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[Draugoth]

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Having recently appeared on the MinnMax podcast, former Bethesda designer Bruce Nesmith was asked about the decision for limited exploration. Although he initially suggested making just a few dozen, he says the studio used the logic that once you create a solar system, it's easy to replicate and create hundreds of them.

There was a lot of discussion about the scope of Starfield. At one point I said, "I bet this game would be a lot better if we restricted ourselves to about 20 solar systems." However, a very legitimate point has been made that once you make one solar system, making 100 of them isn't that much extra work.

You have to know how to create a planet, so that people can walk around it. You have to have various objects, shape lives to interact with, rocks, all of that. You have the ice worlds, the crater worlds. You have to have all this variety. Just by making our own solar system, all that variety, you've done 90% of the work for the rest [of the systems].

According to Bruce, the same was true for planets. Once Bethesda created the right formula on one planet, it was enough to apply the same process to hundreds of planets spread across all solar systems.

Todd basically pulled the number 100 for the number of solar systems out of thin air. All the major activities happen in these 20 solar systems and the rest is open space, but people love our huge games, they love this open area to explore. So let's give it to them.

So it came down to "How do we make exploration meaningful?" And again, you only have to succeed on one planet, once you get the formula right, you have the formula for all the planets.

Bruce says development comes down to choices. Instead of giving players complete freedom in space, she preferred to choose to focus on other parts, such as creating ships.

The designer states that they could have given some ready-made ships for players to acquire throughout the game, but they preferred to bring a complex creation system. Bruce says she was very happy with the excellent reception the creator had in the community, as it was one of the aspects she worked on before leaving the studio.

You have to make hard choices and I think some of the exploration elements didn't do as well as they could have because they decided to make other choices. And make no mistake, every studio on the planet knows the choices they are making. They know what players will complain about.Studios know 90% of the bugs that games are released with, they're just backed up against the wall. The same goes for game functions.

 

[Zones]

However, a very legitimate point has been made that once you make one solar system, making 100 of them isn't that much extra work.

No it absolutely is not...

 

[MDSLKTR]

We could tell, Bruce.

 

[ReBurn]

So many you won't even bother to visit them all.

 

[SmokedMeat]

Of course it’s not hard when there’s nothing worth noting on them.

 

[Salty Popsicle]

Of course it’s not hard when there’s nothing worth noting on them.

Good thing they never promised a space fantasy like Star Wars or Star Trek then. Otherwise, I'd be livid.

 

[Gojiira]

Mhmm nothing to do, randomly generated, yep not hard at all…MEH

 

[Romulus]

They honestly thought we would be impressed by their paste job. Even NMS millions of worlds are more interesting, and they're mostly uninteresting. That's an indie game.

 

[Atrus]

The issue is that Starfield doesn’t create planets. They create basic a game based interpretation of what a planet looks like given their very limited engine.

Not even the planets in our solar system are good representations of their real life counterparts.

 

[BouncyFrag]

Good luck with ES6 you fucking hacks.

 

[killatopak]

Based on what I've seen, there was more diversity on Daggerfall dungeons than Starfield planets and that say a lot when both games used procedurally generated content with a gap of 20 years.

I've seen more diversity in tile changes on D2 LoD than SF. It's simply too common in SF to find the same outpost layout with the same number of enemies with the same loot location.

I accepted procedurally generated planets but at least don't make it obvious you're only using like a dozen variations.

 

[Heisenberg007]

We know.

We've also been using Cmd+C and Cmd+V for years.

 

[Saber]

Of course not. Most procedurally generated, whats the work there?

 

[Gaiff]

We know.

We've also been using Cmd+C and Cmd+V for years.

Found the Mac user. Let's get him!

Also, nice way of saying they were lazy with the work.

 

[semiconscious]

Todd basically pulled the number 100 for the number of solar systems out of thin air. All the major activities happen in these 20 solar systems and the rest is open space, but people love our huge games, they love this open area to explore. So let's give it to them...

you sure it was 'thin air'? cuz i was thinking he pulled that number from out of somewhere else...

 

[adamsapple]

We know.

We've also been using Cmd+C and Cmd+V for years.

Heis you're a Mac user ?

 

[Heisenberg007]

Heis you're a Mac user ?

Yeah, I don't like viruses in my system

 

[adamsapple]

Yeah, I don't like viruses in my system

If you want a completely virus free OS, you're best off sticking to the good old abacus

 

[T-0800]

Bruce says development comes down to choices. Instead of giving players complete freedom in space, she preferred to choose to focus on other parts, such as creating ships.

The designer states that they could have given some ready-made ships for players to acquire throughout the game, but they preferred to bring a complex creation system. Bruce says she was very happy with the excellent reception the creator had in the community, as it was one of the aspects she worked on before leaving the studio.

 

[Icymanipulator]

What i read:

Let’s just give them tons of empty spaces and tell them it’s content to explore.

 

[Crayon]

I would hope there was a little more to the decision than that.

 

[Pimpbaa]

Planets themselves can sometimes look good. But the lack of procedural generation of animals and vegetation kinda sucks. They are all premade just like the bases, and repeat quite often. Also I think I would have MUCH more preferred freedom in space over ship building.

 

[Lunarorbit]

Based on what I've seen, there was more diversity on Daggerfall dungeons than Starfield planets and that say a lot when both games used procedurally generated content with a gap of 20 years.

I've seen more diversity in tile changes on D2 LoD than SF. It's simply too common in SF to find the same outpost layout with the same number of enemies with the same loot location.

I accepted procedurally generated planets but at least don't make it obvious you're only using like a dozen variations.

This is what I've seen and read in tons of criticisms. I don't know how they expected people to play this game for years like skyrim.

 

[Heisenberg007]

If you want a completely virus free OS, you're best off sticking to the good old abacus

I can't watch Eva Elfie on that

Jokes apart though, I have used both Windows and Macs for years, and Macs are just built so well. Lots of awesome apps, excellent synergy between HW and SW, everything is so efficient. I can't work on Windows now; it just feels ancient compared to OSX to me.

 

[VideoGameEnjoyer]

All the major activities happen in these 20 solar systems and the rest is open space, but people love our huge games, they love this open area to explore. So let's give it to them.

So it came down to "How do we make exploration meaningful?"

 

[killatopak]

This is what I've seen and read in tons of criticisms. I don't know how they expected people to play this game for years like skyrim.

I think the answer is pretty obvious and its the same thing lifting the heavy weight from Skyrim. It's mods. The difference I guess is that the base design around Skyrim is a lot easier to work with and has small enough scope to have impact. It would take a lot more work for SF mods to truly become game changing.

As an example of scope, it's alot easier for newer hardware to make Open Cities where the whole map is loaded minus the dungeons and make it have no loading screen than have a galaxy have no loading screen.

Another problem is hardware. The reason Skyrim mods are thriving is because the game is already 12 years old. That's 12 years of tech advancement that allows more performance heavy mods to work. In SF, you already have Todd telling you to upgrade your PC to make the base game look decent. It would realistically take 12 years for Starfield modding to reach the same impact of the current modding scene on Skyrim.

Another is issue is updates. This plagued Skyrim as well as recent as the Anniversary release. Modders actually begged Bethesda not to rerelease Skyrim and update the game cause it actually breaks mods. A lot of people who actually want to mod Starfield are just waiting for a stable version to mod and not deal with update shenanigans.

 

[Heisenberg007]

"All the major activities happen in these 20 solar systems and the rest is open space, but people love our huge games, they love this open area to explore.

So let's give it to them. So it came down to How do we make exploration meaningful?"

 

[ByWatterson]

So the unfair "lazy developer" attack is here a fair attack?

 

[Buggy Loop]

Why did it take 8 years and $400M then Mr. dev

 

[VideoGameEnjoyer]

So the unfair "lazy developer" attack is here a fair attack?

Only if they say it about themselves.

 

[ShadowkillXNA]

Good thing they never promised a space fantasy like Star Wars or Star Trek then. Otherwise, I'd be livid.

 

[Phase]

Good luck with ES6 you fucking hacks.

 

[ryzen1]

More solar systems = more loading screens = good

 

[GHound]

Good luck with ES6 you fucking hacks.

Don't think this game will release in the time humanity has left before the Mass Deletion of 2857.

 

[Heisenberg007]

More solar systems = more loading screens = good

Did somebody say loading screens?

 

[vaibhavpisal]

Good to see some actual discussion on the game.

 

[LordCBH]

I like Starfield. I really do. But my god do I hate the vast amount of straight up empty space. The actual curated locations are great! The other 80% of the game isn’t and I’d rather be in a curated space when I’m in that other 80%.

 

[Dr.Morris79]

Is it ever getting another patch?

 

[JimmyRustler]

Bethesda really has a hard on procedurally generated stuff. They even make their hand made stuff so bad it’s indistinguishable from the generated elements…

I honestly didn’t visit more than a handful of planets that I didn’t have to. Such a waste of time. Mass Effect did it so much better. Everything is unique.

 

[Duchess]

To be fair, No Man's Sky has over 18 quintillion star systems, so ...

 

[crackajack]

I fully understand doing things in an easy way, to tick some boxes about "content" and game length, but it also shows in probably every larger game. There is way too much fluff in many games today, especially anything open world. Practically all sidequests get repeated over and over and if there is even some sort of backstory it is written by some C-tier writer that should not be allowed near a keyboard.

 

[artsi]

I guess they never found the answer and shipped the game anyway.

 

[vaibhavpisal]

So the unfair "lazy developer" attack is here a fair attack?

Play the game and say that.

 

[Skifi28]

What i read:

Let’s just give them tons of empty spaces and tell them it’s content to explore.

And then justify it with the priceless: "space is actually empty guys, it's not a lack of content from our side."

 

[Drizzlehell]

Why did it take 8 years and $400M then Mr. dev

At least they shipped an actual game instead of selling virtual ships for 10 thousand dollars a pop for the past decade, lol.

 

[MidGenRefresh]

Well yeah, that's how procedural generation works.

 

[Mitsurugi Reiji]

I wonder when all the DLCs are done, whether the game would be looked back in better light.

 

[IDKFA]

A reduction on the number of planets would have been more beneficial.

Quality over quantity.

 

[The Cockatrice]

Quality over quantity.

Modern game developers can't see these words.

 

[Ceadeus]

At least there should have been colors variation for its land and sky box etc

God damn they went for straight up gray desolation everywhere you can almost smell the dust and loneliness.