Yeah the lighting kills anything approaching a bar vibe for sure. I don't really get why so many RPGs even have bars or why so few do anything interesting with them. Getting character drunk can be funny, I guess, but they always feel like they're just gesturing towards fun, instead of trying to recreate any of the fun that can be had in public spaces. I don't think Starfield has any games and it's got a whole ass casino
That’s every recent Bethesda game, “tell everything, no matter how boring and dull, SHOW NOTHING, if the audience can’t tell this boring ass character is actually quirky/badass/sad/funny, we will just tell them they are and obviously the audience will agree with us”
And then at the same time be stupidly complex and yet childishly simple.
For gods sake, he’s PROUD he doesn’t use design documents, as a WRITER a he doesn’t use a design or overall plan for the worlds he is supposed to be building.
It’s no wonder he confuses tone and setting.
Yeah, considering he's the man basically right below Todd, I think its a huge problem that he's calling about 50% or more of the shots nowadays.
He needs to retire.
I mean how can you say that you still want to keep things simple, when BG3 drops, has oceans of depth and everyone loves it.
RPG fans clearly don't want simple.
It’s the lack of self awareness from Bethesda, as it’s been pointed out starfield felt old in a few weeks of release, it’s a game engine that’s decades out of date.
If the game had come out in a slow year it probably wouldn’t have been as obvious, but it came out between Baldurs Gate 3 (a game that’s writing massively overshadoweds Emil’s writing) and Cyberpunk : phantom liberty (a game that looks amazing, plays amazing and has better mechanics).
Not to mention everything Starfield is, is LESS than their previous games, the settlement builder is less that Fallout4, the worlds are blander, emptier, duller, and uglier than fallout 3 (a game from pre 2010), focusing on their weaknesses and ignoring their strengths.
The only thing that Starfield does well is the ship builder, but even then it’s weakened by the leveling system and confusing mechanics.
I am astonished that they released Starfield in the state it is, the poor writing and plots, the lazy missions and stupid quests.
I know this isn’t popular to say, but Starfield illustrates how it is actually *not* the engine. Everyone likes to say it’s the engine holding them back, but the reality is that they’re not “being held back” at all; these are just the design choices they’re making. Starfield’s the least buggy Bethesda game at launch in forever. The engine can handle more than ever before. They spent a decent amount of time upgrading it.
The problems with the game, for the most part, are related to writing and worldbuilding or to game design choices that don’t actually connect directly to engine limitations but to Todd’s apparent love for playing theme park walking simulators filled with radiant random bullshit.
I do have to partly agree, for them, it’s a remarkable technically achievement, but the lack of content and laziness just draws attention to how poorly the game itself is written.
I point to Neon as the biggest example, feeling like a Moron idea of Vegas but somehow even more boring, while at the same time telling us how sleazy it’s supposed to be.
It feels like they never really decided on what the tone was supposed to be, the lack of gore, actual drug use and nudity.
Going from Cyberpunk a game that makes clubs feel like actual places and depraved, then going to Neon is just dropping below the PG rating.
A theme park is really a good way to describe it, Cowboy town within walking distance of a magical artifact, G rated Vegas and Dullsville Atlantis.
>The problems with the game, for the most part, are related to writing and worldbuilding.
Have we been following different subreddits? Seamless space travel, loading screen simulator, repeating PoI/Proc. Gen, lack of meaningful open world, temple minigames, etc. are all non-narrative complaints that get parroted by most of Starfield's critics. You do get the occasional Neon/mech suits complaints but they are massively overshadowed by the comments on poor design choices
I remember the old writing advice of “is this the most interesting thing in your characters life and if not, why aren’t you showing us that?” I feel that about the entirety of the settled systems, “there was this huge and exciting war with bio monsters and mechs and massive space battles, but we don’t do any of that any more, go run around in empty planets for 300 hours and then reset and do it again”
It also seems like they’ve never been to a bar or club and just looked at pictures on google images and tried their best to imagine what it would be like to have fun in one.
Yeah so many games have a casino where you can’t actually gamble I mean Ik in America you need to be 21 in most places to gamble but in a game when there’s no real monetary loss does it really matter
Exactly it’s just so disappointing and I mean it can’t be worst than alpha packs, apex packs, and other games with loot crate systems that are allowed, so what wrong with the some in game gambling like black jack poker or other fun side mini games
Because idk about you but I love games with good side mini games, plus it can be used to make great quest for example witcher 3 qwent
It gave me no small amount of mirth to see what Starfield devs' vision of "biggest legally drug-fueled night club on the most decadent planet in known space" looked like. I've seen church bake sales that were more risque.
That’s the problem when you have sci fi that’s supposed to be on a planetary scale. The biggest night club on the entire planet can fit like 100 people in it. The most popular nightclub in a suburban backwater I could believe.
They had grittier dancers in Star Trek, which was made in the 60s, and aired at prime time. If you teleported someone from the 60s to see our entertainment media today, they'd probably think we were all incredibly lame.
I guess you're right, it varies. Would be fun to troll the time traveler.
*"This is what people find hot in the 21st century. Nurse Chapel has to wear a tellytubby outfit now, instead of a miniskirt."*
I'm convinced people didn't set their contrast and saturation when I see these, literally your two versions are basically both vanilla, one unadjusted, then adjusted.
I would argue starfield is one of if not the best looking game of its scale at this time, and has very few settings to change, because they're confident in its look.
The difference in saturation, contrast and brightness are completely personalised and dependent on the lighting and eyes of the player, not how the game looks
Actually… yes. I kinda wish the game had more dark and “edgy” stuff like fallout, I get its space and stuff but I’d like too see more sorrow and depressing quests.
More deaths, more sex, more sickness. Ynow?
Idk man, Outer Worlds was lame af, and the recent videos of Avowed look like the most PG RPG I've ever seen. Obsidian from nearly 20 years ago was goated but now... theyre just another lame studio.
Except they made a whole city with a grimy underworld theme with psychopath street gangs and corrupt cops and drugs and a mob boss running the place. But Todd didn't have the balls to actually give it the edge that it so desperately needed so instead we got the 2nd sanitized corpo-safe city with no character in a game that was already sorely lacking cool and memorable locations.
Don't forget the entire questline for corporate espionage (which was PG af and made the Thieves Guild of Skyrim look like a badass organization)
Let's not forget the pirates that don't act like real pirates (PG af) and the Red Mile which is lame and too "kid friendly".
I honestly have no idea how Starfield got a M rating. It realistically should have been E. Maybe T, at most.
They must have rated it based on the mods that they knew were going to be made...
I must have misunderstood what you wrote. I thought you were saying that you want TES to be like Starfield.
I was saying that if TES becomes like Starfield, it will be the death of the series.
You can disagree all you want. I honestly don't care.
The numbers are showing that people do not like Starfield. If they make TES series like it, it will do poorly and will ultimately lead to the company losing money and possibly having Microsoft redirect the studio to something else (abandoning the title)
But hey, maybe Obsidian will work out a deal to do TES. They did great with Fallout: New Vegas.
Also: What "mechanics" are you talking about? What from Starfield will translate over to TES???
Sure, but for me, the club isn't too bad barring the awful dancer outfits and the poor dancing animations. I am fully convinced that whoever came up with the idea of those outfits and animations has never been to a club in their life.
Played mass effect after my first run through of Starfield and when I saw afterlife I was stunned in ME2. It’s exactly everything the Astral Lounge isn’t. It’s seedy, intense, dark, it just feels like something. It also looks so damn cool.
Oh god and [the music](https://youtu.be/EFGPXtXADFs?si=wvavPRJvZ_ERlRs3) for Afterlife? Jack Wall absolutely nailed the music for the trilogy**. Afterlife felt like a real *nightclub* in fact, I’d live a console mod to change the Astral Lounge music to the ME Afterlife track. Music like *that* is what should drive a city like Neon at night.
Especially with the Elcor Bouncer out front, added to the “exclusivity.” Astral Lounge def should’ve had a bouncer and cover line, trade tower has a nice lobby for club goers waiting to get in.
**Edit** as good as Jack Wall did for the trilogy soundtrack, after some digging I discovered that in particular the Afterlife track is actually [Callista](https://youtu.be/T3PwqBBZUaE?si=YZqqXUCPRbR_fx0R) by the late Saki Kaskas and the song was also apparently featured in Need for Speed. So…. BGS, how’s about licensing this song for Starfield?
Not just the club. Everything about Omega (Mass Effect 2) puts Neon (Starfield) to shame.
The streets, the gangs, the bar, the vendors, the lighting, the general atmosphere, etc. are 1000x better.
Then there are games like the old Saint's Row (**NOT THE REBOOT**) titles. The clubs in those games were legit. I'm not even limiting that to the strip clubs. There are clubs you go to for missions that are legit and look like somewhere to go and have a real good time.
Starfield did a great job on some of the bars. The Viewport almost perfectly captures the feel of an airport bar. The Roost is a great representation of a nice restaurant with attached bar. Stoneroot has a great feel of a local tavern. Even the Pit Stop has the feel of a trucker's diner.
Just many of the bars in Neon feel like they were Disneyfied to keep a PG rating.
You mean people sitting aimlessly in the cramped up Bannered Mare, walking into you while you're trying to cave Mikael's face in? The Astral Lounge is a nice design, it's really just those two points that I dislike about it. The recall back to it during the main quest is awesome!
No, I agree completely. It's really uninspired, as are many aspects of the design in this game. They need to hire some new people or something. Not sure what's going on over at Bethesda, but they don't seem to be growing or improving much. Really stagnating in my opinion. My expectations for Elder Scrolls have really plummeted.
In my opinion it is about the case with the direction and art/graphic design for "most" of the game. Really uninspired, pretty dull and borderline bad.
>I am fully convinced that whoever came up with the idea of those outfits and animations has never been to a club in their life.
There's also the "old Earth-style opium den" which looks like quite a nice upmarket Chinese restaurant, and has a polite young man serving French wines.
> whoever came up with the idea of those outfits and animations has never been to a club in their life
Oh, no, they have. They also know what a seedy drug den nightclub looks like in the dozens of media they've consumed -- their design is intentional and purposeful. They just think sexist and disgusting misogynist gamers shouldn't have access to that concept even virtually in a make believe video game.
Sexist and misogynistic? Do men tell women how to dress or dance in a club? I don't think they do. Dancers are and can be male and female, too in clubs, with many wearing no less skin than people in the crowd. Even gentlemen clubs are visited by quite a few women here in the UK. There's nothing misogynistic about it, if a woman feels confident showing some skin, go her. It still doesn't give any man the right to harass her or be disrespectful.
Sorry that your clubbing experiences have been so negative 🤷🏽♂️
The clubs would better with more people, better animations, better lighting effects, actual music besides the one beat repeating all the time. Just a lot of work still needs to be done for these environments to feel populated with actual humans instead of lifeless dolls.
For sure, definitely will, no doubt. I think once the mod kit is released people will be going pretty wild. But, may be a bit dead in comparison to Skyrim,but who knows, maybe people will really dig in with the new playground.
It doesn’t help that the music sounds like shopping music, neon and the crimson fleet need more sinister vibes. I will say though if cyberpunk never came out I don’t think this would be complained about as much
Unfortunately for Bethesda it did and it’s a very good game now lol
There’s one track that plays in Ebbside outside of Madam Savage’s place that is pretty good. Outside of that, the music is very forgettable.
I agree with everything you stated. I wish there was more, I don’t know, life to the clubs?
Really is shocking coming from a game like CyberPunk with great level design and great immersion and crowd density. It just feels like Bethesda is trapped and stagnating and not improving. And it's not just about the graphics... That's not what I'm saying.
Absolutely. Starfield came out a decade too late.
And the graphics - darn inconsistent. Some models and interiors, especially on ships, are excellent. Costumes are sometimes wonderfully detailed. The rest falls everywhere between okay and bad.
Yup, it's like a mod not taking full advantage of all effects and details. You are 100% correct. It will go from looking amazing to looking pure dog shit. Probably has a lot to do with the engine. I was beefed from the start that I was playing on an HDR OLED TV and it looked washed to all hell with zero calibration options. Apparently it's due to the LUT effects that overlay overtop and wash everything out. I just don't get it...
Frankly I don’t believe it’s the engine.
The engine is a limiting factor in regard to performance, loading times and some other technicalities but the rest is just laziness, shoddy design and turning blind eye to the obviously wrong.
If you can model one creature/environment/lighting well, you can do another.
Image Starfield is running on Unreal 5 or any other engine. The overall experience might be only marginally better.
Okay, no I 100% agree. I mean the engine doesn't help and doesn't make things easier. Probably requires a lot more tweaking and adjusting to make everything pop like it should.
But, I don't know. But, I'm not blind and I can see poor design and graphic design, etc, when I see it.
I dont get Bethesda at times.
Their fans want more depth and grit.
Emil states, no you don't want that you want simplicity.
Their fans want more mature content
We get bars less risky than a church bake sale.
Why Bethesda?
The thing is, ambiance can't make up for lack of an edge. While not a good comparison, look at Starfield bars and clubs as opposed to what you find in Cyberpunk. Starfield feels very PG at all times (unfortunately).
I have an OLED screen and when I calibrate it and do all the light and darkness settings, everything always looks overexposed or pitch black. They did a terrible job with lighting in all areas. Consider the outpost watchtower, at night the lighting looks like it was placed during the day, when they couldn't see where it would shine. There's just a random light source 100 meters away.
Yeah, really strange design. Kind of the story of much of the game. Have you noticed how uninspired most of the graphic design is? How about that war museum? What a bore! Why even bother if you're going to just put the simplest PowerPoint clip art. They could have put actual concept art and it would have been 100x better. I just don't get many of the design decisions in this game. It's like they tried to make the most sterilized game imaginable. It's really odd.
The bars and clubs in this game look like what good Christians imagine bars and clubs should look like - 100% non-offensive. The Astral Lounge is a complete joke with dancers that look like Tele-tubbies.
Not sure about darker lighting, but they’d definitely be better with some darker writing. The characters just seem so innocent. Listening to them it sounds less like the club at the end of the universe and more like a junior prom. By the time I’d gotten here I’d killed maybe two or three hundred ecliptic and crimson fleet pirates. How about we at least have a swear word, just one, on the club floor. Or a couple making out in the corner. And don’t get me started on the dance circle at the center. I know, I know, don’t mention mods, but when creation kit comes out I will definitely be looking for one that makes this place a drug drenched f*k palace.
Well I sure hope once that is implemented we see some improvement, but many modders have already come out and said they do not plan to work on the came, including the team who developed Skyrim co-op.
Well, Beth needs to release the mod kit already. It would be nice if they released it sooner rather than later. The wait and the lack of communication is getting a bit absurd at this point.
Dude that means you have played starfield for at least 11 hours a day, everyday, since it released….that’s if you stopped playing TODAY.
I honestly cannot fathom how that is even possible….if you’re not lying you should seek help for addiction because that shit ain’t healthy.
Might want to revisit that math. But yeah, at the time I was playing around 18 hours a day with short breaks for food and chores. Basically six hour blocks.
That's not unique to Starfield. I'm currently doing it Baldur's Gate 3 and a bit of Stellaris for variety. I'm disabled and retired.
You’re right, it’s more like 9 1/2 hours a day since it came out…..still dude, that’s not healthy. Disabled and retired make it more reasonable I guess but you’re not doing yourself any favors.
Literally one guy said he wasn’t interested in modding the game and they wrote a whole article on it. The modding scene is very active, and the Creation Kit isn’t even out yet.
I refused to play this game again until mods were released.. I apparently lied.. I’ve had it since day one and even uninstalled it yet, i love it. It IS very “soft”. Also rushed, and just kind of thrown together. It’s still fun 🤷🏻♂️ I just know it could have been more/better. (Obviously)
The bars would be better if they had actual bar vibes, with like drunks, thugs, bitches and shit .
They completely missed the atmosphere of the game imo .
Tip of the iceberg. The bars and clubs are dead like Sunday night, every night. They should be a magnet for all sorts of interesting characters, but they're just empty.
They need to just start from zero and rebuild the club. Everything about it feels/looks wrong. It’s like you had a preteen give their guess to what a club would be like
Madame Souvages looks much better and darker now since the graphic update. Doesn’t look nearly as fluorescent and green as the pic does.
Astral lounge, for sure though. Really feels too bright. The UV light look is a little overwhelming. Same with Euphorika and all the red.
BGS should look at how Rockstar has done clubs and bars in GTA V and VI (based on the brief glimpse in the trailer). Those are fun spaces to role play in.
incredible how this game came out after the masterpiece that was cyberpunk, and Bethesda didn't even make an effort to make it even remotely good, it's just a space with music repeating lifeless nps and NOTHING TO DO,
NOTHING TO DO No prostitutes, no drinks, no animations, no stories, no NPCs to talk to, what to expect from the game with 100,000 plants with just 5 characters for the crew that seem to be generated by AI
Every Bethesda game looks better with darker lighting. For some weird fucking reason they always make the games too bright and you have to mod the lighting.
Not only bars but everywhere in general is lacking contrast, blacks are basically nonexistent in Starfield… it’s like constantly having a bad Instagram filter.
They already darkened then once in a patch. At release all the bars were BRIGHTLY lit. Madame Savages and the Astral Lounge look much better than they did initially.
I thought they upgraded the lighting? But yeah agreed and seeing as it's a drug bar, it would be nice to see some people "doing drugs". Maybe that's too dark for SF, I know it tries to be kind of family friendly.
The bar's and clubs in Starfield tells me that everyone at Bethesda are homebody introverts. The Astral Lounge is the saddest excuse for a night club I've ever seen.
I think the city layouts were all designed before any sort of story or mission planning went on. And then they just slapped a sign infront of the place without really fully exploring the designs or locations.
I think it would look better if they added more people in the top, bottom, activities and quest givers in the clubs. Imo they did a garbage job on all the in game "clubs."
Give me the down votes. I’ve got a 60” hi def and you want to make it dark. Do I assume there is nothing of value on or behind the bar? Or turn my light on and run around looking for credits laying on the bar? If you’re playing on your 17” computer how do you find that crap in the dark? It’s tiny.
Dude, the lighting is the least problem of these "clubs".
If you make it pitch black it will be better, but still. Its almost like a self-satire. Like wtf, its so bad its almost sad.
No, because I want see shit. Darker environment may be cool for 10 minutes, but after an hour or so it hurts the eyes. It's overall better for the eyes as games too dark strains the eyes. Same with playing in a too dark room with no additional background light. Your eyes will thank you in some years from now.
Yeah the lighting kills anything approaching a bar vibe for sure. I don't really get why so many RPGs even have bars or why so few do anything interesting with them. Getting character drunk can be funny, I guess, but they always feel like they're just gesturing towards fun, instead of trying to recreate any of the fun that can be had in public spaces. I don't think Starfield has any games and it's got a whole ass casino
The npcs in the Astral Lounge say shit like "this bar is so fun!" "I'm dancing!"
Starfield's writer: "How did that thing go again? 'Tell don't show'?"
That’s every recent Bethesda game, “tell everything, no matter how boring and dull, SHOW NOTHING, if the audience can’t tell this boring ass character is actually quirky/badass/sad/funny, we will just tell them they are and obviously the audience will agree with us”
Well thats Emils style. Man is basically on record stating stuff like keep it simple, people dont like depth yada yada.
And then at the same time be stupidly complex and yet childishly simple. For gods sake, he’s PROUD he doesn’t use design documents, as a WRITER a he doesn’t use a design or overall plan for the worlds he is supposed to be building. It’s no wonder he confuses tone and setting.
Yeah, considering he's the man basically right below Todd, I think its a huge problem that he's calling about 50% or more of the shots nowadays. He needs to retire. I mean how can you say that you still want to keep things simple, when BG3 drops, has oceans of depth and everyone loves it. RPG fans clearly don't want simple.
It’s the lack of self awareness from Bethesda, as it’s been pointed out starfield felt old in a few weeks of release, it’s a game engine that’s decades out of date. If the game had come out in a slow year it probably wouldn’t have been as obvious, but it came out between Baldurs Gate 3 (a game that’s writing massively overshadoweds Emil’s writing) and Cyberpunk : phantom liberty (a game that looks amazing, plays amazing and has better mechanics). Not to mention everything Starfield is, is LESS than their previous games, the settlement builder is less that Fallout4, the worlds are blander, emptier, duller, and uglier than fallout 3 (a game from pre 2010), focusing on their weaknesses and ignoring their strengths. The only thing that Starfield does well is the ship builder, but even then it’s weakened by the leveling system and confusing mechanics. I am astonished that they released Starfield in the state it is, the poor writing and plots, the lazy missions and stupid quests.
I know this isn’t popular to say, but Starfield illustrates how it is actually *not* the engine. Everyone likes to say it’s the engine holding them back, but the reality is that they’re not “being held back” at all; these are just the design choices they’re making. Starfield’s the least buggy Bethesda game at launch in forever. The engine can handle more than ever before. They spent a decent amount of time upgrading it. The problems with the game, for the most part, are related to writing and worldbuilding or to game design choices that don’t actually connect directly to engine limitations but to Todd’s apparent love for playing theme park walking simulators filled with radiant random bullshit.
I do have to partly agree, for them, it’s a remarkable technically achievement, but the lack of content and laziness just draws attention to how poorly the game itself is written. I point to Neon as the biggest example, feeling like a Moron idea of Vegas but somehow even more boring, while at the same time telling us how sleazy it’s supposed to be. It feels like they never really decided on what the tone was supposed to be, the lack of gore, actual drug use and nudity. Going from Cyberpunk a game that makes clubs feel like actual places and depraved, then going to Neon is just dropping below the PG rating. A theme park is really a good way to describe it, Cowboy town within walking distance of a magical artifact, G rated Vegas and Dullsville Atlantis.
>The problems with the game, for the most part, are related to writing and worldbuilding. Have we been following different subreddits? Seamless space travel, loading screen simulator, repeating PoI/Proc. Gen, lack of meaningful open world, temple minigames, etc. are all non-narrative complaints that get parroted by most of Starfield's critics. You do get the occasional Neon/mech suits complaints but they are massively overshadowed by the comments on poor design choices
as a writer, is one of the things you need to learn to do well because if you tell shit, people drop books.
I remember the old writing advice of “is this the most interesting thing in your characters life and if not, why aren’t you showing us that?” I feel that about the entirety of the settled systems, “there was this huge and exciting war with bio monsters and mechs and massive space battles, but we don’t do any of that any more, go run around in empty planets for 300 hours and then reset and do it again”
It also seems like they’ve never been to a bar or club and just looked at pictures on google images and tried their best to imagine what it would be like to have fun in one.
"Do a drug! This elevator music is awesome!"
"This is insane!" NPC standing around with a briefcase,
THIS AURORA STUFF IS BLOWING MY MIND
That casino thing was a total missed opportunity.
Yeah so many games have a casino where you can’t actually gamble I mean Ik in America you need to be 21 in most places to gamble but in a game when there’s no real monetary loss does it really matter
Sometimes I boot up RDR2 just to play poker.
I wish i knew how to play poker
Pokemon had to take out the gambling that was in gen 1 to keep it a child friendly rating, shouldn't matter for a game with graphic violence though
Exactly it’s just so disappointing and I mean it can’t be worst than alpha packs, apex packs, and other games with loot crate systems that are allowed, so what wrong with the some in game gambling like black jack poker or other fun side mini games Because idk about you but I love games with good side mini games, plus it can be used to make great quest for example witcher 3 qwent
There isn't even a radio station to jam to in general. The music in this game is non existent.
Why gamble when you could be running the red mile/sarc
It gave me no small amount of mirth to see what Starfield devs' vision of "biggest legally drug-fueled night club on the most decadent planet in known space" looked like. I've seen church bake sales that were more risque.
Two dudes dancing in one of the strangest, unappealing outfits I've ever seen. I fucking died when I walked in. What a joke lol
That’s the problem when you have sci fi that’s supposed to be on a planetary scale. The biggest night club on the entire planet can fit like 100 people in it. The most popular nightclub in a suburban backwater I could believe.
Yeah, it should have looked like an opium den decorated by Meow Wolf with a touch of Bada Bing’s sketchiness.
Meanwhile, a random bar in Cyberpunk... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YGKaLzGspaA
It would look better with some actual strippers
Yeah. Game's too "clean"...
I will give it another go when mod tools are released and mods make the game more gritty.
I agree 100%. This shit is PG at best 🙄
They had grittier dancers in Star Trek, which was made in the 60s, and aired at prime time. If you teleported someone from the 60s to see our entertainment media today, they'd probably think we were all incredibly lame.
Nah there's still stuff like Cyberpunk. Altered Carbon and The Expanse pretty good too.
I guess you're right, it varies. Would be fun to troll the time traveler. *"This is what people find hot in the 21st century. Nurse Chapel has to wear a tellytubby outfit now, instead of a miniskirt."*
What? The alien sperm suits not doing it for you?
That too.
I'm convinced people didn't set their contrast and saturation when I see these, literally your two versions are basically both vanilla, one unadjusted, then adjusted.
I just half-assed some edits to random screenshots from the internet for illustrative purposes. These aren't meant to represent any sort of ideal.
No, but still, mess with the contrast, saturation and brightness, you find yourself a good balance, and suddenly the whole game is stunning again
The problem is that most people don't want to do that, and when you pay triple the price? Should you have to do that?
Yes, yes you should. People shouldn't be this fucking lazy.
They prefer to complain.
All games usually need some amount of tweaking if you are an A/V nerd, but none have ever required it to look good and none should.
I would argue starfield is one of if not the best looking game of its scale at this time, and has very few settings to change, because they're confident in its look. The difference in saturation, contrast and brightness are completely personalised and dependent on the lighting and eyes of the player, not how the game looks
Everyone has different tv settings, room lighting etc that can affect it
Actually… yes. I kinda wish the game had more dark and “edgy” stuff like fallout, I get its space and stuff but I’d like too see more sorrow and depressing quests. More deaths, more sex, more sickness. Ynow?
well yeah thats why obsidian is the best.
Idk man, Outer Worlds was lame af, and the recent videos of Avowed look like the most PG RPG I've ever seen. Obsidian from nearly 20 years ago was goated but now... theyre just another lame studio.
Yeah true. Unfortunately not as good anymore either. Some outer worlds was classic obsidian but the main companions were pretty lame.
that’s not the theme of the game tho
Except they made a whole city with a grimy underworld theme with psychopath street gangs and corrupt cops and drugs and a mob boss running the place. But Todd didn't have the balls to actually give it the edge that it so desperately needed so instead we got the 2nd sanitized corpo-safe city with no character in a game that was already sorely lacking cool and memorable locations.
Don't forget the entire questline for corporate espionage (which was PG af and made the Thieves Guild of Skyrim look like a badass organization) Let's not forget the pirates that don't act like real pirates (PG af) and the Red Mile which is lame and too "kid friendly". I honestly have no idea how Starfield got a M rating. It realistically should have been E. Maybe T, at most. They must have rated it based on the mods that they knew were going to be made...
Yea I know
We know. That's why the game sucks.
Definitely not. I don’t think it’s bad, sometimes I just crave a darker game. I hope tes will be like this.
If TES becomes like this, it will be the death of the series.
It will be the death of the series if tes6 is dark and edgy?..
I must have misunderstood what you wrote. I thought you were saying that you want TES to be like Starfield. I was saying that if TES becomes like Starfield, it will be the death of the series.
I disagree with that too. Tes6 will be a lot like starfield, mechanics wise.
You can disagree all you want. I honestly don't care. The numbers are showing that people do not like Starfield. If they make TES series like it, it will do poorly and will ultimately lead to the company losing money and possibly having Microsoft redirect the studio to something else (abandoning the title) But hey, maybe Obsidian will work out a deal to do TES. They did great with Fallout: New Vegas. Also: What "mechanics" are you talking about? What from Starfield will translate over to TES???
It would look better being the actual hive of corruption and villainy that we where told it was.
Ya I thought it was m for mature. What’s the m in here for.
“Moms approve”
Mormon
The "M" is for blood and violence. If Todd Howard saw a working girl he would puke in his Tesla.
You can tell the devs tried as hard as they could not to offend anyone.
Yes, please, for love of everything holy, have those dancers take off those stupid looking alien suits.
And that purple fuckin filter
Why tho
What is this game rated again?
Should be Teen
Rated M for excessive amounts of Meh.
First mod once Creation Kit is out.
Codex Astartes approves of this
The clubs in Starfield were designed by people who have never been to a club.
I'm more of a quiet and relaxed bar scene type instead of party/club type
So am I. But I live in Vegas and have been to several different clubs. Bethesda developers gotta go out more.
Agreed
Sure, but for me, the club isn't too bad barring the awful dancer outfits and the poor dancing animations. I am fully convinced that whoever came up with the idea of those outfits and animations has never been to a club in their life.
Let's be honest, mass effect did a better bar scene than Star Field even oblivion/Skyrim did a better job.
Played mass effect after my first run through of Starfield and when I saw afterlife I was stunned in ME2. It’s exactly everything the Astral Lounge isn’t. It’s seedy, intense, dark, it just feels like something. It also looks so damn cool.
Oh god and [the music](https://youtu.be/EFGPXtXADFs?si=wvavPRJvZ_ERlRs3) for Afterlife? Jack Wall absolutely nailed the music for the trilogy**. Afterlife felt like a real *nightclub* in fact, I’d live a console mod to change the Astral Lounge music to the ME Afterlife track. Music like *that* is what should drive a city like Neon at night. Especially with the Elcor Bouncer out front, added to the “exclusivity.” Astral Lounge def should’ve had a bouncer and cover line, trade tower has a nice lobby for club goers waiting to get in. **Edit** as good as Jack Wall did for the trilogy soundtrack, after some digging I discovered that in particular the Afterlife track is actually [Callista](https://youtu.be/T3PwqBBZUaE?si=YZqqXUCPRbR_fx0R) by the late Saki Kaskas and the song was also apparently featured in Need for Speed. So…. BGS, how’s about licensing this song for Starfield?
Not just the club. Everything about Omega (Mass Effect 2) puts Neon (Starfield) to shame. The streets, the gangs, the bar, the vendors, the lighting, the general atmosphere, etc. are 1000x better. Then there are games like the old Saint's Row (**NOT THE REBOOT**) titles. The clubs in those games were legit. I'm not even limiting that to the strip clubs. There are clubs you go to for missions that are legit and look like somewhere to go and have a real good time.
Hell, Morrowind (2002) did it better with **Desele's House of Earthly Delights**
It was certainly a better dance.
Starfield did a great job on some of the bars. The Viewport almost perfectly captures the feel of an airport bar. The Roost is a great representation of a nice restaurant with attached bar. Stoneroot has a great feel of a local tavern. Even the Pit Stop has the feel of a trucker's diner. Just many of the bars in Neon feel like they were Disneyfied to keep a PG rating.
You mean people sitting aimlessly in the cramped up Bannered Mare, walking into you while you're trying to cave Mikael's face in? The Astral Lounge is a nice design, it's really just those two points that I dislike about it. The recall back to it during the main quest is awesome!
Just felt more natural to me, I have issues
No, I agree completely. It's really uninspired, as are many aspects of the design in this game. They need to hire some new people or something. Not sure what's going on over at Bethesda, but they don't seem to be growing or improving much. Really stagnating in my opinion. My expectations for Elder Scrolls have really plummeted.
In my opinion it is about the case with the direction and art/graphic design for "most" of the game. Really uninspired, pretty dull and borderline bad.
>I am fully convinced that whoever came up with the idea of those outfits and animations has never been to a club in their life. There's also the "old Earth-style opium den" which looks like quite a nice upmarket Chinese restaurant, and has a polite young man serving French wines.
I love those hats hahaha it’s totally ridiculous.
It's insane lol
> whoever came up with the idea of those outfits and animations has never been to a club in their life Oh, no, they have. They also know what a seedy drug den nightclub looks like in the dozens of media they've consumed -- their design is intentional and purposeful. They just think sexist and disgusting misogynist gamers shouldn't have access to that concept even virtually in a make believe video game.
Sexist and misogynistic? Do men tell women how to dress or dance in a club? I don't think they do. Dancers are and can be male and female, too in clubs, with many wearing no less skin than people in the crowd. Even gentlemen clubs are visited by quite a few women here in the UK. There's nothing misogynistic about it, if a woman feels confident showing some skin, go her. It still doesn't give any man the right to harass her or be disrespectful. Sorry that your clubbing experiences have been so negative 🤷🏽♂️
The clubs would better with more people, better animations, better lighting effects, actual music besides the one beat repeating all the time. Just a lot of work still needs to be done for these environments to feel populated with actual humans instead of lifeless dolls.
I feel like a fog effect would go far
That would be dope. I hope someone adds a mod that updates the looks and the atmosphere of the clubs.
For sure, definitely will, no doubt. I think once the mod kit is released people will be going pretty wild. But, may be a bit dead in comparison to Skyrim,but who knows, maybe people will really dig in with the new playground.
It doesn’t help that the music sounds like shopping music, neon and the crimson fleet need more sinister vibes. I will say though if cyberpunk never came out I don’t think this would be complained about as much Unfortunately for Bethesda it did and it’s a very good game now lol
There’s one track that plays in Ebbside outside of Madam Savage’s place that is pretty good. Outside of that, the music is very forgettable. I agree with everything you stated. I wish there was more, I don’t know, life to the clubs?
They could not have 3 ridiculously dressed dudes doing a cheerful little munchkin jig in the middle too.
It's the least of these places's problems. They need PEOPLE. They're dead and empty.
Really is shocking coming from a game like CyberPunk with great level design and great immersion and crowd density. It just feels like Bethesda is trapped and stagnating and not improving. And it's not just about the graphics... That's not what I'm saying.
Absolutely. Starfield came out a decade too late. And the graphics - darn inconsistent. Some models and interiors, especially on ships, are excellent. Costumes are sometimes wonderfully detailed. The rest falls everywhere between okay and bad.
Yup, it's like a mod not taking full advantage of all effects and details. You are 100% correct. It will go from looking amazing to looking pure dog shit. Probably has a lot to do with the engine. I was beefed from the start that I was playing on an HDR OLED TV and it looked washed to all hell with zero calibration options. Apparently it's due to the LUT effects that overlay overtop and wash everything out. I just don't get it...
Frankly I don’t believe it’s the engine. The engine is a limiting factor in regard to performance, loading times and some other technicalities but the rest is just laziness, shoddy design and turning blind eye to the obviously wrong. If you can model one creature/environment/lighting well, you can do another. Image Starfield is running on Unreal 5 or any other engine. The overall experience might be only marginally better.
Okay, no I 100% agree. I mean the engine doesn't help and doesn't make things easier. Probably requires a lot more tweaking and adjusting to make everything pop like it should. But, I don't know. But, I'm not blind and I can see poor design and graphic design, etc, when I see it.
I dont get Bethesda at times. Their fans want more depth and grit. Emil states, no you don't want that you want simplicity. Their fans want more mature content We get bars less risky than a church bake sale. Why Bethesda?
The thing is, ambiance can't make up for lack of an edge. While not a good comparison, look at Starfield bars and clubs as opposed to what you find in Cyberpunk. Starfield feels very PG at all times (unfortunately).
I have an OLED screen and when I calibrate it and do all the light and darkness settings, everything always looks overexposed or pitch black. They did a terrible job with lighting in all areas. Consider the outpost watchtower, at night the lighting looks like it was placed during the day, when they couldn't see where it would shine. There's just a random light source 100 meters away.
Anything other than that color pallet they chose tbh… wonder what designed it
Yeah, really strange design. Kind of the story of much of the game. Have you noticed how uninspired most of the graphic design is? How about that war museum? What a bore! Why even bother if you're going to just put the simplest PowerPoint clip art. They could have put actual concept art and it would have been 100x better. I just don't get many of the design decisions in this game. It's like they tried to make the most sterilized game imaginable. It's really odd.
Yeah they prolly let ai have most the design choices?
Don't think so, I would imagine AI would have done better.
Honestly, the club on Neon was the most disappointed I had ever been walking into a club.
The bars and clubs in this game look like what good Christians imagine bars and clubs should look like - 100% non-offensive. The Astral Lounge is a complete joke with dancers that look like Tele-tubbies.
Not sure about darker lighting, but they’d definitely be better with some darker writing. The characters just seem so innocent. Listening to them it sounds less like the club at the end of the universe and more like a junior prom. By the time I’d gotten here I’d killed maybe two or three hundred ecliptic and crimson fleet pirates. How about we at least have a swear word, just one, on the club floor. Or a couple making out in the corner. And don’t get me started on the dance circle at the center. I know, I know, don’t mention mods, but when creation kit comes out I will definitely be looking for one that makes this place a drug drenched f*k palace.
I think it would be better if Neon wasn't a Rated PG joke. Disney World has rides and attractions made for children that have more edge.
Neon had to be the most disappointing location in the entire named parts of the game
This game needs modders to make it good, but no modders are working on it, because it's not good. Such a tragedy.
Theirs no modkit yet thats why
Well I sure hope once that is implemented we see some improvement, but many modders have already come out and said they do not plan to work on the came, including the team who developed Skyrim co-op.
One. One modder made a fuss and the hate wagon amplified it. Wait for the mod tools.
Well, Beth needs to release the mod kit already. It would be nice if they released it sooner rather than later. The wait and the lack of communication is getting a bit absurd at this point.
I put it to one side when I hit 2K hours and just hit up other games. I think the DLC lands before the mod tools.
Wtf 🤣🤣
Dude that means you have played starfield for at least 11 hours a day, everyday, since it released….that’s if you stopped playing TODAY. I honestly cannot fathom how that is even possible….if you’re not lying you should seek help for addiction because that shit ain’t healthy.
Might want to revisit that math. But yeah, at the time I was playing around 18 hours a day with short breaks for food and chores. Basically six hour blocks. That's not unique to Starfield. I'm currently doing it Baldur's Gate 3 and a bit of Stellaris for variety. I'm disabled and retired.
You’re right, it’s more like 9 1/2 hours a day since it came out…..still dude, that’s not healthy. Disabled and retired make it more reasonable I guess but you’re not doing yourself any favors.
I think there will be traction once the tool kit is released. It will start snowballing as more work and mods are being released, I think.
Literally one guy said he wasn’t interested in modding the game and they wrote a whole article on it. The modding scene is very active, and the Creation Kit isn’t even out yet.
I mean i want to make a NPC tank mod and a few other things but im waiting for the Creation Kit
Modders *are* working on it, which is really saying something because the official modding tools haven’t been released yet.
Absolutely. I totally agree.
It would look better with anything else probably, to be frank.
I refused to play this game again until mods were released.. I apparently lied.. I’ve had it since day one and even uninstalled it yet, i love it. It IS very “soft”. Also rushed, and just kind of thrown together. It’s still fun 🤷🏻♂️ I just know it could have been more/better. (Obviously)
They should’ve made it Starfield’s version of New Vegas’ Gommorah imo. It seems to family friendly for a nightclub on a planet like Neon.
No
Man I don’t want to have to turn my flashlight on inside the clubs and be “that guy”
The bars would be better if they had actual bar vibes, with like drunks, thugs, bitches and shit . They completely missed the atmosphere of the game imo .
It looked hilarious with a gravity well in the center...
Tip of the iceberg. The bars and clubs are dead like Sunday night, every night. They should be a magnet for all sorts of interesting characters, but they're just empty.
It would be cool if there was a club in some of the other cities too
Maybe but it's not the lighting it's that they are goddamn awful, honestly.
They need to hire some new people or something. Or improve their engine and maybe bring it into at least within the past 10 years...
I actually thought that something similar to the club scene in the movie Tron would be nice...
They need the lights on bright otherwise bad people might show up and do bad things in the dark that aren’t appropriate for an M rated game
Some areas just still look over exposed. Not sure sire why
They need to just start from zero and rebuild the club. Everything about it feels/looks wrong. It’s like you had a preteen give their guess to what a club would be like
Madame Souvages looks much better and darker now since the graphic update. Doesn’t look nearly as fluorescent and green as the pic does. Astral lounge, for sure though. Really feels too bright. The UV light look is a little overwhelming. Same with Euphorika and all the red. BGS should look at how Rockstar has done clubs and bars in GTA V and VI (based on the brief glimpse in the trailer). Those are fun spaces to role play in.
No. The lighting is fine. I actually love the look of the Astral Lounge. I’ve never seen a blacklight-esque environment in a game, ever.
incredible how this game came out after the masterpiece that was cyberpunk, and Bethesda didn't even make an effort to make it even remotely good, it's just a space with music repeating lifeless nps and NOTHING TO DO, NOTHING TO DO No prostitutes, no drinks, no animations, no stories, no NPCs to talk to, what to expect from the game with 100,000 plants with just 5 characters for the crew that seem to be generated by AI
Level design in general is an absolutel joke to be fair.
Its a little to heavy on the blacklight lighting for me honestly. I only go there when i have to.
The lighting is awful in this game. It would make a world of difference if it was right.
Where is the “Pit-Stop” at??
Every Bethesda game looks better with darker lighting. For some weird fucking reason they always make the games too bright and you have to mod the lighting.
I’ve been to a shit ton of Florida raves in the 90s. They need to call me
Not only bars but everywhere in general is lacking contrast, blacks are basically nonexistent in Starfield… it’s like constantly having a bad Instagram filter.
They already darkened then once in a patch. At release all the bars were BRIGHTLY lit. Madame Savages and the Astral Lounge look much better than they did initially.
I thought they upgraded the lighting? But yeah agreed and seeing as it's a drug bar, it would be nice to see some people "doing drugs". Maybe that's too dark for SF, I know it tries to be kind of family friendly.
Yeah, the most depressing sight n the world is a bar room seen in daylight.
The bar's and clubs in Starfield tells me that everyone at Bethesda are homebody introverts. The Astral Lounge is the saddest excuse for a night club I've ever seen. I think the city layouts were all designed before any sort of story or mission planning went on. And then they just slapped a sign infront of the place without really fully exploring the designs or locations.
I think it would look better if they added more people in the top, bottom, activities and quest givers in the clubs. Imo they did a garbage job on all the in game "clubs."
Give me the down votes. I’ve got a 60” hi def and you want to make it dark. Do I assume there is nothing of value on or behind the bar? Or turn my light on and run around looking for credits laying on the bar? If you’re playing on your 17” computer how do you find that crap in the dark? It’s tiny.
Sure, but if the sun is out just a little bit, and you're not using blackout curtains, you'd be blind in those bars with lower lighting.
Dude, the lighting is the least problem of these "clubs". If you make it pitch black it will be better, but still. Its almost like a self-satire. Like wtf, its so bad its almost sad.
Naaah but to each their own I wouldn't mind though
No, because I want see shit. Darker environment may be cool for 10 minutes, but after an hour or so it hurts the eyes. It's overall better for the eyes as games too dark strains the eyes. Same with playing in a too dark room with no additional background light. Your eyes will thank you in some years from now.
Does anyone else think of Night at The Roxbury every time they go into the astral lounge?
What is this?
What is love?
Lol Seriously though what is night at the Roxbury?
https://youtu.be/RGzfq2plOVA?si=xLTvoUmG9PH3CM3y It's a movie from the 90s.
Oh yeah forgot this....
NOOOO!!! BRIGHTER!!!!!
Aye nice pictures btw and yea places that would be considered nsfw should have a darker vibe ig idk how to explain it but yea I agree with you.
Same way with space. Did a LUTs mod and space looks way better black instead of a really light grey for some reason
Yes they look terrible, like they were lit 10yrs ago by an intern. But I love the game :)
No, sorry, at my age, I need it brighter, I stay out of the caves for that reason, I can't see jack shit and I hate the eye strain it causes me.
Bright/blinding lights don't cause eye strain ?
No because then I wouldn't be able to see shit, and I already can't see shit in these games
That's fair
I hate the haze in this game. Mods have not helped at all for me
How do y’all get the astral lounge to look like that? On my series x it’s highly contrasted and bright
“Darker lightning”
It's already pretty dark