Blue_Mike
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Meet Hanako At Embers
Posts: 5,375
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Post by Blue_Mike on Apr 13, 2023 15:30:36 GMT
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Post by RadicalRex on Apr 13, 2023 15:41:30 GMT
I used to be a time traveller like you, then I got an arrow of time in the knee
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Blue_Mike
Full Member
Meet Hanako At Embers
Posts: 5,375
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Post by Blue_Mike on May 3, 2023 16:39:57 GMT
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Post by technoish on May 3, 2023 16:52:06 GMT
There was a promotional and for this and lucozade on the side of a bus this morning...
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Post by mothercruncher on May 3, 2023 17:16:02 GMT
They’re just taping lucozade to busses now as advertising??
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Post by muddyfunster on May 4, 2023 13:51:32 GMT
There was a good opinion piece on PC gamer recently saying that the key to Starfield being good is whether the side quests mark a return to form.
The side quests were so imaginative from Oblivion through to Fall Out 3 and then Fall Out 4 underwhelmed massively with formulaic radiant AI guff, and village building busywork.
It was also why I didn't get on with Outer Worlds.
I really really hope we get plenty of handcrafted levels and well written quests rather than procedurally generated filler.
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Post by Bill in the rain on May 6, 2023 14:12:40 GMT
Hadn't they promised Radiant AI since about the days of Morrowind, and only finally got it working around Fall Out 4?
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MolarAm🔵
Full Member
Bad at games
Posts: 6,849
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Post by MolarAm🔵 on May 6, 2023 14:20:15 GMT
I mean, they've never really been that good at side quests imo. A Bethesda side quest is "Hey, we're the thieves guild how about you do something for us, don't worry you don't need to do any thieving, ok done you're our leader now". No meaning, mostly no interesting choices.
They were mostly dogshit in FO3 too. I liked the tree quest, but that's probably because of how nice it was to see Harold again.
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Post by FlexibleFeline on May 6, 2023 15:33:08 GMT
I mean, they've never really been that good at side quests imo. A Bethesda side quest is "Hey, we're the thieves guild how about you do something for us, don't worry you don't need to do any thieving, ok done you're our leader now". No meaning, mostly no interesting choices. They were mostly dogshit in FO3 too. I liked the tree quest, but that's probably because of how nice it was to see Harold again. The Dark Brotherhood want a word, MolarAm🔵. |
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Post by darkling on May 6, 2023 16:27:34 GMT
The only thing that disappointed me about FO4 was that there was little point to the settlement building. I built some awesome settlements, but they'd only ever get attacked by small trickles of supermutants.
What I'm really hoping for in Starfield is base / ship building that's more intrinsic to the game.
Maybe the size of your base dictates the size of your potential crew, and the size of ship that you can assemble there.
Maybe the size of your ship's living quarters and life support systems dictates the number of followers you can take on missions.
Maybe the design of your ship and its upgrades dictate how far you can travel through the starfield, and at what speed.
I'd also like to see a VATS-like system, given an FPS @30fps won't be much fun to control.
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Blue_Mike
Full Member
Meet Hanako At Embers
Posts: 5,375
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Post by Blue_Mike on May 7, 2023 17:05:22 GMT
The only thing that disappointed me about FO4 was that there was little point to the settlement building. I built some awesome settlements, but they'd only ever get attacked by small trickles of supermutants. Open the console in Fallout 4 and type:
player.placeatme 0017E6F4 50
Let the fun and massive temporary system slowdown commence.
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Post by muddyfunster on May 8, 2023 20:17:36 GMT
I mean, they've never really been that good at side quests imo. A Bethesda side quest is "Hey, we're the thieves guild how about you do something for us, don't worry you don't need to do any thieving, ok done you're our leader now". No meaning, mostly no interesting choices. They were mostly dogshit in FO3 too. I liked the tree quest, but that's probably because of how nice it was to see Harold again. Wut? That's crazy talk, Bethesda did some of the most imaginative side quests in gaming. They list some classics in the article I was referencing. www.pcgamer.com/starfields-gonna-live-or-die-by-its-side-quests/ |
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Post by muddyfunster on May 8, 2023 20:22:58 GMT
The only thing that disappointed me about FO4 was that there was little point to the settlement building. I built some awesome settlements, but they'd only ever get attacked by small trickles of supermutants. What I'm really hoping for in Starfield is base / ship building that's more intrinsic to the game. Maybe the size of your base dictates the size of your potential crew, and the size of ship that you can assemble there. Maybe the size of your ship's living quarters and life support systems dictates the number of followers you can take on missions. Maybe the design of your ship and its upgrades dictate how far you can travel through the starfield, and at what speed. I'd also like to see a VATS-like system, given an FPS @30fps won't be much fun to control. I agree VATS would be good. Base building perhaps if it's like Subnautica and actually necessary and fun. I only want to do it once too, not have to repeat it on every planet. |
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Post by mothercruncher on May 8, 2023 20:46:24 GMT
I mean, they've never really been that good at side quests imo. A Bethesda side quest is "Hey, we're the thieves guild how about you do something for us, don't worry you don't need to do any thieving, ok done you're our leader now". No meaning, mostly no interesting choices. They were mostly dogshit in FO3 too. I liked the tree quest, but that's probably because of how nice it was to see Harold again. Wut? That's crazy talk, Bethesda did some of the most imaginative side quests in gaming. They list some classics in the article I was referencing. www.pcgamer.com/starfields-gonna-live-or-die-by-its-side-quests/Um, I’m sorry, but it’s like you haven’t played, like, any other games. At all. |
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Post by muddyfunster on May 8, 2023 23:06:24 GMT
Well I've played most major Western RPGs and JRPGs since the late 90s...
I get the fact that Bethesda side quests don't often change the world at all, and there was always a percentage of filler, but they also had some really great self contained stories to discover.
What about going into a painting in Oblivion or the invisible village or the way you discover and earn a place in the dark brotherhood? Then there's the likes of Tenpenny Tower, the cannibal colony and the Superhuman Gambit in FO3 and the hangover homage and the faux noir detective case in Skyrim.
The games were certainly of their time and bettered since. However the point is that exploring a proper 3D open world was rewarded by finding some genuinely surprising and fun quests that were entirely optional and missable.
No they didn't have the writing of a Planescape Torment but some of the side content was a hell of a lot more interesting than most 3rd person open world guff that followed.
Arguably it's the main quest lines in Bethesda games that invariably disappoint.
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Frog
Full Member
Posts: 7,273
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Post by Frog on May 9, 2023 5:49:47 GMT
I'm sorry Mr Funster but you can't compare them to games at their time of release, it's only fair to do it against recent ones  I'm not the biggest fan of Bethesda games but it's almost exclusively down to the combat being shit, never had a problem with their quests. |
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Post by Bill in the rain on May 9, 2023 6:05:32 GMT
I haven't played any recent Bethesda games, but a lot of their best little self-contained side quests were weird or funny, and I get the sense that their most recent games including Starfield are trying to be serious?
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Post by RadicalRex on May 9, 2023 8:02:20 GMT
If by recent you mean Fallout 4, there's very little that's not "go to X, kill everything, bring back item". Off the top of my head, there's a robot murder mystery side quest in the Far Harbor DLC that tries to be weird and funny, but I found it just super lame and endlessly stretched out.
Generally the game tries to be funny and light-hearted a lot of the time, but at the same time it tries to be super serious with its main quest and it keeps jumping back and forth abruptly, so that it always feels like the game doesn't know what it wants to be. But I'd even say most of the time it hardly tries either, just spamming you with whatever-I-don't-know filler and meaningless dialogue that feels like it's written by an AI.
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Post by Bill in the rain on May 9, 2023 8:46:42 GMT
By recent I meant any of the Fallouts and Skyrim.
Earlier games had an issue with having a lot of repetitive content, but they also felt like they were made by a bunch of random people each putting in whatever they came up with. Which doesn't really chime with modern AAA gaming expectations, but resulted in a lot of charm and fun.
You might find 10 very similar caves with bandits, but then you'd run across some weird little random quest or event that made it all feel fun again.
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Zyrr
New Member
Posts: 986
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Post by Zyrr on May 9, 2023 12:56:06 GMT
As a huge fan of the Black Isle Fallouts, I was pleasantly surprised by how Bethesda handled 3. I love it (and NV) just as much as the first two. I found 4 massively disappointing though. It just felt too stripped back in the places that mattered with added busywork I just didn't care for. For a while I tried to force myself to power through in the hope it would eventually click and I'd enjoy it more, but that didn't happen and eventually I dropped it.
I'm trying not to get caught up in all the Starfield hype, but I have to admit if they pull it off it's got the potential to be one of the games of this generation.
Still expect it to be buggy as hell when it launches, despite being in development for a decade or so now. I can live with that though as long as the game makes good on its promises.
I said exactly the same thing about Fallout 4 though. I guess I'm a bit worried that we'll never see another FO3 or Oblivion from Bethesda, as they continue to 'streamline' the RPG elements as much as possible to maximise their audience.
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Post by muddyfunster on May 9, 2023 22:04:29 GMT
By recent I meant any of the Fallouts and Skyrim. Earlier games had an issue with having a lot of repetitive content, but they also felt like they were made by a bunch of random people each putting in whatever they came up with. Which doesn't really chime with modern AAA gaming expectations, but resulted in a lot of charm and fun. You might find 10 very similar caves with bandits, but then you'd run across some weird little random quest or event that made it all feel fun again. Yeah exactly this. There was consistently enough hand curated stuff that raised a smile and meant you couldn't entirely predict what would happen next. They got a lot out of recycling assets by being creative in the margins. As you say each dungeon or shrine quest felt like one person's baby, and IIRC from a 'making of' video for oblivion that's because they did actually work that way. The original point made by that PC gamer piece was that FO4 represented a massive drop off in side quest quality. It was really disappointing. |
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Psiloc
Junior Member
Posts: 1,567
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Post by Psiloc on May 10, 2023 11:19:05 GMT
I kind of felt that way about Skyrim tbh. "Go to cave X and get jumped by draugrs and bring back the macguffin" literally became a meme. Though that game has more redeeming features than FO4.
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Post by Aunt Alison on May 10, 2023 11:43:03 GMT
Semi-related, but managed to stick with FO3 long enough to get to The Pitt and Point Lookout DLCs as someone on here said they were quite good
Thought The Pitt was excellent - one of the best quests in the game. It's exactly the kind of thing I want from these games where you're presented with shitty option number one or shitty option number two, rather than the much more typical good/evil choices and made me actually quit the game and think about what I wanted to do
I ended up helping the slaves, but stealing a baby, murdering its parents and handing it over to strangers to experiment on/raise didn't feel good. And I did think there was some merit to sacrificing in the short term for the greater good but slavery is just too gross
Point Lookout was just such a lot of fun. Great tone, location, story, characters, everything
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Post by anthonyuk on May 10, 2023 11:44:15 GMT
Seem to be in the minority in just not getting Bethesda games, at least any I've tried.
Totally appreciate the size of the world's and how they appeal to some, I just have a hard time getting past the jank.
You might have built an actual city with countless side quests, but if the trade off is incredibly poor animation, frame rate issues and just a feeling it's an inch away from falling apart at the seams, I find myself struggling to suspend my belief enough to get lost in these huge worlds they make.
I'm curiously optimistic, but nothing of what I've seen so far makes me think Starfield will be any different.
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Post by Aunt Alison on May 10, 2023 11:52:11 GMT
Probably comes down to how much work you want a game to do vs your own imagination. Bethesda games give people a world and near blank slate to be whatever they want. It's pure escapism
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Post by mothercruncher on May 10, 2023 12:04:21 GMT
No, I never could imagine that extra 17fps I needed to make it feel like a finished game.
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Post by Aunt Alison on May 10, 2023 12:07:21 GMT
It's about the journey, not the finished game
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Post by Jambowayoh on May 10, 2023 12:48:12 GMT
Skyrim is a much deeper and satisfying game than FO4 IMO.
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Post by RadicalRex on May 10, 2023 17:13:36 GMT
I agree, far mor immersive and tonally consistent too. Also it's a beautiful place to escape to, while Fallout is just a drab wasteland.
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Post by LegendaryApe on May 10, 2023 17:16:15 GMT
Plus of course, The Lusty Argonian Maid..
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