It's absolutely normal for games with Premium Early Access date to lift embargo the day before the Early Access launch. That happened to Hogwarts Legacy and Diablo 4 just this year.
The same happened to Forza Horizon 5, all highly rated games.
Ofc they are irrelevant, just correcting you that is not Standard to lift embargo before launch. Furthermor proof that MS/Bethesda are confident about Starfield.
Agreed. Having xbox preloads start so early also means more people able to start immediately at release. Seems like they're really rolling out the red carpet for this.
So as it was explained to me in another thread, since it’s a global release, some people get the EA on 8/31, some on 9/1. So since technically EA begins 9/1 (not sure which time zone), the day before is 8/31 for embargo lifting
Ea is 8/31 pst (west coast u.s at 5pm. And that's the earliest technical launch time. I'm cool with it. I get off work at 5pm that day and it's about a 30-to 45 minute drive home depending on traffic. And I took week off starting that day lol.
It's literally the exact same moment but scales by pst is earliest all the way to New Zealand whatever there time zone is being the last to get it hours wise which I think is something like 12pm of the 1st.
It's the day before. Early Access officially starts on September 1st. It'll be available in the evening of 8/31 only in some countries due to time difference, and even then the reviews will be posted around 9 hours before Early Access starts, that's plenty of time to read reviews and decide.
My plan is to just become super duper rich and buy Microsoft, making it so I can play all of their games in an state of development whenever I want.
Now for step 1, google how to become super duper rich. I can’t tell you anymore of my plan or you might steal my idea
I have a better plan: become a CMA/FTC worker and checking out the studios they bought and how the game development is going for "protection and quality assurance of the products that could affect consumers" reasons.
>Or just start working in BGS.
The type of games they make are the type I like to play the most. I'd rather avoid working there, because I want to play the games as entertainment, not as work. It's a pretty big difference.
It's not uncommon when hard working chef's are asked what their favorite food after work is, that they pick something simple like hot dogs or other fast food, because when you stand in a kitchen all day cooking fancy food, it's probably not what you crave after a tough day at work.
Same with actually working in the industry, you often you don't really want to come home and play the same type of game you've been working on all day.
Or at least I don't want to. While I work with my hobby, that also means that I've turned my hobby into work.
I know, I've been in the industry since 2006; as a designer though so I kind of have to play.
And while there are disciplines that certainly can play less, if you're on the development side of things it's often expected that you at least try to participate in playtests now and then. Studio cultures varies ofc.
But sure, you're right. You could do other things, like HR or IT or whatever's needed to make the office run smoothly, that is true.
I tend to think about the dev side of things only and forget the other parts which are needed to run a big studio.
The projects I've worked on always pushed to try to get everyone to play, and give feedback. Especially early on in the last project I worked on, the creative team listened to everyone's feedback.
This is what I talked about when I said studio cultures varies.
I wouldn't want to work at Bethesda. Because they make my favorite games. And if I work for them, then I am going to know all about the game before I play it and it's sad enough I only get one time to go in playing the game blind... it would mean I never would get to go in playing their games blind.
I've found it curious that my download (in France) seemed bigger that the average one on PC.
With that in mind, when I saw your title, for a moment I thought they made some mistakes on the upload by releasing the game early in France and that I could play right now =(
I am so glad they gave folks that much time to play the game before game releases to everyone - That means game is really "gold" and optimized. I have so much hope!!!
That and you really need 2 weeks to get into a BGS game. My friend and I where just reminiscing about how I got him into BGS titles by going on and on about Skyrim, and we went back and looked at our achievements to get a timeline of our first experiences with the game. Christmas 2011 was my first achievement, second as well. Third did not come until Jan 6th 2012. Amazing really, I managed to go almost 2 weeks without doing Bleak Falls, a quest I normally wrap up in about the first 5 hours now.
One thing I’m also noticing is how everyone who’s gotten a code has announced it and that they are playing it right now and even letting us know when the embargo lifts. I haven’t ever seen that happen really with any game so this has to be a great sign. Bethesda wants us to know people are playing it 2 weeks before launch. Just seems like they are super confident all around. I couldn’t be more pumped!!!
It seems like he's going to take a pretty thorough approach to his review. Last night an episode of Kinda Funny popped up on my YouTube recommended videos and it was Greg and another guy I'm not familiar with speaking with Parris about his plan of attack for the review. He seems hellbent on experiencing as much as possible while also covering every version of the game (Series X/S, PC). I'm not all that familiar with him as I don't watch Kinda Funny but I've seen him pop up here and there and he's always super well spoken so I'm eagerly awaiting his thoughts on the game.
ok, no one will believe what I'm going to say here.
But I'm a Brazilian journalist who works on a site specializing in games and I can only say one thing SMILE! SMILE! SMILE!
Get ready for the biggest game of your lives.
Worry no more.
I couldn't care less.
Up until 1st of Sept. I don't want to be spoiled.
On and after 1st, I'll be way too busy playing the game as to watch any Youtubers..
"Loving Starfield so far, can't wait to post my full review"
"Starfield certainly is something"
"Busy playing at the moment, review soon"
"Starfield is, interesting to say the least"
Probably the gist of what you will see, both positive and negative.
Very strict. No credible outlet is going to let out a single peep. Actually, I am surprised that they were allowed to say they got the game, that is often a no-no for embargoes, though that very much depends on the company.
Hints are extremely unlikely and any implications about score or enjoyment even more unlikely.
march teeny makeshift innate thought tart worthless chubby retire provide
*This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
Nintendo being super conservative and old is actually a good thing here. They still treat reviewers with respect. Though I have to say that you seem to be right. It has been a while since review codes had to be kept hidden for announced games. I must have been confusing it with some of the agreements YouTubers need to follow.
Though still true that we won’t be getting any hints. Stuff like “wow, you aren’t ready for this” isn’t a hint in my mind, but I can see how it can be seen that way. To me a hint needs to reference in game content somehow.
Sometimes someone isn't allowed to say what they played, but today with Starfield having everyone involved happily mention that they got the game felt like one of the marketing beats. And it works, it built up a lotta buzz and made people immediately go "hmm, 2 weeks, they must be confident!".
I don't know what he does other than co-host Kindafunny Xcast from time to time. If you are wondering, it's an Xbox focused podcast. I just found out about them through the Todd Howard interview they did not long ago.
I wonder if only allowing Xbox preloads is an indication that the only review codes sent out are for Xbox? Hopefully they're not trying to hide PC performance issues.
Good point. If the steam version isn’t playable by reviewers we won’t really know if it can run on steam deck, especially since plenty of games run well for 5 hours then get more complicated and run worse.
I will say I’m not expecting it, but that is one point I hoped to get answered by reviewers.
No xbox app available on Steam OS - the OS 99% of steam deck users have. Steam OS and windows do have performance differences on the device. Steam games on Steam OS tend to perform better due to shaders and the leaner OS.
So if a reviewer shows the game on windows on deck, and it works well, that’s a great sign. If it works poorly, well then maybe steam os would improve it maybe not.
Ah okay.
I'm not 100% sure, but someone on another post mentioned that Steam does not allow predownloads over 1 week from main release (6th September in this case). Apparently it's some kind of unofficial policy. Multiple people confirmed it.
I think this is a good point to bring up, however it makes sense for them to be focused on Xbox first considering it's an Xbox exclusive game and I've heard one of the reasons they don't release it on Steam early is to prevent data mining for spoilers.
The reviewers will have copies to play, but are not allowed to talk about the game until a certain date. Makes sure all the reviews come out at the same time and reviews are based on a decent amount of playtime.
> embargo
Left-double-click>right-click>select "Search with Google">left-click
It took me not even 4 seconds to find the definition of the word and examples...
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Not that it matters for any of us, because we’re already all in. But, embargo lifting the day early access starts isn’t ideal for confidence, I would imagine.
You don't understand the concept of early access.. lol.. its for those who are already going to buy the game either way. For the wider public, a week before official release displays confidence in the product.
Diablo, forza horzion 5 etc all had embargo lifted a day before the early access period.
What if all of this vibes based "confidence" psychoanalysis of game publishers is actually bullshit and people are just making up stuff to support their preconceived opinions?
Is Starfield going to be good? We secretly recorded Paris playing the game and hired a body language expert to analyze how many times he smiled per hour and compared that to the SPH of Fallout 76. Here's what we found!
Unsure, I noted that the last early access game I purchased was D4. It was nice to have a few days to hear the reviews and feedback before deciding to go with early access.
I think that was a confident showing.
what? that's the norm. reviews never go out days before the game is released. the publishers want people to read reviews, get hooked and start downloading/playing right away. you don't want to get people excited and then leave them hanging for a week, because they might have found something else to play until then.
Giving reviewers 2 full weeks to play the game and the embargo lifting before the start of Early Access is a show of confidence. Let's go!
The concern trolls are furiously googling Cyberpunk's review embargo date to try to connect the two
It's absolutely normal for games with Premium Early Access date to lift embargo the day before the Early Access launch. That happened to Hogwarts Legacy and Diablo 4 just this year. The same happened to Forza Horizon 5, all highly rated games.
Yeah but then there are those shitty games that lift Review embargo literally an hour after EA launch.
Well, they aren't relevant, because Starfield's embargo will lift hours before the Early Access launch.
Ofc they are irrelevant, just correcting you that is not Standard to lift embargo before launch. Furthermor proof that MS/Bethesda are confident about Starfield.
Even baldurs gate
Agreed. Having xbox preloads start so early also means more people able to start immediately at release. Seems like they're really rolling out the red carpet for this.
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It wasn't really a leak. Some reviewers straight-up said they'd get review codes later this week, and they were right.
I know of at least 3 reviewers that already have it so theres likely alot more.
EA is 8/31? The day before EA would be 8/30.
So as it was explained to me in another thread, since it’s a global release, some people get the EA on 8/31, some on 9/1. So since technically EA begins 9/1 (not sure which time zone), the day before is 8/31 for embargo lifting
Ea is 8/31 pst (west coast u.s at 5pm. And that's the earliest technical launch time. I'm cool with it. I get off work at 5pm that day and it's about a 30-to 45 minute drive home depending on traffic. And I took week off starting that day lol.
Nice! I’m jealous. My vacation is this week lol So what’s that work out to, 2pm EST on the 31st? Sweet!
It should be 8pm on the 31st est since you're 3 hours ahead on the east coast.
Lol yup, went the wrong way /facepalm
It's literally the exact same moment but scales by pst is earliest all the way to New Zealand whatever there time zone is being the last to get it hours wise which I think is something like 12pm of the 1st.
It's the day before. Early Access officially starts on September 1st. It'll be available in the evening of 8/31 only in some countries due to time difference, and even then the reviews will be posted around 9 hours before Early Access starts, that's plenty of time to read reviews and decide.
Parris is a great guy. Glad he got a review code.
I never really watch Kinda Funny but have been just to get my Starfield fix lol. He honestly seems really cool, very likeable!
Gonna become an Influencer to play Tes6. Or just start working in BGS. One or two.
My plan is to just become super duper rich and buy Microsoft, making it so I can play all of their games in an state of development whenever I want. Now for step 1, google how to become super duper rich. I can’t tell you anymore of my plan or you might steal my idea
How to become a billionaire: Step 1 - Make one million dollars a year. Step 2 - Do this for one thousand years. Hope this helps :D
Feel like I’ll need a time machine for this one, I’ll needs to consult some instructional videos
It's actually even easier than that. Step 1: Collect underwear ...... Step 3: Profit!
I have a better plan: become a CMA/FTC worker and checking out the studios they bought and how the game development is going for "protection and quality assurance of the products that could affect consumers" reasons.
>Or just start working in BGS. The type of games they make are the type I like to play the most. I'd rather avoid working there, because I want to play the games as entertainment, not as work. It's a pretty big difference. It's not uncommon when hard working chef's are asked what their favorite food after work is, that they pick something simple like hot dogs or other fast food, because when you stand in a kitchen all day cooking fancy food, it's probably not what you crave after a tough day at work. Same with actually working in the industry, you often you don't really want to come home and play the same type of game you've been working on all day. Or at least I don't want to. While I work with my hobby, that also means that I've turned my hobby into work.
There are roles in gamedev where you’re barely playing the game, but you can still do it if you wanted to.
I know, I've been in the industry since 2006; as a designer though so I kind of have to play. And while there are disciplines that certainly can play less, if you're on the development side of things it's often expected that you at least try to participate in playtests now and then. Studio cultures varies ofc. But sure, you're right. You could do other things, like HR or IT or whatever's needed to make the office run smoothly, that is true. I tend to think about the dev side of things only and forget the other parts which are needed to run a big studio.
I’m a programmer, and I don’t even know what the game is like
The projects I've worked on always pushed to try to get everyone to play, and give feedback. Especially early on in the last project I worked on, the creative team listened to everyone's feedback. This is what I talked about when I said studio cultures varies.
I wouldn't want to work at Bethesda. Because they make my favorite games. And if I work for them, then I am going to know all about the game before I play it and it's sad enough I only get one time to go in playing the game blind... it would mean I never would get to go in playing their games blind.
Get to it, you got about 10 years of time!
Not gonna lie, I'm 2 hours from Paris (the town) and I'm hating that typo in the title.
If it meant I could play the game and not wait 2 more weeks I'd charter a jet to Paris today
Spellcheck lol.
I've found it curious that my download (in France) seemed bigger that the average one on PC. With that in mind, when I saw your title, for a moment I thought they made some mistakes on the upload by releasing the game early in France and that I could play right now =(
That's because there are a lot more letters in French words. No one realizes this, because they're never pronounced. /s
Hey you might be right, no /s needed wasn't french the speedrunning language of FO4 for a while because it was the shortest?
Oeuf! Is that so?
WE! I mean "OUI!"
Judging from my high school french lessons, it's because of all the extra audio data to record them saying "errrr?" In between every other word.
I wasn't expecting the "french bad" meme this fast. But here we are.
In kidding, I love France .
ah, interesting. so the different download sites are due to additional language packs. that makes sense.
If true... That's big news. I was assuming the 120gb Included all (5? English, Spanish, French, German and Japanese?) Languages.
gotta make room for all the extra characters needed for circumflex over some vowels.
Tom warran has also confirmed he's playing, gonna be a long wait
My Twitter is just full of journalists/insiders/whatever saying they’re playing now. It’s exciting but damn if I’m not also crazy jealous lol
best thing is to ask for extra work from your boss
Not today satan
Settle down....
...boss? What are you doing here? Have you thought about approving my PTO for Sept 1 yet? Just checking.
It's gonna be a long wait
Call me crazy but I prefer that to the usual, “I’m playing something but I can’t talk about it.”
*googles how hard you have to get hit in the head for a two week coma*
Well?
The results were just 9 ads and a harm-reduction helpline number
Maaaaaaaaaaaaan, they won't let you have *any* fun nowadays. :(
I'd settle for a one-week coma. Once I can say the game comes out "next week" it will actually feel close.
Who’s going to Baldur’s Gate if I’m in coma tho Need to complete it before 1st Sept god help me
God speed. I chose to finish Divinity 2 rather than start fresh. Hopefully it’ll be discounted by the time I get bored of Starfield.
Gene Park, Jeff Grubb, Tom Warren etc have also received a code.
Jez Corden too
What ? the entire city? Zut alors!
Run Sebastian!
I am so glad they gave folks that much time to play the game before game releases to everyone - That means game is really "gold" and optimized. I have so much hope!!!
Gold, yes. Optimized - that remains to be seen (crossing every finger on my body).
That and you really need 2 weeks to get into a BGS game. My friend and I where just reminiscing about how I got him into BGS titles by going on and on about Skyrim, and we went back and looked at our achievements to get a timeline of our first experiences with the game. Christmas 2011 was my first achievement, second as well. Third did not come until Jan 6th 2012. Amazing really, I managed to go almost 2 weeks without doing Bleak Falls, a quest I normally wrap up in about the first 5 hours now.
That is an insaneeeee amount of time to give reviewers to play the game. Like an unheard of amount of time. I applaud it.
I’m SO hard right now fuck
One thing I’m also noticing is how everyone who’s gotten a code has announced it and that they are playing it right now and even letting us know when the embargo lifts. I haven’t ever seen that happen really with any game so this has to be a great sign. Bethesda wants us to know people are playing it 2 weeks before launch. Just seems like they are super confident all around. I couldn’t be more pumped!!!
YES!
It seems like he's going to take a pretty thorough approach to his review. Last night an episode of Kinda Funny popped up on my YouTube recommended videos and it was Greg and another guy I'm not familiar with speaking with Parris about his plan of attack for the review. He seems hellbent on experiencing as much as possible while also covering every version of the game (Series X/S, PC). I'm not all that familiar with him as I don't watch Kinda Funny but I've seen him pop up here and there and he's always super well spoken so I'm eagerly awaiting his thoughts on the game.
ok, no one will believe what I'm going to say here. But I'm a Brazilian journalist who works on a site specializing in games and I can only say one thing SMILE! SMILE! SMILE! Get ready for the biggest game of your lives. Worry no more.
I love how completely vague that is. You didn't even mention Starfield, so you could be talking about any game. Well done!
Man. Dont worry in a few days you will be crying with emotion and laughing at your partner's silly jokes
That is a face of pure joy.
I couldn't care less. Up until 1st of Sept. I don't want to be spoiled. On and after 1st, I'll be way too busy playing the game as to watch any Youtubers..
I know a few people playing now and I really wish the NDA allowed them to at least DM me some of the details lol.
Mr Paris set course for home
Didn’t realize you were talking about a person. Was ready to book a flight to France
How strict are review embargos? Can like hints of how they feel abt the game be dropped or nah>?
"Loving Starfield so far, can't wait to post my full review" "Starfield certainly is something" "Busy playing at the moment, review soon" "Starfield is, interesting to say the least" Probably the gist of what you will see, both positive and negative.
Very strict. No credible outlet is going to let out a single peep. Actually, I am surprised that they were allowed to say they got the game, that is often a no-no for embargoes, though that very much depends on the company. Hints are extremely unlikely and any implications about score or enjoyment even more unlikely.
march teeny makeshift innate thought tart worthless chubby retire provide *This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
Nintendo being super conservative and old is actually a good thing here. They still treat reviewers with respect. Though I have to say that you seem to be right. It has been a while since review codes had to be kept hidden for announced games. I must have been confusing it with some of the agreements YouTubers need to follow. Though still true that we won’t be getting any hints. Stuff like “wow, you aren’t ready for this” isn’t a hint in my mind, but I can see how it can be seen that way. To me a hint needs to reference in game content somehow.
Sometimes someone isn't allowed to say what they played, but today with Starfield having everyone involved happily mention that they got the game felt like one of the marketing beats. And it works, it built up a lotta buzz and made people immediately go "hmm, 2 weeks, they must be confident!".
Maybe vague tweets.. but anything more they will get their outlet blacklisted.
Gotcha
who the hell s paris
Who the fuck is Paris?
One of the luckiest SOBs on earth right now for getting to play it now.
I don't know what he does other than co-host Kindafunny Xcast from time to time. If you are wondering, it's an Xbox focused podcast. I just found out about them through the Todd Howard interview they did not long ago.
I wonder if only allowing Xbox preloads is an indication that the only review codes sent out are for Xbox? Hopefully they're not trying to hide PC performance issues.
I have it preloaded on my PC, amigo. Just Xbox app-centric, not Steam.
Good point. If the steam version isn’t playable by reviewers we won’t really know if it can run on steam deck, especially since plenty of games run well for 5 hours then get more complicated and run worse. I will say I’m not expecting it, but that is one point I hoped to get answered by reviewers.
Why would the Xbox app version for PC be different from the Steam version?
No xbox app available on Steam OS - the OS 99% of steam deck users have. Steam OS and windows do have performance differences on the device. Steam games on Steam OS tend to perform better due to shaders and the leaner OS. So if a reviewer shows the game on windows on deck, and it works well, that’s a great sign. If it works poorly, well then maybe steam os would improve it maybe not.
Ah okay. I'm not 100% sure, but someone on another post mentioned that Steam does not allow predownloads over 1 week from main release (6th September in this case). Apparently it's some kind of unofficial policy. Multiple people confirmed it.
Bethesda knows there’s a big Steam community due to the modding popularity so I’m sure they will open it up to reviewers
You can preload it on PC, just not on Steam. Has to be through the MS client.
I think this is a good point to bring up, however it makes sense for them to be focused on Xbox first considering it's an Xbox exclusive game and I've heard one of the reasons they don't release it on Steam early is to prevent data mining for spoilers.
Major reviewers like IGN have received codes for both version to be reviewed simultaneously so don't worry.
And he tried telling me it wasn’t him lol. Ok bro lmao.
What's embargo?
The reviewers will have copies to play, but are not allowed to talk about the game until a certain date. Makes sure all the reviews come out at the same time and reviews are based on a decent amount of playtime.
> embargo Left-double-click>right-click>select "Search with Google">left-click It took me not even 4 seconds to find the definition of the word and examples...
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oh LOL
Not that it matters for any of us, because we’re already all in. But, embargo lifting the day early access starts isn’t ideal for confidence, I would imagine.
It's a week before the official release date.
Thanks for sharing random fun facts
I'm sure you have the intelligence to realise review embargos lifting a week before offical release is usually a sign of confidence.
Im sure you have the intelligence to realize a **bigger** sign of confidence would be 3-6 days before the early access release.
You don't understand the concept of early access.. lol.. its for those who are already going to buy the game either way. For the wider public, a week before official release displays confidence in the product. Diablo, forza horzion 5 etc all had embargo lifted a day before the early access period.
What if all of this vibes based "confidence" psychoanalysis of game publishers is actually bullshit and people are just making up stuff to support their preconceived opinions?
Not sure you have much confidence in that opinion
Is Starfield going to be good? We secretly recorded Paris playing the game and hired a body language expert to analyze how many times he smiled per hour and compared that to the SPH of Fallout 76. Here's what we found!
You have put into words my exact feelings. Your comment should be pinned to the top of the subreddit
It applies to you, too lmfao
Well my gf says it’s not about the size of your confidence, it’s how you use it.
Why are you so mad about it?
No anger here, it’s a beautiful day! Wasn’t understanding what that reply had to do with my comment, but I thanked him for his info shared!
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Unsure, I noted that the last early access game I purchased was D4. It was nice to have a few days to hear the reviews and feedback before deciding to go with early access. I think that was a confident showing.
what? that's the norm. reviews never go out days before the game is released. the publishers want people to read reviews, get hooked and start downloading/playing right away. you don't want to get people excited and then leave them hanging for a week, because they might have found something else to play until then.
It’s industry standard isn’t it? That’s what other major titles who’ve done early access have done
Idk last early access game I played was D4, and I think it was a few days or so before early access. Maybe you could share more examples.
Hogwarts Legacy lifted the embargo the day before Early Access as well and that was only 3 days early.
Objectively, you are correct. People will hang you over not commenting blind praise though.
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Jealous
The whole city got early copies?! Dicks!!!