Starfield release date 11/22/22

[Reigor]

For those worried about Settlements. Recent interviews with Todd and Pete have confirmed that the Settlement system in Starfield is completely optional. You can do the main quest without touching settlements. You can buy all the stuff for upgrading ships and weapons without resource gathering. 

 

There is over 200,000 lines of dialogue (over 3 times Skyrim) with no voiced protagonist, so plenty of handcrafted stuff to engage in without touching with proc gen quests.  

 

Some cool stuff, disabling ships and boarding them will be a something that happens. Not sure if an enemy could do the same thing to a player ship, but would be cool if they could.

 

I have been following this game really closely, got lots of mod ideas for Starfield. So if anyone has any questions I might be able to answer them. 

 

And the OP really needs to change the thread title. Game won't be out till the first half of 2023. 

Edited June 14, 2022 by Reigor

[Clea Strange]

I find it hard to believe that their is 1,000 planets. I mean majority of them will probably be empty and I doubt we will be able to land anywhere we want on any planet like Todd says. Will just have to wait for the game to come out

[Alessia Wellington]

6 minutes ago, Clea Strange said:

Will just have to wait for the game to come out

 

And be heavily disappointed. Just like with No Man's Sky.

[belegost]

3 hours ago, Trykz said:

Skyrim, after 10 years and multiple iterations, is still one of THE most played games ever

 

No. That's actually PUBG and Minecraft, followed by GTAV. Skyrim isn't even in the top 10.

Edited June 14, 2022 by belegost

[Clea Strange]

15 minutes ago, Alessia Wellington said:

 

And be heavily disappointed. Just like with No Man's Sky.

 

I am not disappointed in no man's sky now they turned that around and quite happy with it now. For starfield its going to be the modders who comes in to fix the game make the combat better etc. I also don't think Microsoft who owns Bethesda will stop mod support, course I could be wrong on that.

[Alessia Wellington]

15 minutes ago, Clea Strange said:

they turned that around

 

Didn't know. I've lost interest in it after the first year of release.

[Guest]

I just want to explore, mod the hell out of it, and bang alien chicks. So if it's alright, I may consider this one. All depends where this game goes and how far you can or cannot mod it now that MS is in the picture. And whether they pander to the wokesters. Compelling story has never been their strong suit, so it's not something I care because I'm more than certain it's going to be meh at best. All of this is a big maybe.

 

[31971207]

Wouldn't proprietary physics engine improve animation modding for Starfield? That way Bethesda won't be bound by licensing restriction and could open it up for modders.

Ship combat is interesting because vaporware notwithstanding we haven't had a game like Wing Commander in ages and with today's hardware it "shouldn't" be difficult to replicate Wing Command or Tie Fighter space combat. But knowing Bethesda who couldn't even get horse cart right I am not raising my hope.

[Clea Strange]

If anyone is interested their is anInterview with Todd Howard in this video. He mentions the modding community at around 11:45 saying "we love our modding community"  he goes on to say that this starfield is going to be a dream for the modding community" " that basically in his own way he says can't wait to see what the modding community does in his own way imo". Todd mentions that Elder Scrolls 6 is in pre-production and that Fallout 5 will come out after Elder Scrolls 6.  Now of course take what he says "as a grain of salt" or something like that. We will just have to wait and see as usual of course

 

 

Edited June 15, 2022 by Clea Strange

[31971207]

This is both concerning and interesting as departure from past Bethesda games:

The whole article is here: https://www.gamespot.com/articles/bethesda-shares-details-about-starfields-main-quest-length-dogfighting-and-more/1100-6504617/
>>>
"No. We decided early in the project that the on-surface is one reality, and then when you’re in space it’s another reality," Howard said in the interview.

Both ends of Starfield's gameplay seem like they're particularly robust and built out in order to justify their rather intense separation. Howard confirmed that on the terrestrial side of things, Starfield will have four major cities for players to go to and that one of them, New Atlantis, is bigger than any city the studio's made for its past titles. Starfield's main quest will take players through New Atlantis and follows Constellation, an organization that's been dubbed "the last group of space explorers." Howard told IGN the campaign should take players about 30-40 hours, since he estimates Starfield is currently about 20% bigger than Bethesda's past games.
>>>

So we will have 4 cities that are probably 20% bigger than said Whiterun that require their own cell loading. In between these cells, instead of the beautifully crafted open landscapes we will get empty space with procedurally generated dots/"cell/world" that each require its own cell loading and random encounters. The space concept does broaden what modders can do with Starfield but also means the game is probably best played with fast traveling. This feels like Sims3->Sims4 where the game takes one step forward but also a big step back.

[Reigor]

So about the 1000+ planets. 

 

If you are not into the NMS resource gathering or building outposts then just ignore them. One will be able play the game without needing to resource gather. There is a LOT more content that previous games. 200,000 lines of dialogue. The main quest alone will take about 40 hours to do. 

 

I'm pretty sure the 4 cities are not the only hand crafted settlements, there is likely numerous town and village equivalents that act as mini quest hubs scattered throughout the different planets. The cities themselves look much bigger than Skyrim's, though we need to find out if the buildings can be entered and how many floors the player can go to. 

 

I was sold on space combat when it was confirmed we could board disable ships and be a smuggler.  

[Clea Strange]

Another Interview that I found by someone Pete Hines 

 

 

[Splendor Solis]

Was hoping for more of a Skyrim meets Mass Effect type of game, but it's definitely leaning more towards Fallout meets No Man's Sky. A lack of aliens and diverse civilizations is a pretty big let down for a space game. Although Todd said in that interview that the main story involves finding some artifacts, which could imply the game has a first contact with aliens. But it could also be an "extinct progenitor race" trope, or it could be so far into the future that they're human artifacts. It's hard to imagine myself buying the game if it ends up being 4 cities of only humans, a bunch of empty planets, and a grounded, realistic setting. It's just not what I'm looking for.

[Reigor]

300 years in the future, humanity can become its own aliens. 

 

Nothing stops modders from adding other "races" like cyborgs, genetic modified humans, uplifted animals, or just simple advanced cosmetics to give exotic skin tones or unusual features. Human cultures will change as well.  

 

There will be more than 4 cities. There are 4 major cities and presumably numerous smaller ones.

 

There will be plenty of handcrafted content to play. 200,000 lines of dialogue. 40 hour long main quest. The player will not be required to touch the barren ice balls unless there is a radiant AI style quest to go to one. 

 

But starfield is definitely not a space fantasy like Mass Effect, more like the Expanse, except the ship combat. Which I would prefer something more realistic. At the same time I might enjoy it when the game comes out.

[Popo07]

I'm thinking the planets will be their own world spaces that get random generated with POI when scanned, and I'll be waiting for someone to mod Nirn as one of them.

[Trykz]

20 hours ago, belegost said:

 

No. That's actually PUBG and Minecraft, followed by GTAV. Skyrim isn't even in the top 10.

But it is in the top 20.

 

And I wasn’t really considering much beyond Bethesda’s titles.

Nevertheless, I’m still expecting even deeper mod-ability from this game. Especially after Howard’s comments in his interview today. The way he put it, it almost seemed like they intended to leave a fair amount of open space (with respect to the worlds) for modders to take advantage of. We’ll know soon enough I suppose.

[fishburger67]

22 hours ago, belegost said:

 

No. That's actually PUBG and Minecraft, followed by GTAV. Skyrim isn't even in the top 10.

Bullshit unless you are counting the games on Wii and all that.  Otherwise, it's 10th and no way am I interested in the kiddy games like Super Mario Bros which for me puts it down around 7th.

Edited June 15, 2022 by fishburger67

[gooboo]

I'm excited for the game. After playing lots of Bethesda rpgs I expect it'll follow the same pattern as Fallout 4 for me. 

 

I'll have fun with the vanilla game for ~2 weeks, stop playing for a bit, then when the good mods come out I'll add hundreds of hours of playing time before all is said and done.

 

I'm not expecting a mind blowing story, since that's never been Bethesda's strong suit, but to their credit they're one of the few companies that make the kind of games I like to play with proper mod support. Also I want to walk around my spaceship naked

[Ernest Lemmingway]

Bugthesda and its employees talk a good game (no pun intended), but they've consistently failed to actually deliver what they promised and they've been moving towards a grossly dumbed down system for their games. I'm worried Starfield is going to lack the complexity and dynamism of older titles' mechanics, it'll be another example of "sixteen times the detail," and most of all, it'll be another shooter with RPG elements.

 

I won't repeat my thoughts on modding except to say, "Actions, not words." And their actions since FO4 are worrying in that regard.

[Clea Strange]

Though one of the biggest questions I think would be is this. Since Microsoft bought Bethesda or I don't know if it has fully gone through. My question is this Since Microsoft owns Bethesda, what is Microsoft's stance on Mods in general? Do they allow mods or would they allow mods? Does anyone happen to know or do we not know yet

Edited June 15, 2022 by Clea Strange

[Guest]

You will be able to mod this game. You don't need the Creation Kit to mod this game or any of their previous games.

[31971207]

Does anyone know if Starfield is a DirectStorage game? It better be considering I will be fast traveling everywhere given the lack of a scenic landscape world space.

I would think Microsoft love mods just so to stick it to Sony PS.

[0wnyx]

"u can ignore the settlements..." of course i ignore them, its not about that. the settlements mean that bethesda were spending lots of resources into a grinding game mechanic that kills time and (probably) does not offer the modding community anything new that we haven't seen before. to be honest, i would be sceptical even without settlements. its fallout in space and i expected nothing else here... also prisons ! there will be prisons !

 

what i would like to know is if experienced modders can already tell if there is potential for new mods that were impossible/very difficult to make with the current titles. for example, better body maps/skeletons - the realisation of face/hand/feet physics or other things that would cause the nerds from the skyrim community to flock to starfield

[fishburger67]

3 hours ago, 0wnyx said:

"u can ignore the settlements..." of course i ignore them, its not about that. the settlements mean that bethesda were spending lots of resources into a grinding game mechanic that kills time and (probably) does not offer the modding community anything new that we haven't seen before. to be honest, i would be sceptical even without settlements. its fallout in space and i expected nothing else here... also prisons ! there will be prisons !

 

what i would like to know is if experienced modders can already tell if there is potential for new mods that were impossible/very difficult to make with the current titles. for example, better body maps/skeletons - the realisation of face/hand/feet physics or other things that would cause the nerds from the skyrim community to flock to starfield

Some things are very obvious to me.

 

You get to pick the walking animation in the character creator.   If you look at CP2077 and RDR2, that kind of variety is seriously good.  There is real glass and much more expressive facial animation.  Gravity.  The list goes on.  Tod sez that we mod creators will be pleased with what we can do.   I am very encouraged by that.  I'd bet a dollar to a doughnut that within six months of release, there will be hundreds of new settlements on all those empty planets. 

 

Because this is taking place 300 years in the future, we can extrapolate current culture and physical reality that far easily.  I personally am already thinking on how to utilize these new things even though I haven't seen much of the game yet cause it is something I have already been thinking of since I was a young one.

 

Tod gave an interview to ign.  Go listen to it.  Here is a synopsis:  https://kotaku.com/starfield-todd-howard-length-bethesda-game-pass-fallout-1849064819

 

 

 

Edited June 16, 2022 by fishburger67

[KoolHndLuke]

Guess they saved some money on voice acting with no voiced protagonist and convo scenes. I must've been the only one that kind of liked that feature in FO4. An option for PC voiced lines would have been nice.

 

Honestly for somewhere around the half billion dollars this game will cost them in development and marketing, the previews aren't very impressive so far.

Edited June 16, 2022 by KoolHndLuke