How Starfield Stumbles with the Perfect Setup

foreign [Music] has to be one of the most interesting games I've played in a long time and that's because on one hand while I love this game and it has so much to offer and so many amazing moments on the other hand there's so many things about this game that are just unpolished unfinished or could be so much better and it's left me in a spot where I both love and hate this game but it's also something that I'm quite used to as a Bethesda fan I remember growing up on things like Oblivion and Fallout 3 and even Skyrim and eventually going back to the greats like Morrowind and playing newer games like Fallout 4 and while I've never been the biggest Super Fan of Bethesda games I've always really enjoyed the worlds and just getting sucked up into them and the communities and Starfield might just be my favorite Bethesda game of all time but it also might be the one with the most flaws so today I want to talk with you guys about why I think Starfield is so amazing but also so bad in so many ways and and it's left me in such a weird spot where I just want to sit here and vent you guys about how I feel about this game because for those of you that watch my channel you might notice that this video is a little different than usual usually I do more scripting and more production on each of my videos but today I just wanted to sit down and have a casual conversation with you guys about what I think about this huge game that I've been playing for over 60 hours now because there's so much to talk about and honestly let me know down below what you guys think of videos like this too I work a full-time job on top of YouTube so usually I only have time on the weekends to just grind and try and get videos out so if I could do more like this I could probably make more videos but also I know you guys love the high production value of the other stuff so let me know down below what you think and without further Ado let's talk about Starfield so first off let's talk about what I think is the most important aspect of any Bethesda game and honestly most RPGs for that matter and that's the world and the lore because in my opinion that's what these games live and die on I've never been a huge huge fan of Fallout or Elder Scrolls but what I do love about those games is the world and just sitting down playing and feeling like I can get lost in them for hours and then go watch some YouTube videos about theories and lore that are super fascinating and luckily bethesda's done it again with Starfield this game is full of rich and interesting lore you can go to multiple different planets with huge backstories all the faction quests give you some really cool and interesting ideas about what's happened in this world and not only that but I think what Bethesda has done a really good job at here is there's so many different sides in terms of the different political parties and just factions out there and they all have different ideas on what the past and the lore means and on top of that there's a lot of big reveals in the main quests and side quests alike that have awesome Fantastical Revelations for not only what the past and history of this world is but potentially also what the future is and I have to say the biggest thing for me in Bethesda games is always the world and the lore is this a world I can get lost in and just read different notes and Terminals and just enjoy the things I'm learning about the universe and I can say without a doubt Starfield is 100 that but also on the same token if I'm being honest Starfield does feel a little more generic than bethesda's past games for example when I'm playing Fallout and I open my Pip Boy and I walk around the world and I explore the vaults it really does feel like a unique setting that only Fallout could capture but when I'm playing Star field a lot of times I just think dang you could plug in Star Wars here you could plug in Battlestar Galactica here you could plug in Star Trek here or Mass Effect and it would work and there's a lot of ups and downs to that because on one side the identity of Starfield isn't quite perfected and I don't exactly even now know what it is it's so open and so free-flowing that it also allows for a lot of new ideas to come into the setting and they make perfect sense and as we'll talk about later I actually think this is a great move by Bethesda because it really makes it so modding and also DLCs can fit in perfectly into this game and so many ideas could be plugged into the narrative and it would just instantly work and make sense in this universe another thing that I was surprised by is just how grounded of a Sci-Fi setting this was I know when Bethesda was talking about Starfield and it coming out they mentioned NASA Punk a lot but I really questioned how true that would be would there be a lot of Fantastical sci-fi settings in different areas and the answer is not really this really is a very grounded and just normal human world it feels like honestly Earth in Fallout or nowadays but just in the stars and a little bit more advanced with some new technologies but all of these Technologies were just on the verge of it feels like humanity is still scrounging to scavenge the Stars we haven't mastered the Galaxy we haven't met thousands of new alien races and made diplomacy with them we're still base Humanity we know and love and we're just out in this brand new world trying to discover what's out there and the more I played Starfield the more I actually fell in love with this setting because it's actually so impactful and a more grounded human ideal that makes it something that's so different from other sci-fi that I love like say Mass Effect or Star Trek on top of this too the world is filled to the brim with so many awesome places there's abandoned spaceships that you can scrounge through as it's dark and you must turn on your light and discover things and on top of this there's so many things about the lore in this game that are awesome and fascinating but the game doesn't give it to you easy you have to go on quests you have to read notepads you have to listen to different audio recordings of the past and piece together everything that's happened but because of that it makes the revelations that much more interesting and I have to say I've grown to love the world of sarfield and I think it's the perfect Baseline setting to really grow into something even more Fantastical and awesome with even more sci-fi elements but no world can be good without good exploration too and in bethesda's case that's the staple that they've built their games on and honestly I have to say in Starfield I have a love hate relationship with the exploration on one hand it is really good after you get past the initial hump of not really understanding how it works but on the other hand I do kind of Miss how exploration worked in Fallout and Elder Scrolls let me explain a little bit so in following Elder Scrolls you walk around the world and as you're going certain things happen and different quests pop up and you suddenly are on different Adventures just by walking through the world and experiencing it in Starfield this can happen but it's in a way different way the way you do this in Starfield is by getting quests going to the location and on your path you'll get different side quests and different missions this is cool but it doesn't have the same effect as the Elder Scrolls in Fallout where it felt like I could just venture out in any direction and I knew I would wind up finding something interesting and cool in Starfield if I just venture out to any random planet and land on it 99 of the time it's going to be a Barren Wasteland and there's pluses and minuses to that on one side I really love how it makes you feel so alone and lonely in this universe it really does capture the awe and wonder of space when you land on a giant Moon and just look out into the distance as a massive Sun comes over the horizon and fills the planet with light and you realize that there's no life barely any fauna and that you're just on a huge Rock hurtling through space it's an awesome feeling but it feels a lot less awesome when you start to then run around that rock and realize that anything you do find are going to be randomly generated things like like outposts robotics facilities or caves and while this is cool at first and interesting as you play the game more and more you realize that you're going to be seeing the same things over and over again even within my first five hours of playing I saw the exact same science Outpost with the exact same layout and the exact same enemies and almost all the same weapons and everything and I realized that while it's cool at first the exploration in this game just works so much differently if you want to find the really good stuff in Starfield don't play it like Fallout or Elder Scrolls play it like it's something new play it almost like Mass Effect but the only difference is as you're going on your main quests or your side quests you'll stumble on so many different things most of the cool encounters I had were actually in space when I was traveling from planet to planet and people started shooting at me talking to me or opening up entire quest lines that would last for hours and ended up being really amazing but the core issue is still that the random generation in this game just isn't enough and I actually have to say I think they did it perfectly I think having these random planets with a variety of locations that can spawn any Myriad of different things is exactly how this should be done and I think a system like this could actually be amazing the issue here though is there just isn't enough content when I go into a cave it's cool the first time when I discover some ancient alien skeletons at the bottom and different dead bodies that put together a story that something truly horrific happened in this cave and I don't know what it is but when I find that exact same cave with the exact same bodies skeletons and story on another planet because it randomly generated that breaks my immersion entirely and I want to be clear here the problem isn't the randomly generated planets or content when I first went into that cave it was amazing the issue is there just isn't enough there's so many planets in Starfield and so many different places to go that even though there is a lot of different things that can happen and I did have some awesome moments like one time finding a photographer who's taking some photos and I wasn't sure what was going on it's just not enough when I start seeing the same facilities and same content repeating itself within the first five to ten hours I know there needs to be way more stuff here luckily in my head I know modders will be able to add a bunch of randomly generated content that you could just plug and play into this suite and I think if you had thousands and thousands of different randomly generated things that were all interesting that could occur this system would work fantastically if I could land on a planet and know that I would most likely not be seeing something I've seen before if I just venture out into that cave that would be amazing but as it stands I do not want to land on random planets and explore because I know ninety percent of the time I'm going to be seeing something I've already seen or something that's extremely similar to something I've already seen having said that though the exploration isn't all bad bad because like I said if you focus on the quests and going to the cities especially neon I highly suggest that for anyone who's having trouble with the game early on go to these cities and just listen to the hustle and bustle around town pick up a couple of quests and then start going on these quests have an objective and tackle that objective and on the way you're going to be distracted by really interesting Side Stories and just narrative beats that make you fall in love with this game and give you that same sense of awe and wonder that Bethesda games of old gave you the real big difference here is that in Old Bethesda games like Fallout and Elder Scrolls you could just look out into the distance and walk and find something so interesting in Starfield most of the time that isn't the case you need to have an objective you need to have a quest going on and follow that and it will lead you to some amazing moments and while I wish you could just venture out and find cool things too there's going to need to be a lot more content added to this game to make that action rewarding and by the way I've seen a lot of people talk about how Bethesda should have removed a couple of planets say down to a hundred instead of a thousand that way they could focus on making each planet more interesting but I want to clarify again that's not the issue the issue is that there isn't enough randomly generated content that is unique and interesting to keep it compelling having 1000 planets and tons of places to go in different biomes is part of what makes Starfield so unique and so great the issue is they just don't have enough random content to actually fill in those spots and make it interesting but if they did I can guarantee you without a doubt this would be the best exploration in any Bethesda game ever and that's going to be a theme of this entire review as we keep going through really what frustrates me so much about Starfield is it just has so much potential genuinely I would play this game sometimes and just think in my head I can't believe how amazing the exploration and worlds would be and and just walking around different planets if they just added a couple more things a couple more mechanics and also had more and it's just so frustrating playing this game and being let down so many times when for example you're exploring on a planet and find the exact same thing you've always found when you know that if it was just different you would be having such an amazing time another thing I want to really quickly touch on in the exploration section is I've seen a lot of complaints online about the map of the worlds and specifically also the map of the cities that being there is no map there is no indicators where the shops are there is no indicators where anything is and I understand why this pisses people off but I have to say I actually think this was a great decision by Bethesda when I first got to new Atlantis for example in the game I had no idea where anything was it was super annoying because I just wanted to get some ammo and some Med supplies and I had no idea where the shops were where anyone was or really what to do and in fact I had another story where when I first met my parents in their apartment Suite I eventually had to go back to that apartment Suite but I forgot where it was so I would just went around town for an hour trying to figure out which exact door they were in and while that can be frustrating and annoying I have to say I actually much prefer this for the same reasons I like that Bethesda doesn't have mini maps in their games it forces you to actually feel immersed and live in the world and understand where everything is I can tell you exactly where every single shop is in every city now and even on certain battle Cruisers where I just know I like to sell stuff at and because of that I feel like I'm much more a part of the world it's annoying at first but it really does make the whole experience more immersive one of the best things that Bethesda did for exploration here is the lack of mini-maps the lack of maps and really the lack of UI elements when you're just walking around for example when I played The Witcher 3 I know how annoying it was when I first went into Novi grad and tried to look for all the different shops on the map or when I play MMOs and I'm looking at all the different shops and where they are by the time I finally figured out the layout of the city I no longer find it interesting because the first chance I had to learn about it and really take in all the sights and back alleys that's gone now so I think they actually made the right decision here and even though I know a ton of people won't enjoy it and I'm sure it'll be modded in I do think it makes the game better and it's part of what makes the exploration great so what about that last staple of Bethesda though for me those introductions I'll never forget the first time I came out of the sewers in Oblivion and saw cyrodiil for the first time or in Fallout 3 going through my entire life in the vault and then finally opening the doors to a wasteland like I could never believe Bethesda has always been known for their amazing introductions that are so memeable but also so memorable but here it honestly just sucked I thought the introduction to Starfield was not good at all there was no emotion there was no Stakes there was barely any entry and then you just meet some wacky characters and they randomly give you a ship and suddenly you're being thrust into so many different systems and so many different things so quickly that it really felt like a mess it was only by the time that I got to new Atlantis that the game started to slow down a little bit and I was able to get my bearings and start figuring out some of the systems and enjoying it a little more but you see one of the big issues with Starfield is there's so many systems in this game so many in fact that even 60 hours in I hadn't done a lot of the different systems I didn't know how a lot of different things worked and there's just so much going on in this game and so little meaningful tutorials that it's actually baffling how bad the beginning is when you're first thrown to Starfield what you're met with is all the downsides the endless loading screens the fact that you can't do atmospheric flight from space to ground the fact that the NPCs can act weird the fact that the system sometimes can break it's just a weird and horrible start to the game where really all you see is the bad parts of the game with barely any of the good parts I mean one of the best examples is the first planet they send you to to do a mission is Crete and Crete might be the single ugliest planet in the entirety of Starfield now that I've played the game and seen hundreds of them I haven't seen anything close to as ugly as Crete and I have no idea why this was the first planet they decided to send us to having said that though like I said once you get to New Atlantis and start to slow down and start doing some side quests you really do see The Wonder of this world because for me the biggest issue with Starfield was for the first 20 to even 30 hours I had so many ups and downs I would just walk into a city and be annoyed by how little I knew what was going on but then the next second I would look into the distance as the sun set Over the Horizon and the Rays of light being themselves into different buildings and across the landscape there's so many moments in the beginning of this game that are amazing but also so many moments that just completely take you out of the experience and annoy you like when you realize how many loading screens there are how annoying the flight is at first how annoying it is to figure out where everything is and also on top of this the skills in the game are extremely hardcore when you start this game you can't lock pick you can't use your jetpack you can't pickpocket you can't sneak there's so many different mechanics in this game that just don't work until you level up and put a point into that perk system and not only that but there's even later game mechanics that are vital in other games that I didn't even realize are in Starfield for example I didn't even realize you could unlock sliding as you were running which by the way feels great in combat until I was level 30 which was well over 50 hours into the game and it's for all of these reasons that when you first start playing Star field it can feel extremely bad you barely have any idea what's going on you aren't that interested in the main story or any side content yet all you've seen is the bad traversal mechanics and maybe the worst planet in the entire game and on top of that your character doesn't feel like a level 1 character it feels like a negative 10 character where they can't even do basic RPG mechanics from other games so when this game starts it's really a slow burn but I promise you if you stick with it it does start to get better and it starts to pick up as you get more abilities you start to find the better quests you start to get into faction quests specifically and you get further into the main story and unlock some really cool abilities and it's as you continue to play more and realize the game's strengths that it starts to get a lot better you start to find things that are actually interesting you start to enjoy the exploration once you realize that it isn't quite like Fallout and Elder Scrolls and really everything starts to come together but then again it starts to fall apart because while this game has such a great foundation for something absolutely amazing and is filled to the brim with endless hours of content really truly you'll have to play for 100 to 300 hours to see even a fraction of star field but even with all that there are specific things in this game that really hold it back from being great and it's the same things that frustrate me so much first of all the main thing that really takes me out of Starfield is the writing is very bad funnily enough it's actually much better than Skyrim Fallout 4 or any game bethesda's ever made I think writing has always been their least strong suit and here they improved a ton there is actually some very interesting quests and some decent dialogue lines but for the most part the persuasion and talking and riding in this game is Just unbelievably bad for example the persuasion minigame is amazing but the writing lets it down in game you can persuade different people with different difficulty levels and options and you have to try and fill up a certain bar within a certain amount of turns and if you do you succeed at the persuasion check and if you don't you have to move on by failing there's so many cool intricacies to this systems like context of the actual person you're talking to having an effect different certain dialogue lines having different difficulties and chance playing a role where you can have critical successes where you just instantly win the conversation but the problem is for the most part these conversations are unbelievably badly written for example I had one Quest where I had to go talk to a guard and try to get his key card to get into a secret facility and it literally went down like this I walked up to the guard he said to walk away because I wasn't allowed here and I walked up to him and said hey I'm not going to leave until you give me the key and he said okay you sound annoying here take this and please bring it back now on its own that would be super funny if that was just a one-off quest that would be hilarious to me I would laugh at how stupid and funny that was and it fits well within bethesda's style and humor but the problem is there's so many quests and so many persuasion checks where the writing and dialogue is just unbelievably bad I had multiple times where I was enjoying a quest and especially the ideas and sci-fi behind it but then when I actually got to the meat of the conversations and the people I was interacting with I was pulling my hair out because I couldn't believe how much it was taking me out of an otherwise awesome experience on a planet that looked amazing on a quest that had an awesome idea but then the actual execution was so bad that it kept taking me out of the experience and oftentimes Quest would go from something meaningful and interesting to feeling like I was in a b movie with no budget that just had horrible dialogue and acting and I would start just laughing at how bad it was it goes back to that main theme of Starfield being an amazing game and an amazing base for what could be the greatest game of all time truly but it just Falls flat on so many levels when you have writing this bad especially when you're someone like me that loves games like cyberpunk 2077 and also Baldur's Gate 3 for the riding coming to this it's a culture shock and it's something I cannot get over even though it does have its own charm to it on top of this something else I don't like is the Bethesda zoomed in face conversations I'm okay with the face zooming in and talking a little bit but now that I played games like cyberpunk where you can walk around while the dialogue is happening or Baldur's Gate 3 where it's much more cinematic in the camera angles to me I think there needs to be a mod or update where you allow me to just walk around while the character is talking and look at different things because it gets really tiring just looking in at zoomed in faces that don't look good at all by the way and look last gen and just having to watch as they produce really mediocre dialogue lines that I just want to skip through which by the way is also very hard because it doesn't Auto skip through everything you have to wait a lot for each Skip and this is a problem too when you're in your ship and you're talking to other ships it's so immersion breaking when suddenly Bolger ships completely stop immediately in space and it just Zooms in on the ship as you talk let me just fly around as I'm conversing with different ships in space it would be so much better if I could look out into the vistas and the planets as I'm having a conversation with another ship captain who tells me I should dock right now the other real big offender that takes star field down a notch is for sure the quest design it is baffling how bad some of the quests in this game in terms of their design are it once again goes back to the idea I had so many quests in this game where I loved the setup for example there was one where I had to infiltrate a certain bosses quarters and to do so I applied to be his assistant and then try to get to his computer that way I could approve certain mining regulations from the miners I was talking to to do this though at one point in the quest I actually had to go up to a nearby space station in order to apply to this job so I flew to the space station went through a few loading screens and then I walk up to a kiosk and I start going through this job application and up to this point everything had been great the setup was great the different NPCs seemed interesting and this job application was very funny I did all the funny answers and I enjoyed myself and not only that but later in the quest the NPCs would react to what I chose realistically and make references to things I'd done before all things that Bethesda has never been known for the quests in this game are much better in terms of ideas in terms of choice and consequence in terms of thematics but the issue is the quest design itself is so bad for example in that Quest where I had the job application right after doing the job application I then had to hop in my ship go through more loading screens to go to the old guy who I had previously talked to who then sent me back up to the same star station that I just was at through more loading screens who then sent me back again down to the planet that I was just on Quest design like this is bafflingly bad I remember when I was doing so many quests in Starfield I would literally just sit there and ask myself why do I have to do this why do I have to travel to a planet to talk to an NPC who has two dialogue lines who will then send me straight back to my ship or through a loading screen whichever I choose back to the location I was at I understand why from a lore perspective they do this and it's really interesting and this universe ships have grab drives which can travel very quickly but Communications take longer so it actually makes sense that this is how it works but in practice it just makes the game feel horrible you either need to update the lore that way Communications can go between large distances and that way you can have hologram calls or something like cyberpunk where they show up on the screen or you need to design quests well within the parameters you have don't send me back and forth and back and forth between different planets and space stations just to do one small thing you can send me to new locations or zones but make a quest that actually makes sense within the game mechanics and the rule set you've designed there's so many other issues too like for example the reusion quest line where there's a lot of really interesting Intrigue and talking and also sneaking where it's cool but then when you actually have to talk and persuade someone it falls apart because the dialogue's bad or then when you have to sneak and go through the vents it's really cool at first but then the sneaking doesn't work and it's very buggy and the guards always see you and it's not good steep mechanics and it just doesn't work like I said the base idea for this game and the core mechanics are all there there is sneaking there is persuasion there is traveling wherever you want in the Galaxy but because of the rule set they've designed and how the game works within this game engine you should not be designing quests how you did they just did not handle this well at all and when I think to the writing and Quest design of this game I want to pull my hair out once again because I know how much potential this world and this system has but I get taken out of it so much when I'm on Quest that just aren't working or dialogue that isn't hitting or sneaking around and it just isn't flowing really as I've said over and over the core issue with Starfield is it's the perfect Baseline for the greatest game ever but it just falls apart in so many different ways and this problem with Starfield isn't just the side quests either a lot of the main quests have so many big glaring problems or moments that should have been amazing but just fell so flat that I was baffled at times a great example is the main story in this game is absolutely phenomenal the ending is genius and the idea behind everything is so perfect I can't express this enough the idea of Starfield and what it's trying to do especially in the main quest is quite literally maybe the best idea I've seen for a game especially new game plus maybe ever and also fits perfectly into the themes narratives and just everything in this new Sci-Fi Universe having said that once again because of such bad execution at times things all talk about specifically in the spoilers section here in a moment it just is aggravating to see how much potential Bethesda had on their hands how much of a good idea they had and how flat it falls I will say though that still the main quest is very interesting there's certain things that happen that I won't spoil until later that are fascinating and I'll say while it starts very slow and kind of uninteresting as you're searching for different artifacts and things it slowly grows into a much more fascinating story with interesting backstory and things happening and by the end it does have a very interesting finale another thing though that I really didn't like about the main quest was the companions the companions in this game are so bad I have to be honest I did not like any of them I really try to grow to love some of them they all do have their moments for example Sarah does have some really cool insights and everywhere you bring her andreja can be interesting at times and Barrett did have some funny lines along with Cole and Cora being kind of lovable Duo they were all just so flat it comes back to the writing and Bethesda games the problem I've had with all of their games honestly whether that be Skyrim Fallout or anything they've made I just never feel like the writing is there and these companions are just not it not only are all of them kind of Goody Two-Shoes even the most evil one is not that evil at all and they will judge you for anything you do that isn't the perfect nice guy path but on top of that they just aren't that interesting I never had a connection to any of them I didn't even romance any of them because I didn't care at all and on top of that they just don't feel like they have a lot of Personality or life to them these are some of the least memorable companions in any game I've played and I usually don't mind how good companions are in games all that much either they're really good or I don't care but these ones were bad enough that they actively were kind of taking me out of the game the one thing I will say though that Bethesda did well here is there's a lot of interact ability between your companions and everything in the world if you take your companions on side quests faction Quest and even just walking around random planets and Random Encounters they have a lot of different and interesting things to say about the world what's going on or even just your own actions and I think it was really smart by Bethesda to bring down the amount of companions from some huge cast to just four people that really have most of the talking and dialogue sure you can hire different people for your ships and outposts and different bars and things but really the four constellation crew members are the real Companions of this game and they all fall so flat but at least they do have a lot of dialogue and it goes back again to the same issue of this game it's a great idea having the four companions with a lot of interact ability in the world and they do do it but the execution is so poor that it doesn't work I want to stress this again Starfield at its core is maybe the most impressive game I've ever seen in my life it truly does more than any game I've ever played have the potential to be the Holy Grail the game we've always hoped for but it falls flat on its face over and over and over again whether it be with narrative moments that fall flat companions that just are annoying and not interesting at all dialogue sections that make no sense and seem lazy honestly or just Quest design that is bafflingly bad and I can't imagine anyone play tested and thought this couldn't be done better but at the same moment I do understand because while I'm being hard on this game there are truly some amazing moments I want to stress again how much of a great idea the main quest is how awesome it is landing on a new planet and seeing the Horizon this game is full of so many high highs and so many low lows and that's why I mentioned at the beginning of this review it's so hard for me to know my real opinions because every day I play this game I'm either in love or I'm annoyed by whatever is happening and there's so many ups and downs because the core of this game is truly something magical but they just don't execute well I will say however the one place at Bethesda does actually execute pretty well for the most part is the faction Quest and that makes a lot of sense considering all of the best content from their old games was always from the factions so in Starfield there's four main factions you can join along with some other smaller things as well but the four main ones are reusion Industries the UC CIS death along with Crimson Fleet as well as the Freestar Rangers and each of these factions has a very interesting fun and choice and consequence driven Side Story that is honestly quite awesome personally I think the Crimson Fleet story is amazing it's by far the best thing in the game it has the best writing the best pacing the best lore the most interesting faction the most interesting decisions the most Intrigue the best story to me everything about the Crimson Fleet storyline is exactly what Starfield should have been and if everything else in the game had the quality level of the Crimson Fleet I would be talking about this game as maybe even a masterpiece but alas this is really the only faction Quest I've come upon that was that good otherwise the UC Quest is very interesting and it also has some really great lore I highly recommend if you're playing the game for the first time when you get the UC faction Quest just do the first couple of missions to get some really cool backstory on the world and lore of Starfield and then go do whatever you want and it also has one of the coolest missions in the entire game and the type of missions that we've never seen from Bethesda which again is a testament to how awesome this game is with all the different types of things you can see whether it's horror sneaking fighting flying there's so much to do in this game and it's all usually pretty good but it can also be horrible at times as we've mentioned the Freestar Collective also had a very interesting Mission I liked it was very old western style and you got a really interesting reward at the end that I won't spoil and then on top of that reusion Industries was a great idea with a lot of different Intrigue and a ton of choice and consequence but once again it fell flat because of the sneaking mechanic not being perfect but I have to say as a lover of immersive Sims reusion industry was right up my alley but once again the execution fell from what could have been so perfect on top of this the combat in game is pretty good I think it's a big Improvement upon Fallout 4 but this definitely isn't a Destiny or a valorant type experience the shooting feels pretty decent especially when you can increase your fov on PC and on top of that there's a lot of different ways to tackle situations and once you start upgrading a lot more with sliding your jet pack sneaking around pickpocketing there's just a lot of options and it all feels very fun it feels meaty when you shoot someone and there's a lot of ragdolling going on and also glitches here and there that are very funny I will say though the AI in this game is absolutely horrible as well oftentimes enemies will simply stand there and not shoot me the run back for no reason and then stand still they'll throw grenades at themselves for no reason and while there is some more AI routines that are interesting like I said when they run away or when an enemy gets down and starts screaming and crawling away from you there's some cool moments but the AI is just bad and this is another example of how the game could be amazing but it falls flat because while the combat has been improved while the shooting feels better while there's so many ways to tackle every situation and so many different gadgets you can use for combat and it all feels good the issue is when your AI is this brain dead especially on higher difficulties it just makes it not really fun it feels like I'm just shooting bullet sponges that can't have a fight back and I can easily cheese the AI in every fight to the point where I stop thinking about the combat and thus I get a lot less interested another perfect example of how this game could be great but it's let down by certain mechanics and choices or just game systems that aren't quite working to the level they should and or order to actually make it amazing the one place where I actually think the combat is pretty much perfect and this surprised me is actually the ship combat I absolutely adored getting into dog fights in space building up my ship adding new lasers and weapons along with new cargo and different styles of holds everything to do around ships in this game is absolutely fantastic and if everything else was up to the level of the ship building and dog fighting this game would be a masterpiece there were times where I was in dogfights with three other ships as I was flying through an asteroid field and it genuinely felt epic turning around and trying to chase these guys down while firing missiles and all these new upgrades that I put on my ship and it was just so satisfying and I can't express how much I love the ship combat and really just flying the ship around even just moving through space felt amazing when you would turn on the thrusters and hear the creek of your engines as you're going through space and the Silence of it it truly is is amazing and also some of the best moments in terms of Randomness and Random Encounters are when you're flying through space and really my biggest surprise for this game was actually probably how much I love space combat and designing my ship and everything to do around my mobile base of sorts because going in I thought that would be something I wouldn't be that interested in and I would fall off really quickly and I also know a lot of the leaks from years ago talked about how bad the Starship combat was and how it didn't feel good but I can say without a doubt especially if you're upgrading and putting perks into your Starship in your upgrade system you feel so powerful so amazing and every ship you build and every design you do feels way different really interesting and they all have their own ups and downs and a system that's honestly quite complex as well with many things to learn and master and overall shipbuilding and ship combat in this game is probably the Highlight in terms of Polish and just systems coming together and really really working well Bethesda knocked it out of the park with this but again when the game does all come together it truly is unparalleled I'm telling you there are certain times I landed on planets when the Mist was covering a certain asteroid and the sun was coming up over the side as I saw a pack of animals in the distance chasing each other down where I just realized just how awesome this game can be and I would get swept up in the moment or other times where I would go on quests that actually did have really cool moments like one time I met an AI on board a Starship that had been abandoned and tried to piece together what had happened here and if the AI was actually sentient and it had so many twists and turns and the decision I made in that Quest ended up having ramifications on my playthrough 30 hours later there's so many things here Bethesda is doing better than they've ever done before things like actual choice and consequence and missions having an infinite World it feels like to explore and get lost stand a huge variety of biomes and places to go ideas that are so amazing and a base sci-fi world that can be built upon so much with really interesting lore and just an awesome World in cities to get lost in there's a lot of architecture in this game for example that's amazing it reminds me of cyberpunk 2077 when you go to things like neon and then you can go to other just small outposts on a moon that look absolutely vibrant and teeming with just love and care put in by the world designers at Bethesda there are times where this game Just Hits on all cylinders and that's why you can probably tell I have a love for it I have a passion for it because there is so much that's great about this game but again the sad part is so many times you see the greatness you can see just how good it could be you realize that even with all the loading screens and lack of ability to fly from space down to a planet seamlessly it still could have been amazing but it's let down by so many things like the writing the quest design and just weird decisions that don't quite work or systems like sneaking that are so broken that it just ruins what otherwise would have been amazing experiences I can't stress enough and I'll say it again this truly is more than any game I've ever played the Holy Grail this game shows me that someone could make the game I've always dreamed of you know when I play things like Star Citizen or no man's Sky they're cool but you realize they're so shallow as you play more and more but with Starfield it has so much love it has so much care it has all the systems it needs to be the ultimate game that so many of us dream of whether that's building our own ship building our own town which I barely got into because this game is so massive and then flying into the Stars discovering what's out there and just going on an adventure this is the first game I've played in my life that actually really hits that goal and makes me feel like I'm playing that game but it constantly lets me down with things that other Studios do so well like Immaculate writing awesome Quest design and just things we see from other Studios like Rockstar CD project red or Larry and nowadays it's hard because I love Starfield for what it is and what's trying to do but at many times it feels like Bethesda almost bit off more than they could chew and because of that they couldn't perfect everything in the game and because of that everything is brought down because of it I will say though the one thing I'm really excited for is mods because also more than any game I've ever played this game feels like it is ripe for modding I would not be surprised if this becomes the most modded game of all time just because of the potential and the systems at play here and if modders could fix some of the things I'm talking about here along with adding more randomly generated content more interesting side quests and things to do this this game could grow and flourish into something truly amazing and one day maybe during a star field too we could even get the other things we're asking for like less loading screens and seamless space travel but once again there's a core to this game that can be built upon and improved in so many ways and once the creation kit drops and modders really start get going I'm going to be so interested to come back to this video years from now and see if this game can live up to the dreams and ideas I'm having for it with modding so now let's jump into the spoiler section of this video which by the way if you guys don't want spoilers or haven't beaten Starfield yet I highly recommend you come back to this after you have because there's going to be some big spoilers here that will ruin a lot of moments so first off let's talk about the ending because I absolutely love the idea here but I'm a little disappointed on the execution so for anyone that's beat start field you know that at the end you reach What's called the unity which is a basically at the center of the Multiverse where you meet with some sort of being or yourself and they talk about how you can move on to another universe and leave the one that you're in behind so personally I chose to do that and I think it's such a great idea for New Game Plus being you lose all the stuff you had in a previous universe but with you you bring your knowledge that being your perks and your attributes and I think it's such a perfect idea for New Game Plus on paper it's amazing and truly the entire ending of Starfield was pretty awesome with the lights and feeling like you're at the center of the Galaxy it had a huge build up and what seemingly was a big payoff but see again this is where Starfield drops the ball on execution so when I first beat this game and went into New Game Plus which was a whole new dimension a whole new universe I was expecting to land down and there to be new planets newly generated creatures and all new characters but to my dismay when I got to new Atlantis it was the exact same story with the exact same characters with the exact same looking City the NPCs were the same type of outfits had the same haircuts and when I got to the lodge lo and behold it was the same cast of characters but this time I had the option to skip the campaign in a cool ship in spacesuit I can't tell you how big of a disappointment that was and while as I've played more and more of new game plus I've realized that there is some really awesome moments where you can now as a starborn have new dialogue options that completely change things like when I went to meet my parents again and told them of this weird Adventure I went on that I couldn't quite explain and there was some new dialogue and new interactions and that was awesome because well I'm me in a new universe but then you start to realize that so much is the same in certain moments where I felt like I should have had a dialogue option now that I was a starborn I didn't and in other dialogue options I did have it didn't change very much and I really just wish Bethesda had actually put in all of their effort into ideas like this imagine if after New Game Plus and when you were in a new universe when you touchdown on new Atlantis a lot of the colors were different instead of Terror Brew it could be a new type of coffee shop the NPCs could wear different types of clothing and when you got to the lodge maybe for example Sarah could have a different hair color and different eye color how cool would that be even just small changes things that wouldn't break the game and would essentially keep the story and everything intact but small changes that would really feel like you're in a new universe and not only that but it's such a huge missed opportunity to completely reinvent the Universe imagine if the random number generators on all of the planets and all the different things that can happen completely changed every time you went into a new Universe imagine if there was a thousand different random things that could happen and in each Universe there was a hundred so every time you switched you felt like you were having a completely new playthrough how awesome would that be it's once again another example where Bethesda just didn't go all out on an idea that was awesome it's the story of this game amazing on principle in theory the best game ever made but in execution it falls so flat and it's so frustrating to me because I love the idea and I genuinely don't know if any game has had something as potentially interesting as this even near automata and many other games with amazing endings don't come close to the potential this game has but once again the execution isn't there and I will say after doing New Game Plus more and more times there was some interesting changes for example when I went through for the third time I actually came back to the lodge and someone else was there that being Cora all grown up and people surrounding her with guns and it kind of changed the story while keeping it intact stuff like that is mind-blowing and amazing and when that happened I was blown away at how much fun I was having with the game but then you come back down to earth and realize that all Bethesda did do some cool changes and there are changes even on more new game pluses and some slight things in New quests or new encounters at the end of the day they didn't go all out they had a cool idea and a cool system but they didn't go all out and it ruins what could have otherwise been an absolutely 10 out of 10 Masterpiece experience and ending that would have lasted with everyone forever and the reason it bothers me so much and the reason I get so passionate about this is because it's such a good idea this game has so much to offer this game has so many things that could make it great so every time it falls flat it's just annoying to me because I can't believe how much better it could have been another example of a moment that just should have been so much better was midway through the main story too when you first encountered the starborn it was genuinely jarring how bad this moment was we had all this build up of finding the artifacts and trying to figure out what was out there and all these different questions of what it really was and then the moment of the reveal when it finally happens was astoundingly mundane and uninteresting instead of there being a build up where a ship slowly approached you and on your intercom a weird static came up and different colors and sounds started to fill your vision and your cockpit as you were sucked into something and something happened instead you simply ended a mission came out of the planet and suddenly there was a ship in front of you that told you everything it was genuinely astounding how bad this moment was and it's the perfect example of an amazing idea and a good build up that then just has the worst payoff of all time where it completely made me uninterested and the story suddenly because while I was having fun thinking about the discoveries and Mysteries before the reveal was so bad that I suddenly didn't like it anymore or what about when you visit NASA in the main quest it's a really cool Mission and it does have some good parts but it could have been so much better imagine if there was even more logs and Mysteries that you could find in secret rooms with more open areas and spaceships to explore and really dig into the history of NASA and secret projects outside of the one we were looking into that would have been such an amazing moment but instead it was just a good quest with an awesome reveal and some good moments but it didn't live up to the potential that it could have which once again is the story of this game in a nutshell if I had to say anything it feels like Starfield is a thousand miles wide but only a hundred miles deep it does have some depth to it with choice and consequence and missions that later affect other missions well down the line really intricate and awesome ship and environment building and just so many different systems and things that interact with each other in cool ways the game is awesome it's fun as hell it's the reason I keep going back to it this is one of the most addicting games I've played in a long time and I do overall really enjoy it but it just feels like it needed more depth it really does feel like if they made a star field 2 and just improved on everything that I'm talking about here it would be the perfect game it would have the depth along with the breath that it already has and it's so frustrating and disappointing not because I hate the game or I don't like it but because I love this game I love it so much I love exploring the planets I love the world on offer here the lore and the interesting history the absolutely mind-blowingly awesome ending that wall cliche in terms of things like Marvel and other places with multiverses nowadays is so perfect for the video game medium and the story it's telling but it just Falls flat in that depth and that meaning in the writing and the quest design and the core of what makes art beautiful in so many ways and yet still at the end of this review I think for me Starfield is my favorite Bethesda game ever and now keep in mind I've never been a huge fan of Bethesda I love their games and their world and I I watch many videos on them but at the end of the day I've never been a super fan I play a couple hours and do a couple quests and usually fall off but for the first time Starfield has utterly enraptured me and my soul and it hurts me every time something occurs that I know could be so much better because otherwise I enjoy the game so much and I know just how amazing it could be I'm excited for Elder Scrolls 6 and Fallout 5 and I can't wait to see what these games become and I for sure will be playing many hours in them too but without a doubt what I really want from Bethesda now is Starfield 2. updates to Starfield as it is currently and making this game everything it could be because at the soul and heart is something really special here something that for many like me is the Holy Grail of games the game we've always dreamed of a space exploration Adventure where you can go out into the stars and become whoever you want to be and do whatever you want to do with deep characters Immaculate writing and a story that lives on forever in our hearts and Starfield is so close to getting there but it falls flat in so many ways that at the seams many times the entire package falls apart but at the core is something truly special a game I still love right now and enjoy playing but one that I'm frustrated by how many things need to be improved and are honestly unacceptable in many ways your writing can't be this bad you need to improve Bethesda side quests need to meet the quality that we see in other products because if you can do that if you can put the love and effort into every system that this game requires it would be an utter Masterpiece and I really mean that but as it stands it's just a good game it's a fun game I enjoy playing but it's absolutely littered with flaws and over time we will see how many get fixed maybe with mods and DLCs a lot of things will change and it will only get better and better I imagine it will but as it stands star field is a beautiful but flawed game one that I will play for a long long time from now especially with mods and enjoy many years into the future I think this is a game that will be talked about for some time but truly I think there's so much potential that wasn't reached here too and it's frustrating because of how good the game otherwise is the biggest compliment I can give this game is that while I don't think it's perfect it's not a masterpiece it's not the best RPG of all time like Baldur's Gate 3 or one of the most moving experiences I've ever had in art like cyberpunk 2077 but this game does have a heart to it something special a magic Bethesda magic that if captured and fully realized could be utterly amazing and the reason I'm so passionate about this game and I wanted to talk about it is because I think it's important I think this game truly could be something amazing and this studio could be onto something that would change games forever but they didn't hit the mark they bit off more than they could chew and they didn't go fully into every system they could have it felt like at so many turns instead of going 10 out of 10 on effort and desire and will they went 5 out of 10 on this system an 8 out of 10 on this one and six out of 10 on this one but if every system got the love and care it really deserved this game would be Beyond special and as it stands it's still very special and I very much enjoyed my time with the game I know I was negative on it for a lot of reasons but it's because I love it I love this game there are a bunch of awesome moments and quests and just awe-inspiring Vistas and Views but it's just bogged down over and over again as you play to the point where I was really frustrated and annoyed but let me know what you guys think down below of this review and if you like the more low-key kind of just me talking off the cuff ideas and discussions I had a great time doing this and I hope you guys did as well and if you want to support me always feel free to check out the membership program down below or my Gog affiliate link it really does help me pay now for the people I'm doing with editing as well as thumbnails and content creation ideas and things like that so thank you guys so much I really do appreciate it and I hope you all have a fantastic time and let me know down below what do you guys think of Starfield

Channel: FranklyGaming

Views: 10,162

Keywords: starfield, starfield review, starfield gameplay, starfield amazing, starfield bad, bethesda, xbox, gaming

Id: cD43PhpmQqs

Length: 56min 33sec (3393 seconds)

Published: Thu Sep 07 2023