Can manufactured hype and money really make a game successful? I've often thought about this question as I see games like Red Dead Redemption 2, Call Of Duty and Skyrim use restrictive, dated game design formulas but still end up on top.
Starfield has renewed my interest in that question and time will tell what the answer will be. In the mean time however, I'm going to show you by direct comparison what makes Fallout 4 (Bethesda's second best fallout game) a better space game than their dedicated space game, Starfield.
INTROS
Starfield
Starfield's introduction is a boring conversation in an elevator about why you're working as a miner for this particular company. Your feverish anticipation to just play is dammed by an uneventful trek to an important place with little more than repeated lines from the first NPCs you meet and no incentive for trying to do anything more than follow along the old beaten path. Does this sound familiar? It's because Skyrim notoriously committed the same sin with an intro so long and arduous (ie. unskippable) that a modder had to create a way to just skip it. At least the story being told in that game on your way to get executed was interesting. Also to Skyrim's credit the first dungeon crawl was fun. #clapButNotSlow
Starfield's intro (sort of) ends with me touching a mysterious stone that makes me black out and I recover in a med bay where I pick my starting traits and look. It's nothing to write home about. I put on my helmet and head outside into the planet's atmosphere after stealing all the expensive valuables that no one seems to care about in my mining facility.
I immediately head off into the horizon to see what I can find on this planet and after 20 minutes of running around I find rocks and a dead end. I restart as it's the quicker way to return to the station for idiots like me who like to run off before the game says I have license to do so.
Once I'm done reloading, a mysterious pilot lands at our facility. He came to get the item that knocked me out. He's followed by some space pirates, a fight ensues (which we win) and then he tells me that I need to take the item to the people he was gonna deliver it to. He hands me, a total stranger, his ship and the address of the client to which it needs to be delivered. Naturally I'm not interested in doing anyone's job for them so I look for ways to not deliver this item but alas there are none.
As soon as I take off into space via a loading screen, I get introduced to space combat which is pretty challenging and fun. It's the best part of the game so far by far. I think to myself, now that I'm spacing it! (ie. killing enemies effectively in the space room I just loaded into #eyeRoll) I'm ready to buck the main objective and mess around.
I land on the planet and immediately try to assassinate a janitor of some sort. The Bethesda code god sees me immediately from the ether and I'm under attack by the whole base's guards. Hey didn't that happen in Skyr..im #sideEye #eyeRoll
I succumb to the power of the level 12 soldiers and restart trying a more subtle approach to dissent. Perhaps I'll just tell constellation to shove it, in fact, I'll definitely tell them to shove it. Oh sorry turns out I can't. I must join constellation (insert robot voice and repeat 4 times). At this point I'm done with this game. I sigh turn it off and uninstall (only to reinstall and try my best to give it more time. More on that later)
So with that, I've arrived in the world of Starfield and my arrival is, as I predicted it would be, disappointing.
Fallout 4
Fallout 4's introduction puts you in front of a mirror in your bathroom with an iconic phrase "war never changes" Do I even need to write anything more than that? I think that's it for the article. No need to write another word.... Ok since you insist. Observe the difference, this starts with immediate engagement by having you play right away. I'll say that again. THE GAME ACTUALLY STARTS WITH YOU PLAYING, exploring, creating in the world from the very first second. You explore all the options for the creation of your character, then you explore your home that hides more than a few interesting interactions including one with your son. Following that you explore conversation with a pushy salesman giving responses that feel meaningful and realistic.
I can be a turd to the man, I can be nice, I can be funny or I can be gray. It's all in there and it's all expertly written. The salesman is even a foreshadowing of... I'm not even going to add that extra detail as players who've played FO4 know what I'm going to say and know that details like this are what make FO4 extra special.
If you've played the intro 1000 times like me you begin to notice details like looking outside right away nets you a glimpse of the salesman that comes to your door later talking to your neighbor first.
Once I finish my conversation with the salesman, talk to my floating robot servant and retreat back to my family not knowing what will happen next and then BOOOM!!! a nuclear bomb alert and all of a sudden I'm running for my life with my wife and baby to the nearest bunker and because I'm in the military my family and I get a spot in the bunker while other people stay outside and get hit by the nukes!! Poor bastards! You should have joined the military!!!!
That's what I scream internally as I descend into the vault that will keep my family and I safe until the nuclear fallout clears up. The place looks like a technological marvel from the 1950s shiny metallic everything era and I must say despite the suspicious lack of info from the doctor registering me in this vault, I feel pretty safe. The doctor convinces my wife and I to step into a cryogenic chamber for decontamination and before I know it I'm freezer napping.
I won't give away what happens after that because the nuance of the story is nice for people who haven't played FO4 but let's just say I wake up much later to a lot of weird stuff and dead people. I emerge from the prison I was tricked into entering after killing some weird things and the world has completely changed.
There are "aliens" everywhere. Giant flies, zombie dogs, giant crabs, irradiated cows, giant mole rats, and the list goes on. Each of the things I mentioned above are a story waiting to be discovered via the cleverly placed lore. This is a world full of intrigue that encourages full exploration. Did you take the nuclear battery? Did you kill the cow? Did you find the gun? Did you use the bench? Did you craft a bed? Did you craft a turret? Did you plant food? Are you going to help people, kill them or something in between? And that's just in the first 30 minutes of the game.
Be honest gamer, which of these two intros strikes you more as a space exploration game? Is it the super boring, space room navigating, load screen loving, hand holding, constellation forced joining pretend space odyssey or the irradiated creature spawning, cryo-chamber emerging, evil scientist having, alien meeting, space laser shooting, craft your life away, survival, don't get eaten by zombie dogs and watch out for the nukes fun fest of Fallout 4?
I think we have an obvious answer! I have more to say on this. Stay tuned for part 2 of the article.
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