It’s no secret that Starfield — out now on PC and Xbox Series S/X — is hands down one of the most monumental game launches of the year. For Bethesda, it’s a gamble in uncharted territory as they undertake their first new universe in 25 years, set across the stars in a futuristic civilised corner of the Milky Way galaxy. For publisher Xbox, it’s an opportunity to bounce back from a lacklustre 2022 slate and dominate the gaming conversation for a long time — probably years, given the staying power director Todd Howard’s RPGs are notorious for. With over a thousand planets to explore, dashing factions to align with, and cosmic mysteries bubbling with political intrigue, Starfield aims to be the most complex spacefaring adventure of our generation. As such, it soars gracefully, but not without some turbulence.
Starfield review: Main story and its pitfalls
The year is 2330. Earth, what was once known as the ‘Blue Planet,’ lost its atmosphere and turned into an uninhabitable barren wasteland, causing humanity to leave and settle in other star systems. And so, our story begins in the cosmos, from the humble beginnings of a nameless space miner who’s unearthed a cavern and found a mysterious piece of shiny debris. Touching the shard pulls us into a bizarre trance of celestial visions and sounds that speak to us on a spiritual level, before blacking out. Open your eyes, and Starfield hits you with the classic RPG amnesia trope where one must remember who they are through in-depth character creation. It’s got all the hallmarks of a standard Bethesda game, sticking close to its role-playing blueprint of exploring, scavenging, and killing, albeit on a much grander scale that feels overwhelming a lot of the time.
Fair warning though: Starfield is extremely slow to start, restricting you to some bland exposition hunt for the first few hours, before opening things up and granting the freedom to explore any planets at will. I admit that the game soon becomes irresistible to put down, but that opening stretch could easily make or break the experience for many, as you mindlessly go from point A to point B or try getting attuned to its unorthodox menus. Personally, it took me over 10 hours for the game to finally get going, forming doubts in my mind if I’ll ever end up enjoying it. And it’s not like I hate passive openings either — most of my favourite movies are slow-burn dramas that spend a chunk of the runtime establishing their characters and the setting. Sadly, video games are a different beast altogether. They could easily go beyond 60 hours of playtime and thus demand 100 percent engagement.
Character creation
Character creation in Starfield is quite detailed, with swappable traits that make you feel like a blank slate.
It doesn’t help that Starfield’s main campaign isn’t all too compelling, having you join a ragtag group of interstellar explorers called the Constellation, who’re looking to track down artefacts of unknown origin — like the metallic one we encountered earlier. As you’d expect, the story hits familiar beats as we are tasked with hunting the mysterious artefacts down by venturing into other planets, throwing us into all sorts of wondrous adventures — from dark mines teeming with space raiders to deserted landscapes that serve as a graveyard for mechs. However, these stellar sequences are wrapped around repetitive missions that involve basic puzzle-solving, dispatching enemies, and floating around in potentially alien temples, which gets boring really fast and pivots into fetch quests that you feel coerced to do for the sake of pushing the story forward.
While the plot is certainly derivative with tonnes of sci-fi tropes stuffed in, there is some delight to be found through its intriguing cast of characters — precisely, our companions. None of them are really likeable at first, but bringing them along on adventures makes them open up about their feelings and backstories. The lone space cowboy Sam Coe became my favourite of the bunch, wanting to escape his celebrity father’s shadow and often musing about his early years smuggling across the vast expanse.
You learn there’s more depth to him than simply being a brazen peacekeeper when he brings along his daughter on board, stressing his overprotective nature as he never-endingly praises her smarts. But you also uncover a sense of entitlement and internal conflict in his parenting, where he questions whether it’s ideal to raise her under the risky, often life-threatening situations he puts himself through. It’s indeed humane, but I utterly despise how his backstory is unspooled — just incessant trauma dumping at random intervals, with no regard for your objectives.
Companions
The companions’ plight came across as overly shallow at times.
The same could be said for other companions as well, though I wasn’t able to form equally strong connections with them. Sure, there’s some individual charm to Constellation chair Sarah Morgan’s drive to explore the stars, the easy-going adventurer Barrett, and the mysterious stealth expert Andreja, but their plight came across as overly shallow and at times, conveyed dully for me to care enough. You see, conversations in Starfield give you a close-up full-frontal view of the other person, revealing flaws in Bethesda’s character modelling, which limits certain facial expressions. Basic emotes like sorrow or happiness have a creepy demeanour to them, venturing into the uncanny valley — almost as if the NPCs are all secretly androids being trained to fake smiles. They all look dead inside, which isn’t helped by the often-stiff voice-acting that makes it tempting to read through subtitles quickly and spam-skip to the next line of dialogue.
Starfield review: Immersive side quests and world-building
Keeping with Bethesda’s tradition, Starfield’s true magic lies in its sprawling side quests that pop up along the way — most stemming from random gossip and world events. I wouldn’t call them all equally gripping to boot, but they all led to some unexpected encounters that often had a hint of tragedy to them. Once on foot, it’s easy to lose track of your initial goal and spend hours exploring the more populated, charming regions of the galaxy teeming with odd denizens who have a big or small ask of you.
One such locale was the suitably named Neon, a rain-drenched Blade Runner-esque cyberpunk city where I ran around threatening vandals, pocketing exotic fish-based psychedelic drugs, and vibing at the local dance club. But mainly, it was a place to make some big money, which I did by climbing the corporate ladders of Ryujin Industries, a massive tech corporation that deals with weapons, spaceships, and drones. Within the next couple of hours, I went from grabbing coffee for my superiors to heading out on espionage missions to sabotage rival corporations by breaking into their systems.
Exploring Neon
I had a lot of fun exploring the valleys of Neon, hoarding an immense amount of quests.
Safe to say, I’d become an integral asset of the faction, getting into the confidential stuff and being able to smooth-talk my way into restricted areas. This persuasive approach was something I decided from the very get-go — during character creation — with an extra **
