Don’t get me wrong, I’m not a hater. I actually was really excited for the game. But so far I am just not having fun.
For a little bit of reference, I just finished playing thru Cyberpunk 2077 and then jumped right into Starfield. Maybe that was a mistake because I kinda just want to go back to Cyberpunk (and I will in a few weeks when the DLC comes out).
But I’m noticing two really big issues with Starfield: first, the gunplay/combat is… let’s call it underwhelming. I realize it’s quite probably a skill issue and I need to just git gud, but holy crap, everything is a bullet sponge and I don’t have that many bullets! Stealth seems to be pretty worthless at early levels as I don’t have any high-alpha guns that can take advantage of it and, most of the time, I’m detected before I even see the bad guys. I’m just not enjoying this aspect of the game at all.
The second big issue for me is that there’s a loading screen every five seconds! Again, probably a me thing, but OMG, it’s driving me nuts. Get into ship, loading screen. Launch from planet, loading screen. Fly to next planet, loading screen. Land on planet, loading screen. Leave ship, loading screen. I just want to go shoot things! Let me shoot things!
Okay, found some spacers, time to… oh shit, out of ammo. Let me swap to a worse gun that still has ammo. Sigh. Okay, they’re dead. Let me just heal up… oh shit, out of med packs. Sigh.
Oh and wrestling with the UI is exhausting.
Anyways, I realize that this probably isn’t the place to find a lot of like-minded people. But I really do want to like this game. Any tips on maybe at least ways to make the combat less of a chore?
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Most low level enemies drop weapons that only deal between 3 - 11 damage, which are basically useless against anything higher than level 5. I found some higher level weapons in a shop that dealt 30 - 40 damage and found they made combat much more fun.
As I progressed however, I noticed that enemy levels in a location were distributed:
- 4-5 low level
- 10-15 med level
- 1-5 high level
So there is still a problem with bullet sponges. I keep an overpowered shotgun (med damage, high rate of fire, explosions on crit) with me and just bum rush the high level enemies with that. Otherwise you’d be shooting them all day with your 40 damage rifle.
As you go on, those high level enemies drop weapons that do more damage, so there is progression…. But you also just encounter higher level enemies with more health so the problem continues.
I see that there are already combat rebalance mods on nexus, the kind I’ve used on Fallout games in the past, and I’ll probably install one of those when I decide to start a new play through. (Which, I definitely will. I’m enjoying the game a lot overall despite there being some tedious aspects)
Thanks, I’ll pay closer attention to the weapon damage. Maybe I’m not upgrading enough.
I found that too, and I’d say that kind of design makes sense. For an RPG, it shouldn’t be like Uncharted where anything lying on the ground from your warpath suits the need; there should be reason and investment to get a good gun, then make it better.
I’ve actually been buying up ammo, something I didn’t do in Fallout, because the caliber I get off enemies is puny.
I truly dont understand the “everything is a bullet sponge” argument.
I havent skilled any combat related skills and I am doing just fine in combat. Also I dont expect enemies in an RPG to get down in a single shot. Especially when they are armored like tanks or some weird giant alien creature. People have weird expectations tbh.
Just FYI - ammo doesn’t weigh anything. I didn’t notice this for quite a while. If you have some cash go by a couple of gun/ammo shops and just buy out like, all of it. Pretty quickly you’ll get to the point where you have plenty of ammo for any gun you pick up. IMO the upfront cost is super worth not having to worry about having ammo for one gun or the other.
Not to mention if you pick up guns from corpses chests etc, their ammo is added to your stash and you can then toss the now empty gun.
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I know for certain it works on my game. If it isn’t for you then it’s either a bug or the weapon you’re using doesn’t use the same ammo as the weapon you picked up.
Wait really?? That’s gonna be helpful since I stopped picking up guns that were too heavy to be worth selling. Of course now it’s one more chore to do… between wrestling the horrible UI and the inventory management itself (already a chore even if the UI wasn’t bad), I’m not sure if this tip will be a net gain in fun levels. lol
Tbh I just used the console to increase my carry weight allowance by 500, it’s been a game changer. If you don’t want to do that, remember to use your followers, they usually can carry at least ~130 mass. Then when you get back to your ship, dump all their crap into your ship’s cargo til you get to a vendor and mass sell. Or, in the context of my tip above, to dump all the weapons after you’ve accumulated so much.
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Yeah, if you use a controller just hit LB1 once or twice and it changes to selling from your ship’s inventory in the vendor menu. I’m sure there’s a keyboard binding for it too but I don’t know what key it is, probably the same one you use to change to selling mode.
I find the start kinda weird. Touchy tabloid, pass out. Wake up and akwardy get forced in to ship and spooky drone watching you. Got to the new atlantis and was bored already.
Even skyrim did this better.
Explored the first planet to see whats the deal. Terrorform was uglyass mf, but standing on 1meter rock glitches it completely, and then just empty all ammo on it.
I’m having fun.
It’s not NMS and I don’t want it to be. NMS is great for what it does, but it’s barely an actual game (in my experience - not played it for a few months so it may have changed).
I’m familiar enough with loading screens from FO3, FO:NV, FO4, and ES:V so that doesn’t bother me much.
Also, I’m an old man, so I’m playing on easy because I want fun and to explore the story rather than have a stressful challenge. The bosses with multiple health bars are a bit shit but I’ve rarely run out of ammo.
So, yeah, I’m having fun. But my expectations going into it on Wednesday were that it would be FO4 in space. So far it’s doing slightly better than that for me.
This is exactly how I feel about it. Well put.
I’ve only watched someone play it, but it does seem like it is super superficial, like a puddle that looks deep but is only a few inches
To be fair, I don’t feel like I’ve gotten far enough into the game to be able to tell how deep it is. But compared to Cyberpunk, the both the story and the combat are a lot less engaging. The space combat seems like it has potential and base building is something I really want to get into but they are both things that require more money (aka time played).
the bullet sponge must be really bad if you’re complaining about it after coming from Cyberpunk lmao
I’ve found hammering folks with a shotgun kills them pretty quickly but an entire *magazine from an assault rifle doesn’t kill most enemies. Pretty annoying.
I played Cyberpunk with a Sandy and Gorilla Arms and even on the hardest difficulty I was killing most enemies in one hit. Though I think early game was pretty rough before I got chromed.
Yeah I played pistol headshot build until they nerfed it, that was the only build that worked for me, it being one shot too. I dislike the leveled enemies in general. If I play it again it will be with a mod that removes levels and gives the factions more gameplay significance (like Maelstrom needing armor piercing).
I played Tarkov before that and after that any amount of bullet sponginess is agony. I like realism.
I completely ruins the immersion in Cyberpunk’s amazing worldbuilding if unarmored enemies don’t die after duping an entire mag into them. And even more so if I oneshot enemies in one neighborhood and in the next neighborhood they eat all my bullets for lunch without any visual indication why they would be stronger.
It’s absolutely the most bullet-spongiest gunplay in my recent memory. As the other guy said, I can unload an entire clip with an AR an not kill a normal mob, and there are elites with multiple health bars. Ugh…
Wasn’t quite sure at first, but I kinda knew what to expect from a BethRPG - slowly grew on me and now i’m pretty into it. About 22 hours in and I feel like i’m getting thru most of the main quest. Seen some cool stuff, and I guess there’s a NG+ so i’ll probably push thru the main plot and then go a bit slower in the next game.
Wish you could traverse planets a bit faster, it can be a bit tedious. Felt like too much fast travel at first, but once you embrace it, it does move things along. (Wouldn’t want to play with a HDD and not an SSD) Gunplay isn’t bad. The companions are annoying and seemingly turn into stalkers lol.
I’m definitely having a hard time giving a fuck about literally anything in SF. Shame but I’m happy to go back to bg3 ig
Old Bethesda is gone and isn’t coming back, I wish people would stop pretending like they aren’t
I still dont really know what the selling points are. In the lead up to release i was waiting to see what was gonna make it exciting. Never seemed to happen. Just clinical sci-fi.
I’m holding back till more mods start coming out to improve it like all other bethesda games
I agree mostly with this. The bullet-sponginess makes me somewhat dislike the combat. During some random exploration, I found a nice weapon which allows me to one-shot most people. That actually helped a lot, which is one thing that made me realize how spongy things actually are. And yeah, I also found Cyberpunk’s combat better.
I’m on the fence with the menus and loading screens. Personally I just wish it was more consistent. If I set a course while sitting in the pilot’s seat, I at least get a cutscene that offers some slight immersion. If I do it from the nav table, I jump instantly to my destination regardless of where I was before. Hate that.
Personally I just wish it was more consistent.
Ha, I agree but the opposite. The cutscenes for immersion are great… the first 50 times. After that, I just want the option to SKIP IT!!!
But you can! Just use the nav table.
git gud n3wb!
Jk i couldn’t resist
If you like it and are having fun, good for you. If you don’t like it and would rather spend time on the bazillion other games out there, you won’t be missing out much either.
At the end of the day, Starfield is just another Bethesda game. Same mould, same problems, same gameplay, with a slightly improved engine for overhauls which will be carried out by none other than free and enthusiastic modders.
Screaming at each other for liking or disliking a game is just what gamers always have been doing and will keep doing forever.
I have a recommendation for running out of ammo and health packs: spend the time searching everything. There are boxes of ammo everywhere to the point that I’ve never gotten close to worrying about running out.
Yes, it’s tedious, yes, it’s probably not great gameplay to have to spend so much time searching rooms, but it helps you not run out of ammo.
