Topic: Starfield

@Balta666 You're 100% right. Don't know why I was wondering it really.

@NintendoByNature Absolutely. Time flies. I only just realised the other day we're basically only 2 months (and 2 days) away from Zelda. 6 months will disappear quickly.

@themightyant yep! And TotK will keep me busy well into end of June, mid July. Coupled with some other stuff during the summer and it'll be September in no time.

@NintendoByNature I was planning to go away for a while this year. But currently i'd rather get lost in Hyrule and Space

Bethesda and their Creation Engine has been terribly disappointing. Skyrim has aged like a fine warm glass of milk, Fallout 4 was a downgrade from 3 and Vegas and don't get me started on 76. When I first heard of Starfield my curiosity was peaked, but as soon as they said it was still using their Creation Engine I quickly became worried.

I am glad it's included on Gamepass so I can quickly verify my concerns

Spotted a bus with a Lucazade Starfield promotion yesterday, they must be pretty confident on this release date.

@AgentCooper they surely can’t delay for a third time now they’ve given a fixed date for a second time.

But stranger things have happened. Halo Infinite was advertised on products despite it not releasing till a year later - I had the Halo themes Moa Burger Pringles. I also have a T-Shirt for the Athens Olympics in 2000… except 2000 ended up being Sydney, Athens was 2004. Lol

In short I’ll believe it when it’s in my hands!

@themightyant Yeah too true, I would take another delay though, games releasing unfinished and broken are becoming all too common.

@BAMozzy thanks for sharing this. I don’t follow IGN at all and likely would have missed it.

@themightyant No probs - I thought it was an interesting interview and therefore shared it in case anyone missed it.

I was 'ok' with the way Starfield was presented the first time. Yes it didn't exactly look 'smooth' or particularly 'next gen', but it looked a step up from ANYTHING Bethesda had delivered before and on a much larger scale but the extra time has really seemed to help polish the Visuals as well as refine the movement etc. It looks almost like a remaster of that original Game Play slice.

Most people were probably expecting that 'rough' around the edges game - maybe not as 'buggy' as per usual from Bethesda - but now its looking a lot smoother and much more polished, even those who insist on 60fps are softening...

On the subject of 60fps, nothing is stopping Bethesda from potentially adding a 'Performance' mode at some point - maybe not with the Series S and maybe only when some 'X Pro' mid gen hardware or next gen Consoles come along. After all, Skyrim or Fallout 4 weren't 60fps games on Console and only got boosted with 'newer' hardware. I'd rather have a LOCKED 30fps than an unlocked 60fps that barely hits 60fps unless you look at the sky and not everything scales with Resolution. If you have 20 enemies on screen, you still have all the AI, the Physics, the Hit detection etc etc regardless of whether its 1080p or 4k, still has the same resources and takes the same time to process. With so much Procedural generation etc, it could be 'very' CPU intensive that '60fps' is impossible even at 540p - its not the 'Graphics' that are the reason its not hitting 60fps.

The whole point of 30fps is to find the right balance between PQ and Playability and give the 'Console' hardware the maximum amount of 'time' to spend on each frame. 60fps reduces frame time in half (33.3ms to 16.6ms) so you are reducing the amount of work the CPU and GPU can do, the amount of Data that can be moved around etc etc in half too. With a 12TF GPU, that's 'per second' maximum, that means that each frame at 30fps has 0.4TF of resources or 0.2TF at 60fps. If a CPU is running at 3.6ghz, that's 0.12 cycles per frame at 30fps or just 0.06 cycles at 60fps. I know you know this @themightyant but for any other readers to consider.

Anyway, I was impressed by the amount of 'polish' I have seen from their first Game-play reveal to this breakdown...

@BAMozzy Yes it was a really good interview and interesting that he seemed to step back somewhat from Elder Scrolls 6 next THEN Fallout to leave things a little more open.

I was blown away by the whole deep dive. The best compliment I can give it is that after putting in 200+ hours into Zelda I thought GOTY was sewn up, both for me and generally en masse. Now i've seen that Starfield deep dive, if they can deliver, I think it has a reasonable possibility this is a real competition. It looked phenomenal and has me so hyped. What a year for gaming.

The 30fps isn't a deal breaker at all for me, but it is a disappointment. But as someone who works in web and software development i'm 95% certain that that limit is because of their ageing engine Creation Engine 2, which was built on CE1, which was built on Gamebryo which was built on NetImmerse. Yes it's modular and many modules have been completely rewritten several times but it's core design, along with some limitations, goes back over 25+ years to before the millennium. I have NO doubt if they rebuilt the engine from scratch (which is a massive and daunting undertaking) they would be able to hit 60fps AND have it look even better (some of the character models looked a bit last gen to me or example) but it's worth it in the long run and eventually leads to faster development workflow. You can't get away from having so much legacy code in software development like this and how much inefficiency that leads to and how much you aren't embracing newer tech stacks and workflows etc.

For balance there are many reasons NOT to update the engine e.g. both devs and modders are used to it (though more modern modding scripting would be appreciated too) and it's such a MASSIVE undertaking. We've had to it for several legacy apps and web apps, especially when iOS jumped to 64bit with iOS 11 and it was a giant job BUT the efficiency and practicalities of updating it going forward were immense, many orders of magnitude faster from a codebase that was a quarter the size

Regardless as I said 30fps not a deal breaker for me just a bit disappointing.

The only thing I REALLY dislike is that they are selling 5 day "early access" at a premium. It's complete BS. "Day 1 on Game Pass" is a complete lie, but "Day 6 on Game Pass" doesn't have the same marketing ring to it. This really needs to be called out more strongly imho, but it will get a pass and people will lap it up sadly. It left a very bitter taste in my mouth of what should have been all good and positive. A real shame. It's just so dishonest.

@themightyant New engines take extra time to develop on top of the game and 'most' are built on or from a core 'legacy' engine. Very few true completely new engines are built. you have Pro's and Con's to both but building a completely new engine alongside building a game of such scale magnitude, when they talk about how they were able to modify their existing engine, get aspects from the id Software engine into their engine etc, it may well of been the better option.

As for the 5days 'early' access - well that's been used before as Pre-order bonuses in games but the 'official' release is still stated as the Day 'everyone' can buy and/or play, not just those select few that paid more to play 'early'. In the history books, it will still state it released on the 6th September regardless of whether some get to play a few days before. Its not a 'complete' lie because you can't walk into a shop or purchase the standard edition to play before the release date so its still 'Day 1' when its available to EVERYONE. Its a bit like offering some Cosmetics to the 'Premium' edition - some 'bonus' to encourage people to buy the game - especially as 'sales' will be hurt by Game Pass - so I can understand why MS offer early access as an incentive to 'buy'.

Others have had Beta access to pre-order customers, early access (Take CoD on PS - it has had extra/earlier Betas and game access for 'pre-ordering' Premium editions) but the Official date is the day that its available to 'everyone'. I don't begrudge those willing to spend over $100 on a Game to get a few extra days' early access than those buying the Standard edition or using their Game Pass Subscription to play on its 'official' release day. Think about how many 'Sales' at $70 they are going to lose on launch so encouraging people to buy a Premium version to play a few days earlier makes sense to me and 5days later, that 'bonus' on the Premium editions is gone.

60fps would be better, 5 days earlier release would be better, but I don't feel 'disappointed' myself these aren't available to me (unless I buy the Premium edition for 'earlier' access - but I'd rather have the Cash in my Bank account and use Game Pass to play the day it 'officially' releases, the day that I expected to be playing. If I was that bothered, I would be 'pre-ordering' to play earlier and take advantage of that 'Premium' bonus...

@BAMozzy I'm sorry I don't buy the spin that early access is 5 days early in this case, the reality is everyone else is effectively being delayed for 5 days unless you fork out for the £100 edition or £35 on top of Game pass. It completely divides the player base. It's a very deliberate ploy and I absolutely hate it.

Also doesn't say much about their faith in the Game Pass business model if they have to prop it up with a £35 play early + expansion pack. But it will sell like absolute hotcakes and will be big business for them, sadly we will see more and more of it for big releases and will continue to be fed the "Day 1 on Game Pass" falsehood. I will keep calling it out for what it is. BS.

@BAMozzy Anyway I don't want to be "old man screams at clouds" too much, it just pissed me off.

Back on point. The game looked absolutely incredible, the presentation with all the devs was just about perfect. An amazing production all round. I've been humming the Starfield theme in my head all day.

@themightyant No Probs, we are all different so what pisses you off isn't going to have the same effect on everyone and no doubt see things how we want to see them too. I wasn't arguing, just saying how I see it and what the history books will say. Starfield for example will be listed as launching/releasing on 6th Sept 2023 even if 'some' may get to play sooner and it will be listed as entering Game Pass on the day it 'officially' releases.

There was a time when I could pre-order games for delivery and sometimes they'd turn up a day or two before they 'officially' released and so could play earlier than those who bought/Pre-ordered from a retailer and had to pick them up on the day of release. I even attended a few 'midnight' launches to play earlier than 'most'. Maybe that's contributing to my different opinion on this to you.

I rewatched the presentation this morning and think its a big step up from what they showed last year. It also gives me hope that Avowed can be polished and those 'rough' edges be smoothed over in the same way. This has to be the best breakdown of ANY game I have ever seen and loved the way they presented this, letting the Devs talk about aspects and areas they were involved in and despite it being a LONG show, feel like they didn't tell us 'everything' and/or spoil much either. Combat in particular looked a massive step-up from where we last saw it..

Anyway, its got me even more interested in playing and looking forward to 6th September. Most of the time, I don't look that far forward - more interested in the week ahead than caring about something that's months away - maybe I can play it at '60fps' on my RoG Zephyrus or Ally (especially if I do buy the RTX 4090 eGPU dock too) all without needing to buy multiple versions - so I don't begrudge those willing to pay 'Premium' money upfront for a few extras (inc a few days 'early' access - which to me is 'earlier' bonus access). If it bothered me, I'd pay the £35 fee because after the 6th, its still £35 but any 'early' access bonus is pointless. Again, not criticising your opinion or perspective on it, just stating my own.

I was looking forward to getting this on PC, but this presentation really underwhelmed me to the point where I’m not even excited for the Elder Scrolls 6 now.

I’ll probably still poke around the world, but it’s a shame how little Bethesda feels the need to progress as a studio who once stood for innovation. Their approach feels like such an old hat now. Explore city and talk to bland, dead-eyed NPCs, then go on quest which like Fallout 4 will just be to shoot a couple of guys and retrieve an item. Rinse, repeat. Work for the alliance or with the rebel factions? Be a thief, work in the mines, or be a corporate commander? Also a lot of the time spent on these “1000 planets” is going to be copy and pasted asset templates with the same enemy base layouts and resources. Any uncurated content in a Bethesda game is terrible, like those copy and pasted skeleton caves that litter Skyrim.

I guess a lot of the success or failure of this game will come down to the writing, but after being disappointed by the blandness of Skyrim and Fallout 4 I’m not holding out too much hope for this. Also did they indicate if the NPC AI would improve in this game? It’s the one area Bethesda could actually be making real progress in, as many AI programmers use Skyrim NPC as an interface for programming interesting AI interactions. The demo didn’t indicate much of a meaningful change in how NPC interactions work.

Exploring will probably be rewarding and the gunplay could be an improvement over Fallout, but I can’t shake the feeling that Starfield just looks like No Man’s Sky, Mass Effect, the Outer Wilds, and every other recent Bethesda game.

I am extremely excited for this game. I stated this already in an article, but I purchased the Constellation edition.

The 30fps in consoles does bother me. Yes I heard it, there is a high possibility that the game is using too much CPU power to do anything faster, but that is not what Todd is saying. He is saying its about not sacrificing fidelity, something I find absurd. For me, it is bull[bleep]. An option does not sacrifice a mode, and if the issue is CPU limits, then it's not about fidelity.

I have high hopes the game does support mods on consoles out of the gate. I'm sure someone will come up with a mod to disable stuff, even maybe physics if needed, and unlocking or increasing frame rate cap via that. As far as I recall, there was a similar mod for Skyrim before anniversary, and a similar mod for Fallout 4.

The 5 day preview thing does not bother me. Yea, I did buy the Constellation edition, but I got to admit I might not even get around to play day one. I know there is a big fuz about "day one on game pass", but I never taken that as that strict of a rule. If Game Pass changed tomorrow to "day 5 on Game Pass", I would still remain subscribed. If you tell me its a month later, then I raise an eyebrow. I guess, for me, the point is that I don't have to wait a long time for the thing to come to the service.

Maybe MS did shoot themselves in the foot with Game Pass by going "day one". They could had perhaps started a bit less drastic, like, all games go into the service after two weeks, and work from there, but I'm sure that would be a hard sell, to change that now. I would dare bet the service would be just as successful as it is right now with a 2 week delay. Anyways... I am derailing enough.

TLDR: annoyed about the 30fps messaging, don't mind the 5 day head start. I'll be playing it on PC.

@Tharsman The 60fps mod on Skyrim etc. was only really useful once we had the added power of One X and Series X. Before that it was a worse experience in many ways, an even more wildly fluctuating frame rate. I'm not sure a 60fps mod is going to help that much. They also haven't talked about mods, but typically they don't enable these till much later. I wouldn't expect these at launch.

On the pre-order stuff. I still wouldn't like the for the payers / FOMO edition, that is not the future of gaming I want where we are charged extra to get the game first. But what really pisses me off is they are pushing the "play day 1 on game pass" as well, firstly that is just not true anymore, plus you can't have your cake and eat it too! It's spin and semantics calling it "early access" a term traditionally used for games still in production / alpha or beta NOT 5 days from release. It's disingenuous spin and false advertising it needs to be pushed against strongly imho or we will see this in more and more games. Frankly i'm astounded how many seem OK with it. But i've theMightyRanted about that enough. It's not the end of the world, just very annoying.

That aside the showcase was almost perfect. Bethesda made me believe they are back to their best after a few years where they seemed to be on the slide. Couldn't be more excited for the game. I'll play on Xbox unless I upgrade my PC rig before Sept.

@themightyant Hello there, awesome Forum, just saw it pop up.
I'm excited for Starfield, I never thought I'd say that haha, Skyrim in Space.

As for the 60 FPS thing, it does bother me a bit, but the visuals should be absolutely mind blowing and the space scapes in 4k will look wonderous.

I was thinking maybe we get a 60 FPS patch say in a years time from release, as a Mod that is proven then implemented down, as the mod community loves Skyrim and Bethesda etc. Maybe the community can help or something.

@Tharsman Hello slightly off topic, but clicked your gamer profile and it took me to a cool Exophase site, that follows your gaming history, looked awesome. Would you recommend, looks temping.

I like the idea of people seeing my history and not judging me off the bat ^___^