bethesda announces game concept.

people freak.

bethesda announces game. 

people hype.

bethesda starts hyping the game.

people go fucking nuts hyping the game as a result. their social media team plants those seeds to make it look organic.

a year or more of speculation occurs.

todd howard being his little schmuck self comes out and boasts about their new game.

people lose their god damn minds.

whispers of shitty gameplay start occurring closer to launch.

the masses tell those people to fuck off how could they know, dishonest review etc etc.

the big names in game reviews all review it and give it out of the park amazing reviews.

people go batshit crazy. people are out in the streets killing their parents for a chance at the new bethesda god game.

the game is released and is somewhat playable but jesus fuck is it lacking, it’s buggy, and every character looks like they’ve been updated from skyrim graphics of yore. the story sucks. the game play is empty but goddamn is there a lot to explore.

everyone rushes in like a madman.

everyone realizes the gameplay sucks.

people start bitching.

others say “oh don’t worry, DLC and user created mods will fill the game out nicely.”

years pass.

the unpaid modding community pours their heart and soul into making the game not fucking suck.

after all the DLC has come out (all with mostly positive or mixed reviews on steam) the game will go dark for a year or so.

todd howard wakes from his capitalist vampire coma needing fresh life force. the blood money of his unsuspecting idiot fans.

todd howard makes it into the office and says we could make a new game or we can milk this game for the next decade and a half. quick come up with names to rerelease the game under. game of the year edition. complete edition. master edition. elite edition. remastered. remastered complete. anything works!

over the course of the next three decades, todd howard is fed the blood of bethesda’s fan base.

he is swollen, like a fat tick upon his harkonen throne, waiting to burst.

“the people. they call for a NEW game”, he says, a devilish sneer contorts his face.

and the cycle continues.

and these fucking idiots. every goddamn time.

I don't get it.

People wanted another Bethesda game.

They got what they wanted.

I said in 2008, after playing the first Fallout game by Bethesda instead of Black Isle: "Only Bethesda could manage to make a post apocalyptic prostitute boring."

They've always been boring, they've always had ugly character models, and the writing has always been bad. You get what you paid for. A Bethesda game.

There's a trait you can pick that exactly explains my problems.with the game. The trait is 'Dream Home'. It is described as

'You own a luxurious, customizable house on a peaceful planet! Unfortunately it comes with a 125,000 credit mortgage with GalBank that has to be paid weekly.'...

I thought this was a cool way of adding increased difficulty for myself. I tend not to play at the hardest setting because I don't have much time to play. But having to plan ahead and work around this limitation sounded like it would add an interesting wrinkle to the strategy I'd have in the game.

However, when you start the game you discover that the loan has to be paid off in full... And you have unlimited time to pay it off. The only way to be foreclosed upon is if you actively go tell the bank to foreclose on you. It's like they had the idea, but couldn't be bothered to implement it.

What's worse is 120k is nothing in the game. You can easily get there within a few hours of play. This is just one example, but it speaks to the game's complete unwillingness to give the player anything negative or push them any way from their 'freedom'. The sheer fact you are not locked out of any faction or faction mission is another example. There are 0 stakes in the game and you feel 0 connection to the people you meet or places you visit. Not helped by Sarah potentially being one of the most annoying judgemental characters in any Bethesda game I've ever encountered.

Update: I eventually visited this 'Dream House'. It kinda sucked. The planet it is on is kinda ugly. There is more to this mechanic than I originally thought, however. When you visit you can pay 500 credits for 1 week of access as a 'payment' towards the principal. Still very deceptive of the original description.

My wife, a couple friends, and I have all put a ton of hours into this game and absolutely love it. I put several hours into the shipbuilder alone. Every hand built sidequest I run into feels like a TNG episode. And I love the kinda Becky Chambers / Star Trek-style utopia with mystery and drama theme they've got.

This is the most Bethesda game they've ever made, for better of worse. It doesn't hand hold you. There are plenty of times where I've looked at my quest log, found nothing i could do except the main quest, and then decided just to jump to a random system - only to get pulled into some crazy new adventure for a couple hours. You're supposed to be an explorer, if you put even the smallest effort into exploring, you will be rewarded.

A lot of people complaining were never going to like this game or any Bethesda game and I don't know what to do with those people. The amount of constant negativity on the internet makes me really appreciate stories like TNG and writers like Becky Chambers and Cory Doctorow, because they're so positive and affirming and optimistic and when they criticise, they also offer solutions. And this game really scratches that itch for me.

And after almost 40 years of life dealing with the constsnt cycle of negativity and hatred and anger and frustration and drama, on the internet, a global scale, and in my own life.....I'm just tired. I can't play games with "edgy dark stories" anymore. I can't go back to New Vegas because its bummer after bummer. And i know a lot of people thrive on that "scortched earth" bullshit but I just can't anymore.

I just...wanna sit down and play a game. And maybe one where everything is okay for once. And this is that game for me.

Rule of thumb. Wait until you see top ten mod lists for Bethesda games and is at least on sale.

Why are people pretending the game isn't getting glowing reviews? Is the Bethesda hate circlejerk still going on?

When this is the first meme I see a community make. I know the game is mid as fuck.

you guys really think it's boring? :/

I don't understand why is it popular to shit on Bethesda games? Just don't play it if you don't like it. At least it has no microtransacrions or Battle Pass nonsense.

I somehow entirely missed the hype around this game and came across it again only accidentally on early release day when looking at some other sale on Steam. Been playing it and it seems fine to me in a vague Skyrim-in-space sort of way, which is all what I was expecting from a Bethesda RPG.

The world seems alive enough and there are plenty of side-quests and amusing / interesting things to discover. Now suddenly I have been coming across a bunch of posts everywhere where the game is supposed to be terrible or something. Still seems fine to me, but maybe I have lower standards after decades of gaming. shrug.

I think it's fun, but I'm a run and gun kind of guy. So I'm having a blast shooting dudes in the face. The shooting is much better than Fallout. I LOVE fighting in the zero gravity arenas. It's so cool like floating between pillars and headshotting a guy off in the distance and his body is now bopping around. Those are so rare though. Idk how I can find more.

But overall I find the game frustrating outside battles. It's like death by a thousand cuts though. There's no one thing that's egregious but there's just stacking outdated design choices that continually build up. The games indecision around flying your ship being an easy catch all for the multiple failures in making your ship mean anything outside of battles and the map system. For the love of God fix the slide, you slide like 2inches. There's also a constant battle with backing out of menus. Idk.

But then I find some spacer trap house and have a good time blasting away. Excited for when I can actually can craft bespoke weapons.

Starfield is fun to me 🤷‍♂️

I’m not surprised. I haven’t seen vids or played Starfield, but just judging by how Fallout 4 and Skyrim play, I was gonna expect the game to get old and boring really quick between the bland gameplay and milquetoast writing of those two games.

Oblivion, Fallout 3 and Morrowind were probably their last good games, with Morrowind being Bethesda at their absolute best imo.

I literally spent my entire Labor Day weekend playing this game so anybody that says it's boring I'd really don't understand what they're talking about

I like the game