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[ReBurn]

Who is dumb enough to respond to Steam reviews? Todd, honey, listen...don't respond to Steam reviews. They'll tear you apart.

 

[Agent_4Seven]

It's boring by design.

 

[Heisenberg007]

Good to see even Metro covering this crap:

Bethesda is contacting Starfield owners to say their negative reviews are wrong

Customer support staff on Steam are replying to negative reviews of Starfield, in an attempt to get players to change their rating.

metro.co.uk

 

[GHG]

Got check out the Forza review thread where just yesterday you'll find me calling out Xbox and turn10 for releasing a shitty product. On PC which is were i spend 95% on my gaming time.


I'll play what I like thanks, not what some committee on the internet tells me I should like. Not sure why its so difficult to comprehend.

Nobody is telling you not to play it, but if you actually do play on PC rather than on Xbox then you shouldn't be mystified as to why the reaction is what it has been considering the plethora of options available. People aren't here to prop up Xbox and their games studios in their time of need, it's of nobody's concern on the platform.

 

[eNT1TY]

There are plenty of other games that suck in peace, poor Starfield. May it suck in peace.

 

[Giallo Corsa]

Until you get to the third act when it does.

---

And it's hard to take the extreme criticism of Starfield seriously, especially since we know there's a concerted effort to slag anything Microsoft by certain folks within the industry.

Starfield isn't perfect, but it's far from being as horrible as it's being made out to be by review bombers. If this would have come out on the PS5 it would have gotten GOTY nominations all over.

Ay lmao
Here we go again with the persecution complex, man, you just can't help yourselves, everything has to be a VS, everytime it's someone else's fault...

 

[ChorizoPicozo]

Fix your engine or make a new one. They deserve all the negativity.

 

[Topher]

Starfield isn't perfect, but it's far from being as horrible as it's being made out to be by review bombers. If this would have come out on the PS5 it would have gotten GOTY nominations all over.

 

[GHG]

Until you get to the third act when it does.

---

And it's hard to take the extreme criticism of Starfield seriously, especially since we know there's a concerted effort to slag anything Microsoft by certain folks within the industry.

Starfield isn't perfect, but it's far from being as horrible as it's being made out to be by review bombers. If this would have come out on the PS5 it would have gotten GOTY nominations all over.

Clown take. Go look at the Steam reviews for Hi Fi Rush, the Forza Horizon games, the AOE games, Grounded, Age of Mythology, Flight Sim, MCC, etc and then come back to us.

 

[SirKicksalot]

>Pete Hines retires
>they start doing this dumb shit

Perhaps Pete was not so bad after all.

 

[clarky]

Nobody is telling you not to play it, but if you actually do play on PC rather than on Xbox then you shouldn't be mystified as to why the reaction is what it has been considering the plethora of options available. People aren't here to prop up Xbox and their games studios in their time of need, it's of nobody's concern on the platform.

why are you ignoring all the positive reactions and hand waving them away? Obviously they don't fit the narrative that you want so they must be wrong. Right?

Again the game sits at 85 or so on MC, and 2 out of 3 people on steam like the game. I'm not saying the game is the second coming of Christ, just i had a fine time with it, despite some glaring flaws. As did the Majority of people who played it. That's a fact.

What am i supposed to be mystified about?

 

[BigLee74]

There was only going to be one of two people creating this thread…

I am not disappointed.

 

[GymWolf]

A GHG topic about starfield is almost as good as an evilore topic about the roman empire.

 

[GHG]

why are you ignoring all the positive reactions and hand waving them away? Obviously they don't fit the narrative that you want so they must be wrong. Right?

Again the game sits at 85 or so on MC, and 2 out of 3 people on steam like the game. I'm not saying the game is the second coming of Christ, just i had a fine time with it, despite some glaring flaws. As did the Majority of people who played it. That's a fact.

What am i supposed to be mystified about?

There are "positive reactions" for every game in existence.

Where this is currently sat on Steam is below expectations given the developer and the publisher.

• It has a lower user review score than fallout 76.
• The player count has fallen off a cliff, it's currently being played by less people than Skyrim and Fallout 4 signifying the fact that most people who purchased it would already rather spend their time elsewhere (which wasn't the case for Bethesda's previous games, Skyrim in particular).
• If there were no problem then you wouldn't have the developer in full desperation mode responding to the negative reviews on Steam begging people to play the game.

Not sure what you're attempting to dispute here.

There was only going to be one of two people creating this thread…

I am not disappointed.

 

[clarky]

There are "positive reactions" for every game in existence.

Where this is currently sat on Steam it's below expectations given the developer and the publisher.

• It has a lower user review score than fallout 76.
• The player count has fallen off a cliff, it's currently being played by less people than Skyrim's and Fallout 4 signifying the fact that most people who purchased it would already rather spend their time elsewhere (which wasn't the case for Bethesda's previous games, Skyrim in particular).
• If there were no problem then you wouldn't have the developer in full desperation mode responding to the negative reviews on Steam begging people to play the game.

Not sure what you're attempting to dispute here.

Amazing.

 

[JohnnyFootball]

Until you get to the third act when it does.

---

And it's hard to take the extreme criticism of Starfield seriously, especially since we know there's a concerted effort to slag anything Microsoft by certain folks within the industry.

Starfield isn't perfect, but it's far from being as horrible as it's being made out to be by review bombers. If this would have come out on the PS5 it would have gotten GOTY nominations all over.

Stop with the drama. If it had come to all systems like it was supposed to, it would have gotten same criticism of 30 fps, excess loading screen, too much random generated content, piss poor optimization, weak PRG elements, too much quantity over quality with "1000s of systems." The faction quests would still get praised as being the high point.

 

[Sethbacca]

Please generate Disneyland on the entirety of the surface of the planet, in less than half a second, on every planet I visit, just like in the real world. Sounds totally reasonable.

Maybe they should have limited their scope to create a handful of more entertaining planets rather than creating a lot of nothing?

 

[Madflavor]

After Fallout 4 being a step back, FO76 being an unbelievable disaster, and Starfield a disappointment as well as showing the age of Bethesda's design philosophy, I don't understand how anyone can have hope for TES:VI.

Todd is an old dog who can't learn any new tricks at this point. That man is still stuck in 2006 - 2011 and thinks the standards from that window of time are even remotely impressive or acceptable in 2023. If Bethesda doesn't take the reception to Starfield as a shot across the bow, TES:VI is fucked. And if anyone wants to say "Hurr it got great reception accckktually. When is a mid 80s score bad?" don't start with that. There were plenty of people during Starfield's first week launch that immediately saw the problems with it, and many people who enjoyed their time with it got hit hard with the Post Honeymoon phase. It's been a couple of months, it's generally accepted at this point that Starfield is a 2006 game made for 2023.

 

[cireza]

Maybe they should have limited their scope to create a handful of more entertaining planets rather than creating a lot of nothing?

Maybe not ? Maybe this is what you would like but maybe that others are happy with the universe and how it is depicted ?

 

[Buggy Loop]

I ended up disappointed by Starfield by the end of it but, I kind of understand what they're saying.

Yes, empty planets are required I think. I hate No man's sky fucking brimming with life and always some random fucking creature pop-up every square kilometer for a bazillion planets, it's cartoony and stupid as fuck.

The problem is peoples expect a space game to be tailored made ala Mass effect (cough the planets were not cough) but at a big scale. Maybe in fact Bethesda should have done this as in the end its an RPG and they dropped the whole space sim aspect completely.

But the likes of Elite Dangerous & Star Citizen, you have to expect that there's planets with no special features. Difference here is that they are online so players CAN make the content on empty planets. War waging between orgs, etc. Elite dangerous is a bit more problematic for that since it's the whole Milky Way, spreading players too far and wide that any encounters when you're outside the main system becomes almost like finding a pin needle in a haystack.

The problem with Starfield is not that the planets are empty, it's that the traversal is SHIT. No land vehicles, can't fly ships. IMHO of course.

It's really a problem for all space games. Players love the idea of it, but ultimately are disappointed when you go for realism. They basically want just the good parts of the space opera ala Star Wars / Star Trek / etc. Not the travel of it, not the emptiness of it. But when they hear that it's massive with X number of solar systems, they dream big. Honestly, I don't understand the expectations.

 

[Mortisfacio]

I gave up on the game in Neon. After spending 5-10 minutes getting coffee as a quest I just couldn't do it anymore. Nothing up to that point felt compelling, good writing, gunplay was average. Just doesn't do anything well and doesn't respect your time.

 

[Zathalus]

[*]The player count has fallen off a cliff, it's currently being played by less people than Skyrim and Fallout 4 signifying the fact that most people who purchased it would already rather spend their time elsewhere (which wasn't the case for Bethesda's previous games, Skyrim in particular).

Has it? I just checked Steamcharts and it seems higher then both looking at the one week peak and one month average. Fallout 4 and Skyrim are also the most heavily modded games in existence while Starfield doesn't even have the creation kit released yet. I spent my time in the game, I see no reason to return to it unless it has major mod or expansion content.

The player drop off doesn't appear that much different from other single player RPGs. Hogwarts Legacy faced a similar drop in players. Baldurs Gate 3 has a much higher player count, but it is the better game with multiplayer and extensive choices for very different replayability.

 

[SmokedMeat]

Not even remotely similar games, which you would know if you played both of them.

Which is why I said just play No Man’s Sky.

 

[Roxkis_ii]

Instead of collecting the complaints and working on updating the game according to player feedback, they try pissing in the ocean of steam reviews to try to save their egos. Pathetic.

Even now, I still find myself wanting to try the game out, but stuff like this isn’t attractive or encouraging at all.

 

[GHG]

Has it? I just checked Steamcharts and it seems higher then both looking at the one week peak and one month average. Fallout 4 and Skyrim are also the most heavily modded games in existence while Starfield doesn't even have the creation kit released yet. I spent my time in the game, I see no reason to return to it unless it has major mod or expansion content.

The player drop off doesn't appear that much different from other single player RPGs. Hogwarts Legacy faced a similar drop in players. Baldurs Gate 3 has a much higher player count, but it is the better game with multiplayer and extensive choices for very different replayability.

Steam is far bigger now than it was when those games launched. You need to calculate based on player % attrition over time.

Also steamdb is what you want to use.

 

[Topher]

why are you ignoring all the positive reactions and hand waving them away? Obviously they don't fit the narrative that you want so they must be wrong. Right?

Again the game sits at 85 or so on MC, and 2 out of 3 people on steam like the game. I'm not saying the game is the second coming of Christ, just i had a fine time with it, despite some glaring flaws. As did the Majority of people who played it. That's a fact.

What am i supposed to be mystified about?

The game is clearly divisive but you are not wrong. Most folks on Steam are giving the game a thumbs up versus a thumbs down. Certainly we all expected a lot more thumbs up than there is, but it seems the game's obvious flaws are too much for many or the hype was too inflated. Like you, I stand by my opinion that Starfield is a damn good game. I've got 140 hours in the game so I feel no need for any validation of that opinion. The flaws are obvious and there is no denying that. I believe we discussed them quite thoroughly in the OT. But flawed doesn't mean automatically bad. This game was over-hyped but once we get past that acknowledgement and focus on the core game play, there is a heck of a lot to like about this game, imo. If others don't see it that way then that's fine. Isn't the first time I've enjoyed a game that was panned by a very vocal minority. Not even close.

 

[Dr.Morris79]

Hrrrm, what other mediums have been taken over by certain people that can't handle any kind of criticism?

I wonder

Seems to be a running trend lately. They make shit, can't handle that it's shit, call you shit for you not liking their shit

Winning times these are.

 

[StealthGoblin]

So the game being boring and shit in places was by design? Awesome.

Whole idea of doing this is cringe. Taking the feedback on board is fine, but actively trying to convince someone they are wrong is something else.

 

[Mortisfacio]

Steam is far bigger now than it was when those games launched. You need to calculate based on player % attrition over time.

Also steamdb is what you want to use.

Even then, 30 day chart is Starfield 21,736 average.

Skyrim has two editions. 19,583 for special edition and 2,015 (or 21,598 total). It's a 2023 game with a 30 day average in line with a 2011 game.

 

[graywolf323]

Until you get to the third act when it does.

---

And it's hard to take the extreme criticism of Starfield seriously, especially since we know there's a concerted effort to slag anything Microsoft by certain folks within the industry.

Starfield isn't perfect, but it's far from being as horrible as it's being made out to be by review bombers. If this would have come out on the PS5 it would have gotten GOTY nominations all over.

ah yes the ’Xbox tax’

 

[NeroDaGod]

I’m getting second hand embarrassment from this.

 

[Flutta]

You're still a couple of points off (on the 10 scale) if I'm going to be pedantic.

You also referenced the OT and how everyone was loving it there so I responded accordingly. This is the worst rated Bethesda RPG on Steam and in general a review score under 70 on the platform is not good no matter how you shake it.

What you need to understand is the fact that on PC (and in particular on Steam) there is absolutely reason for a people to make excuses for (and continue playing) games that don't meet their expectations.

There are too many other high quality games, spanning decades. If someone wants to scratch a space game itch then there are plenty of other options like x4 foundations, spaceengine, elite dangerous (the real version, not the console port), NMS, Stardeus, etc. If you want space ship building specifically then there's stuff like cosmoteer and space engineers.

And then on the RPG side of things Baldurs Gate 3 and Colony Ship (the latter being space themed) have just released. The competition is fierce so people have no reason to mince their words and there's certainly no reason for people to waste their time.

Xbox are also suffering a similar (but much worse) fate with Forza Motorsport on PC. Why in earth is someone going to play that when they have stuff like Assetto Corsa, Automobilista 2, Rfactor 2, iracing, etc, etc at their disposal? There's even the option of emulating older Forza and GT titles if they want to revisit older titles.

So the solution is simple, instead of Xbox fans lashing out and attempting to shut down any discussion surrounding what is going on with this latest batch of XGS games on PC, you should demand better products. Instead of Bethesda wasting time in steam reviews gaslighting and begging their customers, they should make better games.

The problem exists at source, nowhere else. They have the resources (more so than any other company in this industry) to make games with universal acclaim, so it's about time they made games with universal acclaim instead of pooping unfinished/substandard games out and then instead using those resources to attempt to control the narrative after the fact.

Xbox fanboys…

 

[mayham2199]

I just don't understand why MS\Besthesda would waste their time with this? Maybe their CS department has a lot of free time and they decided to have them do this during their spare time.

 

[Solidus_T]

The response is full of bad writing and the illusion of player choice, just like the game. At least they are staying consistent here.

I laughed at "[t]he option to fly freely among planets is still there." This is making it so much worse for them.

 

[Saber]

Who is dumb enough to respond to Steam reviews? Todd, honey, listen...don't respond to Steam reviews. They'll tear you apart.

I'm more surprised to read what Topher posted about dev response on steam.
Its basically a full "We're sorry that you're wrong". I never saw a gigantic bullshit, written as a formal response. It's just like you complain about your steak at the restaurant and the chef post a full letter saying that he is sorry that your taste is crap, explaing every step of the cooking process for you to see how wrong you are.

 

[Fake]

This shit is backfiring badly. Check out the responses to the "developer response".

Steam Community :: MOONSH☮T :: Review for Starfield

Boring, empty, soulless. Unpleasant to play. Todd told me I'd be exploring space, not fast travel menus. You don't really explore anything at all. You just teleport from desolate waste to desolate waste. Then your space ship sets down a 15 minute walk from the copy/paste POI you'be been...

steamcommunity.com

Western devs in a nutshell. They are right and you are wrong.

We are sorry that you do not like landing on different planets and are finding many of them empty.

This is the next gen level of comedy.

 

[ByWatterson]

Clown take. Go look at the Steam reviews for Hi Fi Rush, the Forza Horizon games, the AOE games, Grounded, Age of Mythology, Flight Sim, MCC, etc and then come back to us.

Or just like...literally all my posts about Age of Empires II and Halo Infinite. There's no conspiracy - I desperately want more great experiences from XGS, but they're just not there. And yet I use my Xbox nearly every day to play just those two games. Those two, by themselves, make the console worth it.

So having invested in the platform, and mostly really enjoying my time, I'm allowed to demand more from marquee titles like Starfield. It's a huge disappointment from a BGS team that, let's face it, hasn't produced a consensus banger since 2011, or possibly 2015. It's even worse in the context of the historic Xbox drought of consensus bangers, over a decade now.

It's been a minute, and I don't think anyone is being biased or dishonest.

 

[VideoGameEnjoyer]

Damn that’s cringe.

At least they are clearly marked as being paid by Bethesda though. We need a similar tag like that for people on this forum.

 

[mansoor1980]

“ We are sorry that you do not like landing on different planets and are finding many of them empty.”

 

[Topher]

I'm more surprised to read what Topher posted about dev response on steam.
Its basically a full "We're sorry that you're wrong". I never saw a gigantic bullshit, written as a formal response. It's just like you complain about your steak at the restaurant and the chef post a full letter saying that he is sorry that your taste is crap, explaing every step of the cooking process for you to see how wrong you are.

That surprised you? Sure I love the game, but nonsense like this has to be called out.

But you are right, this is basically Bethesda wagging their fingers at negative reviews and explaining why they are wrong. If this is how they react to negative feedback then I think Madflavor is absolutely right and TES 6 will be a shitshow.

 

[justiceiro]

Ever before release, this game is in full defense mode. They keep trying to convince us the game is perfectly fine when it could be so much more. It doesn't bold well for the future of Bethesda.

 

[Reizo Ryuu]

If you want to make players like your game how about working on improving it?

That's too reductive and self-absorbed. That's like walking into a burger king and tell them they need to make the whopper more like the big mac, because you like the big mac more and thus it would be an "improvement"; just because you have an opinion and preference, doesn't mean it would be an improvement on what they want to product to be.
There's plenty of people who cry about not having an easy mode in souls games, surely it would be an improvement for them to include it, but it wouldn't be an improvement on what the games are supposed to be.

 

[DeepEnigma]

“ We are sorry that you do not like loading (screen) into different planets and are finding many of them empty.”

FTFY. I mean.

 

[danklord]

To me, the more interesting aspect to this is rooted in the surprise mainstream successes of Skyrim (Who would have thought that game was going to be the hit it was? Not me!) and Fallout installed a hubris into Bethesda that they're god tier, leading to a game that is stuck in the philosophies of what worked in the past while trying to defensively match the hype of the present. The product is enjoyable, there's no doubt, but it isn't at the level of obsession of Fallout or Skyrim and that seems to be bothering everyone.

They need a new engine, a new art style -- but more importantly, a new vision for these worlds. The new TES needs to be a leap similar to BOTW.

 

[Fbh]

Ah the good old Shenmue argument: "it's supposed to be boring".
That said people still don't seem to be able to manage their expectations. The second they announced 1000 planets everyone should have come to the conclusion that most of them would be empty/boring.

 

[Sushi_Combo]

"You're playing it wrong" - Todd Howard

 

[Laptop1991]

If you're playing it like previous Bethesda games, meaning you land somewhere and wonder around looking for stuff, you're not gonna have a good time. Like at all. Actually, it will be a terrible time.

I think that's why people are so disappointed in this game.

Agreed, but Todd did say Skyrim in Space, so that's probably why most were expecting a game like the previous ones and i did too to be honest.

 

[BbMajor7th]

Someone at Bethesda: "Hey, it's fine - we should treat this whole thing as a learning experience."
Their boss: "Yeah, for the stupid fucking nerds who don't get it. Am I right? AMIRITE?"

 

[MidGenRefresh]

Agreed, but Todd did say Skyrim in Space, so that's probably why most were expecting a game like the previous ones and i did too to be honest.

Todd says a lot of things.

 

[Heisenberg007]

That surprised you? Sure I love the game, but nonsense like this has to be called out.

But you are right, this is basically Bethesda wagging their fingers at negative reviews and explaining why they are wrong.

Bethesda:

If this is how they react to negative feedback then I think Madflavor is absolutely right and TES 6 will be a shitshow.

You can add me to that list: ES6 will be a shitshow.

One of the biggest reasons for that will be Starfield and its negative reviews, and how Bethesda will be in 2 minds regarding what to do and what not to do.