space/scifi atmosphere instead of the Elder Scrolls or Post Nuclear Apocalypse.

This. It's why I bought it. I would have thought anyone who is familiar with Bethesda would have known this is what you were getting. I'm not saying everyone's complaints are not justified, especially since I haven't played it so how would I know? But I'm saying Bethesda has a pretty clear method of making games. It's not quite 'cut and paste' but it's close. 'Sandbox' is a good way to describe it.

It's true. I am overall more greatful to have this sandbox to use and mod with then I am disappointed with the vanilla game's story/gameplay/UI. It's why I do keep buying their games. I can be critical of the obvious....the UI is a great point, it is complete trash AGAIN.....but at the end of the day I will still have it on my hard drive 5-10 years from now for modding most likely, just like I do with Skyrim now. There aren't many games in my collection that are still installed in the hard drive by default, and even fewer after 5-10 years. Morrowind, Oblvion, Skyrim, and now Starfield make up 4 of the roughly 10 or so games I install on a clean system. (sorry Fallout fans, not my cup of tea aesthetically...if it was, I would do the same thing with them I am sure) The difference now is that while Morrowind felt like a real "game", Starfield feels more like a demo selliing a sandbox.

Also...until we get a creation kit for it...I probably ought to not count my chickens before they hatch. The community can do amazing things, but things really pop off when the developers release an editor/creator package. They say that's a this year thing, I hope so.

Prez wrote on Jan 13, 2024, 16:40:

In other words.....its a great sandbox if you are into modding and want the space/scifi atmosphere instead of the Elder Scrolls or Post Nuclear Apocalypse.

This. It's why I bought it. I would have thought anyone who is familiar with Bethesda would have known this is what you were getting. I'm not saying everyone's complaints are not justified, especially since I haven't played it so how would I know? But I'm saying Bethesda has a pretty clear method of making games. It's not quite 'cut and paste' but it's close. 'Sandbox' is a good way to describe it.

As I said...I'm wondering why people are so surprised. SkyUI was never going to be the catalyst for them to make UI changes. Just like all the mods for Skyrim never pushed them in a direction. This is what they do...they present a game world and make it serviceable. The rest is up to you.

This comment was edited on Jan 13, 2024, 18:27.

In other words.....its a great sandbox if you are into modding and want the space/scifi atmosphere instead of the Elder Scrolls or Post Nuclear Apocalypse.

This. It's why I bought it. I would have thought anyone who is familiar with Bethesda would have known this is what you were getting. I'm not saying everyone's complaints are not justified, especially since I haven't played it so how would I know? But I'm saying Bethesda has a pretty clear method of making games. It's not quite 'cut and paste' but it's close. 'Sandbox' is a good way to describe it.

yonder wrote on Jan 13, 2024, 01:02:
I've always found this response fascinating. There's 20 years of evidence of Bethesda developed games that some of us saw.

Morrowind -> Oblivion -> Fallout 3 -> Skyrim -> Fallout 4 -> Fallout 76 -> Starfield

It's a straight, consistent, predictable pattern of streamlining and polishing. Some of it great, some of it horrible. But Starfield was... inevitable.

My time with Bethesda goes back to The Elder Scrolls Arena (1994) and The Terminator (1991).

I don't think it is so much streamlining and polishing so much as what feels like a disjointed mess during development. Streamlining means things flow together and Starfield is the exact opposite of that. For example, the Crimson Fleet questline was hands down the best of the entire game. The main questline in the game is positively sophomoric in comparison. It's like someone watched a 7 minute video on YouTube about M-Theory aimed at middle school aged children, took that understanding of it, and said "I wanna make a game about that!" Multiple universes can be fun if done well (No, not you Marvel. Sit down) but Starfield decidedly did not do them well. Then there's the whole disconnect between the mind numbingly boring planet "exploration", the utter pointlessness of building a base, and generally characters you couldn't give a shit about. The "hub" locations of the game were just so...stereotypical. Two were clearly ripped off inspired by Firefly and one was inspired by Blade Runner. Inspiration can be great when you do your own take on it but hewing too close to the inspiration just comes off as copy-catting.

The skill system is just such a major step back from Skyrim. In that game, you developed skills by actually doing them. In Starfield they're just point dumps and unlocks.

There's just so much fundamentally wrong and broken with Starfield that I could write a dissertation here.

/---\

Kastagir wrote on Jan 13, 2024, 02:50:
Starfield's Creation Engine 2 is like a Ford Pinto with racing stripes, spoilers and a muffler bypass...

Bad example. The Pinto came with the bulletproof Ford Kent and LL23 engines which could be performance monsters with very little effort. In addition, it shared the same front end as the Mustang II which, to this day, is a highly sought after front end because it is light, quick, and responsive. Given that the Pinto is such a light car (for its era), it can be quite the little speed demon. The owner of a garage near where I live has a racing Pinto and Miatas have a hard time keeping up with it.

A better example of a crap car bolted and cobbled together for cynical market reasons would be Chrysler's K-car platform.

Slashman wrote on Jan 13, 2024, 13:31:
What I'm wondering is what were you expecting?

Without going into the specifics because that would turn into a long and tedious discussion: What I am expecting of any developer on this planet is a learning curve. I expect a developer to listen and to learn from past "mistakes".

The only area in that Starfailed has learned anything is Bugs Bunny. To me (maybe I was lucky but a lot of people seemed to share the sentiment), it was a surprisingly polished experience. I only encountered some glitches but nothing serious at all.

Pretty much ALL other areas of the game left A LOT to be desired. I still had fun with the game and mostly enjoyed it but it could have been so much more.

Going back to expectations, a very simple thing that I would expect from Bethesda would be to go to the Nexus and check out the top 100 mods by popularity of each of their games. How awesome of a resource is that? Most developers do not even have this luxury but Bethesda can (could) very easily do their research and learn what people are apparently missing, fixing, adding, changing, modding, building, whatever.

Why the fuck are they not using that resource? Why? How arrogant can you be? My favorite example would be the clusterfuck of a UI in Starfailed. SkyUI is the most popular mod of all time for Skyrim. How the fuck can the Starfailed UI even happen if you would be respecting your customers?

This is my problem with Bethesda and why I'm terminally done with them. They do not learn or listen. They always repeat the same mistakes. A developer that shows absolutely no willingness to change or to actually accomplish any progress or improvements from game to game is no longer interesting to me. They can shove their next mediocrity called TES VI where the sun don't shine. I do not care anymore.

Burrito of Peace wrote on Jan 12, 2024, 22:31:
I was excited for Starfield because I loved Skyrim so much. Graphics tweaks aren't going to fix the fundamental structural problems with this game.

I just built my first base - a very basic base - and I can see I'm already done with this aspect of the game. What a horribly shallow gameplay loop. Forcing people to zip around to different solar systems and planets to create bases to acquire stuff to build more stuff. Rick Sanchez said it best, "So you're mining stuff to craft with and crafting stuff to mine with? Did your dad invent this game?". I haven't played all that much but I already feel like I'm done with it. I may motor through just to finish the main quest but this game is mighty weak sauce. Can't believe they put off a new TES for this.

I am, however, really enjoying Wartales in particular, Against the Storm, and Dune Spice Wars. I'll definitely buy these three at some point - I'm playing all these on XGP. Tried Gotham Knights and quickly uninstalled it.

What I'm wondering is what were you expecting?

It seems to be classic Bethesda. With a main story that's so-so and many side quests and stories to occupy you depending on the flavor of gameplay you want.

Combat seems to be serviceable but could do with more depth...the story of every Bethesda game ever made since Oblivion.

Were people really expecting a universe filled to the brim with unique locations to explore? Were you expecting super deep space combat gameplay? What lead you to expect these things?

Did they promise seemless open world? I can't find any place where they stated that was a part of the game.

It's just underwhelming for me personally. It's not creative, unique, and it certainly doesn't bring anything new to the table from a gameplay perspective. Skyriim was over a decade ago and it's much smaller world was much more interesting to me personally.....and it was a step-down from Oblivion in that way, which was a step down from Morrowind in that way. I love Bethesda games for their modding support, but their games are trendiiing the wrong way in terms of original content and gameplay. The Steam Award given to this game for Most Innovative Gameplay will forever be one of the biggest jokes in the iindustry. They miight as well have put a " /s " after the award.

In other words.....its a great sandbox ifi you are into modding and want the space/scifi atmosphere instead of the Elder Scrolls or Post Nuclear Apocalypse. It's pretty lame compared to expectations as a "game" unmodded.

Argonius the 3rd wrote on Jan 13, 2024, 12:52:
the game is broken beyond repair !

Well, yes, it is.

THEY DONE FUCKED IT UP!

People just had ridiculous expectations. Some people overplayed it in too short of a time.
Yes, I agree it should have been delayed until they patched more, but the game design is perfectly enjoyable.

No, this is not Todd Howard's account. I really do like the game.