Starfield will be one of the biggest games of 2023, but I’m not that excited to play it yet.
While Starfield’s spotlight at the Xbox & Bethesda Games Showcase this year highlighted some impressive features, I couldn’t shake the feeling that I’d already gotten everything I’d want from a traditional sci-fi RPG like this from another game: The Outer Worlds from Obsidian Entertainment. Ironically developed by another Microsoft-owned studio, The Outer Worlds showed that bloating up a sci-fi game with thousands of planets isn’t necessary when a “less is more” mentality can still result in an expertly designed sci-fi RPG.
Although The Outer Worlds might not be as nearly as grand as Starfield in scope, it still leaves an impression every time I revisit it. It’s a focused, replayable, and hilarious adventure without much bloat, which is what I want from my RPGs. It does this while emulating Bethesda’s classic The Elder Scrolls and Fallout games too, beating Starfield to the punch.
Starfield could impress me when it launches, but what I’ve seen of it hasn’t got me that eager to play it when I’m so content with replaying The Outer Worlds while avidly waiting for its sequel.
From the moment your escape pod accidentally lands on a bounty hunter that’s supposed to help you, it’s clear that The Outer Worlds is a tongue-in-cheek, satirical take on capitalism, colonization, and the sci-fi genre as a whole. While Bethesda Game Studios’ narratives have their fair share of humor, much of its writing tends to be more serious and dryly written. We haven’t seen enough of Starfield’s dialogue or narrative to get a sense of its thematic identity yet.
Starfield’s narrative could be more playful than we’ve seen so far, but the game’s massive
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