Starfield design director calls out unfair game criticism: 'Don't fool yourself into thinking you know why it is the way it is'
...He's not wrong, but it's not really a relevant argument? This is something you bring up when people are attacking a specific staff member, not when the vast majority of the comments are "the game feels empty and dull"
...You know, I just recently watched a video on the development of Thief 4
, and I wouldn't be surprised if something similar to what happened there happened here— Frequent changes in leadership resulting in the game's identity getting sanded down, but also causing the staff to really bond together out of stress
Well we know Starfield's leadership hasnt left the company before Starfield came out. Pete Hines announced his retirement recently after the game came out. The director was Todd, who is still there. The Designer is Emil Pagliarulo, who is still there.
We're not dealing with a Bioware / Blizzard situation here.
Just because it could have happened doesn't mean it did.
And frankly crunch is ubiquitous in the game industry, that doesn't explain why Starfield is mediocre. The problem isn't that it's a poor quality product that was made through bad means, it's that the design vision behind it was fundamentally bad and demonstrated a fundamental misunderstanding of what made Bethesda's games loved to begin with.
Edited by Fourthspartan56 on Dec 19th 2023 at 3:08:59 AM
"Einstein would turn over in his grave. Not only does God play dice, the dice are loaded." -Chairman Sheng-Ji YangXbox Era rumor: actually coming to Playstation 5 in the future.
Still no sign of the mod Creation Kit for Starfield nor the promises of randomly generated towns/cities. And while this video is far from an absolute authority given the anonymity of the individual game developers polled, it seems like the Creation Engine is the biggest culprit for Starfield's gameplay failings. It's less that it's no longer up to the task anymore, but rather that it's best used for small setpieces and environments, where the Creation Engine's emphasis on simulating everything in the environment becomes it's greatest strength - something that Starfield notably lacked, with only a handful of repetitive objects being interactive, and everything else being impossible to move or alter in any way. Also, supporting not just one, but multiple open worlds to such a level of interaction standard for a Bethesda game is simply too much for it to handle efficiently.
Now, for the story, on the other hand...? Yeah, that's entirely Bethesda's fault.
Their own storyboard writers and level designers outright admitted they had to cram for the ending since while they had a concept on paper, everybody had more or less forgot to actually design and build it.
Honestly they are talking mostly about the final level, not the game's actual ending or plot. And Bethesda games never tend to have great final levels.
Morrowind's another cave dungeon where to go hit a rock with two weapons in a specific sequence. There's also technically the final boss there but he's prone to falling off a ledge.
Oblivion has you walk to a building so an NPC can defeat the final boss in a cutscene.
Skyrim is more cinematic, but also has 3 NPCs who will literally pound the final boss to dust for you so you barely need to get involved.
To Starfield's very little credit, at least the final level has some cool bits, like fighting all the copies of yourself? Like, it's not a great final level, it's another space quarry fighting more generic starborn but Bethesda's done far worse for a final level.
Game added paid mods, and is getting review bombed
The issue is that many already felt Starfield was lack luster, and Bethesda's glacial update pace didn't help. The latest patch adds a mission for free, but the follow up to that mission is locked behind a paid mod. And in fact several missions are apparently each to be purchased individually.
There's a rover that's in the game now, a really good escape room creation AND Shattered Space coming this month.
youtube.com/Fire Trainer 92I'm casually optimistic about Shattered Space. All signs suggest Bethesda took players' feedback seriosly. And their DL Cs always have been good.
F4's DLC was very hit and miss IMHO.
It's def going to be a wait and see thing for me. Not only to see how much content there is but also how much it addresses my issues with the game.
I heavily expect stuff like the godawful perk system full of Double Unlocks and the fact that there's like, 3 type of energy weapons to the like two dozen types of bullet gun to go unfixed.
Or how Melee is basically unusable like they forgot to implement it half way through.
Edited by Ghilz on Sep 13th 2024 at 11:35:25 AM
A Deep dive on Shattered Space.
A) The entire plot takes place on a single planet. You can leave and return but the plot never sends you offworld. The Planet is the House Varruun homeworld.
B) The planet is not procedurally generated like those of the base game.
C) House Varruun tore a hole in space time on their planet. You arrive a few weeks after this happened.
D) Spacers and Crimson Fleet are on the planet too.
E) There's more focus on melee. (I wonder if Anti-Gravity still makes all melee enemy defenseless lol. I bet that's not been changed)
Edited by Ghilz on Sep 16th 2024 at 2:40:18 PM
Shattered Space is out.
General user reviews on Steam are Mixed. The general vibe I've seen from both users and critics is that while it is more engaging and interesting that base game, for 30$ the DLC offers very little. About 10 hours of content including sidequests and exploration detours. There's some new armor and weapons, but a fairly limited amount and apparently they get outperformed by stuff you find in the vanilla game. It also apparently doesn't bring in any new mechanics. No improvement to the game's terrible melee, no new skills, no new abilities.
So much about Shattered Space being the shot in the arm Starfield needed.
Edited by Ghilz on Oct 2nd 2024 at 8:41:26 AM

To be fair, I don't think he's wrong. The article's title is kinda manipulative as is fishing for a reaction. The guy's main point is you can't know why something is the way it is in a game by looking at the finished product. Which is 100% true.
Edited by Ghilz on Dec 17th 2023 at 5:34:19 AM