We are in a brave and strange new world, everybody. The world is on fire, up is down and Bethesda got bought by Microsoft, but you know one thing that never changes? Bethesda leaks that threaten to undermine their incredibly lethargic marketing schedule which pins itself on some strange fascination on shortening the time between announcement and launch even when that skewers perception on the game the public thinks they're getting. (Like it did last time.) It's quite telling how the second biggest purchase in gaming history managed to go completely under the wire but Bethesda can't manage to hide their own game successfully. Someone needs to be more thorough vetting the OA department. But then again that's just my assumption, who knows what it is that makes studios like Bethesda and Ubisoft prone to gaffs and slip-ups with such regularity that they may as well be part of the marketing cycle? Perhaps it's one of the universal truths of reality; time is linear and Bethesda can't even reveal their games without someone doing it for them first.
Starfield, in fact, has a particularly bad history of leaks, in that the entire existence of the game was made known several years before the announcement due to an impromptu tattletelling. Unconfirmed rumours even suggest that it was the leaks themselves which prevented Starfield from being announced a year earlier, propagated on the way that year's Bethesda E3 conference seemed themed on stars and spacey-motifs despite Bethesda having, at that time, no space games to announce during the show. If that's true, then it means the history of Bethesda's latest baby has been in the public eye through illicit means more than it has through actual discussion. I mean think about it, how much do we legitimately know about this game? We know its title thanks to the teaser, we know it's a Science Fiction game and we know that the development team was looking into fictional fuels for the ships based on real scientific speculation through an interview Todd did alongside Elon Musk; so practically nothing then. For the few who actually managed to cobble together something resembling a hype-train on that thread-bare foundation; I salute you and this leak is the salve for your aching and malnourished hearts.
"But what is this leak?", I hear you ask; "Was there talk of systems? gameplay? Perhaps even some game footage?" Better! For you see, dear ladies and gentlemen, we have been presented with a whole single screenshot of a figure and a spaceship. -wait, make that two screenshots! The other one seems to be of a test cell! How exciting... (Wait- did I say "Better"? I meant much, much worse.) I suppose in many ways this is a consequence of being so incredibly tight lipped about your game, without the size to really keep the secret until the time is right a slip-up like this can happen and the result is an embarrassing first impression upon the world. I mean this as a Bethesda fan who owns just about every one one of their games and has eaten up their formula for years, but these screens looked rough; bad even. (Although that isn't entirely their fault but I'll get on that later.) This is now what people will think when they hear 'Starfield'. (Talk about 'negative association')
So what are these images and what do they show? Well the first is a third person view of an astronaut looking at the backside of what appears to be a spaceship or some sort of prefab structure, we have a clearly unfinished HUD on the bottom right hand part of the screen and some sort of space age altimeter on the left. As there isn't really a great deal to go on, all we can really focus on is the fellow in the middle of the screen and I have to say straight up that it looks like a dull design. I know that's a little pre-emptive given we've seen but a single angle but that is quite literally the first thing I thought off and it confirms a fear I had about this game. (Which again, I'll get too later.) The second screen is either another location or the same one from a different angle, what we can tell from here is that the structure is a pre-fab and that the location around the player is likely a test-cell. (Or just supremely unfinished) Some arm-chair detectives have taken it upon themselves to analyse the shape of the prefab and conclude it's the right shape to fit Bethesda's settlement building system from Fallout 4, but I'd remind those folk how that Settlement building system was literally based on the way the game world's are built on the Creation engine, this proves nothing.
Now I'm not going to comment on how unfinished the visuals of everything looks, like the lighting and generally boring textures as, providing these images are as real as folk seem to think they are, these are screens from a 2018 build of the game. These are likely just some pre-alpha shots with placeholders for practically everything, (except I have feeling that the astronaut is a final design, there's a bit too much going on in his design for him to be a placeholder) I wouldn't even be surprised if the corner HUD is completely different for the final build. Although this doesn't exactly mean the best news for Bethesda, as their title is getting represented all over the internet with years-old pictures that are representative of practically nothing at this time. In fact, in the light of this knowledge, as well as the lack of real details provided by these 'leaks', I have to conclude that the only real effect this has had is to dilute my opinion of a game I haven't even seen yet. (How troubling)
Apart from these two screens there is a third apparent leak, although this one isn't so much a screenshot as it is appears to be a concept model, or maybe just a far-back asset pic. There's no second guessing about this one, this here is definitely a spaceship, and it is perhaps from this that we learn the most about this game. Firstly, and I know I'm not the first to point this out, but the spaceship looks rough, rustic even, almost reminiscent of The Unreliable from 'The Outer Worlds'. Secondly, it seems to be modular, almost as though there are nodes there to stick other parts of ship onto or merely for connecting two ships. And thirdly; it's just so darn terrestrial. Wait, that doesn't make sense- we're talking about a spaceship. Let me be more clear- this looks like a feasibly normal spaceship. (Not a comment on the quality of the asset, I actually think it's the highest quality out of the leaks, but rather the context it's appearance evokes) It's this that builds upon my fear for this title that I mentioned earlier.
And here it is: my fear. I'm worried that this game is a Sci-Fi game. I know- that seems a bit odd, afterall we already know it is. But what I mean is that I think this is a Science Fiction game, as opposed to a Science Fantasy one. Everything these screenshots tell me, from the mundane looking spacesuit to the vaguely scientific HUD and the almost-real feeling spaceship makes me think this is a game that focuses on the act of space travel, rather than the exotic wildness of space. And that sort of bums me out. Bethesda are known for making this fantastically wild and immersive worlds that defy our own in such wild ways, even Fallout draws itself from an alternative version of our own reality, so it sort of feels like a step-back for a game about space-travel to be so mundane. No Aliens, probably no laser guns and unlikely to be any mind bending plot. (Though I suppose Bethesda aren't really renowned for their plots anyway, now are they?) They already had a Science fiction series, why couldn't this one be a little more unique and interesting?
Now don't get me wrong, some games can settle themselves in Science Fiction and still have all that cool stuff, just look at Mass Effect, but I don't really think Bethesda have it in them for that level of creative ingenuity, it just doesn't seem like their style. Whatsmore, this really does place them in direct competition with The Outer Worlds, which was similarly grounded in most aspects aside from the wild and heavy-handed worldbuilding and plot. (I honestly thought we were all just memeing with those comparisons, but it seems not.) At the end of the day I suppose it's unfair to lose hope for the game based on a couple of screenshots, (and that interview when Todd mentioned the fuel which they hoped to base off real/speculative space fuel; seems like a bit too much effort if they were making a Science Fantasy) but regardless it's factual that Starfield just fell off my anticipated list. No hate to the game itself, it's just not what I was expecting and I really don't think it'll end up being something that I want. A realistic space sim built by Bethesda? Nah, I'm fine thanks.
No comments:
Post a Comment