Bethesda Is Responding to Negative Reviews of Starfield on Steam - IGN
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Bethesda has taken the unusual step for a triple-A video game maker of responding to negative reviews of Starfield on Steam.
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312Y

Luckily only tried it once on gamepass. For sure has some interesting parts to it (I did like the ship designer) but it hit me on the second location I explored - this is pretty much a Skyrim reskin. The are randomised dungeons everywhere for no goddamn reason whatsoever, my goddamn spaceship can only fit like 5 suits… alright. Been there, done that, I’m out.

Looking for a re-release in 5 yrs with all the add-ons and mods, maybe I will get it then.

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-22Y

Why get it then and support this bs? We got this trash because people kept buying Skyrim and circlejerking it

@[email protected]
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22Y

I just wonder how someone can encounter randomly generated content when all these handcrafted locations exists where all the story and quests happen.

I played like 30 hours before I even came across random generated content.

And those things definitely felt like end-game stuff.

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172Y

Pirated it but it wasnt worth the disk space. Tried it for a couple hours but it was so boring. I have done a quest for a bank where I was supposed to collect money. It went like this: Fast travel to the ship. Fast travel to the planet the person is on Talk with them. Fast travel back to ship Fast travel to bank planet Fast travel to bank. Talk to bank guy to get money. Next bank quest. Rinse and repeat

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52Y

Badabing badaboom now that’s a $90 value

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52Y

You can reply to reviews on Steam???

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82Y

Yeah? There’s a comment section and developers comments get highlighted on the store page. As far as I know it’s been like this for many years.

@[email protected]
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22Y

Yeah that’s how developers respond to negative reviews or problems that their players have.

e-ratic
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2Y

Some of Starfield’s planets are meant to be empty by design — but that’s not boring. “When the astronauts went to the moon, there was nothing there. They certainly weren’t bored." The intention of Starfield’s exploration is to evoke a feeling of smallness in players and make you feel overwhelmed.

May as well boot up SpaceEngine then.

Carighan Maconar
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262Y

Starfield, the epitome of scientifically correcty simulations. Why would I expcet my Starship Travel Simulator 2000 to be a fun-focused game after all, durr.

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232Y

scientifically correct

Why doesn’t nasa just open up the starmap and simply fast travel to the moon or mars?

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22Y

they do basically except they give spacex a chunk of money to have their rocket tp them

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262Y

It really evoked a feeling of smallness in me. Namely how small and devoid of content the universe feels.

This is made worse because every inhabited planet I go to has some elaborate situation just waiting for me to solve it. For example: I land on the landing pad, walk 30 meters through a gate and am greeted by a hostage situation in a bank where the hostage negotiator is going to let me, some random, go do his job instead of him, trusting me with the lives of everyone involved without even blinking.

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2Y

Landing on the boring planets wasn’t my problem with the boring game.

The ground combat was terrible. The space flight was terrible. The space combat was terrible. And it was wedged into every activity for no reason other than lazy design to pad things.

And then there was the UI…

You can’t “feel small” when the game makes you a fiddly murder hobo in the tutorial.

Alto
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1862Y

“When the astronauts went to the moon, there was nothing there. They certainly weren’t bored."

Yeah I think that might be because they were on the moon and not pressing WASD to walk around a fake moon

Runwaylights
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282Y

It also bugs me that Bethesda keeps saying that the game is about exploration and finding new planets, but so far every planet I’ve visited has some kind of building upon it. Its clear that people have been on this planet before, so why the hell should I explore this planet? At least give me some incentive or a better reward for finding a true empty planet.

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62Y

You’re not wrong, but OTOH, it’s pretty funny to see a planet having a building on it equated to the planet being explored, considering Earth was still being explored thousands of years after the first buildings.

Runwaylights
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62Y

Yeah thats true. In Bethesda’s dictionary exploration means: find minerals, 7 life forms and 3 unique geological formations. And by unique we mean like on the other planets.

@[email protected]
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82Y

Or because they didn’t show up at the moon after a loading screen

SSTF
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492Y

If you landed in an in-game fake moon it would be a wonderfully interesting plot thread.

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32Y

I think I saw a documentary about that recently

Echo Dot
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72Y

Yeah they should 100% have a flat planet somewhere. Held up by a turtle.

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752Y

I wish these idiots would quit trying to tell the people playing the game that they are wrong for not liking it. Like, no man, listen to them, this is feedback. You can’t take all of it without a pinch of salt but if you see a common theme, then you should address it.

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62Y

Slow news day, eh IGN?

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362Y

Everyone seems to be missing the point so I’ll let Todd Howard remind you all, “We’re going to be doing a lot of add-on content for Starfield.”

$5 horse armor folks. That’s Bethesda. Stop paying them to make garbage, or at least stop complaining about it.

peopleproblems
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132Y

… I liked it

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2Y

its fun, I liked the main story although it does have its slow spots, the vanguard terrormorph quest was pretty cool, but after a while like all games it gets kind of tiring, this game still feels like it needs some work, hopefully it will get even more post release content than fallout 4, there is a lot of space they can add stuff

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372Y

There may in fact be a few games where empty spaces and a sense of vastness actually contribute to the atmosphere and make for an enjoyable game. But NOT in a game that’s divided by fucking loading screens with not a single “vista” to look out at.

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232Y

deleted by creator

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42Y

No Man’s Sky. Too large for human comprehension. And sometimes it’s way too empty. Just like real space. Especially in VR.

HaruAjsuru
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522Y

I have played most of the fully 3D Bethesda RPG games and I am accustomed to their game design, bugs, and janks.

But the only thing I hate about Starfield is just the way the game always talks about how amazing exploration of the unknown is (heck, your main character is even a part of the explorer group name Constellation) while trying everything it can to stop player to do just that (overly rely on teleportation, cannot travel seamlessly between planets, etc…)

It feels like you are playing an institute scientist in an fallout game, always stay in your high tech base and only travel using teleportation to the outside world

This is a major turn off for me and there is no way to fix it

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352Y

100%. The best part of Bethesda open world games is exploring the open space between towns, quests, objectives, etc. Fast travel is an option, but rarely necessary. If you rely on it you will miss lots of cool stuff.

Not so in Starfield, the space between objectives is literally empty space.

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-12Y

That’s a fair opinion to have, but my preference is actually exploring the towns. I love that Starfield removed many of the middle of nowhere winding dungeons that I got so bored of. (Dwemer/Nord ruins in Skyrim and office buildings/other skyscrapers in fallout 4.)

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-12Y

I mean, that’s why it’s called “space”, right? That’s literally what it is.

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72Y

yes. the point is it doesn’t work well in a video game.

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-82Y

So why are you playing it then?

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182Y

And space travel isnt actually a fun adventure, but the point of a video game is to romanticize the concepts. Not make them as boring and realistic as possible

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2
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2Y

I agree. Unless that’s the whole point of the game you are making, and then it’s just the nature of the game. Flight Sim is one of my friend’s favorite games, but not so for me. At least they aren’t telling people that they are wrong about it being boring because it’s realistic and realism is better or some crap.

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22Y

There is, in fact, a very heated debate on whether or not simulators that stay true to form are actually games. With the argument being, they are either toys or simulators.

“I had fun playing with it” isnt exclusive to games, as a ball is not a game but I would gladly throw it against a wall for hours by myself with some music.

But lots of people would likely shit on an attempt to rebrand those things as “video toys” when the distinction is largely only relevant to people studying design, so the heated debate is mostly between academics and pedants.

Echo Dot
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72Y

There’s lots of actual stuff in interplanetary space that you can pull on for inspiration on how to make an interesting game.

You can have counters with shady trader types that are only in the vast gulf between the systems, there could be rogue planets with billion year old abandoned cities to explore filled with automated defences for you to fight and interesting loot at the end. Distant ancient asteroids that contain the seeds of the first life in the universe that when you interact with temporarily give you status change that you can only get from asteroids and temporarily gives you super strength or something, allowing you to complete missions in a way you otherwise would not necessarily have done.

The way these kind of side quests are supposed to work is the player is plodding along trying to get from point A to point B and on the way they get sidetracked by this side quest (the clue is in the name Bethesda). Maybe it changes their priorities or how they’re going to tackle and upcoming mission. Side quests are not supposed to be independent standalone things, they’re supposed to integrate with the main story. They’re not supposed to be something you find easily there’s supposed to be something you come across on your own as you’re exploring the environment, but you can only do that if the developers bothered to provided environment for you to explore. If they just teleport you to your destination then there’s no opportunity for this kind of emergent gameplay.

Loads of stuff you can put between the star systems.

MeanEYE
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82Y

Funny thing is, they don’t care. As long as they have fans who will complain but still buy their product at full price… they simply don’t care. This is evident with every product of theirs. Fallout76 had bugs originating from FO4 that were patched by community but were reintroduced in FO76.

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32Y

I’m actually fine with personally, but what I dislike is that Starfield is too grindy and slow.

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172Y

Yeah it’s quite an accomplishment to make the vastness of space feel claustrophobic and small.

Some of the response to the reviews is bizarre - one seems to try to claim that the planets are not boring because they’re realistic and the real world is boring, and that the player is probably just overwhelmed by the awesomeness of it all.

It almost feels like the game Devs have convinced themselves that they’ve been working on the greatest game ever made and when told “no you haven’t” they’re responding by saying “you just don’t get our vision”.

It’s an ok game. I’m actually less bothered by the loading screens and more by the old fashioned story telling. This game would have been amazing if released closer after Skyrim. But it’s been 12 years and we’ve had Witcher 3, Cyberpunk and Baldurs Gate 3 that have changed expectations. All of them are better at evoking a sense of emotional engagement with the game, and actions having meaningful consequences in the plot. Subplots like the bloody baron in Witcher 3, or Judy in cyberpunk have stuck with me in a way characters and events in Skyrim and now Starfield just never have.

Problem is I suspect Bethesda will focus on all the loading screen / sense of scale complaints and not register the more important (imo) issues with the stories, characters and gameplay. Less but better is the real lesson I think.

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282Y

oh good, this reminds me I haven’t bothered to leave a negative review yet. let me correct that.

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262Y

Starfield frustrates me, because in many ways its a major step in the right direction. It has much better roleplaying mechanics than Skyrim or Fallout 4, but at the same time the lore is half-baked and the skill system is fairly weak. It has great potential, but a lot of it feels toned down and less “real” because of it. Space exploration has a lot of potential as well, but setting every objective so far apart on planets ruins exploration by filling it with monotonous procgen.

That’s why I’m fairly confident that once properly patched, and mods/DLCs are in full swing, it will probably be remembered very fondly despite the release state. It’ll pull a Cyberpunk.

guldukat
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32Y

When players are tired of paying to be game testers then things will change. Until then, go mine some ore or whatever, I haven’t played it.

-Bethesda, maybe

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15
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2Y

I think everything you said here is spot on except the idea Starfield will improve pike Cyberpunk at this point because Bethesda’s attitude really doesn’t indicate that they seem to admit anything needs fixing.

With that said I doubt many people expected Cyberpunk to do as well later on so you are probably right and I hope you are for the game and genre. I really like the aesthetic of Starfield and want it to succeed.

I’m just so tired of getting such half baked stuff at release.

One annoying thing about the “make your own stories” concept is that content us going to be recycled. My followers don’t say anything new or have new things to do etc because it’s all baked in but also on this supposedly open RPG landscape.

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92Y

I would agree with you if Bethesda games haven’t always been saved by modders, rather than Beth themselves. If we had to depend on Beth to fix their own game, Skyrim would’ve been abandoned long, long, long ago, same with Fallout 4.

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22Y

Yeah, Bethesda games have always been… playable, I guess, but hardly any good, without modding, at least as far back as Oblivion. Morrowind was the last game they made that was just good, out of the box, without needing mods.

So I figured in a year or two Starfield will be good, with mods, just like Oblivion, Skyrim, and Fallout 4 were all bland at best on release, until mods made them good.

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32Y

100% I actually think Starfield has the best bones, even if it has the worst meat, so to speak, so adding meat gives it a much higher ceiling in a few years time.

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42Y

That’s true and what worries me the most after wanting Starfield to do good. I’ve been playing Starfield for a bit only to find myself moving to Cyberpunk sooner than later lately.

@[email protected]
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22Y

No harm in waiting for Starfield! It will only get better, while Cyberpunk is largely complete. I loved cyberpunk, especially the DLC.

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12Y

I hope it does and I think it will but again with the reliance Bethesda puts on the community I’m nervous.

Anyway I’ve gotten much of the way through at 100 hours and have enjoyed it - definitely got my money’s worth - but I just sort of hit a wall. To be fair you’ll do that with most games but it seems like Stanfield is just bland.

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12Y

We’ll certainly see! I trust modders.

bruhduh
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7
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2Y

The problem is that starfield is modern warfare III of Bethesda but people trying to see it as next skyrim, Bethesda ai generated almost all this game and looped it in roguelite shape, the only things evolved is mechanics as you’ve said yourself, and again as you’ve said yourself, this game will be saved by modders

@[email protected]
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72Y

Oh I’m anti-Bethesda and Bethesda practices, I’m just sure it will eventually be a great game once the community steps in and fixes it. It isn’t an excuse for Bethesda, but rather admiration for the modding community, and an example of why FOSS and a rejection of the profit motive is so good.

bruhduh
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22Y

I agree with you) communities solve everything

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12Y

i dont know why people shit on bethesda for “letting modders fix the game”

i dont really know any other developer that embraces the modding community as much as bethesda does, and i wish other games had the same amount of modding capability that bethesda games do

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12Y

deleted by creator

@[email protected]
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82Y

I think it’s fully possible to criticize Bethesda’s incomplete and highly flawed game design and praise their willingness to support the modding community with great tools at the same time.

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122Y

Procedural generation is not AI, don’t spew nonsense.

bruhduh
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12Y

deleted by creator

@[email protected]
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12Y

Procedural generation has existed for many years. There’s nothing AI about it

@[email protected]
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122Y

The world is now full of technology that used to have real names, but is now called AI so that investors spunk themselves as they high five each other in shareholder meetings.

MeanEYE
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722Y

Bethesda, simply put, doesn’t know how to react to criticism. Instead of taking this feedback and improving their product they double-down and insist that you should like it because they said so. If it’s boring it’s boring man. They are simply as disconnected as possible. Remember the whole canvas bag fiasco? Then they said “ah, canvas costs too much, we aren’t planning on doing anything with the nylon one”… deal with it in other words. Then they were puzzled why people disliked them to all hell.

SSTF
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222Y

I can’t believe how ignorant you are of the worldwide canvas shortage of 2018. Canvas became a global strategic resource. Lack of canvas destabilized numerous nation states.

The idea of frivolously wasting that precious canvas on a video game trinket is frankly offensive.

-Bethesda, probably.

MeanEYE
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112Y

They wasted all the canvas on influencer merchandise some months prior.

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82Y

How that’s not false advertising is beyond me.

MeanEYE
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52Y

Well, there is a class action lawsuit against them in regards to that and other things FO76 related.

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22Y

Dont forget about the moldy helmet, how fun.

(it was only for some exclusive edition, not the normal collector helmet, but still)

MeanEYE
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22Y

Yup. And shitty plastic shell for the rum. Then people who requested refund got their info and CC numbers leaked by their system which they took offline immediately.

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32Y

they took the criticism of fallout 76 and continued working on it, still getting updates to this day when most other places would have left it to rot

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102Y

I’m not 100% sure but I think FO76 is maintained by BGS Austin. They seem to be far more interested in taking feedback and making the game better than the main Bethesda studio. FO76 may be fundamentally flawed but post-launch it’s definitely getting more care than Skyrim, FO4 and Starfield combined.

MeanEYE
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62Y

They also took class action lawsuits for that game as well, so that might be affecting that push to fix the game. But even if they fix it, doesn’t negate the fact they said they don’t plan on fixing canvas issue, or any problem they caused. Only when there was an outrage they reacted. Remember the horse armor for Skyrim or when they tried to sell mods that were included in previous game. I do.

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32Y

horse armor was oblivion

MeanEYE
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2
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2Y

Thanks for the correction. Same company though.

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12Y

yeah. and i guess the 2 expansion packs made up for that fuckup because i hear nothing but great things about the sheogorath expansion

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deleted by creator

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-12Y

A step back in what sense? Technically? Yeah probably. Starfield is the first Bethesda game to have working ladders(one slight sort of exception in Fallout 4) lol. But in terms of story, and world building, I think it’s fair to say Starfield is much ahead in that.

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62Y

That’d be more meaningful if Bethesda had ever managed to create a story with any worth. Sometimes the bones of a decent story are there, but the execution is usually amateur hour.

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-32Y

In my opinion Starfield has the best story Bethesda has written. Not entirely saying much, but the main story and the side stories are at least more interesting and less predictable that Fallout 4 and Skyrim quests.

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52Y

Assuming you haven’t already, you should give Morrowind a shot. If you can get past the dated graphics and mechanics, the story is by far Bethesda’s best work imho.

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12Y

Yeah, I have played Morrowind(well actually TES3MP) and in terms of flexibility and story Morrowind is definitely great, my issue is that my least favorite aspect of Bethesda games are the tedious winding dungeons(why NV and Starfield are my favorite because they have the least of that) and Morrowind unfortunately has a lot. One aspect of Morrowind that I really enjoyed actually though, was the opportunity to be given information to actually take notes on(I wrote down directions quest givers gave for example) and Starfield was the only other Bethesda game I’ve played with a taste of that. Although unfortunately much less.

@[email protected]
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2Y

Man, feels like we played totally different games regarding Morrowind. Most of Morrowind’s dungeons are the smallest of any Bethesda game, and honestly it had the least amount of quests that even sent you to dungeons. Still, if you found them tedious you found them tedious. (anychance you installed other mods besides MP?)

All the same, I think the story is by far Bethesda’s magnum opus. (I mean Bethesda proper, since New Vegas was Obsidian and all)

And while I find exploration in Starfield to be extremely tedious, I will say they employed a “Skyrim/FO4” style sensibility where each dungeon should roughly take 10-20 minutes, making for nice bite sized chunks of gameplay.

I completely agree that NV had stellar use of dungeons that almost never overstayed their welcome.

Though if you want real tedium, in both winding dungeons and exploration, give Daggerfall unity a try. Great game, but my god does it go on and on and on.

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