Starfield (PC) - Part 1

Developer:

Bethesda

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Release Date:

2023

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Systems:

Win, Series X|S

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This week, Bethesda's infamous Starfield is getting a free update to coincide with its launch on the PlayStation 5! It's a huge upgrade that apparently makes the game better in every way.

But I won't be covering that.

I actually played Starfield way back in January 2025 and never finished writing about it. Because I somehow keep forgetting that trying to do seven things at the same time always leads to nothing getting done. So this week on Super Adventures, I'm opening a time capsule containing my opinions on the game as it was.

It's a shame I couldn't have been more hyped about Starfield, as I love the 3D Fallout games and Mass Effect, and space games like TIE Fighter and Freelancer used to be my thing. So "A new space RPG by the makers of Fallout 3" was right at the top of my 'dream game list', just underneath "A new space RPG by the makers of Fallout: New Vegas". I can't believe I actually got both of them in the end, though it wasn't a huge shock to me that both turned out kind of flawed.

Still, it's a new IP from the developer that gave us the Fallout sequels and the Elder Scrolls sequels and nothing else in two decades besides IHRA Professional Drag Racing, so that on its own is interesting. Though it wouldn't have been so bad if they had used an existing IP for their space game... like that Star Trek licence that Bethesda Softworks had at one point. "A Star Trek RPG by the makers of Fallout 3" is even higher on my 'dream game list'. 

Alright, I'm going to go on an expedition into Starfield to see if there's any joy in there to find. It's a big universe so this will be the first part of two.

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Hey it's letting me use the mouse in menus without making me unplug my controller first! I thought this was supposed to be worse than Bethesda's earlier games.

I'm liking all these gameplay options, even though I'm going to leave all of them alone for now. If you're feeling a bit more hardcore you can make bullets heavy, go 'survival mode' and change it so you need to eat, and all kinds of stuff. I don't see a way to just pick a difficulty mode however.

Rebinding keys is being a bit more awkward than it needs to be, and not just because it won't let me drag the scroll bar with the mouse. Right now it's apparently complaining that the key I've assigned to 'Menu navigation: Accept' is the same as the key I've assigned to 'Menu navigation: Accept'.

Okay I've put all the graphics to 'Ultra' and turned upscaling off for now. I'm not expecting miracles from my rig, but I am expecting to get better screenshots this way, so I'll see if I can also get a frame rate I can live with.

SOL DATE: MAY 7, 2330 
ARGOS EXTRACTORS MINING OUTPOST - MOON OF VECTERA

The game starts off a bit like Skyrim, except I'm trapped in a lift instead of the back of a wagon. There's a lot of talking here and I don't get to join in, but Heller and Lin seem likeable enough.

It's 2330, 300 years in the future. So somewhere between Star Trek: The Original Series and Star Trek: The Next Generation... is what I'd be saying if this had been a Star Trek game. If you're wondering about when it takes place in relation to the Star Wars movies, it's set a long time after.

This is a mining outpost on the distant moon of Vectra, we've got our spacesuits on and we're going down to do some mining. I'm not entirely sure why they need the suits, but it might be because of all this dust in the air. The way it looks has got me wondering if I've set the brightness or gamma wrong.

Supervisor Lin has the blue hexagon on her head so I'm following her around until I receive further instructions. Actually she's walking too slowly so I'm going to run off and see what's down the tunnel.

Oh, I learned that the reason they're wearing the suits is because the oxygen processors don't extend this far. That's cool, I like it when the writers have taken the time to figure out reasons for things. We also get a bit of world building here, as it turns out that this is in Freestar Collective space, so they don't have to deal with all the regulations that come with working in the United Colonies.

Hey, someone on the design team saw Star Trek VI! Those cutting lasers are straight from the Klingon penal colony of Rure Penthe.

Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country

I suppose if you're going to borrow ideas it's better to take them from one of the good Trek movies.

Okay, we need to wait for the digging machine further down the mine to do its thing, so in the meantime I'm doing cutter device training. I have to point it at the marked bit of wall, hold the button down for a couple of seconds, and then move onto the next bit. Beryllium added!

It's nice to finally get a chance to do something and the mining laser recharges mercifully quickly, but I'm hoping this doesn't drag on for much longer. It's been seven minutes and I've already played Red Faction, I'm ready to move onto the bit where I shoot bad guys.

Well I learned about aiming and now I'm learning about the flashlight as I'm heading into a dark cave to investigate an anomalous material causing weird gravity readings.

Weird floating chunks of ore, interesting. 

There's a metallic substance embedded in the rock and it certainly seems like something I should cut out with my laser. Don't worry, I've done the training, I know the drill... uh, literally.

Hey isn't this about the time in the movie where something really bad happens to the curious idiot who goes in first?

Well investigating the mysterious space artefact was either going to put a cryptic vision into my brain or a face hugger onto my face, so I'm glad the game's going down the Mass Effect route. I want a space adventure! 

The player wakes up in sickbay, and it turns out they survived! They're in good shape physically at least, though I'm going to have to go through the character creation to make sure they still remember who they are.

I'm not keen on games that make you play through an intro before you get to the character creator, especially when it takes nine minutes. At least you can make a save so you never have to do it again.

The face editor seems pretty powerful, but it's so awkward that I'm not having much fun playing around with it. I mean for each part of the face you get these sliders labelled 1-9, and when you slide them it does... something. It's a mystery! Each one is a different face shape you can blend in, but you can't see what you're adding and to make it worse, it makes the other sliders slide back down, undoing your previous choices.

Also I'm using the mouse and whenever the mouse cursor hovers above the left panel while I'm dragging sliders, it switches over to that instead.

On the plus side you get 40 hair options, with no division between male and female styles. And if you think your space hero should have bright pink hair, it's not just a possibility, it's a preset.

Though hang on, why does the game have half the cast of The Expanse here as presets?

Actually, better question, why doesn't it have more characters? Where's Luke Skywalker and Lone Starr? Ripley and Riddick? Kirk and Spock? Commander Shepard and FemShep?

Next I get to choose my character's background. They could be a gangster, a chef, a sculptor...

But I went with the space scoundrel class, even if Han Solo/Mal Reynolds/Star-Lord etc. is about as generic as space heroes get. It just seems like a really sensible choice; it gives you shooting, flying and talking skills, so it ticks all the boxes!

The game's got a fairly typical body shape triangle to adjust how heavy and muscular your character is, you can pick male or female appearance, and there's a skin tone slider. No voice options though, so it seems like they learned some lessons from Fallout 4.

There are no attributes to select, though I do get to pick a few traits. If I want to.

The Great Serpent, wasn't he in Doctor Who?

Wait, jumping addition is a trait? Does that mean FTL jumping between star systems or just literally jumping as you're walking around? I suppose it wouldn't be so weird for a Bethesda game to have you bouncing all over the place to get a stat boost.

'Adoring fan' is another 'bonus' you can get, but I think I'll pass on that.

I followed Lin and Heller up to the surface of this alien moon and it looks pretty much what you'd expect an alien moon to look like. Rocky, dusty, barren.

My eyes went straight to this pretty spaceship that's coming down instead. Partly because I don't want to accidentally stand under it, but mostly because it's awesome and I want it. This is 'the client' arriving, apparently. 

Oh hang on, space pirates are shooting at me.

I know that they're pirates because it says 'PIRATE' over their head. It's a good thing too, as otherwise I wouldn't have known that there was a head there, with my pistol covering them up.

The most obvious thing for me to compare the shooting to is probably Fallout 4, or maybe The Outer Worlds, but it's been a while since I've played either of them. It seems... comparable. Right now though the main thing I'm aware of is that I've probably sacrificed too much framerate to give you nicer screenshots. Maybe it wouldn't be so bad if I explored the DLSS options.

The others told me to stick to cover, but I'm more of a 'run and gun' kind of hero so I charged straight into danger. Then the game told me that my health was low due to all the laser blasts hitting me and that I should use a Med Pack. We're not doing regenerating health then? That's fine, I'm okay with that.

Oh, I almost forgot to search the bodies. The graphics are so hazy that I almost can't find the bodies.

This part is very Fallout 4, as I get a list of what they have and I can take what I want. Except it doesn't look like the list includes clothing this time. I suppose it's probably for the best that I don't start swapping spacesuits while I'm walking around on a moon.

I like that it doesn't zoom right into a person's face when you talk to them. Sometimes they barely even turn around. 

This is Barrett, the guy who owns the pretty spaceship, and he came here to pick up 'the Artifact'. And to have a chat with me. He's from Constellation, a mythical group of explorers, and he's here to give me his ship. No seriously, I didn't even have to ask for it, he wants me to have it. And now I've got dialogue options to discuss his bizarre decision.

It turns out that he's got business he needs to take care of here, but seeing that vision down in the mine has made me really important, so I need to take the ship and go visit... the Lodge. His robot, Vasco, will be sticking with me to make sure I end up where he wants me to go. So no roaming the galaxy, and no space adventures. Though he did give me a cool watch to keep. It's apparently very useful, and it even tells the time.

It turns out that the interior of his ship is just as great as the outside. It's a little bit Alien and a little bit The Expanse. It even has coffee. I love it, I want to live here in real life. Though maybe I'd put some carpet down before I moved in.

Hey I can see the watch on the bottom left of the screen. I can also see that Barrett's funny robot is going to annoy me. Robots in sci-fi are either great or frustrating, and he doesn't seem that great so far.

Anyway, I can't hang around here, filling my spacesuit's pockets with everything that's lying around, I need to get this ship in the air. And then into space.

I appreciate how the game basically says 'To skip the tutorial, figure out how to do everything yourself'. 

Alright, challenge accepted.

It's asking me to power up all systems, which I'm guessing are those bars on the bottom left, but it won't give me any extra power to put into the GRV column. So I guess I have to take it away from something else? I'm just going to balance the power between all the systems and hope that ENG and SHD don't need more than 2 bars of energy.

YES it worked! Tutorial averted! See, I can figure out games. This isn't my first space rodeo. I haven't figured out how to make the graphics look less washed out yet, but one problem at a time.

Hey it's the Crimson Fleet pirates again... and they've locked missiles. There's no cover to hide behind this time, so I think evasive manoeuvres are in order.

The space shooting reminds me of Freelancer, with how I'm aiming the ship and the weapons with the mouse. It's got the old 'shoot the shields with one gun and then finish off the hull with another' mechanic, which works pretty well. Though it seems like it's helping out with a bit of autoaim, because I don't ever miss. Also, no awesome dynamic space battle music? Seriously?

Okay, Vasco wants me to search the wreckage for salvage, and I can't actually figure out how. I worked everything else out by myself, but this is the part that's tripped me up!

I looked up how to do it, and it turns out I have to target the debris and then loot it like a body.

The bad news is that Barrett must have really pissed off these Crimson Fleet pirates, because they are never going to stop coming after the ship.

The good news is that we know where they live, the nearby moon of Kreet, and Vasco is encouraging me to fly over there and kill everyone. Well his exact words were 'deal with the local Crimson Fleet captain', so I could try diplomacy. But I'm bringing a gun.

I selected Kreet on my Starmap's solar system view and jumped straight over there. I'd show you a picture, but from space it looks like the moon I just left, so there's not much point. Now I just have to select 'Kreet Research Lab' map icon on the Starmap's planet view and I can land nearby.

Hah, it uses your own pictures for the loading screens! Either that or I took a very generic and obvious picture.

It's a bit of a shame to be doing all this fast travel in a game descended from Elder Scrolls and Fallout 3, but it's a space game with spaceships so it was probably the right choice. Hiking around a fantasy landscape or exploring ruins is fun because you get a nice view and there's always something interesting to go off and investigate. Roaming around the infinite black emptiness of space is less fun, at least if you're doing it from the cockpit view.

KREET - MOON OF ANSELON

Damn, this really does feel like I've travelled to an alien world. I've gone from a brown barren rocky moon to a blue barren rocky moon. So okay there's not much to see here, but I'm still going to take some photos.

It won't let me fly the ship around in the air, only in space. But it does let me jump on top of the ship! The Mass Effect series wouldn't let me jump onto my ship until the fourth game, but Starfield's letting me do it right away and this is going to earn it points in my final assessment.

Okay I can see where I need to go, it's that giant building in the distance, but I'm going to check the map anyway.

I always appreciate having a map, and this one seems to tell me everything I need to know. Like that there's a research lab over there. Also I have a 'fast travel to ship' button, which will be useful later.

Okay I'm going to go deal with the Crimson Fleet captain, but first the tutorial wants me to press a button to bring up the scanner.

The game's definitely giving me some No Man's Sky vibes right now. The tutorial tells me that each unique item I scan progresses my survey data of the planet. So that's cool.

I tried scan this kreet stalker creature on my way to the research lab, but I guess it doesn't like having its picture taken because now we're enemies! I'll just, I dunno, shoot it a few times, then get on with my day.

Okay, now I'm inside the abandoned lab and it's all looking a bit abandoned. Aside from the pirates lurking around.

I feel like I'm back in the Fallout games, exploring one of the doomed vaults. I'm sure there has to be a computer around here which explains its grim backstory. Though the enemies in the Fallout games weren't so good at blending in with the scenery. I suppose these pirates aren't so hard to spot while they're moving. It's once I've killed them and want to loot the body that I really struggle to find them again.

This is a brand new game to me so I'm not sure what I should be picking up. If this actually was a Fallout game I'd be going for the wonderglue, but who even knows what the important crafting components are in this.

Dude, what the hell? What just happened? Why is everything on fire now?

Was this my robot buddy Vasco's fault?

Oh, I think I've figured it out. Sometimes I'll damage an enemy enough to wound them without killing them, and then they'll sit the rest of the fight out. Once they're no longer a threat I'm happy to just leave them and move on - I'm not here to murder all the pirates! I'm here to deal with them.

Vasco is a bit more thorough than I am however. Vasco doesn't take prisoners. So my theory is that he executed a helpless wounded man with so much enthusiasm that his stray bullets detonated a nearby explosive. Near to me that is, not to Vasco. I'm the one that got singed here.

I like a flashy menu screen, and this is not one. Though I also like it when a menu has its own distinct aesthetic and this definitely doesn't look like anything else I can recall. In fact it took me a second to figure out how it works.

There are options in each corner and I have to pull a direction to reveal them. Like 'Skills' is in the top right, 'Starmap' is in the top left and 'Inventory' is in the bottom right.

I love it when games let me admire the 3D models, especially when they look like this. That is a beautiful design for a handgun.

You can 'favourite' guns in your inventory to select them quickly during gameplay, and it's worth carrying a few so that you've got the right tool for the job. Also it saves you from having to decide whether you should keep a pistol with 11 phys damage, 50 fire rate and accuracy of 67.5% or a rifle with 4 phys damage, 150 fire rate and 65.8 accuracy.

I feel like I should be making a spreadsheet for this, and that's maybe not the experience they were going for.

Okay, this seems to be how I level up my character.

I can only choose skills in the top row of a category until I have spent enough points there to unlock its other rows. I receive one skill point every time I level up, so that part's straightforward enough. But then it seems like it wants me to complete challenges to rank up the skill? 

If "Kill 20 enemies with a pistol" is what the challenges are like, then that won't be so bad. Though I hope I get something for my skill point investment before doing any challenges. I don't want to level up my piloting skills and then find I haven't actually gotten any better at all because I haven't done enough barrel rolls, or whatever.

These kinds of games get less fun when enemies get better at getting their head behind a wall. Don't make me come up there! Actually the blue quest hexagon is leading me up there so I should be going that way anyway.

On the plus side the enemies haven't been too bullet spongey. Plus they rag doll when they die, which is always a laugh.

I don't know if the pirates are listening to the base logs, but I can hear talking from somewhere. Apparently the Terrormorph is loose! Or was loose, however many years ago this was recorded. I'm not seeing any Terrormorphs around at least, and with a name like that I'd probably know if I saw one.

I've found the lockpicking tutorial though, and look it's different! It's not the same minigame that Bethesda have been sticking in all their RPGs since Oblivion, and that is a bloody miracle.

This time the game is about choosing single-use digipicks that fit the holes in the ring. Once the ring is complete, you move onto the next with whatever picks you have left. So you have to make sure you don't use pick shapes you'll need later in the puzzle.

After opening the safe and helping myself to the contents, I took another lap of the facility just to make sure I didn't miss anything. It's best to be thorough.

Okay to be honest I just didn't spot the ladder leading outside, and I was wandering around for a while looking for the exit. But now I'm out and there's a Crimson Fleet pirate captain out here who wants a chat.

I asked him what his problem with Barrett is anyway. Turns out that the Crimson Fleet have nothing against the guy, they just want his ship, the Frontier. But that's my ship now!

It doesn't seem like lying about Barrett being dead is going to serve any purpose here. I do have the option to say that I'm part of Constellation and see if that intimidates them, but I haven't actually met them yet. Screw it, I'll just kill him.

He seems to have a bigger health bar than most enemies, but that just means he needs a bigger investment of ammo. I'd be happy to send some over, except there's a robot blocking the door so I can't see anything!

Hey Vasco, dude, get your fat metal ass out of the doorway.

There are lots of great robots in games. HK-47, Dog, Nick Valentine... but I am not Vasco's biggest fan right now. He keeps trying to crack rubbish jokes, he gets in the way and the way he executes wounded enemies is getting a little disturbing. I hope our time together is a brief one and I get a different companion soon.

Once I could get out the door I spotted some stairs and ran up to a higher roof to get into a good sniping position against the boss, or anyone else who's around.

Damn, there are a lot of red dots on my radar right now, shooting me from over in the distance. But if they can't hit me with their machine guns, it's probably not worth me trying to shoot back. Maybe I'll get a few red Xs with my stray shots, but I really need a sniper rifle for this job.

I'll just jump down and run over to them. I'm on a low gravity moon so I'm actually very good at jumping right now, though that kind of exertion does increase my O2 consumption.

Hey, I got the pirate captain somehow, his body's lying down here on the roof. I think I'll take that Anti-ballistic Star Roamer Space Helmet he's holding.

Hey, that's not the helmet the captain was wearing! Was he carrying a spare helmet just in case? I suppose it's not that weird, as I've got four of them at the moment.

Look at all those damage types I need to keep track of! Physical, energy, thermal, corrosive... etc. No clue what 'airborne' is about. Which helmet is the best against bullets, I'll switch to that.

Alright I've cleaned up the last few stray pirates here and the game's telling me I can fast travel back to the Frontier. We can go to the Lodge and visit Constellation without anyone bothering me any more. But there's another building over on the horizon I want to investigate first. 

I've been scanning aliens along the way there, completing my planetary survey, plus I've also discovered that I can drill certain rocks to get minerals. So that's good.

What isn't good is that I can barely move without running out of O2! That's basically my stamina meter and it disappears fast when I try to walk while over-encumbered. Then the CO2 meter fills up and my character starts to suffocate. Fortunately I can get O2 back by standing still for a bit, but I don't want to stand still! And I'm too stubborn to drop any of this junk I've scavenged.

I guess I'll just keep running until my health runs out.

Okay I'm inside the other building and this place has tons of workshops. It also has enemies and enemy robots, but they weren't a massive challenge.

Now that I've got some peace I can use this workbench to modify my spacesuit and guns by putting mods into the slots and changing their skins. Though I can't scrap things for parts like I could in Fallout 4, which is a shame as I really need to lighten my backpack.

There's also a research screen. If I feed it enough of the right materials it'll teach me the secrets of creating Antibiotic Paste, and all kinds of stuff. You can never have too many systems in a game I guess.

I actually appreciate that the game's finding a purpose for the stuff I collect, as it means there's a reason to pick it up. It's like Elder Scrolls and Fallout - you go into a place and it's covered in pens, peaches, meals, food cubes, and all kinds of stuff, and maybe something will be useful. So you've got to go looking everywhere and paying attention.

Okay, now that I'm done with the Crimson Fleet I can set a course for New Atlantis on Jemison, the capital city of the United Colonies. Hopefully it's a bit less rocky and barren.

NEW ATLANTIS - JEMISON

Oh damn, this is a proper city! The art design here is beautiful. It's not quite as gleaming as the capital city in Oblivion, but the glare in that game seemed somehow brighter than the sun, so it's not really a fair comparison.

Now I just need to find where this Lodge is so I can go say hi to Constellation. Actually I'm still over-encumbered so I need to find a trader who'll take all this stuff off my hands before I somehow suffocate in an Earth-like atmosphere.

Damn, I found one guy but they only had enough money to pay for half my stuff and the woman running the coffee shop doesn't want to buy assault rifles.

You know what? I've been playing for two hours, I can't be bothered dealing with this right now, I'm taking a break.

TO BE CONTINUED

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Next time, it's still Starfield I'm afraid. It'd be really weird if I stopped here before I've even finished the first quest.

But now it's your turn to type something, if you want to.