Starfield

[Jason]

The best part of the combat in the footage was when they were using traditional ammo based weapons that looked accurate and then they looted a fancy new lazer gun from a locked chest which looked like it couldn't hit a cows arse from a meter away, it was some stormtrooper sh*t. 

[Lock n' Stock]

On 6/13/2022 at 4:46 PM, Jason said:

Edit: 

 

 

I'm used to both voiced and unvoiced protags and there are pros and cons to either option. If this means more dialogue options then I'm absolutely not against it. First person dialogue is a bit odd, though. Easily fixable through mods ofc.

The voiced protagonist in Fallout 4 was heavily criticised. This to me almost seems like Bethesda admitting it was a mistake.

[Mexicola9302]

8 hours ago, Turan said:

Looking real good so far. 

 

Only one concern: gunplay looked really mediocre. I know it is Bethesda, but come on.. improve your combat already. 

In FO4 and FO76 the gunplay is actually good, compared to FO New Vegas and FO3. In the gameplay reveal of SF it still looked really clunky, but i think the combat is one of the last things they optimize, it also looked bad because of the bad FPS, the game isn't optimized with game ready drivers and stuff yet.

 

There also was this scene shortly after he got out of the space ship, the 2 or 3 creatures that move in front of him, that he first wanted to attack but then stopped, also looked very clunky how they moved. I honestly got no idea how game devs optimize their games, i mean in what order they do it. But i think first the game world needs to work, then the NPC's with their dialouges etc. picking up items, quests, sidequests does this work does that work etc., and in the end the combat gets optimized if the game is in the "polishing phase".

 

Combat is probably the last thing they optimize, because it has the least impact on the game itself, well coding wise. What we saw in the gameplay reveal, looked very much like Beta.

Edited June 15 by Mexicola9302

[SpaceBeagle]

about bad shooting/gunplay, just few reminders... it's "RPG" and you have to 'learn' your shooting, to level up your personal accuracy & handling and of your weapons with different stats & mods & types - and for 'dumb AI', they are also going to level up (maybe along side players advance, or via locations and game/story progress) and you can see in shown shoot-out from beginning of game pirates are 'level 2' prob. with some weak pea-guns. This was also sort of entry to the main story, so it could be also kinda 'tutorial' part of the game. Another thing - this is 'space game' with lots of different planets with different gravity & atmosphere, so I expect that gunplay is going to be little bit different from place to place! 

Maybe Bethesda even took some 'looter-shooter' approach with players/AI weapons and levels, because you can steal and use everything in the game, from guns up to whole ships  (to make thing bit harder for pirate/reseller type of gameplay)

 

Looking at modern shooters, and 'modern players', it feels like everybody expect that every gun is with at least 90% accuracy out of the box, even if you are a crappy player . 

For me shooting looked OK, who knows from what game build it was - and it was on console without use of any crosshair, but prob. with some form of aim-assist that is connected with your low level combat stats.

 

As a 'old school' PC player I want me some running around with bullets flying around in both directions, at least until I build-up my character to face some 'tanky-guys'... and not just entering base and killing everyone in less then 2.5mins  from a get go (that said I do hope that AI are smart enough to take cover and try to outflank you, not just bullet-sponge autoaim bots )

[Jason]

7 hours ago, Lock n' Stock said:

The voiced protagonist in Fallout 4 was heavily criticised. This to me almost seems like Bethesda admitting it was a mistake.

 

Voiced protags in RPG's can work but I think for what Beth do with their RPG's an unvoiced is ultimately better. It gives them more freedom that passes on to the player I think.

 

1 hour ago, SpaceBeagle said:

about bad shooting/gunplay, just few reminders... it's "RPG" and you have to 'learn' your shooting, to level up your personal accuracy & handling and of your weapons with different stats & mods & types - and for 'dumb AI', they are also going to level up (maybe along side players advance, or via locations and game/story progress) and you can see in shown shoot-out from beginning of game pirates are 'level 2' prob. with some weak pea-guns. This was also sort of entry to the main story, so it could be also kinda 'tutorial' part of the game. Another thing - this is 'space game' with lots of different planets with different gravity & atmosphere, so I expect that gunplay is going to be little bit different from place to place! 

 

Sorry but... nah, none of this is the case.

 

We already saw a bit of the skill tree and leveling up your gun skills will do things like increase damage and not accuracy. Being unable to hit a barn door with a machine gun at the start of the game isn't fun and Bethesda 100% won't be going down the path. Nor do I expect the actual gunplay to be impacted by what planet we're on, outside of low/zero G fighting anywho.

 

And I'm sure the AI enemies get more difficult as you go, a few pirates at an abandoned base won't be the pinnacle of difficulty in the game, but yea I doubt the AI is gonna all of a sudden make a massive leap in intelligence and tactics as you play. It'll happen a bit as you fight harder groups no doubt, but a lot of the difficulty increase will come from the AI simply having more health, armour and better weapons.

 

I really liked what I saw of the game and it's sitting along side BG3 as the game I'm most looking forward to playing next... but Starfield won't have great combat lol. Open world RPG's rarely do.

[JOSEPH X]

Good to see people are avoiding the hype train and information binges for this game. Just doing that alone will alter your enjoyment and opinion of Starfield when you get it and experience it for the first time. I know this because I've been burned so many times.

 

All my favourite games were ones I purchased either not knowing anything about them or watching the barest minimum of build up - Skyrim, Mass Effect 2, Fallout 3, GTA IV. My biggest disappointments were all games where I boarded the hype train and consumed every bit of information, speculation, expectation and analysis Red Dead Redemption, GTA V, Deus Ex: Human Revolution.

 

It's psychological and it's neurological- you burn though all your endorphins in the build up discovering minute details from screenshots and trailer breakdowns. When you come to play the game you don't get those endorphin hits you get when you experience something for the first time.

 

Starfield could be a system seller for me and it looks like Microsoft thought the same thing and bought out Bethesda. Todd Howard looked so at ease when he said, "and it's not just one planet you can land on - it's all the planets in the system, and not just one system - it's all the systems."

 

I've been discussing the game on reddit over the past couple of days and the information about 1000 planets has fried some peoples' brains. The two major gripes are seamless landing on planets and lack of vehicle while on the planet.

 

These guys are geniuses when it comes to placing objects in gameworlds so you put in X amount of effort for X amount of reward. They're not going to land you on a planet someplace where you have to walk 200 miles to get a nugget of iron ore. People don't seem to understand what makes exploration rewarding in previous Bethesda games. There's a lot of useless junk, but amongst that useless junk you find something useful.  The analogy I've been using is empty wine bottles in Skyrim. You'll be looking through them going, "That's useless, that's useless, that's useless ...ah look, a potion of ultimate healing. Take that." I'm as upset about seamless entry into a planet's atmosphere when landing as I am about seamlessly entering interiors in previous BGS games. If all the interiors in Fallout 3 were seamlessly enterable there would have been three Burger Shots and three clothes shops ha ha.

 

Todd said you can land anywhere on any of over 1000 planets. How it works when you land anywhere on a planet, how it feels when you land anywhere on a planet, what's there when you land anywhere on a planet or how far you can go when you land anywhere on a planet are thoughts I don't want to know until I experience them myself. Very excited for this.

Edited June 16 by JOSEPH X

[GiveMeLiberty78]

Interesting views everybody, and I agree with you @JOSEPH X about why people should be careful not to get 'hyped up' for the game (or anything). (Oh, and yes an interesting and true psychological/neurological explanation too!)

I like the overall look, but the lack of seamless landings (and presumably takeoffs) is a missed opportunity in my opinion - yeah I understand why that is technically harder to create (and for players to pull off), but rewarding for me so I enjoy that kind of immersion à la flight sim and Star Citizen. What do you guys think?

Out of curiosity, what do you guys think about possible different 'styles' of play? E.g., will we be able to go in guns blazing, sneak undetected, or use silent take-downs, or any combination? I am not really a big gamer and have little time for it unfortunately, so I wonder what your thoughts are.

Oh, and I think that the silent protagonist idea is an interesting choice. I have read some interesting reasons even just on this forum. Perhaps I am just getting old, but the last silent protagonist who I remember playing as was Claude from GTA 3! (As I recall, it was a deliberate choice to reduce that game's development workload, and to let players take on his persona more easily.) The overall customisation looks impressive too, which to me makes sense with a silent protagonist.

A shame that it is delayed but I'm unsurprised why, but overall I like Starfield as a concept.

[Jason]

1 hour ago, GiveMeLiberty78 said:

I like the overall look, but the lack of seamless landings (and presumably takeoffs) is a missed opportunity in my opinion - yeah I understand why that is technically harder to create (and for players to pull off), but rewarding for me so I enjoy that kind of immersion à la flight sim and Star Citizen. What do you guys think?

 

I've played a fair bit of NMS which has planet landings and take-off and landing is something that ultimately becomes trivial. It's cool early on, and I'm not saying I'd be against it at all if it existed in Starfield, but I buy their reasoning that it's not worth the time and effort it'd cost them to do over other aspects of the game. I would be disappointed if it goes to a load screen or something like that, mind you, but based on the demo it seems to be a cutscene which if so... I'm not against. Would sorta make it feel like a TV show/film watching your ship land on a planet. Eitherway, as long as there's no fade to black I'll be fine with it my self.

 

1 hour ago, GiveMeLiberty78 said:

Out of curiosity, what do you guys think about possible different 'styles' of play? E.g., will we be able to go in guns blazing, sneak undetected, or use silent take-downs, or any combination? I am not really a big gamer and have little time for it unfortunately, so I wonder what your thoughts are.

 

Yea Starfield will allow all of this, plus no doubt a fair few situations that you'll be able to talk your self out of, it's part of what makes a Beth RPG's what they are,

 

1 hour ago, GiveMeLiberty78 said:

Oh, and I think that the silent protagonist idea is an interesting choice. I have read some interesting reasons even just on this forum. Perhaps I am just getting old, but the last silent protagonist who I remember playing as was Claude from GTA 3! (As I recall, it was a deliberate choice to reduce that game's development workload, and to let players take on his persona more easily.) The overall customisation looks impressive too, which to me makes sense with a silent protagonist.

 

Silent protagonists like Claude should not be confused with an unvoiced protagonist, which is what Starfield has. Unvoiced protagonists are popular in RPG's because there's A LOT of dialogue and voiced protags typically limit the amount of freedom developers and writers can have with the story and choices. They can work, Mass Effect does them well, but for more open ended games like Bethesda RPG's, and other stuff like CRPG's, unvoiced protagonists allow for a better RPG.

[AkshayKumar]

Would you rather dialogue be like Oblivion where when you speak to characters your perspective gets locked on to them? Or like Skyrim where you can look around most times when a character talks to you and the world doesn't freeze as you are engaged in dialogue? 

 

Starfield has religions apparently that you can be a part of during the character creator. Three of these religions are

Enlightened

Sanctum Universal

The Great Serpent

 

https://www.theloadout.com/starfield/religions

 

Apparently these religions have their own traits, like Enlightened and Sanctum Universal are opposed to each other while if you worship the Serpent your character has to keep jumping now and then or else your health will lower. 

Interesting

[Mexicola9302]

I don't think it matters that much, if the protagonist is silent or not. Because the person you talk to still says a lot of text. If the char you play is silent the NPC's still talk a lot, it isn't less work for them or anything. I actually liked that our char was able to speak in FO4.

 

It doesn't really matter if our char speaks or not.

 

I don't really care that we don't have seamless landing on planets, a cutscene is okay for me.

 

I think i will use the starter home trait, it's nice having a home in the beginning of a game to store stuff and getting a well rested effect and stuff like that. If i play Skyrim with the "Alternate Start" mod, i always pick the Breeze Home in Whiterun.

[GiveMeLiberty78]

Yeah, that all makes sense @Jason. I think that like you and @Mexicola9302 said, a kind of cutscene/more natural transition is something that I could live with. (I'm a flight sim enthusiast/pilot-in-training, so for me it is all about greasing those takeoffs and landings! Plus I like that kind of immersion, but yes I understand everything you said about Starfield being an RPG; it is not a space sim.)

Good find @AkshayKumar - I like the passion for deep-dives that you guys have for Starfield (and other games I've read about in this forum). I agree @Mexicola9302, I really like the 'Starter Home' trait. 'Serpent's Embrace' is kinda quirky, but I like the idea. Interesting indeed.

[Jason]

2 hours ago, AkshayKumar said:

Would you rather dialogue be like Oblivion where when you speak to characters your perspective gets locked on to them? Or like Skyrim where you can look around most times when a character talks to you and the world doesn't freeze as you are engaged in dialogue? 

 

They mentioned that dialogue is in first person, I so I reckon you get "locked" into it though you can probably walk away and come back like you can in Fallout 4.

 

As for traits, I dig the idea of the "Spaced" one (less health/endurance on planets, more in space). I like the idea of playing a character who grew up in space so if I can do that I may go with that for my 1st char. For the background my go to is always an early start on charisma/persuasion as I like to be able to talk my way through stuff from the get go.

[AkshayKumar]

1 hour ago, Jason said:

As for traits, I dig the idea of the "Spaced" one (less health/endurance on planets, more in space). I like the idea of playing a character who grew up in space so if I can do that I may go with that for my 1st char. For the background my go to is always an early start on charisma/persuasion as I like to be able to talk my way through stuff from the get go.

Would be cool to see a complete pacifist playthrough in this game where you smooth talk your way till the end

 

I like this trait

 

Man if I get to play I would regularly visit my parents and see if they comment on my actions or act as a moral compass or even if it's just the same regurgitated lines it will be cool to have them around still. 

 

I wish we could have our own family if we want too

 

Interesting that there's a choice between being an introvert versus extrovert. I would lean extrovert though you can probably opt for neither. If you thought the Skyrim character creation was time consuming this one might jussst be a bigger time sink lot's of interesting options it looks like. 

The unwanted hero sounds interesting though idk what it is exactly

 

1 hour ago, GiveMeLiberty78 said:

Good find @AkshayKumar - I like the passion for deep-dives that you guys have for Starfield (and other games I've read about in this forum)

Haha I personally just post stuff I find on reddit here so it's the redditors who have to be commended in my case

 

Here's another thing I found there

Edited June 17 by AkshayKumar

[Mister Pink]

6 hours ago, AkshayKumar said:

Would you rather dialogue be like Oblivion where when you speak to characters your perspective gets locked on to them? Or like Skyrim where you can look around most times when a character talks to you and the world doesn't freeze as you are engaged in dialogue? 

 

Starfield has religions apparently that you can be a part of during the character creator. Three of these religions are

Enlightened

Sanctum Universal

The Great Serpent

 

If The Enlightened are the science-based religion, I might run with them. However, any scientist worth their salt wouldn't allow themselves to be associated as "science as a religion." But that being said, we'll have to see if there are perks/downsides. The Enlightened might just be hijacking "science" as a means to promote their religion but it's still faith-based. So, we don't know if that's the religions PR or if they are literally science-based. If they are literally science-based then they will have my interested from a role-playing point of view. In Fallout 4, I sided with the Institute. 

 

Even though The Institute kidnapped people to experiment on and had many faults, their technology I found was the key to the future of mankind's survival even if that meant nefarious practices. The human race and human survival in Fallout is at a critical low in a nuclear fallout world, so I was able to rationalize The Institute's more extreme behaviour as being not great but necessary. Extraordinary times call for extraordinary measures. I  might be able to continue this kind of thinking by being a part of The Enlightened. 

 

Currently playing through Mass Effect 2 and I'm kind of going down a Renegade route. My character's in Fallout or Skyrim are neither black or white, good/bad. I try just make the right decision I think is right at the time, sometimes if I think it's an asshole move but benefits me or the greater good or I feel the other person/collateral was being an idiot. 

 

I hope Starfield will have some morally grey choices with real knock-on effects but also overall a character system that can make decisions that doesn't just put you into a binary good/bad. 

 

2 hours ago, AkshayKumar said:

Man if I get to play I would regularly visit my parents and see if they comment on my actions or act as a moral compass or even if it's just the same regurgitated lines it will be cool to have them around still. 

That's what I was wondering a few posts back. How can this backstory/Trait actually affect gameplay? I would like to think something like you mentioned does happen. Or regular visits to them increases some skill. I mean, it's a quite a realistic feature.. I imagine people growing up with two parents might give you some more stability in life. How can this be manifested in the game? 

 

Oh Starfield! You beg more questions than you give answers! 

 

And I watched Destin's video about Starfield and the concerns he has for the game based on mostly the low frame count Are you guys worried about this? We were all burned with Cyberpunk to a large extent and Fallout 76 was a launch disaster. Personally, even all CP77's faults, it's one of the best games I've played. I think if Starfield launches a bit wonky, I'm sure I'll still love it based on genre and concept alone. Hey, I enjoyed ME: Andromeda. You might think my standards are low but usually enjoy the vision of a game, the setting and can get on board with what they were trying to do, even if it falls short in areas.  

Edited June 17 by Mister Pink

[AkshayKumar]

@Mister Pink I would probably go with Sanctum Universal if I had to choose a religion. I wanna see what it would be like believing in the idea of God in a science driven galactic society, sounds like we'd be a bunch of colourful outcasts and that sounds fun. 

 

I wonder how House Va'arun or however you spell them plays into this, aren't they a bunch of religious fanatics too? Haven't heard much of them after when they were announced like a year back. 

[Mister Pink]

19 minutes ago, AkshayKumar said:

@Mister Pink I would probably go with Sanctum Universal if I had to choose a religion. I wanna see what it would be like believing in the idea of God in a science driven galactic society, sounds like we'd be a bunch of colourful outcasts and that sounds fun. 

 

That does sound fun. I like the self-imposed juxtaposition. Which begs another question. What if you are religious but you keep ignoring your religious trait responses.. at some point in the game, can you swap out a trait; .ie leave your religion or even worse somehow be ex-communicated. OK, probably a bit far-fetched, but would be nice if there were some character-arc related to traits and your character changing over time. You start of religious but increasingly your decisions are out of character. Eventually you get prompted to change one trait, your religious one because you aren't practicing. 

Edited June 17 by Mister Pink

[Jason]

Science as a religion is not unusual in sci-fi, though it often revolves around said group worshipping advanced unknown (alien) technology more so than simply Earth based science.

 

I don't expect the background or traits you pick to have massive long term effects though, even stuff like the parent one I imagine will just be a small little thing you have that may or may not come up now and then as you play.

[Tacymist]

I'll join the religion that has the coolest outfits tbh.

[Mister Pink]

5 minutes ago, Jason said:

Science as a religion is not unusual in sci-fi, though it often revolves around said group worshipping advanced unknown (alien) technology more so than simply Earth based science.

Yeah I remember the Church of The Children of Atom 

 

 

 

Edited June 17 by Mister Pink

[Matrelith]

 

One of the things I'm most curious about it is the kinds of companions we'll have. One thing the latest Fallout/TES games did well in my opinion is companions, so I'm hoping Starfield continues that trend. The 'Introvert' description specifically talks about ''human'' companions so I'm guessing something like a robot companion is pretty much a given. I'd love a Dogmeat kind of companion, just a doggo in a lil' space suit. 

[Jason]

The robot we see walk out of our ship is a companion we can recruit, they confirmed it in one of the dev-talk videos a while back.

 

What I'm curious about re: companions is how many we can stock on our ship. We know based on the ship builder footage we can increase the size of the crew slots on our ship (2-10 was shown, to be seen if it can go further) but I wonder if that's 10 of the fully fledged companions we can put on our ship, or some generic (probably named) AI that we can recruit.

 

Being able to make a Firefly style crew is something I really want from this game my self.

[Mister Pink]

3 hours ago, Jason said:

What I'm curious about re: companions is how many we can stock on our ship. We know based on the ship builder footage we can increase the size of the crew slots on our ship (2-10 was shown, to be seen if it can go further) but I wonder if that's 10 of the fully fledged companions we can put on our ship, or some generic (probably named) AI that we can recruit.

 I can imagine Bethesda having a system where when we upgrade our ship ie. add an armoury that there is a weapons expert that spends time there that we can trade with or go to them to unlock upgrades. You might add a medical facility and have a doctor onboard giving you access to medical supplies etc. Going off Mass Effect, you might have; a pilot, a medic, a comms person, armourer, an onboard engineer, and R&D person. Would be nice if some of them can be companions so you can choose the right companion to go with you for the right planet. 
 

At least it would be nice if your ship eventually becomes self sufficient to allow you to travel farther out and not have to fast travel back to a city for supplies. I would also love that if you get a pilot that you can set a course for the your spaceship and you travel in real time. During this time you can relax in your captain's quarters, upgrade weapons and the weapon's bench, listen to space radio, talk to companions, and enjoy a viewing deck. At any time then you can either fly yourself or skip journey if you have already been there. I wouldn't like a pilot at the start of the game. But recruiting a pilot so you can enjoy your ship and be travelling at the same time would be nice. Paying for crew would be cool too. Paying for crew with varying degrees of experience would be nice. 

 

I do hope there is a cost to fast travelling. And not just an arbitrary monetary cost. I would love to have to refuel the ship like in Mass Effect. I know it's not a space-sim but I want to have those big space journeys that give you a sense of scale and space. Travelling to another solar system isn't just some overused fast-travel affair. I hope there are incentives to fly and explore and not just use relays and the game becomes this, tap to go here, cue loading screen job. 

 

If they can make it worth while to fly to your destination every or most times it would be great. For example, you'll always at a minimum make back in resources what you lose in fuel and a profitable amount. Then also the option to raid or defend from space pirates, giving you all their cargo and even fuel. Stealing fuel would be a nice addition. 

 

Imagine going out to the darker corners of the universe and encountering really more obscure high-level aliens and space pirates. They have the best loot but also require you to be very skilled to defeat them. Can't wait!

Edited June 17 by Mister Pink

[Jason]

14 minutes ago, Mister Pink said:

I do hope there is a cost to fast travelling. And not just an arbitrary monetary cost. I would love to have to refuel the ship like in Mass Effect. I know it's not a space-sim but I want to have those big space journeys that give you a sense of scale and space. Travelling to another solar system isn't just some overused fast-travel affair. I hope there are incentives to fly and explore and not just use relays and the game becomes this, tap to go here, cue loading screen job. 

 

There are parts that add "grav jump fuel" which seem to increase the jump range of your ship. No idea if you'll need to refill that fuel but it does seem likely.

 

The ship cockpit seems to dictate crew slots, or at least be a good source of it. Looking at it again, I wonder if your crew is different from your staff? In the ship customisation video we se a medical bay and bridge that's got got a good amount of people in it. Perhaps your companions fill the "crew" slots you get from ship customisation and staff for the various facilities on your ship (medical, armoury? etc) are staff based on the size of the facility or something.

[Candy_Licker]

On 6/17/2022 at 10:57 AM, Mexicola9302 said:

I don't think it matters that much, if the protagonist is silent or not. Because the person you talk to still says a lot of text. If the char you play is silent the NPC's still talk a lot, it isn't less work for them or anything. I actually liked that our char was able to speak in FO4.

 

It doesn't really matter if our char speaks or not.

 

 

 

For me, a not voiced characters in 2022 is a no-go. I know where they are coming from, but I don't need complete "carte blanche" characters. Apparently in every game you  have the ability to completely customize your character, including generic "back stories", to the point it all feels generic, shallow and ultimately irrelevant. I get that for many people, creating a character from scratch without any presets is what RPG are all about. For me,  in a single player RPG where there's lots of interaction with NPC's, it's just immersion breaking and ultimately a missed chance to give our character some personality.

Mind you, I'll probabbly check it out eventually, due to a lack of alternatives in sight, but hype? Nah.

[Mexicola9302]

It doesn't feel more immersive to me playing somebody like Geralt in The Witcher, or other predefined characters. For me both is okay, fully customizable chars and predefined chars. One thing is not more immerisve than the other, it doesn't really matter.

 

I wonder if there will be a Hardcore mode, so we have to eat, drink, sleep, but no idea how the not fast travelling would work if we travel through space. Also maybe the oxygen is limited while we explore planets without any oxygen in the atmosphere.

[Failed Again]

I prefer a voiced character. I played FO4 then followed with FO/NV. It didn't grab me. I missed the voice.

 

Also, think RDR2, after Aruther M, going voiceless was disappointing. 

 

Luckily, I just started ESO, so I am getting use to no voice. Still would be Beter with one

 

Anyway, in space they say, " no one can hear you scream"...

Edited June 19 by Failed Again

[Jason]

1 hour ago, Candy_Licker said:

For me,  in a single player RPG where there's lots of interaction with NPC's, it's just immersion breaking and ultimately a missed chance to give our character some personality.

 

Voiced characters in RPG greatly limit what you want. Unless you want to play a predefined character, unvoiced protags allow the developers to create far more dialogue options for you, giving you more choices in the story and allow you to create a deeper more personalised character.

 

You can do a voiced character in an RPG well, I think Mass Effect is a great example like I said previously, but for Bethesda style RPG's which are much closer to a CRPG, unvoiced ultimately allows more play freedom and allows us to create deeper and more personalised characters.

[Mister Pink]

4 hours ago, Candy_Licker said:

For me, a not voiced characters in 2022 is a no-go. I know where they are coming from, but I don't need complete "carte blanche" characters. Apparently in every game you  have the ability to completely customize your character, including generic "back stories", to the point it all feels generic, shallow and ultimately irrelevant. I get that for many people, creating a character from scratch without any presets is what RPG are all about. For me,  in a single player RPG where there's lots of interaction with NPC's, it's just immersion breaking and ultimately a missed chance to give our character some personality.

Mind you, I'll probabbly check it out eventually, due to a lack of alternatives in sight, but hype? Nah.

I don't see it as generic, shallow or irrellevant. In fact, I see it as the complete opposite; unique, deep and very relevant, and I'll explain why. 

 

It's not really generic as there aren't any kind of open-world RPG games like Bethesda's that allow you to pick traits like this. Personally, I don't know a game that allows you to start off with a mortage (debt) or choose to be an introvert. Remember, these traits will contribute to gameplay. I'll use Introvert trait as an example. 

 

Introvert  

 

 

• Pros: Greater endurance when adventuring alone
• Cons: Less endurance when adventuring with other humans
• Notes: Can't be combined with Extrovert trait (source and other traits)

 

So you see the effects and negative effects this has on gameplay - that's the relevence.  But, it's a role you are choosing to play. This contributes to immersion because you imput either your own personality into your character or at least if it's not your own personality it's some creation you've made. That's user-defined, that's some investment you as the player gets to invest in the game. The opposite of that is someone else write that into the story for you without the consequence on or choice of consequence gameplay, just a pre-defined player which is argubly more generic as there is no choice. It's also more of a passive participation. It's almost like the difference between watching a movie and playing a game. Watching a movie is fun and enjoyable but you don't control the protagonist. It's a passive venture where you decide nothing. With videogames, the immersive element is that you control the protagonist and you decide to a certain degree what happens.  With traits that affect gameplay, it's one step forward to being in more control of the story. I personally think it's more immersive I can't think of an argument to contrary. 

 

Of course, there is a predefined story in Starfield but I asssume there are multiple outcomes for parts of the story. Also, how you navigate the story by role playing is built upon by traits, skills that you choose and responses you give. 

 

4 hours ago, Candy_Licker said:

I get that for many people, creating a character from scratch without any presets is what RPG are all about. For me,  in a single player RPG where there's lots of interaction with NPC's, it's just immersion breaking and ultimately a missed chance to give our character some personality.

 

Respectfully, can you see how that for people like me that enjoy the idea of a silent character or having traits that they are the oppoturtinity to give our character some personality. It's not about the character having an actor voice our responses, it's about having a character you created with personality traits you've chosen. Based on your personality traits, there will be or should be dialogue options that don't exist for someone who chose a character with different character traits than me. That leaves more variables, replay value etc etc. The immersive part is that we can role play by leaning into our character and responding in a why we believe our character will behave. That to me is more immersive that just having somone voice the character. 

 

To sum it up, Starfield will allow us to inject more our options we choose. IMO, there is a more of a synergy with the player/character becase the player gets to participate and mould the character to our taste in the Starfield univserse. Choosing traits, choosing responses and making decisions that affect the story is probably about as immersive as one can get. I can enjoy a pre-defined story or character like Geralt but it's less immersive because it's more like driving playing Scalextric, stuck to one pre-defined person. That's great if the character is written well but essentially in a Bethesda game we write the character of the protaonist within the confines of the world Bethesda created.  That's the beauty.

 

And no voice? I am the voice of the main character! I voice it in my head. It's a very interactive experience. 

Edited June 19 by Mister Pink

[Jason]

I remember The Outer Worlds had some background stuff for your character but it was very basic, beyond that I can't really recall any modern AAA RPG's where you can do that sort of stuff, it's usually reserved for CRPG's. I do remember Todd Howard in a dev talk for the game a while back talking about how he thinks players are "ready" for that type of stuff to return, so I hope it's a trend that continues.

 

Though I don't think players somehow got so dumb background traits for characters were a bad option, those types of options got removed for a lot of the same reasons a lot of classic RPG features got removed from AAA RPG's which is to dumb them down cause in the mid to late 2000's publishers thought console players were dumb as rocks, which was never true.

[Matrelith]

The most recent game I can remember that has a ''traits''-like feature is Disco Elysium, with the Thought Cabinet. Though you were a bit more free in choosing which thoughs to have. It does feel like Bethesda has been taking notes from Obsidian on how to do the RPG aspect right. I loved the Traits system in New Vegas and later on in The Outer Worlds. It gives your character a bit more personality.