WITWI - Starfield, Just Let The Modders Do All The Work [ULTRAWIDE IMPRESSIONS]
1I find it hard to believe that a game under development for 7 years is lacking basic functionality settings such as an FOV slider, texture resolution and various other post FX settings that cannot be turned off. I do not want the "yes but this is classic Bethesda though" to be something the devs can cling on and get away with it either.
PROS:
-Massive world
-Fun gunplay
-Extreme details in every corner
-Extensive ship building tools
-Overshadowed but present base building
-Fun but rare space fights
-Relatively engaging side quests
-Pleasant soundtrack
CONS:
-No FOV slider
-Heavy reliance on mods
-Aggressive LUTs that need mods to be disabled
-Loading screens for everything
-Horrendous performance
-Barebones graphical settings options
-Locked resolution
-Stamina (personal gripe)
-Uninspired main story
-"Walk next to slow NPC" quests
-Tedious quests
-Lack of proper minimap/ map
Steam Curator: https://rb.gy/w9b9x
I have had to walk up and down stairs to talk to two different people way too many times to complete a quest. A lot of the side busy quests are just filler and padding busy work. There are some hidden gems that you might stumble upon if you are lucky, like the hidden base side mission that I completed in this video. That mission was the most fun I have had with this game in a while.
A game should not require to be played for 12 hours to "get good". Most games are not even 12 hours long. I am coming from the wonderful experience I had with Baldur's Gate 3, a game I was shocked with, had zero interest in and was immediately engaged upon playing it. Now I am being told that the game I was excited about, backed with Microsoft millions and developed by a veteran studio, requires I play it for 12 hours to get to the good part?
From the tedious pressing L to open the quest screen, pressing B to view quest location, fast travelling to location, sprinting for a few minutes to get to the person I have to talk to, repeating the process to get to the actual quest site, fighting a few bad people, and then doing the same thing all over again. If I am lucky. Usually I have to talk to several people for boring expedition before I get to go bang bang.
Performance is pretty good on my 3080ti when I am inside dungeons, when the game does not have to render the vast, empty and poorly optimised world environment. But once I step outside, it all goes to hell. I have had several crashes back to back, but no matter how much I try to improve the performance by tweaking settings, I cannot seem to get it right.
The settings menu is looking very sad for a AAA title. There are no basic settings such as an FOV slider or the ability to change the draw distance, the texture quality and resolution, the post FX settings like the TERRIBLE LUTs that just make my monitor look like there is a whole screen sized smudge all over it. Did Bethesda just say F it, let the modders do it for free who cares?
The perk system is simply fine. I am not a fan of having to complete challenges to progress to the next level of the perk. That is simply padding and stretches the game to lengths that would otherwise not be achieved, and clearly not in a good way. The gun play feels great, in the dungeons where performance is acceptable. Out in the world the 30-40ish FPS make it a chore. And I suppose that is a good word to describe this entire game, a chore.
Have I had fun with this game? Certainly. Is the percentage of boring dread more than the fun I have had? Absolutely. Where did the extra 10$ go? Why is this game 70$ and BG3 is 60$? How was the ball dropped so hard?
#bethesda
#review
#unfinished