Starfield Pre-Release Thread [GAME RELEASED, GO TO NEW THREAD]

[Old Hans]

Just a quick example from a NPC I just found from wandering around in TW3:

I think the reason the witcher 3 background npcs still look better than cyberpunk and starfield is 'cause they are not really randomly generated faces. they are hand crafted, but there are a only a handful of them, used over and over, but even with just a handful of faces, I still think it comes out on top

 

[Non-Edgy Gamer]

they're afraid to lose their lifeblood, the modders

I think someone did a breakdown of how many people actually used mods in Skyrim etc. and it wasn't as many as you think.

It's certainly responsible for a lot of PC sales, but I doubt most console users bother with them.

No, I think what they're addicted to is the workflow of the toolset. They've trained their teams to make games a certain way and don't want to alter that for a whole new engine. Not to mention the cost of creating or licensing a new engine.

 

[Grauken]

I think people will widely overestimate how spacious "Space" actually is, both for space combat and travel and for interiors.

You mean in the game, or in reality? Because people usually widely underestimate the second

 

[Non-Edgy Gamer]

I think the reason the witcher 3 background npcs still look better than cyberpunk and starfield is 'cause they are not really randomly generated faces.

It's not just the faces though. It's the animations. They were more natural, even in throwaway conversations with unimportant NPCs.

I think this was a result of the animators having a good database of natural-looking reactions, as well as having a better sense of the art of putting together a scene.

 

[La vie sexuelle]

We need to change the slogan "mods will fix it" to "mods will make it bearable".

 

[Vic]

we're hitting a new playercount peak less than a day before release

 

[Old Hans]

We need to change the slogan "mods will fix it" to "mods will make it bearable".

everyone knows the good stuff is years away. the first couple years of bethesda games are full of mods like "Steve's 8k texture wearable cowboy hats"

 

[Vic]

We need to change the slogan "mods will fix it" to "mods will make it bearable".

everyone knows the good stuff is years away. the first couple years of bethesda games are full of mods like "Steve's 8k texture wearable cowboy hats"

on loverslab, right?

 

[Jarmaro]

Is there a good variety of melee weapons in the game? So far I've only seen axes on videos, I'd like to try a melee build.
Persoanlly, I haven't played the game yet, still considering whether I should (on xCloud of course, way cheaper but greedy Microsoft doesn't allow for Ultimate Pass to be played without controller on PC lmao).

From everything I've seen and read about the game in the last week...I maintain my opinion from the first trailer - the game's weakest point is the lack of hook. They have good set-up with Nasapunk they were going for, but aside of that it's rather dull. Compare that to grandiosity of Oblivion and its daedric invasion, epicness and dragon fighting in Skyrim, even the satirical climate of 60s in Fallout 4. All of the previous Bethesda games had concrete identity. Starfield doesn't seem to have even half of that.
I guess as Bethesda lacks the world-building made by Morrowind writers and setting bought from Fallout devs they can't cook up anything interesting by themselves.

By the way, the game really does seem to be the best baseline game made by Bethesda in the last 20 years. A lot of content (apparently bogged down by over-use of procedural generation, not that it isn't there, just too much of weak stuff in the way), wealth of systems (even if some of them barebones) and solid gameplay (basically everyone I see praises it).

Some people said that Bethesda has learned nothing from Skyrim and Fallout 4 criticism. Those people are retarded. It's typical Bethesda jank design philosophy, but they made a lot of progress in the character progression, dialogues and immersion.

All of you seem to forget how Oblivion, Skyrim and Fallout 4 played at launch. Hell, even with patches and DLCs all of those games are nearly unplayable on their own most of the time in terms of gameplay. Compared to them Starfield is a big step forward, if not without sacrifices.

Tl;DR
Best Bethesda baseline game to date, would be much better if they had the game take place on just a few hand-crafted big locations instead of immense space filled with repetetive content.

 

[Old Hans]

We need to change the slogan "mods will fix it" to "mods will make it bearable".

everyone knows the good stuff is years away. the first couple years of bethesda games are full of mods like "Steve's 8k texture wearable cowboy hats"

on loverslab, right?

those are the types of modders who make a pair high heel shoes using 9 zillion polygons

 

[orcinator]

I think people will widely overestimate how spacious "Space" actually is, both for space combat and travel and for interiors.

If your space stations don't look like this then your space game is shit.

 

[AwesomeButton]

I think people will widely overestimate how spacious "Space" actually is, both for space combat and travel and for interiors.

You mean in the game, or in reality? Because people usually widely underestimate the second

No, I really mean over-estimate, because they've watched a lot of Star Wars. Given the actual vastness of Space, and your ship's miniscule resource capacity, you are really a very constrained little microbe trying to travel through a moutful of spit, and your travel time in realtime would be multiple lifetimes

So the feeling of "I keep travelling in outer space and not a damn thing is *happening* to me!" is actually on point. You're not travelling through Skyrim, you're travelling through space. As others already compared many times.

I think the reason the witcher 3 background npcs still look better than cyberpunk and starfield is 'cause they are not really randomly generated faces.

It's not just the faces though. It's the animations. They were more natural, even in throwaway conversations with unimportant NPCs.

I think this was a result of the animators having a good database of natural-looking reactions, as well as having a better sense of the art of putting together a scene.

That was the next thing I was going to mention. They cleverly reuse animations both for plot characters and for NPCs. The end result is that they manage to weave a kind of individuality to characters' body language. Even if Geral smirks the same way, or shakes his hand the same way, it ends up turning into a "signature body language trait".

We need to change the slogan "mods will fix it" to "mods will make it bearable".

Times are changing, yes (for the worse).

 

[racofer]

Witcher 3 will forever remain a game where the devs pulled very smart tricks in order to do a lot with a little.

Their NPCs look good because, first - they are not random generated, they are all hand placed and have their own routines. If you load the same savegame 1000 times you will see the same npcs walking around in novigrad and its outskirts. Second, NPCs are reusing faces. Indeed those faces are well designed, but they are often reused. In the case with this woman on the screenshot, CDPR have used the dress and hat to mask the fact that her face isn't unique. Starfield I believe generates its pedestrians on the fly, likely cycling predefined face presets. But in Witcher 3 nothing is modular about the faces, the game simply doesn't have a face generation system as such. If you check out Cyberpunk where there is a face generation system, and where pedestrians are actually generated and streamed by the engine, the face variety and quality is lower.

I didn't remember that. It certainly explains why TW3 NPCs look so good.

Just a quick example from a NPC I just found from wandering around in TW3:

I think the reason the witcher 3 background npcs still look better than cyberpunk and starfield is 'cause they are not really randomly generated faces. they are hand crafted, but there are a only a handful of them, used over and over, but even with just a handful of faces, I still think it comes out on top

Handcrafted NPCs sound like a much better system, but it also takes a lot more work thus it's obvious why developers won't even bother.

Still, my point stands that Cyberpunk can generate better looking NPCs. Although you can come across some disturbing stuff from an aesthetic point of view due to randomization, it's still visually better than what Shartfield does.

Quickly looking around Jig Jig Street:

Imagine the horror of this specimen in Todd's world:

 

[La vie sexuelle]

We need to change the slogan "mods will fix it" to "mods will make it bearable".

everyone knows the good stuff is years away. the first couple years of bethesda games are full of mods like "Steve's 8k texture wearable cowboy hats"

We need to change the slogan "mods will fix it" to "mods will make it bearable".

everyone knows the good stuff is years away. the first couple years of bethesda games are full of mods like "Steve's 8k texture wearable cowboy hats"

on loverslab, right?

They will be the first to make all things related to women and sex (clubs, etc.)

We'll have to wait for the rest.

 

[Hace El Oso]

Just a quick example from a NPC I just found from wandering around in TW3:

I think the reason the witcher 3 background npcs still look better than cyberpunk and starfield is 'cause they are not really randomly generated faces. they are hand crafted, but there are a only a handful of them, used over and over, but even with just a handful of faces, I still think it comes out on top

But randomly generated NPCs aren’t used in order to have a greater variety, they’re used to remove the need for effort and care.

 

[AwesomeButton]

I think people will widely overestimate how spacious "Space" actually is, both for space combat and travel and for interiors.

If your space stations don't look like this then your space game is shit.

Only modders would take their craft so seriously. Paid employees, never would. Is this from Minecraft?

 

[La vie sexuelle]

I think people will widely overestimate how spacious "Space" actually is, both for space combat and travel and for interiors.

You mean in the game, or in reality? Because people usually widely underestimate the second

No, I really mean over-estimate, because they've watched a lot of Star Wars. Given the actual vastness of Space, and your ship's miniscule resource capacity, you are really a very constrained little microbe trying to travel through a moutful of spit, and your travel time in realtime would be multiple lifetimes

So the feeling of "I keep travelling in outer space and not a damn thing is *happening* to me!" is actually on point. You're not travelling through Skyrim, you're travelling through space. As others already compared many times.

I think the reason the witcher 3 background npcs still look better than cyberpunk and starfield is 'cause they are not really randomly generated faces.

It's not just the faces though. It's the animations. They were more natural, even in throwaway conversations with unimportant NPCs.

I think this was a result of the animators having a good database of natural-looking reactions, as well as having a better sense of the art of putting together a scene.

That was the next thing I was going to mention. They cleverly reuse animations both for plot characters and for NPCs. The end result is that they manage to weave a kind of individuality to characters' body language. Even if Geral smirks the same way, or shakes his hand the same way, it ends up turning into a "signature body language trait".

We need to change the slogan "mods will fix it" to "mods will make it bearable".

Times are changing, yes (for the worse).

If Cancer had TV commercials, this is what its slogan would be.

 

[JamesDixon]

Only modders would take their craft so seriously. Paid employees, never would. Is this from Minecraft?

Puhlease... It's Space Station 13.

 

[AwesomeButton]

I didn't remember that. It certainly explains why TW3 NPCs look so good.

Since children models are far less numerous and varied, their face reuse must have made an impression on you.

Imagine the horror of this specimen in Todd's word:

Hah, for a moment I thought this is Starfield, and Bethesda have included a Tim Cain cameo.

Quickly looking around Jig Jig Street:

One thing that's got me laughing in Cyberpunk while walking around the city is the amount of typical-typical Polish girl faces. You know the kind if you've ever been to Poland, you can't mistake them. The one on the right here is a good example, but I've seen even more classic ones, I think outside of the Mox' bar.

 

[Caim]

Looks like MxR is back to doing mods for a Bethesda game. Reupload because he showed too much of Starfield's first nude mod, which is made by the guy who made the first nude mod for Skyrim.

 

[Iucounu]

i wonder why movies still use really attractive actors for most movies and western gaming decided to go into the opposite direction

Good question actually. Does anyone have a theory?

I think most actors and models look awful, but I suppose movies are at least trying. Could it be that more women watch movies, and they want to see pretty heroines to identify with? On the other hand it seems advertizing has started featuring "unconventional" models lately, so maybe the other industries are just lagging behind games a little.

 

[Iucounu]

I don't get why it has to be so (homo)sexual. Game's really horny and it's embarrassing.

So it is homosexual after all. The entire thread seemed so focused on race that I became cautiously optimistic for a while.
I suppose it means the indoctrination is working, if players don't even react to faggotry in games anymore.

For any of you whine babies complaining about black people in Atlantis

The same posters who are whining about black people in Starfield loved being surrounded by FAGGOTS in BG3 for 100+ hours straight.

For real? That's pretty damning...

 

[Iucounu]

whites are the minority, yes, but that's because you have all races mixed together, it's actually quite balanced among all races it seems.

But all those races are culturally American, I presume? Before the left sold out to globalism they used to talk about American cultural imperialism...

I wouldn't mind entire space colonies populated by genuine cultural Africans, but I realize the likelihood of a game developer achieving that in a believable way is non-existent.

 

[Vic]

whites are the minority, yes, but that's because you have all races mixed together, it's actually quite balanced among all races it seems.

But all those races are culturally American, I presume? Before the left sold out to globalism they used to talk about American cultural imperialism...

I wouldn't mind entire space colonies populated by genuine cultural Africans, but I realize the likelihood of a game developer achieving that in a believable way is non-existent.

it's not a colony, there is no more Earth in Starfield, so that's all of humanity you see, not just America, hence the diversity.

 

[tastywaffles]

Pretty much, yeah. She didn't fly to a different planet, she flew toward the planet until she collided with the sprite.

And yes, collision bounds would seem obvious to anyone but a Bethesda staffer. Spacebourne 2, a $20 indie game in early access, did planetary landings using bounds.

"Nevermind planet bounds, no one's gonna spend seven fucking hours flying towards the damn thing." Two decades at it and Todd still doesn't know his target demo.

I've only progressed up to the end of the rescue mission (first mission together with Sarah) but I can see how this process of walking between area loading points can quickly get repetitive.

I didn't expect a full blown space flight simulation, but it was Bethesda's job to come up with activities, random events, and minigames, so it's not a predictable process of fast travel every time, and the necessity to press the same sequence of buttons as a player until you get to the loading screen.

Structuring the cosmic segments around planets instead of stars is probably the biggest flaw merely because it's the stupidest one. I get that space is "big" and Bethesda might've been shooting for some sort of "realism", but it's also quite empty and you don't have to go for a 1:1 representation of space flight. There's no reason that Gamebryo couldn't have handled navigating a star system in free flight and you could've populated it with random encounters and POIs. Atmospheric flight, entire persistent planets, that stuff would've presented technical challenges, but this would've been easy.

While traveling those long voyages between planets it should automatically switch to a pixelated Gradius-like side-scrolling game. Seven hours of forced Gradius could be a nice palette cleanser.