Thoughts on NG (Main quest spoilers)

[DocClox]

Main story spoilers below!

 

Spoiler

I've been thinking about the New Game+ mechanism. A couple of things occur.

 

Firstly: I can see this being really hard on mods that need a new game to run properly. Or a new game for each update. Skyrim, I don't mind so much; I've finished that game so many times that I generally have the same character doing the same sort of stuff, and reloading doesn't affect that much. 

 

Thing is, I can see Starfield characters lasting a lot longer, time-wise. Not so much maybe if you want to get to NH+1 and them speed run the temples to get to NG+10 and maxed powers, but if you're playing with a bit of RP (and most of us will for a while) then asking someone to junk their NG+7 character and start out back in the mine at Vectera is going to be a bit ask. Especially if you do it for each new release.

 

So maybe it would pay us to think in advance about ways to make out mods so they can be upgrades in mid-game. I know, I know; we don;t always know what we need until we need it, and sometimes we need that restart so Things can be Done In The New Way. Still, it probably ought not to be the default for Starfield.

 

Secondly: we won't know for sure until we get teh CK, but NG+ seems to reset a lot of variables in the game. So, it might be a workable substitute for new game in some cases. To upgrade, install the new version, but the changes won't manifest until you go through NG+. If we have to have a new game, this might be a less painful way to do it.

 

Thirdly: thinking about NG+ again, there's potential for shenanigans at that point. For player slavery mods, for instance. Imagine letting the player run through the game normally, and then on NG+, instead of coming back in a Star Guardian, they wake up naked in a cage on a slaver ship. Obviously, this isn't the parallel universe they were expecting...

 

Just a few thoughts.

[isee]

Just looking at the save files you can see a (rather concerning if I'm being honest) large decrease in file sizes when you start a new game plus run. So something is happening, most likely it works almost like an alternate start mod. Sets a variable to tell the game you are on a NG+ run and then imports your character settings before starting up.

 

The other option being that each planet you visit and item you collect is actually ballooning your save file quite a bit is more concerning. So hopefully that isn't the case. Though Skyrim had this problem if I'm remembering right. It was just harder to get a game to last that long when you had a larger modlist. 

[DocClox]

Yeah, I think it goes through the save file and drops almost everything that isn't part of the player record. It's a clever plan, really. You get improved character longevity, and clean up a lot of the crap accumulated over play.

[Miauzi]

When you consider how the cargo hold of the ship is "enriched" with various rubbish items with every landing at a space port - you don't have to be surprised if the space requirement of a save file becomes larger and larger.

And obviously, when a spaceship is sold, all "loose" items (like thermos flasks, pens, etc.) are put into the cargo hold of the "home" ship - instead of being sold with the ship in question.

I had captured some ships from "pirates" in the beginning and recently sold them all - as I don't use them.

Well - you know the "rubbish planet" in Skyrim .... now I guess there is an equivalent in StarField!

?

[ThyraUnn]

I think it could have been Implemented a little better, I am a hoarder in games, I like to Collect one of every weapon and Armor set.

 

Spoiler

The inclusion of some kind of Vault or something to keep certain items would have been nice, and the ship you leave on cause building my ship every NG+ takes awhile cause I gotta grind credits every time...

 

[alcurad90]

8 hours ago, ThyraUnn said:

I think it could have been Implemented a little better, I am a hoarder in games, I like to Collect one of every weapon and Armor set.

 

  Hide contents

The inclusion of some kind of Vault or something to keep certain items would have been nice, and the ship you leave on cause building my ship every NG+ takes awhile cause I gotta grind credits every time...

 

 

It could be done by some mod that work like achievements that storage data out of the save file

And we need blueprint mod too

Edited September 29, 2023 by alcurad90