The ship has landed and it’s time to take off into the world of Starfield! One of the most highly anticipated games of the year is finally available through the Premium Edition, allowing players to access Starfield now, rather than its September 6 release date. In addition, players get the Shattered Space Story Expansion DLC when it releases alongside skins, the digital artbook, and soundtrack.
The embargo for Starfield lifted yesterday, August 31 at 12PM EST, flooding the internet with reviews, impressions, and opinions from the press and content creators. However, while the consensus on Starfield seems to be fairly positive, everyone’s going to have a different opinion. Some believe it missed the mark a little while others believe it’s perfect. Is Starfield overhyped? Did it actually deliver on players’ expectations? Can we call Starfield the “Game of a Generation”?
Starfield is Bethesda’s newest open-world action-RPG set in outer space. It’s their biggest and most ambitious game yet, with Xbox having console exclusivity. It was announced five years ago during Bethesda’s E3 2018 Press Conference and fans have been waiting to dive into the ever since. Press have had their hands on Starfield as early as August 18, hopefully giving them enough time to explore as much as possible before their opinions are made public.
Related: “There will be mods”: ‘Starfield’ Developers Announces a News Xbox Users Have Been Waiting For
Reviews of Starfield: How Do They Stack Up?
Over at Metacritic, Starfield on PC currently has an 88 Metascore while the Xbox Series X version has an 87 Metascore. Each version has plenty of perfect scores (100) with some critics also giving it a 60 or 70. Gameblog.fr’s perfect review of Starfield calls it “more than a game, it’s an epic, an odyssey.” Meanwhile, Meristation’s review said “Starfield is far from meeting the expectations it has generated over the years,” resulting in a 5.8 out of 10 score.
Critics seem to be somewhat divisive over Starfield. Some call it amazing, while others feel like it fell short. Like everyday people, critics are going to feel differently about certain games (like The Last of Us Part II), so it’s no different here with Starfield.
IGN’s Five Review Scores on Starfield
IGN is one of the biggest and most popular websites for gaming and entertainment news (only second in quality to FandomWire of course). Many gamers look at IGN’s reviews and scores as a way to gauge if a video game is good or not. With the massive project that is Starfield, IGN had five of their reviewers from each IGN division write a review for Starfield. Out of the five scores, four of them were 9 or above while only one score was a 7.
The perfect scores from IGN reside in IGN Japan and IGN Spain, while IGN Brasil and IGN France gave a 9.5 and 9 respectively. The 7 score, the lowest among all other IGN reviews of Starfield, is from the main IGN based in San Francisco, California. The reviewer, Dan Stapleton, said:
“Starfield has a lot of forces working against it, but eventually the allure of its expansive roleplaying quests and respectable combat make its gravitational pull difficult to resist.”
Stapelton seemed to have more issues with Starfield compared to his colleagues overseas. No mini map, and bad inventory management are some of the negatives pointed out in Stapelton’s Starfield review. These points may very well turn some players off from Starfield, while others might not care about them at all. It’s all about personal preference and these points knocked Starfield down to a 7 for IGN. Nothing wrong with a 7 out of 10 game, but among the sea of other perfect review scores, it can be jarring.
Related: Starfield’s Outrageous New Requirement for PC Users Will Ruffle a Lot of Gamer Feathers
Is Starfield Overhyped? Underwhelming? Or Both?
Bethesda have made a reputation over the years for their massive open-world action-RPGs and Starfield is the newest one in the genre. Bethesda also has a reputation for their “jank” or bugs and glitches found throughout their games. From Skyrim to Fallout 3, their titles usually have a few bugs that will take you out of the experience. Starfield is no different as a player on Reddit has already experienced “Bethesda jank” in this new screenshot.
While it is not appropriate for Bethesda games to have graphical glitches and bugs be the norm, it was expected to come with Starfield. Whether critics experienced bugs and glitches in their playthrough, it could affect their overall score of Starfield. One Twitter/X user found rocks popping in and out right in front of them as they were shooting a pirate. Another user replied asking Bethesda to “turn up the polish.”
Did Digital Foundry mention pop-in inches from your feet? In the middle of a fight and rocks directly in front just completely disappear and then reappear.#Starfield pic.twitter.com/pdmC50yxNf
— THE RED DRAGON (@TWTHEREDDRAGON) September 1, 2023
Did Bethesda overhype Starfield? Potentially. Giving fans expectations of 1,000 planets to explore but only 10% will have life might’ve tripped some of them up. Then again, if you do the math, that’s still 100 planets to explore with creatures and “life” to interact with. That’s, in my opinion, plenty of planets to explore in Starfield. Fans will always have blown up expectations, especially for a game they’re really excited about.
If anyone is disappointed in Starfield, look at your own expectations of the game versus what Bethesda presented to us. Overhyping could’ve played a part from fans and Bethesda, but at the end of the day, everyone is going to have a different perspective on Starfield. It’s fine to call Starfield “Game of a Generation” and it’s also fine to say it needs improvements. No one is going to like every video game they play and the same can be said for Starfield.
What do you think of Starfield so far? Is it a masterpiece or is it rough around the edges? Let us know in the comments!
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