Bethesda Exec Responds To 'Unprofessional' Criticism Of Starfield's Menu Screen

The Dev that complained and assumed it has to do with overworking and or not caring is acting like a idiot. He certainly made himself look bad and uninformed. Bad "career move"!!

Looks fine to me.

Less is more. I absolutely detest cluttered start screens, this one looks clean and concise. As they all should.

Looks very nice and showcasing what a space game is about.

Others may not like it, fair enough, but that clearly doesn't mean the developers don't care. It just means it wasn't made exactly how you wanted.

But this sort of complaining seems to be the common thing nowadays - "the game/show/movie wasn't developed exactly to my tastes so the creaters clearly don't care and are lazy".

But also, who cares? It is a home menu. It doesn't matter.

Who needs fanboys for review-bombing when even professional developers cannot show respect and professionalism. It's moronic and bizarre.... by the way I love the clean minimalist look of the starting/menu screen 🙂.

It's a main menu screen. 🤷

That guy just sounds like a disgruntled ex employee.

Who let this clown out the circus! Not sure why someone would make an assessment of a game based upon a start sceeen. Clearly has something against Xbox or Bethesda to be making such a stupid statement.

Folks just want to pull Starfield down for whatever reason even with something as inconsequential as the start screen.

Seen a similar thing going on with Baldurs Gate 3 from supposedly "professional" devs as well.

I just find it all a bit sad in both cases.

(Right back to playing avoid the Starfield spoiler roulette until it launches on game pass..)

Pete should've said they were allocating all resources in the upcoming ES6 to title screen. Jokes aside I don't think that guy has a good enough reputation in the gaming industry. Most of his ex colleagues hate him. Man is a sore loser at this point.

"The physiognomy of start screens." 😂
He killed the Greek language in one sentence.

It seems that some people simply like to complain. It is simple, tidy, and effective.

Reminds of the fuss last week, when the Xbox home page/front end changed as well. And changed for the better, in my opinion.

If they had added a lot more to the menu, I guarantee that these same people would complain that it was too cluttered.

Edit - I just clicked on the message/tweet (whatever they are now called) and it loaded the picture full screen. It looks amazing.

Wow. I had pre-ordered two copies of each special edition for every console, but after seeing that menu screen I'm cancelling the lot. REALLY dodged a bullet there.

I don't care about this topic. I cannot wait to play the game.

Is this the same clown that said all YouTubers covering Xbox news were paid by Microsoft?

Wow, creating the whole narrative around a menu screenshot.. nice, almost a new territory for internet.
Joking aside, there is no way to know how that menu scales with screen size. I'm assuming his criticism is based on menu not being front and center (as, khm khm, it is in D2) and items being relatively small compared to available real estate. Which might all be totally fine if this is taken from a 60 inch screen.
Also, you will spend literally 2 seconds looking at this everytime you boot. Nobody cares

If people are having to resort to complaining about something as trivial as a menu screen then you're probably doing something right.

Uncluttered menu screens are just unused advertising space. I've got half a dozen battle passes to sell you...

Anyhow, this reminds me of the Mass Effect start screen, which itself was similarly uncluttered with a planet and a title being the focus. I think this guy is just being cynical for the sake of being cynical.

While I agree with the point of the defense, saying "we haven't touched the menu screen in years" isn't exactly the alleviating response to "the devs don't care about it" that he might think it is.

@Scummbuddy yes it is. It shows it was something they decided on and were happy with ages ago. It wasnt a last minute thing so they did in fact care about it.

I can’t believe the traction this got. There’s a weird false narrative on multiple fronts being pushed around when Xbox have games and exclusives you don’t really see against any other platform.

It’s a menu screen similar to millions of other games out there, this should have been a non story.

Ridiculous nonsense about a menu screen. The real meat and potato is the gameplay, story, character progression and vast amount of worlds to explore.

One of the better starting menus in my opinion. I dont know why anyone would even dislike a title screen. All it needs to do is offer new game or continue options and with quick resume you probably will only see it a small number of times.

Don't know why he even bothered responding to this loser.

@Amigator Seems like a guy who would use the word zeitgeist without knowning what it means haha.

Out of all the potential concerns I have, start screen was not one of them. What a bizarre take, but it’s generating him revenue on Twitter I imagine.

I like the simplicity of that main menu. New developers seemingly want to shove 10 different sections on a main menu to sell micro-transactions and battle passes.

I like the menu, sure the panel in the top right doesn't fit with the rest of it and could be ticked out of sight and opened with a button press, but a simple menu is all you need.

You don't need to clutter your menu with crap, you just need to make it simple to follow with just the necessary information for the user to navigate to where they want to be.

Most title screens are just a list of options, a static or dynamic image and that's about it. This guy probably complains that water is too wet.

@Darylb88 Exactly. He seems like a poser.

0/10 game: not enough attention to menu screen. Worst experience of my life.

NOTE: Joke

@Lightning720 Yeah, I agree it can certainly mean that and is what is meant here but it could also mean "we set it up day-one and haven't touched it in 5 years".

@Scummbuddy and? Lots of things have different meanings but that clearly wasn't what he meant here.

A clean, simplistic start screen that conveys the vastness of space exploration Bethesda is going for, is lazy? Haha ok.

Look up Mark Kern and you'll see all you need to know about him. Spent millions "yes, millions" on a bus and squandered more on failed ads and promotion only to run his game, Firefall, into the absolute ground. He's angry and life and people that worked with him detest his incompetence and lack of awareness in the industry.

Fitting ...

Starfield screen has from the first time I saw it always looked professional, well designed and polished. I love it. Please don't change it

@RetroMan71
That's because he is a disgruntled ex-employee. He was fired from Blizzard and then fired from a smaller studio where he was the CEO

Did this guy ever play Skyrim, Fallout or any Bethesda game? They've always has the simplistic style start menu... Such a stupid thing to gripe about in the first place...

I can't be the only one who finds Salty Pete Hines hilarious.

And the bashing begins. Just because some people like inserting themselves into their Playstations. Imagine being that desperate to not want others to have fun.

Also this guys X display picture looks exactly like you would expect.

Screen seems fairly consistent with all their other start screens

We are in 2023 and not bc it has been your menu since the beginning of time means that it should be the same now specially when you are about to release a massive game. As a UI and UX designer with 15 years of exp this has questionable design decisions and from a merely visual standpoint looks weird in terms of composition and graphic style. Yes it has this 'minimalistic' look but that does not necessarily helps the aesthetic of the design. Maybe it is ok for the masses but not so good for the people who really like and tend to pay attention to these kind of things. So in my opinion this looks a bit bland. I really hope that the UI looks much better. As a personal note I don't know why but majority of XBOX games UI interfaces look cheap but that's a subjective opinion and topic I guess.

All this started from Sony pony's fanboys comparing it to TLOU and GOW couple a days ago. They are grasping at straws and there response to rational answers is mind blowing.
I must look at Starfield start screen on PS5...Hmmm...That strange its black.

The things people choose to get upset about will never cease to amaze me. Literal addiction to complaining 😂

i think nobody cares Grummz opinion

Guy wanted to get a little attention. What better way to do that? Starfield gets attention just by existing.

I can’t believe a dev is petty enough to criticise another game’s Start screen! Very sad. I’m sure once the game releases the Start screen will be the last thing people will be talking about.

As someone who played Firefall, I can tell you this guy is an idiot. Just likes to troll and get his name in the headlines. He did it for years with WoW classic.

Really hate when other Devs attack and put dowm other Devs, its rude, not really helpful and not being supportive. As Pete says this style has been the style in all their games from Oblivion to Fallout 3 to Skyrim and even Fallout 76.

@K1LLEGAL ‘Just because some people like inserting themselves into their Playstations.’

🤣🤣 the mental image that gave me, Jesus.

It reminds me of the Halo Infinite menu screen. And that's the perfect example of a fantastic game that met all expectations.

Kern hasn’t had anything come out in almost a decade. And he got voted out of Blizzard by the board for a list of failures. I fail to see where he remains relevant for an opinion on this. Besides, the menu looks stellar.

I mean, yeah it’s a bit basic… but no need to jump to extreme conclusions lol

TOTK has as very basic main menu screen, and we all know how that game turned out....

I like this actually, very clean and neat.

Crying over the menu screen… what a baby lol

I can promise you there is a lot more going on behind this comment than his opinion of the start screen.

@Tharsman wasn’t that Jaffe?

I'll barely see it assuming the game supports quick resume and doesn't crash often.

@Lightning720 when it come to PlayStation fanboys They care about all the things that don't matter They had to find something to say bad about this game and that's all they can come up with say it really

Weird take by the OP. Having said that I'll have a moan too; I don't like developer notes, updates or dlc notifications being displayed on a start screen. Similarly I don't like a game's tile to change on the dashboard.

I don’t agree with Mark Kern’s comments but even I dislike the grey box background on the menu options. It just screams retro and looks out of place with how clean the rest of the screen looks. I’d personally make the grey boxes completely transparent and an option to get rid of the welcome message if it doesn’t already fade away itself.

The number of things this guy infers from a start screen. Wow. A true detective.

Happily, he is not diagnosing people.

Sure a start screen could be made to look nice but honestly who gives a ***** about it I'm more concerned about the gameplay and story and the much more important parts of the game being solid and and not a broken mess

@mousieone that’s why I ask, I don’t know and was too lazy to look it up. Just remember it was a former blizzard employee.

I have gamepass but a part of me is really nagging to get it physical anyone else in same boat?

Some of he best games in history were simply background images of the game with “Press Start” to play. Lol

The start screen does not make or break a game at all.

What matters is the story/environment, gameplay in the game, RPG elements, graphics in the gameplay, sound in the gameplay, etc. I would rather them dedicate a resource to those then to a start screen.

Just wait for mods like everyone else. Bethesda games are some of the only games you can get an entirely different UI than the one the game shipped with.

These recent 'big news stories' are seemingly random developers of variable quality, posting a negative message on social media about a game which has nothing to do with them. These unprofessional jerks need to do one. And if big news = troll on twitter, it really has become the worst timeline. Attention seeking narcissistic cretins with oodles of time on their hands.

And honestly that screenshot looks classy and minimalist. A fabulous logo and easy to understand options. So the guy has no taste either.

Aliens reading this article, "Turn the ship around, they still aren't ready"?!?!?!?!? Seriously, is this what the Human race has evolved into? I'm so glad I'm not a Human.

How is this even news?

Cyberpunk 2077 menu is very similar style but no one picked on that.

Kids and social media 🙄

@swagbag7 A truer statement has never been made. The internet allows humanity to devolve in to their base form; a slobbering, angry, pointless sack devoid of all logic and reason. People honestly think their inane opinions are valid and that anybody actually spends longer than a scroll caring about what they have to say.

@Tharsman Yeah no worries. There are have been a lot of stupid takes about Xbox and it's fans lately. Like I get criticism, but a Start Screen? Or a Cult? You can't just say you think this might be uninspired but you have no evidence yet? I don't know. It's weird.

Who cares...it looks fine...hope the game is good