Starfieldcame and went in a way nobody could have anticipated. It dropped out of the conversation almost immediately and a distinct lack of nominations atThe Game Awardsboth in the official categories and reader’s choice speak volumes about how it has faded out of the mainstream in record time. I’ve heard more positive discourse aboutSkyrimandFalloutin recent weeks than Starfield, with players returning to fond favourites because Bethesda’s latest offering just doesn’t light the intended fire in their hearts.
It’s a shame, but also a fascinating set of circumstances to delve into, and goes to show howBethesda, a studio that once had the mainstream gaming world at its fingertips, has long fallen out of favour with an audience of millions. In hindsight,Fallout 4was a clear warning of this stark eventuality. Ahead of launch, hype surrounding the sequel was infectious, and everything we saw prior to release hinted at a deeper, more comprehensive RPG poised to build on everything that made Fallout 3 and New Vegas so special. The reality was more diluted as a number of hardcore players were turned off by lighter RPG systems, a voiced protagonist, and writing that just wasn’t as witty or pointed in its satire as its predecessors. It still boasted the apocalyptic open world of Boston to explore that I lost myself in for hours, but beyond that, it failed to stick in my memory.
After a lengthy eight-year wait, Starfield arrived. The future of the studio’s output is already plain to see, and after the muted reception, I’m curious if we’ll bother showing up in the same numbers or continue to evolve our tastes towards open-world RPGs in a medium that is constantly doing the same. Fallout 4 was archaic when it released, heralding a need for Bethesda’s formula to modernise and leave some of its bad habits behind. We all hoped Starfield would deliver that evolution, but it failed. Not because it didn’t try to introduce enough new ideas or strive for a grander sense of scale, but because Bethesda walked further down this path than ever while still wearing the same tattered pair of shoes.
Fallout 4 and Skyrim are being talked about far more than Starfield right now, while more comprehensive RPGs likeBaldur’s Gate 3are still dwarfing it in popularity. Starfield is the most advanced game Bethesda has ever made, but it’s also more simplified, compartmentalised, and lacking in personality that games need to express nowadays if they want to endure. With a few exceptions,you are hard-pressed to find anyone talking about their favourite companions in Starfieldor thequests that stood out most to them, and these discussions aren’t loud enough to break out of the echo chamber and bring new or lapsed players back into the fold.
For the first few weeks of its release, the majority of us played through the campaign, felt a bit disappointed, and chipped away at random planets and major settlements begging for something of worth to surface. Bethesda achieved its goal of creating a realistic universe with endless planets to explore and resources to gather. But like outer space in reality, the vast majority of it is empty, boring, and not worth bothering with. Starfield would have been fine if there were enough compelling main quests and characters to carry the emptiness on the periphery, but it didn’t, and unless the upcoming expansion surpasses our wildest expectations, it never will.
Skyrim didn’t need to provide memorable characters we could fall in love with because it set a new benchmark for fantasy worlds for us to explore and make our mark upon. You seldom hear people praise the main quest in Skyrim because they were too busy making their own stories by exploring caves to kill spiders or infiltrating bleak fortresses ripe with bandits. Starfield, despite its grandiose size, doesn’t provide us with the tools to make our own stories that we’ll repeat to friends for years to come. Without that, Starfield is bound to fade away, if it hasn’t already done so.
