Kind of interesting that the vast majority of negative/mixed reviews are regarding gameplay/story rather than complaining about major bugs (although jank has been noted in a few, and I’d honestly be a bit disappointed if there wasn’t any).
We’ll have to wait until release (Cyberpunk’s bugs weren’t that prominent in reviews either), but I really hope this “lol Bugthesda” meme can die.
Regardless of how buggy it is, I expect Dunkey to somehow break it as soon as he boots it up, which should be entertaining.
Skyrim for PS3 is in an unacceptable state to this day. The longer you play a save the worse the performance gets. My cousin finished the game at like 5 fps.
Fallout Nee Vegas has crash on startup issues day one on PC. Lots of folks couldn’t play it and I believe an unofficial patch came faster than an official.
Watching a few people play it on stream, they didn’t come across any bugs but the AI was making really silly choices still. Like Rushing a gunner with a melee weapon from far away. It’s essentially still the “Gary” AI. From everything I’ve seen, it’s going to be Fallout but you can drive the alien crashed spaceship to another planet.
As much as I love them, I’m about to be a hypocrite and say I don’t know if Bethesda will ever have non-janky AI. It’s the one thing that’s been fairly consistent over a very long time now.
Whether it’s enemies or your followers, or just pathfinding weirdness with NPCs, it’s like their AI is just kind of… there sometimes. If had a conspiracy theory about it, I’d say they’re doing it on purpose to get you to explore the world by finding your missing followers (of which I’m sure we’ll see many get stuck on different planets entirely now).
I mean it wasn't a meme. Bethesda games are buggy on release. The PS3 edition of Skyrim was notoriously not fit for release, I honestly do not think that level of bugs would ever have been tolerated nowawdays. It's also something that Microsoft's QA team really ought to be credited for because it seems they are the reason this game stands out amongst Bethesda releases in recent years.
That said imma wait till a few days afterwards just in case. And the story getting bad reviews is not unsurprising as Bethesda has not really had a good one since Morrowind, or maybe Point Lookout in F3.
You are right, but I just get tired of it sometimes as a “predictor” or that they should be lauded for not releasing something that falls apart at release.
Bethesda have a reputation for a reason, but the lack of QA (or at least publishers willing to listen to QA) in a lot of modern gaming has made some of Bethesda’s previous issues seem almost normal.
I guess that’s more an indictment of modern gaming than really a defense of Bethesda, lol. And for all the shit they get about “modders fixing their games”, they were the ones who actually went and fixed a lot of FO76’s issues after that launch disaster.
Either way, regarding the story… Yeah. I find that oftentimes the side quests (particularly faction quests or the FO4 follower quests) tend to be way more interesting than the main quest in some of their games.
The lolbugthesda meme exists because it’s true. There aren’t many games I’ve had to completely start over because of a game breaking glitch in a side quest, but that was Skyrim and the infamous thieves guild glitch.
They’re good games but pretending there are no bugs, either funny cosmetic ones or serious progress blocking ones, helps no one.
Sure. I don’t think I was pretending there weren’t any bugs. I think it’s more the dismissive approach toward their games before release that gets a bit tiring, even if it is often warranted in some respects.
Creation Engine is buggy as fuck, and I’ll always expect their games to have a fair amount of jank at the very least. Even Obsidian had troubles with it (though some of those bugs could also be attributed to lack of time and testing).
But I hope that if this does prove to be have better release than their others (admittedly, it can be a low bar), that it sticks.
I played from 5 pm yesterday at release until 5 am today, and I literally encountered one single bug, which was that I managed to get a big enemy’s pathing hung up on a rock, so I could kill it.
Im near the end of BG3, and “stuck”: I’m just unwilling to end it. Happens often with RPGs for me. So a good time to take a break and play something else.
I bounce around between games a lot, so I was never going to be done before anything else came out, but they should definitely scratch different itches, also. They might both be big RPGs, but I fully expect to be able to play Starfield with stuff in the background and there's just too much narrative to do that with BG3. I also just itch for more actiony stuff at times (right now that's a 2D pixel art game called Chasm). Even if I drop 20 hours in a game before switching to the next one, one game isn't going to actually be the only one I play for that long, personally.
Yeah I feel this too with games that really hit me. You get so invested in your character and your playthrough that you don’t want to let go of your save, so instead of committing down the last stretch of main quest you maybe boot it up, scrounge out a fight somewhere or do some small remaining side quest, then run around town mindlessly a bit and shut down the game.
I had that happen with Cyberpunk earlier this year and I’m feeling it starting to set in with BG3. The allure of a second playthrough is stronger here, though, so that might help me stay the course.
"Once we head out, you won’t be able to return to your hometown for a while. Are you ready to leave?"
Yes
No
So many moments like this in RPGs that make it hard to leave just by saying that. I get so sad and I have to walk around saying goodbye to everyone in the whole area before I depart.
I’m in the last act and nearing the big bads… But bugs are getting more frequent. One of them allowed me to traverse the entire foundry without starting a fight. One bug wouldn’t let me remove one of the party members from my group after they got knocked unconscious and I couldn’t help them up.
So it’s been a slog of frequent saves and reloads. Still enjoying the game, though. And can’t wait to start a 2nd playthrough.
Patch 2 came out yesterday and was supposed to address some Act 3 issues. Have you played since then? I’ve also noticed some bugs in Act 3 but nothing gamebreaking thankfully.
Rock, Paper, Shotgun - Edwin Evans-Thirlwell - Unscored
A short, sparky and colourful 2D PICO-8 blaster about a space captain fighting fascist robots.
This one is a parody/joke about someone who put a game on itch titled Starfield. Kind of shitty for RPS to allow. Especially since it’s directly connected on OpenCritic to Starfield the Bethesda game.
It’d be extremely unethical to score it. It’s still pretty bad to have added it to the 2023 Starfield opencritic page. A few reviewers no longer score their reviews because score in general is not a great way to recommend something. A blurb on recommendation is ideal. Like “If you are okay with X, Y, Z and are a fan of the genre then you might like Starfield.” Unscored reviews are becoming more common because of that.
Eh, it’s more that fun should be restricted to your own website. Not an aggregator website meant to show facts at a glance. Thus you are potentially ruining the factual glance.
The best review, as always, is to watch the first 20 minutes of gameplay to gauge whether you like it. I’m optimistic, and more than a little surprised at only a singular mention of glitches from a game developed by Bugthesda.
Seems like roughly Skyrim/Fallout in space. Even though I’d have wanted something different, I can’t say I’m not a sucker for their formula so I’ll just wait for a sale and have a blast with mods.
I wouldn’t call it scary. One of the creatures is a mimic and turns into the props that surround it, like a cup or a plate, or radio or cone (for example) and when you get near it, it lashes out at you. So there’s some startling moments, but it’s not a horror game by any means. There is tension, due to the subject matter and setting, but the intent isn’t to be scary.
Ok thank you, that’s what I’m not into. :p Also, I have enough stuff in my backlog to wait for Starfield to have 1K mods and be at 50% off with all DLC :p
I’ll just be playing it on Game Pass and then probably buy it when it goes on sale on Steam in a few months. Probably Winter Holiday sale or whatever.
By that time, maybe the Creation Kit will be released (though, that’s more likely to be next year) as well, which makes for much more in-depth mods. Also any script extenders (which will very likely only work on the Steam version) and unofficial patches should be a bit more stable early next year.
Until then, I don’t really need it on Steam.
I keep forgetting to preload, though, which I should do when I get a chance, just to get the initial ~120 GB out of the way.
I’ve downloaded it on two devices already. It’s on the Starfield - Standard Edition page, not the premium edition one. The usual play button will say “Pre-load install”.
exploration in the game is unfortunately weak in many aspects; This is due to the large reliance on procedural generation of environments. Also, the role-playing elements do not have a strong presence or impact.
I was really hoping proc-gen would be just for the terrain and surrounding areas and the interesting setpieces would be as handcrafted (or as close as possible) to a regular TES/Fallout experience. I guess they had to trade in a lot of these to make the big universe happen though...
That’s how they described it, too. Oh Todd you done it again!
Looks like there’s not much to do on the planets. One review even said the classic “get lost on the way and end up doing ten other things” just doesn’t happen in this game anywhere. It can happen in a city, but then they also said the cities are pretty meh.
I really hope I’m wrong about this in five years, but it looks like No Man’s Sky did even more damage to the space sim genre than we thought. We’re in a year with great handcrafted experiences that still feel vast: Tears of the Kingdom, Baldur’s Gate 3, even Everspace 2 in a similar setting (and Everspace 2 wouldn’t have had the same, fatal loading screen issue if it was a AAA game). Starfield went the other direction.
By chasing the procedural generation dream, from everything I’ve seen, Bethesda really hamstrung the space exploration to get there. Fortunately I really like the old Bethesda formula, so hopefully the Skyrim/Fallout experience that’s still there will be enough for me to want to put hundreds of hours into it. I’m just hoping developers don’t keep trying to do this for games in space settings.
It sounds like No Man’s Sky. You’re supposed to be able to explore the whole galaxy and see many creatures, environments, etc but they all end up being the same so exploration is boring, at least to me it was
I felt similarly. Exploring is just another thing to "do" to get credits/nanites. It was cool to see genuinely new things like the huge Dune-styled worms but once you see one you've seen them all.
That extends to base building too. I have no reason to build a base anywhere else in the galaxy once I have a capital ship that does all my crafting for me. Except resource collecting, I guess. But meh, different strokes for different folks. I don't think there's been a non-MMO continually-updated game that I've come back to as often as NMS but coming back is usually pretty short-lived.
This is the core issue with all procgen games, IMO.
You are promised "infinite exploration", but in truth there are countable variants of the procgen algorithm. Once you see all those variants, you've effectively seen everything. Sure, you'll see small variations, or new ways to combine the existing variants... but when you see all the "tricks" the veil falls.
variants of the procgen algorithm. Once you see all those variants, you’ve effectively seen everything. Sure, you’ll see small variations, or new ways to combine the existing variants… but when you see all the “tricks” the veil falls.
That’s what makes this even more of an issue. The game isn’t procedural. They used procedural tooling but everything is set in stone now. They could’ve gone through and cleaned up and tweaked everything so it didn’t feel bland. Doesn’t sound like they did.
I knew the writing/rpg aspect was going to be shallow like all of Bethesda games but, they always had fun exploration so this is unfortunate to me. It sounds like they reuse assets a lot, even in the main quest line. Like same buildings with the same enemy placement just on a different planet.
It's definitely a Bethesda game. Their dialogue choices and roleplaying has always been shit. People like Bethesda games primarily because they're given a large open world to explore. But they made most of this one procedurally generated so they've lost their main good quality. I really hope the players are pushed by the stories and side quests to the hand-crafted worlds and the procedurally generated are mostly in the background for players that want to go off the beaten path.
Edit: I just read one that played 70+ hours and even two characters. I was afraid these people were rushing through the game to get reviews out but glad to see that isn’t the case.
I’m curious of they have managed to make the camera feel better in this game versus Fallout or Skyrim when using a controller.
I realize that’s somewhat a vague statement, but I’m not sure how to describe it other than to say the that moving the camera up/down/left/right always felt very linear and it was hard to do precise movements. Like if you try to barely adjust your aim you might overshoot your target. As a comparison, Destiny feels really great to move and jump and aim. And many other games have figured this out. But Bethesda games have always felt very jerky. And, yes, it’s more RPG focused, but that doesn’t mean they also can’t feel good.
Edit: Also, as an aside I want to say I appreciate these big review posts that show up here. I enjoyed those on Reddit so keep it up!
Edit 2: at least in this Digital Foundry video, it’s very briefly mentioned that the combat “feels great” so perhaps they fixed it.
I focused a lot on my social skills because, much like Fallout before it, Starfield isn’t the most adept shooter. It may look like one, with a huge range of weapons to collect and the ability to play from a first-person perspective, but this is not Destiny. Aiming feels wonky, and oftentimes, shots that seem to hit an enemy point blank will fail to register. It’d be nice if Starfield had the equivalent of the VATS system from Fallout, giving it pseudo-turn-based combat, but instead, it’s just a passable shooter attached to a very ambitious RPG. That might be the reason I spent so many skill points on my persuasion abilities.
Pretty excited to get my hands on this game 5 days later! Reviews are surprisingly more split than I expected, with some calling it an easy 10/10 while others call it shallow. The general impressions are: If you like Fallout, you’ll love this game. I like Fallout, so I’m in.
By the way, IGN gave this game a 7/10, which is a new one for them because they hand out 9/10s like candy.
Pretty excited to get my hands on this game 5 days later! Reviews are surprisingly more split than I expected, with some calling it an easy 10/10 while others call it shallow. The general impressions are: If you like Fallout, you’ll love this game. I like Fallout, so I’m in.
By the way, IGN gave this game a 7/10, which is a new one for them because they hand out 9/10s like candy.
This game is on my to buy list, but probably in a few years when they have ironed out all the issues and dropped the DLC in a GOTY or whatever edition they make later.
Console is downscaled and 30fps and one guy on pc had 45-70fps 1440p high settings using a 3600x/2080ti. But yeah, more performance info should pop up soon :)
I'm thinking Steam Deck. Or wait for the Switch 2 and expect a port to that (Microsoft seems to have no problem putting exclusives on Nintendo platforms, c.f. Ori)
I kind of enjoyed fallout but it did feel very shallow for an RPG. I’m hoping this one does a bit better in that regard but I’m trying to temper my expectations.
Fallout had a lot of clever environmental storytelling, vignettes in random buildings, drama happening via terminal logs throughout abandoned factories, etc.
I hope that Starfield hasn’t gotten rid of that aspect of their world building.
I think many ambitious games recently get divisive ratings. I remember many cyberpunk 2077 reviews rated it highly praising the (imo excellent) highs while minimizing the lows before many reviewers bashed it for the bugs and incomplete scope. When these reviews come out it almost feels like the reviewers are scared to be the first to open the “hey it’s bad” floodgates
The easiest way to figure out where a game is writing its saves is to load it up in Sandboxie and save your game, then check sandboxie’s box content to see what got updated or saved and where.
Also, Cyberpunk is on GOG (because it’s made by the people who run GOG), there’s no need to get it through DODI unless you have a severely restricted internet connection and therefore desperately need the smaller size of a repack - you can get the clean gog installer from gog-games. You should just be able to install the latest GOG version over the old version with no difficulty.
Yes, I was planning to download the new version from gog games. But when I installed the game I didn’t think about gog games at all, when searching for games I often go directly to DODI.
Could you explain this Sandboxie method? I don’t understand, what do I have to upload?
Sandboxie is a sandboxing app. It’s main purpose is to isolate an app from your PC, mainly used to run suspicious apps. It can track what the isolated app does.
It’s rather complicated, so it’s easier to find the game here, or as what I do, use Everything and sort by recently modified files so I can check what files are just written.
I can also recommend Everything (1.5a) as it’s the only tool I know of where I can search not only for file names, but also for the contents of pdfs, docx, etc on every drive, including network drives.
You can also check out Process Monitor which is a freeware tool from Microsoft. So basically what you would do is: open process monitor, make a new game save and then process monitor will show you where this save file is located.
This actually worked, thank you. I’ve located the save files now. Now what, I copy it and (in case the reinstallation of the game deletes those files) just paste it?
Yes, backup save and config files, and restore them in case of the reinstallation, but generally games rarely delete them when you uninstall them. This approach works almost with every game.
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