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Are there any games like Starfield? (lemmy.zip)

submitted 1 month ago by winety@lemmy.zip to c/games@lemmy.world

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So, Starfield was a disappointment (in my opinion). The story isn't interesting. The lore and world-building do not make sense. The game mechanics do not mesh together. (And it doesn't run well on the Steam Deck.)

But the promise of Starfield? The big space game? The big space RPG where you can play as Captain Reynolds type character? That's something I can get behind. I want to traverse space, visit different planets, get lost, meet interesting characters, solve their problems, and shoot some stuff. Two games come to my mind when I think of this:

No Man's Sky
Mass Effect

I've only played a few hours of No Man's Sky, but I think it does space traversal well. To put it bluntly, flying from planet to planet without interruption is better than fast travel. But the gameplay loop did not

Mass Effect nails the space adventure side of things. You visit multiple interesting places, you meet different people with curious problems, and you solve these problems (mainly by shooting). But it's a typical Bioware game: The places you visit are small and confined, and there are (comparatively) few of them. The space traversal is done by clicking a few buttons in a menu.

My question is: Are there any “big space games”? Are there any games that deliver on the promise of Starfield? What are your favourite sci-fi RPGs?

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[-] Vinny_93@lemmy.world 13 points 1 month ago

Star Citizen will get a story mode called Squadron 42 witch should be feature complete and it has a star studded Hollywood cast. It looks worthwile but it won't be here for at least a year.

[-] AbsolutelyNotAVelociraptor@sh.itjust.works 28 points 1 month ago

A year or twenty. Given how long they are taking, I wouldn't be surprised if the game was never released.

[-] verdigris@lemmy.ml 4 points 1 month ago

SQ42 has gone gold and is in polish phase, I would expect it within two years for sure.

[-] deadcream@sopuli.xyz 9 points 1 month ago

I can't tell if it's satire or not

[-] AbsolutelyNotAVelociraptor@sh.itjust.works 6 points 1 month ago

Given the history of these guys, I am not gonna believe it until I see the game released and in the stores. Until then, as everything around star citizen, this is vaporware aimed at milking the whales that keep giving them money.

[-] verdigris@lemmy.ml 6 points 1 month ago

I love how it gets called "vaporware" when it's a playable product with more gameplay than many MMOs. I'm also very grateful to the whales for providing the funds to develop the game.

[-] winety@lemmy.zip 12 points 1 month ago

I enjoy your optimism. I hope we see Squadron 42 soon and I hope it’s good. (The shitstorm if it isn’t would be huge!)

[-] Aurenkin@sh.itjust.works 3 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago)

Yeah the prologue level they showed looked incredible. I really hope they can give the game all the polish it needs, after so long in development they absolutely need to release something with quality to match.

[-] Agent_Karyo@lemmy.world 1 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago)

I wouldn't be so sure that SQ42 will be a guaranteed slam dunk as many SC fans seem to be speculating. That's if it ever does get released or course.

The gameplay in the recent demo is subpar. FPS combat in particular was trash, far worse than HL1; a game released more than a quarter of a century ago. Turret gunning and the platforming parts looked decent but they are not going to carry the game. No example of player controlled space flight was shown.

The space battles looked nice in a b-movie kind of way, but I have my doubts how this will translate to fun space flight gameplay.

From SC, we know that they have a very history of even basic conceptual balance and they are horrible at iterative play testing.

Regarding the Hollywood cast, Gary Oldman sounded like he wanted to get his money and get out of there ASAP. Anderson wasn't much better. Writing was some high school-level drivel "we must win because we must!" and lots of shouty one liners. There is a very real possibility that the whole thing will be a Wing Commander: The Movie - 30 hours of tedious custscenes. And you just know it's going to take itself extremely seriously (think the space bulldozer scene in Wing Commander).

Looking at the UI/UX of SC, it's not unreasonable to assume SQ42 will suffer the same sorry fate. Very flashy ironman-style UI visuals that are nigh unusable in a video game.

Let's see what happens.

[-] Furbag@lemmy.world 1 points 1 month ago

As much as I'm a fan of the project, I don't think SC/SQ42 would scratch the same itch that somebody who just got done playing Starfield or Mass Effect would feel. Star Citizen is way more on the simulation side and light on RPG elements.