Starfield has a release date

[DjchunKfunK]

The thing is, Freespace made a cracking space game that wasn't the least bit boring, full of stuff to do, and honestly needs a line-by-line reboot into a next-gen gaming engine. I know it wasn't a galaxy full of stars, and no "planetary exploration," but still Bethesda could have taken a few tips from one of the best space trader/shooters ever.

I like Freespace but I think if you were to put that out today without any changes there would rightly be a lot of complaints about the repetitive nature of the quests and things you do.

With regards to taking tips from Freespace I think that depends on the type of game you are trying to make. Freespace is a space shooter whilst Starfield is an RPG with some space shooting in it, I think they are ultimately different games and Bethesda chose to focus on the RPG side over the space shooting side.

[Raid]

Are we getting Freespace mixed up with Freelancer?

I would kill for a modern remake of the Freespace games with VR support. I know they've been modded for 20+ years (my brother used to write for a user-made campaign), but as the X-Wing Alliance upgrades have shown, you really need a modern graphics engine if you want worthwhile VR support.

[DjchunKfunK]

Ahh yeah I am. In terms of Freespace I think there is even less for Bethesda to take from that, as they are not making that type of game at all.

[Wrathbone]

Still thoroughly enjoying Starfield, but one quirk of the Creation engine that increasingly stands out the more I play is the staggeringly bad NPC pathfinding. Ironically it works best in crowds - e.g. if you’re following someone through a city, they’ll do a decent job of avoiding pedestrians, which is probably because crowds are a new feature with new code to handle them. But head to an enclosed space with obstacles and good god is it embarrassing.

Akila City’s al fresco bar, the Hitching Post, is the worst location I’ve found for demonstrating this. It’s a small deck area filled with tables and chairs and a whole bunch of NPCs who walk into things, walk into each other, vibrate violently as they attempt to walk over the deck barriers, block your path around tables and - most annoyingly - stare silently when you try to talk to them as they slowly finish their animation for getting off a stool and then immediately go to slowly sit on another stool.

Pathfinding was never great in BGS games but how have they not made improvements yet? How hard can it be? They appear to have it reasonably sussed for crowds, but not for individuals, which is really weird - almost as if crowd people are classed and co-ordinated as a single unit rather than as individuals. I’ll defend many of Starfield’s jankier areas, but this one seems inexcusably awful.

[Raid]

The pathfinding is one of the reasons I've lost interest. They've created a game filled with tight, fairly intricate indoor environments, and not come up with AI that can navigate them. It makes every firefight feel the same, and I think it's one of the issues that's contributing to my impression that it feels no different to Skyrim. Admittedly I've not got a huge amount of playtime, but I haven't seen an enemy use the boost pack that nearly every one of them carries, and if my experience is the same across the whole game, I assume it's because the AI simply isn't capable of navigating in three dimensions. That fight I had in the zero-gravity casino had them basically moving back and forth inside the same area, using no cover nor seeking me out when I left their view.

[Sly Boots]

I'd argue it's worse than Skyrim, I can't remember having to wait for several seconds after clicking on an NPC for them to slowly reposition themselves to talk to me, it's bizarre.

And I hate that bar on Akila, without fail every time I go in there I end up getting trapped by an NPC who's wandered in and refuses to back up, and the ceiling is too low to jump over or around them - this is also a problem in ships with your companions and crew (who often decide to stand in a tight group staring intently at a particular section of wall).

But what has also bothered me, and what I feel is a backward step from the ES games, is that now no-one has their own day-night schedule. I spent an untold amount of time in Oblivion waiting for shopkeepers etc to go to bed so I could break into their shops and ransack the place, while they'd often also go to the tavern for lunch or an evening drink. In Starfield, no matter the time of day, a shopkeeper is always in their shop, which is always open. For that matter, NPCs are ALWAYS in the same place you last saw them. It makes them feel even less like actual people and just two-legged cash machines or quest boards.

Yet they made 98% of planet exploration boring as hell because immersion

[DjchunKfunK]

I've not had issues with the NPCs I talk to but the followers are as bad as ever, made funny when they pop into the conversation and they are on the floor below so you just get a shot of the ground instead of their character model.

[Wrathbone]

Speaking of funny bugs, I had one yesterday where an engineer at the New Atlantis spaceport decided to slowly levitate into space.

[Sly Boots]

I've not had issues with the NPCs I talk to

Try initiating conversation with one who's sitting on a barstool...

[Animalmother]

On the flipside of the shops always being open there's times when the ship technician is nowhere to be found when you want to repair or upgrade your ship. I also find that some shop keepers will give you their life story when you approach them, I don't fucking care when you got to whatever planet we're on just sell me crap!

[Solitaire]

Are we getting Freespace mixed up with Freelancer?

I would kill for a modern remake of the Freespace games with VR support. I know they've been modded for 20+ years (my brother used to write for a user-made campaign), but as the X-Wing Alliance upgrades have shown, you really need a modern graphics engine if you want worthwhile VR support.

I might be. Just ignore my commentary re: all this - my old brain is remembering everything in a huge foggy mess, so never mind me

[Wrathbone]

They say any landing you can walk away from is a good one, but this one's not going to buff out:

Spoiler

[Animalmother]

Does the ship land exactly where you pick or is it always a set location? Never landed in a tree before

I landed near a fracking plant, unlocked a spaceship hatch and just took off. Was able to register then sell it for profit. Nice.

Maxed out friendship with Sarah then immediately got rid of her, not having a preachy ball ache on your shoulder is refreshing. Andreja is more chill.

[Wrathbone]

Does the ship land exactly where you pick or is it always a set location? Never landed in a tree before

It was a quest marker. To be fair my current ship is obnoxiously big.

[Wrathbone]

After 130 hours I've finished all the faction questlines and the main quest, heading into NG+ (which to be honest isn't worth it - my advice is create a save before heading into the heavily-signposted final mission and then go back to it, else you'll lose all your ships, outposts, inventory and credits). Without spoiling anything, the main story is kind of a non-event which feels like it ends about 75% of the way through it. What should have been a momentous, dramatic and even emotional ending was totally benign, almost pedestrian. If Fallout 4's ending was a bang (literally, as I shot Father in the face with a shotgun because he was an arse), Starfield's is a disappointing fizzle.

It's a real shame because there was a lot of promise to the story early on, and I love the game as a whole. And I know everyone says BGS main quests are always crap, but I've rarely found that to be the case if you give them some scrutiny (even Fallout 4's story was decent until the final chapter). The truth is that Starfield's main questline is the least interesting of them all, with the UC / Crimson Fleet ones being the best.