Starfield has received immense hate from players after a recent leak. The clip showed a player standing with a “boundary reached” message on the screen. Just before the release of this triple-A title on 6th September, it was the target of a huge controversy. However, leaked information should be taken with a grain of salt.
The controversy sparked with Bethesda’s Pete Hines and Todd Howard claiming seamless exploration of planets. Players took their fury to X, saying that Bethesda lied to them and Starfield isn’t a masterpiece anymore because of the Boundaries compared to other RPG games with massive maps like The Witcher 3.
Also Read: One of the Most Highly Anticipated Open World Games Loses Top Spot to Starfield in Steam Rankings
What is the Starfield Controversy?
Bethesda claimed that Starfield will have an entire planet exploration game. Starfield director Todd Howard said to players during the Starfield Direct back in June that they could land anywhere on a planet and start exploring.
On August 22, 2023, the Head of Publishing at Bethesda, Pete Hines replied to a tweet.
Yup, if you want.
Walk on, brave explorer.
— Pete Hines (@DCDeacon) August 22, 2023
However, recent leaks show a “boundary reached” message pops on the screen at certain positions. This implies that the planet exploration isn’t as seamless as Todd Howard made it out to be. There are limits to how much a player can do on a given planet. However, these leaks resulted in a terrible backlash towards Starfield. Players have been disheartened and some even expressed their thoughts on how Bethesda lied about the size of the game to them and misled them.
Did Bethesda mislead their players?
It wouldn’t be correct to say that Bethesda lied to their players. The basis on which these allegations, being thrown upon the developers, is information from leakers. Several people are playing Starfield, but embargoes restrict them from exposing anything substantial. To take information without any credible source to the heart and bash on a game isn’t appropriate.
Paul Tassi of Forbes expressed his honest opinion on the entire ordeal at the moment. Considering he is one of the people with hands in the game early on, he tweeted his thoughts.
The Starfield “boundary reached” drama is very stupid, that’s all I’ll say https://t.co/TcqNkVjpxo
— Paul Tassi (@PaulTassi) August 26, 2023
Just from a leaked moment of the game, it’s rather difficult to judge what triggered the “boundary reached” message and if it’s at all real to begin with. Keeping this aside, even if a player wanted to reach this boundary in question, they’d have to walk for 40 minutes in whatever direction they chose continuously. This simply indicates that Starfield is a massive game.
Did the Starfield controversy ruin The Witcher 3 for players?
The recent Starfield ordeal won’t ruin any other game for players if they really love to play that game. Players couldn’t help but express their utter disappointment at the recent revelation about Starfield. Apparently, Bethesda couldn’t keep up its promise regarding the seamless exploration of planets in the game universe.
But what triggered the gaming community more was the “Boundary reached” text as it resulted in complete detachment from the game at any given moment. The Witcher 3 is quite a massive game but it doesn’t pop a message when the player reaches the boundary. Considering, that every game has boundaries on the map no matter how colossal their said maps are, be it Minecraft or No Man’s Sky.
Source: X (Formerly Twitter)
