Starfield, Bethesda’s new open-world space RPG has garnered immense praise and positive reviews from both critics and players alike for its detailed stories and impressive scale. Players have enjoyed exploring the expansive universe that Bethesda has crafted, with hidden items and Easter eggs lying around every corner in a chest, dead NPC or just hiding in plain sight. Various players have discovered one bittersweet item, in the form of a note, put in by the developers as a tribute towards a certain gamer, Alex Hay, who had posted on Reddit in early 2023 that he wouldn’t likely be able to play due to his lung cancer and told members of r/Starfield to enjoy the game on his behalf.
Starfield Review - To Infinity, But Not Beyond
31.08.2023 - 17:45 / gamespot.com / Michael Higham
Bethesda's spacefaring adventure has its moments with impressive scale, satisfying combat, and some worthwhile side quests, but its shallow RPG systems and uninspired vision of the cosmos make for a journey that's a mile wide, but an inch deep.
By Michael Higham on
It's hard to ponder the infinite possibilities of space and not get romantic about it. Our imagination of the cosmos has taken many artistic forms, and the hard science behind the greatest discoveries on the final frontier has been just as enthralling. It's this sense of wonder that makes the prospect of Starfield so intriguing--even more so than if it were just Bethesda Game Studios' next major RPG. However, it's best to cast aside that love and fascination with space because, at its core, Starfield follows a very familiar formula without meaningfully engaging with its setting or the gameplay systems therein.
Starfield is undoubtedly impressive in scale, from the sheer number of star systems and planets you can explore to the multitude of gameplay mechanics that tie the experience together. But once you start to see how all these big ideas are interconnected from a narrative perspective and technical standpoint, the illusion of a grand cosmic voyage shatters and the veneer starts to wear thin. And so, somewhere along my 55 or so hours spent playing Starfield, I dropped the notion of finding that wondrous space adventure and accepted Starfield for what it is: a shooter-focused RPG in the traditional Bethesda framework that has its wild and fun moments but one that's ultimately a mile wide and an inch deep.
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Starfield's main quest is the most emblematic of the game's shortcomings. Despite romanticizing the idea of taking to the stars to explore the great unknown, these narrative ambitions fall into shallow stories that undersell the spacefaring premise. You start as a lowly miner extracting resources for a faceless corporation and within minutes, come in contact with an «Artifact» that activates mysterious visions of something bigger out in the galaxy--a sort of leaving-the-vault moment like in Fallout. You're then shuffled into the ranks of a small organization called Constellation, whose sole purpose is to chase these Artifacts and uncover their purpose. With the handful of characters who make up the group, Starfield tries to instill personality into its story, but consistently weak writing and generic dialogue means these characters--who do have a few interesting moments along the way--largely fall
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mmorpg.com
12.09.2023 / 18:07
Starfield Review - Written In The Stars
My Starfield review-in-progress went up 11 days ago, on August 31. I had made my way through a good chunk of the main quest and was getting my bearings in Bethesda's gigantic universe. Now that I'm on the other side of dozens of hours spent galavanting through the galaxy, much of what I said before still holds true, and other than some small nitpicks, Starfield is truly out of this world. And now that pun is officially out of the way.
wccftech.com
07.09.2023 / 19:19
Seagate Releases Starfield Xbox Game Drive But Your Xbox Series Won’t Play The Game From it
Seagate has released its Starfield Xbox Game drive but your Xbox Series X|S won't be able to play Bethesda's game from it.
thesixthaxis.com
07.09.2023 / 13:41
Starfield Review in Progress – It has Skyrim’s eyes and Fallout’s nose
It’s a little bit funny to think that, while Starfield features a brand new sci-fi galaxy to explore, it was also almost jokingly a known quantity for gamers well before launch. Bethesda Game Studios has a type of game that they make, and while Starfield’s story is of an adventure to find the unknown, the actual game itself feels immediately familiar.
xboxoldies.com
07.09.2023 / 13:13
Starfield – Review
Xbox’s most anticipated game in years has finally arrived and it’s reaching for the stars… While everyone has been preparing for lift-off, we’ve spent the last week sailing around the universe to discover if Starfield is a small step for games or a giant leap for gaming kind.
fortressofsolitude.co.za
07.09.2023 / 06:59
Starfield Review
To say there’s been a great deal of hype leading up to this point for one of the first Microsoft/Bethesda post-merger is a bit of an understatement. There’s been a lot said about one of the first feature games of its new era, Starfield. While most of the game’s coverage has been largely positive, the talk on behind-the-scenes matters hasn’t always been.
gamesradar.com
05.09.2023 / 13:55
Modders have already got around Starfield's biggest controversy, but it might still crash your game
Modders have already found a way around Starfield's biggest controversy, but it's far from a perfect solution.
pcmag.com
01.09.2023 / 16:07
Intel: Sorry, But Our Drivers To Play Starfield on Arc GPUs Need Another Week
If you own an Intel Arc graphics card, prepare to face a buggy experience when trying to play the newly-released PC game Starfield.
gamesindustry.biz
01.09.2023 / 15:19
Starfield review controversy traces game journalism's orbital decay | This Week in Business
This Week in Business is our weekly recap column, a collection of stats and quotes from recent stories presented with a dash of opinion (sometimes more than a dash) and intended to shed light on various trends. Check back every Friday for a new entry.
pczone.co.uk
01.09.2023 / 12:39
Starfield review roundup: epically broad, yet frustratingly shallow?
Starfield is the most anticipated game launch in recent memory. After a seven-year development cycle, this oh-so-slow-baked RPG from Todd Howard and Bethesda gets roasted by the critics (apart from those in the UK) and the result? The taste is pleasant but less than thrilling, at least for some.
venturebeat.com
31.08.2023 / 20:31
Starfield review: Let me play among the stars
We're thrilled to announce the return of GamesBeat Next, hosted in San Francisco this October, where we will explore the theme of «Playing the Edge.» Apply to speak here and learn more about sponsorship opportunities here. At the event, we will also announce 25 top game startups as the 2024 Game Changers. Apply or nominate today!
videogameschronicle.com
31.08.2023 / 18:27
Podcast: Starfield Review Special
The latest episode of VGC: A Video Games Podcast is now available on all major audio platforms.