I love Bethesda, but putting TES6 on the back burner to make Starfield for eight years was an idiotic decision. They also took the wrong lesson from Skyrim, believing that streamlining the game through stripping of features was the reason for its success. They’ve done this same with each successive game since, and each has been more poorly received than the last. Go back to your roots and make a good, deep Elder Scrolls game. Continue to leave the shitty +5 modifier leveling system out, but at the very least restore attributes and birthsigns. Restore spellmaking. STOP FUCKING IT UP. You’re on your last strike here and I don’t have a lot of faith that you’re going to make the right call.
New IP would have been fine if they didn’t drag Gamebryo’s corpse into it, as well as the worst part of Fallout 4’s perks, “+5% pistol damage at night” and adding requirements onto those like it made them special. Almost every RPG part of this game is bland and uninteresting and it’s so fucking unfortunate. Star Citizen might be taking a dozen years to complete but at least they’re using Unreal Engine and actually adding some fucking depth to their shit.
If they wanted to create something fresh then sure, but the end result was the same game they’ve released multiple times, except this time it’s with a new coat of paint.
They could’ve spent that time adding to an existing IP instead of creating a new IP to make the same thing again.
Yeah, also imagine waiting this long for the next elder scrolls and it was this quality. Now they have one more chance to get things right and apparently they needed it.
I disagree that they took the lesson that streamlining was the reason for Skyrim’s success, because Starfield is not streamlined in the least. It’s a complex series of menus and loading screens that lead to empty planets and probably other types of content, I’m not sure, because I hated navigating the menus and loading screens.
The lesson they should have taken from Skyrim is that the more immersive the game feels the more popular it will be. Immersion doesn’t require streamlining, and features like spellcrafting would be hugely welcome back for ES6, IMO.
But there’s no way to enjoy a space exploration game where the space exploration is handled so incredibly clunkily.
I think the number one rule of space exploration is “players must be able to fly wherever the fuck they want in their spaceship.” Their engine couldn’t handle that so they were hobbled from day one. All the design decisions were working back from that catastrophic mistake. They should have used Unreal or built a new engine or radically overhauled Gamebryo.
To play devil’s advocate, Starfield is absolutely a better RPG than Skyrim when it comes to roleplaying, quest design, and more. They made huge improvements to complexity and options for the player.
They just also paired that with awful world design, and could no longer rely on lore written by GOATs no longer working for the company.
I have a hard time believing they spent one year on this game, let alone eight. Half of it, including the game’s engine, the leveling system, and the fucking dragonshouts in space, is pulled from existing sources, the writing sucks, the base building is a pointless perk sink, there’s maybe three dozen unique structures copy-pasted again and again, the enemies are spongy and boring as hell, and despite being Bethesda’s “Least Buggy” work to date, it’s still chock-a-block with bugs.
You know what I think? I think they jerked around exactly like Randy Pitchford did with DNF and they’re trying to pretend they didn’t.
Basically give us a Morrowind clone with a better leveling system, remove the hit rolls, and updated visuals.
OH, and voice acting. Nit because it’s better than text, but because the writing on Morrowind was way too verbose. I don’t need to read a 30-page essay on the history of the history of a family whose servants once believed they spotted a mythical ring that culminate in a fetch quest.
I love Bethesda, but putting TES6 on the back burner to make Starfield for eight years was an idiotic decision. They also took the wrong lesson from Skyrim, believing that streamlining the game through stripping of features was the reason for its success. They’ve done this same with each successive game since, and each has been more poorly received than the last. Go back to your roots and make a good, deep Elder Scrolls game. Continue to leave the shitty +5 modifier leveling system out, but at the very least restore attributes and birthsigns. Restore spellmaking. STOP FUCKING IT UP. You’re on your last strike here and I don’t have a lot of faith that you’re going to make the right call.
Hard disagree that taking the chance on a new IP was a bad call. It didn’t work out, but more of the same thing forever would be worse.
New IP would have been fine if they didn’t drag Gamebryo’s corpse into it, as well as the worst part of Fallout 4’s perks, “+5% pistol damage at night” and adding requirements onto those like it made them special. Almost every RPG part of this game is bland and uninteresting and it’s so fucking unfortunate. Star Citizen might be taking a dozen years to complete but at least they’re using Unreal Engine and actually adding some fucking depth to their shit.
Did Star Citizen change engine? I thought they used a modified CryEngine. Just checked, they now use Lumberyard, which is based on CryEngine.
Wait, really? I would have bet real money on it being UE4. Whelp, my mistake.
I’m pretty sure UE4 wasn’t even close to being released when Star Citizen started, and changing engine is a good way of wasting a lot of time.
UE4 released in 2014 and Star Citizen started releasing modules in 2013, so pretty close actually.
If they wanted to create something fresh then sure, but the end result was the same game they’ve released multiple times, except this time it’s with a new coat of paint.
They could’ve spent that time adding to an existing IP instead of creating a new IP to make the same thing again.
Yeah, also imagine waiting this long for the next elder scrolls and it was this quality. Now they have one more chance to get things right and apparently they needed it.
I disagree that they took the lesson that streamlining was the reason for Skyrim’s success, because Starfield is not streamlined in the least. It’s a complex series of menus and loading screens that lead to empty planets and probably other types of content, I’m not sure, because I hated navigating the menus and loading screens.
The lesson they should have taken from Skyrim is that the more immersive the game feels the more popular it will be. Immersion doesn’t require streamlining, and features like spellcrafting would be hugely welcome back for ES6, IMO.
But there’s no way to enjoy a space exploration game where the space exploration is handled so incredibly clunkily.
I think the number one rule of space exploration is “players must be able to fly wherever the fuck they want in their spaceship.” Their engine couldn’t handle that so they were hobbled from day one. All the design decisions were working back from that catastrophic mistake. They should have used Unreal or built a new engine or radically overhauled Gamebryo.
To play devil’s advocate, Starfield is absolutely a better RPG than Skyrim when it comes to roleplaying, quest design, and more. They made huge improvements to complexity and options for the player.
They just also paired that with awful world design, and could no longer rely on lore written by GOATs no longer working for the company.
I have a hard time believing they spent one year on this game, let alone eight. Half of it, including the game’s engine, the leveling system, and the fucking dragonshouts in space, is pulled from existing sources, the writing sucks, the base building is a pointless perk sink, there’s maybe three dozen unique structures copy-pasted again and again, the enemies are spongy and boring as hell, and despite being Bethesda’s “Least Buggy” work to date, it’s still chock-a-block with bugs.
You know what I think? I think they jerked around exactly like Randy Pitchford did with DNF and they’re trying to pretend they didn’t.
Basically give us a Morrowind clone with a better leveling system, remove the hit rolls, and updated visuals.
OH, and voice acting. Nit because it’s better than text, but because the writing on Morrowind was way too verbose. I don’t need to read a 30-page essay on the history of the history of a family whose servants once believed they spotted a mythical ring that culminate in a fetch quest.
I’d kill for a Daggerfall remake. That was my first TES experience and I still remember staying up all night to play it in highschool.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QXOWKABmxCQ
Theres never been a more perfect time! This project recently reached 1.0 converting it over to Unity and is supported by mods!
That’s Awesome! Thank you!