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[Thirty7ven]

Just goes to show that fanboys will go to extreme lengths to pretend that <big exclusive game> is not that good and has obvious issues or is a copy/paste from the last game in the series.

To be frank. People are idiots. Whoever claims that Spiderman, Horizon and - based on reviews so far - Starfield aren't amazing games probably doesn't own the console they are released on.

Threads like this are all about expectations, hype. It’s not really about the games themselves because nobody has played them when these threads hit aside from rare cases like BG3.

You and I and everyone who have been around knows this. Looking at the critical reception, yes Starfield sounds like a great game depending on what you are looking for in it, just like the other games mentioned.

But just like Horizon FW and FFXVI, expectations are at the heart of it. With Starfield it’s even more because the expectations were wild. And I said it all the way, Bethesda was put into a position that had nothing to do with them and their games and everything to do with the pressure Xbox is under.

 

[BennyBlanco]

"highly likely I come back to Starfield" how would you know? You haven't even played it yet. You are shilling quite hard for something you haven't put one second into lol

Same reason 10s of thousands of people still play Skyrim to this day. These games have crazy longevity and endless fucking around with mods. These big bethesda games aren’t for everyone and you probably already know where you stand.

 

[Heisenberg007]

Elder Scrolls will not need to have dozens of different maps and terrain in memory at all time.

It will not be the same kind of things at all.

Starfield doesn't either. It procedurally generates the terrain when you click to land on a planet and wait on the loading screen.

Even NMS doesn't -- despite having seamless landing on planets. Nearby planets can be loaded from HDD / SSD.

 

[adamsapple]

Spider-Man, H:FW, R & C, FF16 is 4X 88s and earned scores in-line or even exceeded what were expected of them from the the community and were just individual feathers in a feather-laden cap, rounding out an eclectic library. None of them were realistically expected to be GOTY contenders, let alone GOTG.

Starfield is 1 88 (soon to be 83-85) which was touted as being THE GAME OF THE FOREVER, the saviour of Xbox's flagging console business and propel Xbox Sales and Game Pass into the stratosphere, earning endless GOTY awards and turn Xbox game studios into critical darlings, replacing Halo as Xbox's premier franchise. Safe to say Starfield fails at achieving any of that and is nothing more than a good-decent, but mostly mediocre game.

Good satire.

Starfield doesn't either. It procedurally generates the terrain when you click to land on a planet and wait on the loading screen.

Even NMS doesn't -- despite having seamless landing on planets. Nearby planets can be loaded from HDD / SSD.

The generation is only done the first time you land, after that it is persistent. It doesn't generate each time you land on a planet.

 

[Panajev2001a]

And here I am thinking exactly the reverse xD
Thinking of getting a 4k bluray player, might as well get a Series X

Maybe get both if you can afford it. XSX and PS5 do not support Dolby Vision playback for UHD Blu-Ray movies .

 

[Banjo64]

Obligatory i'll drink Banjo64 cum if Spider-Man 2 reviews lower than Starfield

Not if I drink urs first x

 

[Fools idol]

Starfield review

It's Bethesda's biggest RPG by far, but nowhere near its best.

www.pcgamer.com

PC Gamers review is always a good one for my personal tastes. Given how highly they creamed over BG3 which I did as well, I'm not surprised with the 7/10.

Bethesda has gotten far too comfortable making middle of the road games that do the bare minimum of nostalgia poking and baiting, it's really quite annoying at this point. The game not running well despite them going blue in the face to say it was, is also a ballsack crunch.

 

[damidu]

The sad part is that Elders Scrolls will be built with this technology

Which means loading galore in 2029-ish

Madness

thats true and this shit will age faster and faster with every passing year.

 

[NT80]

Exactly, Does anyone remember any of the cities in Skyrim? It's not like the map told you exactly what each building was. Who really wants that anyway?

I don't know how it is in this game but I wouldn't want to be wandering around aimlessly trying to find something in a big open place. I don't want to have to memorize the layout to remember where everything is.

 

[Macaron]

Same reason 10s of thousands of people still play Skyrim to this day. These games have crazy longevity and endless fucking around with mods. These big bethesda games aren’t for everyone and you probably already know where you stand.

Idk. Call me crazy, but I feel like before you start heaping praise like "I will come back to this game over and over" you should, you know, maybe play it first. For just a min or two at least. Lol

 

[Dr.Morris79]

She’s literally flying towards Saturn. A planet based in our reality, in our solar system.

Total Recall is a film based on Mars where you can go on holiday, talk to rebels and meet Kuato, who tells you how to make Mars breathable

Because it's set on Mars, it doesnt make it real

 

[rhodesianshepard]

I mean even if they end up exactly the same score I played through SM once and deleted it

Its highly likely I come back to Starfield over and over again to get stuff accomplished I want done

Regardless of scores if a game keeps bringing me back to me that is a great game

To each their own. I return to very few games after I beat them. Starfield does seem like a game that can still be entertaining 100hrs+ into it. At the same time, just by reading reviews, it seems like it takes 20+hrs before the game doesn't feel like a slog. So, if that is true, many gamers won't bother getting past that point

 

[Cashon]

Do people really want this to be a space sim/No Man's Sky type game?

After seeing the reviews, it seems more like a first-person Mass Effect 1, which has me more interested than I was pre-reviews.

 

[Toots]

My man Mortismal is a goddam 100% machine

 

[Banjo64]

Total Recall is a film based on Mars where you can go on holiday, talk to rebels and meet Kuato, who tells you how to make Mars breathable

Because it's set on Mars, it doesnt make it real

Do the laws of space apply in Total Recall?

 

[alphachino]

So is an 88 a 'feather on a feather-laden cap' or 'a mostly mediocre game'? At least be consistent with your asinine takes.

Be honest, you're mad that the game scored as high as it did, aren't you.

I think you missed the point of my post. I'd take a system with 4x 88-rated games over 1 game rated 88 that's been artificially inflated by selective-choosing who gets to review the game. I'm not annoyed in the slightest, in fact, it's the opposite. I was hoping to be surprised and that it would score 95%+ like so many people were telling me it would so I could download it and make some use of my Game Pass sub, but now I won't even bother.

 

[Heisenberg007]

The generation is only done the first time you land, after that it is persistent. It doesn't generate each time you land on a planet.

The tiles are procedurally generated during loading screens. That is why there are loading screens (albeit smaller ones) when you select a landing point on the map.

The game would have seamless landing if everything was already present in the memory.

And as I gave the example of NMS, even that would be a terrible way to manage the memory, as data can be easily pulled from SSD for nearby planets.

 

[Punished Miku]

I know what type of game I like maybe?

And sorry to let you down but I don't shill for anyone

Welcome to the club. Soon you will be an alt.

 

[Ass of Can Whooping]

Well but the good part is that it won't have space travel and planets and shit so it might be more in line with skyrim and with faster loadtimes (will probably be on whatever next-gen console xbox is making).

Not having the baggage of trying to make a space sim does wonders for your game

 

[BennyBlanco]

Idk. Call me crazy, but I feel like before you start heaping praise like "I will come back to this game over and over" you should, you know, maybe play it first. For just a min or two at least. Lol

I disagree. I also beat Spiderman once and never really thought about it again or played miles morales. I enjoyed my time with it but that’s it. One of the first things I did when I got a steam deck was install morrowind and OpenMW lol. I will definitely play Starfield more than once.

 

[Zathalus]

What is your point exactly? God of War Ragnarok had 5 playstation centric sites give it a perfect score. Spider-Man had 4 playstation sites give it a 95-100 score.

Just to be safe should we give all Sony and Microsoft exclusives -5 on aggregate sites?

 

[Kacho]

Well this thread has reached the point where I tap out. Have fun fellas.

 

[marjo]

I think you missed the point of my post. I'd take a system with 4x 88-rated games over 1 game rated 88 that's been artificially inflated by selective-choosing who gets to review the game. I'm not annoyed in the slightest, in fact, it's the opposite. I was hoping to be surprised and that it would score 95%+ like so many people were telling me it would so I could download it and make some use of my Game Pass sub, but now I won't even bother.

Why are you talking about 'systems' on a game review thread? Each game mentioned scored the same. Yet, according to you, 3 of them are great 'feathers' and one is mediocre. The 'system' they are released on is irrelevant, or it would be to anyone who isn't an obvious fanboy.

 

[Dacvak]

It's 88 on opencritic. That's the same score as Spider-Man, Horizon: Forbidden West, Ratchet and Clank: Rift Apart and Final Fantasy XVI. It's also higher then games like Ghost of Tsushima, Returnal, and Death Stranding.

How on earth are people trying to spin this as a bad game?

I mean, I kinda get it. We've gotten a few games in recent time that have pushed their respective genres forward in fairly significant ways. I'd say that Eldin Ring, TotK/BotW, and recently BG3 come to mind. Those are games that were largely hyped and, in general, have seemed to exceed expectations in some significant way. BG3, especially, is an unfortunate comparison to Starfield, considering how stupidly dynamic and massive the story and characters are.

I think people just wanted Starfield to also have something really fresh and unique. At least that's what I was hoping for. I don't personally care for the Bethesda RPG experience, so I had hopes that it wouldn't just be "a good Bethesda game, but in space."

Does that make it a bad game? Not at all. Some Bethesda games are considered masterpieces, and given some of these reviews, Starfield could very well be just as good.

Still, it's a bit disappointing that there doesn't seem to be one specific gimmick or element of the game that really stands out as groundbreaking.

 

[Macaron]

I disagree. I also beat Spiderman once and never really thought about it again or played miles morales. I enjoyed my time with it but that’s it. One of the first things I did when I got a steam deck was install morrowind and OpenMW lol. I will definitely play Starfield more than once.

Morrowind is not Starfield. You should probably play Starfield, before telling us how good and replayable you think Starfield is.

 

[Ass of Can Whooping]

Do people really want this to be a space sim/No Man's Sky type game?

After seeing the reviews, it seems more like a first-person Mass Effect 1, which has me more interested than I was pre-reviews.

I never wanted a space game tbh. Rather they just went straight to Elder Scrolls

But having no system is better than a shit system. They tried it. It's shit and it'll be judged for it.

 

[alphachino]

Why are you talking about 'systems' on a game review thread? Each game mentioned scored the same. Yet, according to you, 3 of them are great 'feathers' and one is mediocre. The 'system' they are released on is irrelevant, or it would be to anyone who isn't an obvious fanboy.

Because Starfield was being held up as being the saviour of Xbox, which was always a patently absurd stance to take when it's not exclusive to the platform.

Also: I mentioned "systems" because those 4 games listed by OP are obviously PS-exclusives so therefore the OP was obviously tinged with implied reference to platforms.

 

[graywolf323]

Welcome to the club. Soon you will be an alt.

that sounds like something an alt would say

 

[Thyuda]

I can understand if people don't care as much but holy poop, from the streams and the reviews, the facial animations are distractingly bad.

 

[Pelta88]

It's 88 on opencritic. That's the same score as Spider-Man, Horizon: Forbidden West, Ratchet and Clank: Rift Apart and Final Fantasy XVI. It's also higher then games like Ghost of Tsushima, Returnal, and Death Stranding.

How on earth are people trying to spin this as a bad game?

Sure it's not the 90+ that many were hoping for, but it's by most accounts a great game that you will sink a massive amount of time into. Three years plus from now this game will be have that special Bethesda touch of being even better due to the massive modding community.

None of the games you mentioned had the weight of an entire platform on their shoulders. Starfield did. It's unfortunate and it's not right... But that was the reality facing the XB platform due to years of neglect.

And in that instance an 80.whatever simply doesn't suffice.

 

[marjo]

Because Starfield was being held up as being the saviour of Xbox, which was always a patently absurd stance to take when it's not exclusive to the platform.

Even if that were true, why should what it was being held up as have any bearing on the quality of the game?

 

[adamsapple]

My boy Heisen007 going 5x overtime in this thread today

 

[BennyBlanco]

Morrowind is not Starfield. You should probably play Starfield, before telling us how good and replayable you think Starfield is.

Holy shit dude. It’s almost like I know what kind of games I like. Crazy, right?

 

[Banjo64]

To quote a great man:

Sure Spider-Man 2 will be a fun 6-8 hour romp. But I’ll be spending hundreds of hours with friends blowing down boundary walls in Starfield 3.

 

[Topher]

Do people really want this to be a space sim/No Man's Sky type game?

After seeing the reviews, it seems more like a first-person Mass Effect 1, which has me more interested than I was pre-reviews.

Doesn't have to be a space sim to have good space exploration. Everspace 2 is an arcadey space shooter, but zipping around each system was fun as hell. The problem with Starfield is that it seems that actually traversing the system doesn't happen. It is a menu selection. That kind of sucks, but as long as there is a lot to do in space with combat, pirating, smuggling, or whatever then I think it will be ok.

 

[Flutta]

How did the company that pioneered open world games, even to the point of coding the original Xbox to reboot in the background to flush RAM w/o the player noticing, make Starfield with a shit-ton of loading screens?

Seriously, wtf?

Let's be honest here... The game was clearly not ready for release for two significant reasons.

Firstly, creating an RPG set in space and exploring the cosmos is an immensely challenging task. It's not something that can be rushed. Unlike a game like Skyrim, where you can design a specific land area, space is vast and consists of numerous planets. Achieving the desired level of detail is an intricate process. Just look at examples like SC and NMS to understand the complexity involved.

The second issue is Microsoft . They were in need of a major release for the Xbox, which is self-explanatory. Phil put a burning fire under Todd's ass

 

[IntentionalPun]

I'm not super hyped anymore.

Don't care about the score, which is fine.. it's the details.

They compromised one of the great things about Bethesda RPGS (having one big seamless open world) to throw "space" into the mix and then did that in a mediocre way.

 

[Slayer-33]

After watching the IGN review I had to get in here ASAP ..

 

[DenchDeckard]

Spider-Man, H:FW, R & C, FF16 is 4X 88s and earned scores in-line or even exceeded what were expected of them from the the community and were just individual feathers in a feather-laden cap, rounding out an eclectic library. None of them were realistically expected to be GOTY contenders, let alone GOTG.

Starfield is 1 88 (soon to be 83-85) which was touted as being THE GAME OF THE FOREVER, the saviour of Xbox's flagging console business and propel Xbox Sales and Game Pass into the stratosphere, earning endless GOTY awards and turn Xbox game studios into critical darlings, replacing Halo as Xbox's premier franchise. Safe to say Starfield fails at achieving any of that and is nothing more than a good-decent, but mostly mediocre game.

"Good decent, but mostly mediocre"

88

 

[Heisenberg007]

My boy Heisen007 going 5x overtime in this thread today

Sharing reviews in a review thread.

 

[Cashon]

I never wanted a space game tbh. Rather they just went straight to Elder Scrolls

But having no system is better than a shit system. They tried it. It's shit and it'll be judged for it.

I have never been able to get into Elder Scrolls (ditto for Kingdoms of Amalur, Lord of the Rings, etc), because I generally find fantasy settings to be boring. I tried Skyrim again last night for probably the 5th time. It's just supremely uninteresting to me.

Anyway... To which system are you referring?

 

[Sleepwalker]

Fallout new vegas, Fallout 3, The Evil within, Prey, Dishonored and Skyrim main quests are beloved.

Bethesda games studios only made Fallout 3 and Skyrim out of that list.


Either way I read some spoilers about the story that piqued my interest so I'm going to complete it for sure.

 

[DryvBy]

Why are people arguing if this is GOTY material? None of that matters as this year games have been amazing.

 

[Ass of Can Whooping]

I have never been able to get into Elder Scrolls (ditto for Kingdoms of Amalur, Lord of the Rings, etc), because I generally find fantasy settings to be boring. I tried Skyrim again last night for probably the 5th time. It's just supremely uninteresting to me.

Anyway... To which system are you referring?

The whole space sim aspect of the game.

 

[lefty1117]

idk, watching youtube reviewres, DF, and most of the other reviews from sites other than the big 3, it just seems like there is something off with those couple of reviews in the 70s. I thought it was going to be nearly impossible for anything to topple BG3 in my mind, but mid 70s when everyone else has it higher just makes me wonder if there's some reaction to how the UK review sites were excluded from preview codes.

 

[marjo]

"Good decent, but mostly mediocre"

88

It's absurd isn't it.

To sum up the last few pages of this thread:

Console fanboys: "88 is usually a good score. But because Microsoft had no good exclusives last year, it's now mediocre."

Normal rational person: "???"

 

[Cashon]

Doesn't have to be a space sim to have good space exploration. Everspace 2 is an arcadey space shooter, but zipping around each system was fun as hell. The problem with Starfield is that it seems that actually traversing the system doesn't happen. It is a menu selection. That kind of sucks, but as long as there is a lot to do in space with combat, pirating, smuggling, or whatever then I think it will be ok.

I think if the game forced you to traverse the system, it would be very tedious. I suppose the middle ground is to at least have the option, but then you'd have to spend time to create and implement systems that a fraction of your player base would actual enjoy.

 

[damidu]

Why are people arguing if this is GOTY material? None of that matters as this year games have been amazing.

nobody is arguing that anymore. its clearly not

 

[Montauk]

idk, watching youtube reviewres, DF, and most of the other reviews from sites other than the big 3, it just seems like there is something off with those couple of reviews in the 70s. I thought it was going to be nearly impossible for anything to topple BG3 in my mind, but mid 70s when everyone else has it higher just makes me wonder if there's some reaction to how the UK review sites were excluded from preview codes.

“Makes me wonder” = I have no evidence for my conspiracy theory

 

[Gaiff]

It's absurd isn't it.

To sum up the last few pages of this thread:

Console fanboys: "88 is usually a good score. But because Microsoft had no good exclusives last year, it's now mediocre."

Normal rational person: "???"

It has to be weighed against expectations. People were expecting Starfield to score 90+ and be a serious contender for GOTY. That it scores 87 is fine but quite a bit below expectations which is a disappointment. If Baldur's Gate had scored an 88, nobody would call it a disappointment because no one was expecting it to be as good as it is.