How can I say I don't recommend a game I put over 150 hours into? It's kind of like trying to define the difference between a sandbox and a box full of sand. The technical definition is pretty much the same, but the box full of sand doesn't have that spark to ignite the imagination to want to build and explore. Starfield felt like a box full of sand to me. The game engine worked. There were characters. I liked some of them. There were locations. I liked some of those too. The mystery of the first artifact was neat. But the game as a whole felt flat. It lacked the humor and heart of Fallout. It lacked the hand crafted feel of the earlier Elder Scrolls games. There were factions, but rising in their ranks didn't offer much. You can't reach the top of any of them. They're never pitted against one another. No Man's Sky came out almost a decade before this, and handled the planet hopping and resource collecting in a way that was fun and felt fresh and new. Outer Worlds came out 5 years before this and was full of biting satirical commentary. Mass Effect was 17 years ago and was full of planet hopping and incredible characters I felt for. Borderlands has a wild art style and is full all kinds of random guns and wacky characters.
Starfield felt more like Spore - a vast pool that was 6 inches deep.

The Good:
-A new IP! This one felt like a miss, but that doesn't mean I think they should stick to ES and Fallout only. I'd love to see them do more new stuff - even smaller projects.
-It has some of that Bethesda game feel to it. Walking around, makes me nostalgic even if it's a new place.
-Some great voice acting (sometimes) and hearing Liam O'Brien and Aabria Iyengar made this Critter feel like he was running into old friends.
-The forced choice between companions and the consequences afterward were great, and hit home well.
-Scanning people with bounties breaks them for the purposes of collecting the bounty, but the lists of crimes they've been accused of are INCREDIBLE.

The Bad:
-Ship combat. If you don't start out with some ship combat skills, the first few fights feel TERRIBLE. You can barely move, and the dogfights feel like an unfair slog instead of an exciting adventure. Once you do have some perks in it, and can outfit your ship with some Vanguard particle weapons, and then every fight is a joke. On PC, the default medkits hot key when you're on foot is 0. The default hot key to use ship parts (medkits for space ships) when you're flying is O. Not only are those not the same key when they could be, but they LOOK like the same key in the keybinding list so it seems like it just doesn't work. Why not just default it to 0 which we're already using to heal?
-I've got crew on my ship... they should do something other than just stand in my way and say the same greetings over and over. Having a weapons expert should have them shoot at enemies or something. It says they boost the player's skills, but it didn't feel noticeable or measurable at all to me.
-Ship Inventory. Why can I carry more on my person than the hold of my cargo ship?? Can we just make secured cargo cover everything so I don't have to clumsily move contraband from my hold to my person and back again every time I need to go somewhere and forget that I picked up some random item?
-No perks for fast travelling while encumbered or for moving items to your ship long distances.
-No flying ships in atmosphere on planets. I can hop my ship from place to place, but not fly it around near the surface and blast spacer outposts or anything. Feels like a missed opportunity. It would also eliminate the need for the buggy thing which I hate. It's super annoying on terrain, and feels like a slapped on after-thought. No additional models, can't be upgraded outside of the player's perks. It's less maneuverable than being on foot, but also doesn't prevent you from being irradiated or shot to pieces, so it feels lose-lose.
-Building and upgrading and selling ships is very tedious and unintuitive. Flew another ship for a mission? Now you need to find a technician, set something else as your home ship, exit that menu, open a different menu that looks exactly the same, and then sell it. Ships also sell for basically nothing because they need to be registered first - and good space suits routinely sell for more than functional, upgraded star ships.
-Getting into and out of pilot seats is a weird little cut scene that takes forever. Happens with every chair, really - but when you're in combat, or trying to respond to a hail, and hold the button for the wrong amount of time and then need to watch your character scoot back in the chair, stand up, stretch, and then you regain control and can walk back to the chair to watch them scoot it back, sit down, and slide back in again. WHY? What does this add?
-Attempting to steal a ship on the ground when you've been spotted is terrible. You get maybe a minute or so of combat, and then you just die. Cool... Why not just lock the door to prevent it if that's the intention?
-Melee combat - especially unarmed. There's no button for unarmed fighting. You can't favorite it or enable one. There are perks for fighting unarmed... but how are you supposed to do it? Was this tested? It doesn't feel like it... Melee weapons work... but the damage is so low that it feels pointless when the guns do so much more damage, from range, behind cover, and can still be suppressed for stealth kills. The melee weapons don't make you faster, tougher, stronger, or give cool abilities to make it a more viable choice.
-Is there anything to do on the entire right/eastern side of the world map? There are systems and planets there. I checked a few out, but I never got any quests to go to any of them. Pirates, Spacers, Ecliptic, Civilian Outpost with the same fetch quest - rinse and repeat. I played for like 150 hours, and they just kinda felt... there.
-The Temples! WHY do I have to keep doing the same annoying mini game chasing swirls over and over and over? The first one was cool, the music swelling and everything, but it's super unclear how many things you need to catch, and since you're weightless, there's little you can do to speed up and maneuver, so depending on where they spawn it can just take forever, and is super tedious and repetitive. It's not challenging. It doesn't use resources. It doesn't involve a choice. It's not dramatic. It doesn't give us more information about the world. What's the point? What does this add to the game?
- The Starborn... Really? Starborn? Who get powers from temples? SUPER different from the dragonborn who gets their new powers from temples. I hated both faction options the Starborn presented. The big reveals felt forced and soap-opera to me. Their whole deal just didn't click for me. Also, there are temples on inhabited worlds. Yet I'm the only one who ever opened the door and got the super powers?

There were things to like for sure. It did keep my attention for quite a while. I got to sneak around with a sniper rifle - always a plus. Art, music, acting, programming, testing - it takes SO MUCH WORK from SO MANY PEOPLE to make a game like this, and it's a hell of an accomplishment. It just didn't feel like it's own, unique thing to set it apart from its peers. It wasn't a super technical space simulator like Kerbal or Space Engineers. It didn't take a unique art style approach like Borderlands. It didn't use a fresh new programming ideas for generative environments like No Man's Sky. I didn't love all the characters like Mass Effect. It didn't poke fun at society like Outer Worlds. It felt like moving around in Fallout - broken down old buildings, but lacked the humor and ridiculousness. If all those games were hanging out at a party, Starfield could talk to any of them comfortably, but is trying to hard to blend in and seem normal among them.

This game in my view is way overhated. Does Bethesda need to improve its game design? Absolutely. Do we need to move on from the typical story cliches? Yes. But is this game still an overall enjoyable experience, full of things to do, things to see, and characters to interact with? Very much so. While I hope Bethesda, as unlikely as it is learns from the genuine criticisms against the game, it's a positive experience overall for me. I recommend getting it on sale, and I think you’ll be pleasantly surprised with your purchase in that circumstance. Relax, and let the game take you places.

7.5/10.

If this is Bethesda's passion project I'm terrified for Elder Scrolls 6