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Gi.biz - The pressure of expectation adds a sour note to Starfield’s launch
- Thread starter Unknown Soldier
- Start date
- Business Analysis Platform
Unknown Soldier
Member
DeepEnigma
Gold Member
The Pleasure
Gold Member
Topher
Identifies as young
"This was a game in which people had enmeshed part of their personal identity, and it needed to be world-changing; it needed to be the game which would catapult Xbox’s game portfolio onto an even playing field with PlayStation’s studio output, the game whose very name would be the mic drop that would settle any fanboy argument about which platform had better software."
Far too many people worrying about bullshit like that. I didn't buy this game to catapult Xbox or even the playing field with PS. I just wanted a kickass game and that's what I got.
Far too many people worrying about bullshit like that. I didn't buy this game to catapult Xbox or even the playing field with PS. I just wanted a kickass game and that's what I got.
Hero of Spielberg
Member
So much desperation to take down a game. Play it and enjoy it or move on. All of this stuff just reeks of sweaty fanboyism
Unknown Soldier
Member
Ironically being QB for the Dallas Cowboys isn't really what it used to be. Pretty terrible job these days.
"Yes, I was in the Chess Club" still kills me every time I hear it
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Banjo64
cumsessed
Xbox have a habit of setting its own games up to fail due to pressure and hype. How can Hellblade, Perfect Dark, Fable, Everwild and Avowed be anything less than perfect bangers when they’ve been on the oven for 5+ years and the fans have had 4 years to hype them since reveal?
Xbox love to sell you on hype for things coming down the road, but they don’t seem to care that this places an unacceptable amount of pressure on their devs.
Xbox love to sell you on hype for things coming down the road, but they don’t seem to care that this places an unacceptable amount of pressure on their devs.
VideoGameEnjoyer
Member
Is this sarcasm? Yea, can’t find a Starfield discussion anywhere around here.
Success
Gold Member
Check out the Starfield OT if you are looking for Starfield discussion since you seem to be new here.
Killjoy-NL
Member
I think you missed the point of the article.
StueyDuck
Member
I feel like MS went the undercover shady "influencer" marketing.
And with that comes shitty fans and shit fanboys. If the game was just marketed through ads and interviews etc it would've had a different narrative around launch (probably less positive considering the abysmal pc performance and the overall game still having creation engine quirks/jank)
But getting the likes of fatty jezzy doo doo and speshal nick and colt Eastman or whatever those dumb fucks are to play religious zealots for starfield has invited heavier criticism due to just how much bs they muttered online (let's not pretend there wasn't shadow operators on here and era and reddit either, the marketing knew their goals and their targets)
At least that's how it feels to me surrounding the overall narrative of this decent to great game.
Compare it to the success of say baldurs gate 3 and you can see how it's probably all manufactured. Seems to have paid off for them however with high player counts and the likes so I guess there's nothing really to critique
And with that comes shitty fans and shit fanboys. If the game was just marketed through ads and interviews etc it would've had a different narrative around launch (probably less positive considering the abysmal pc performance and the overall game still having creation engine quirks/jank)
But getting the likes of fatty jezzy doo doo and speshal nick and colt Eastman or whatever those dumb fucks are to play religious zealots for starfield has invited heavier criticism due to just how much bs they muttered online (let's not pretend there wasn't shadow operators on here and era and reddit either, the marketing knew their goals and their targets)
At least that's how it feels to me surrounding the overall narrative of this decent to great game.
Compare it to the success of say baldurs gate 3 and you can see how it's probably all manufactured. Seems to have paid off for them however with high player counts and the likes so I guess there's nothing really to critique
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Negotiator101
Member
no why?
vaibhavpisal
Member
Yesterday I was browsing a pc hardware e-commerce site. Even their everywhere, Starfield.
Get it with AMD GPU, CPU, bundles....
Everywhere.
OuterLimits
Member
Haven't played the game yet, but I imagine it will be significantly improved in a couple years following the many mods and DLC content.(much like most Bethesda titles). The overall foundation to build upon seems pretty decent based on reviews.
Wildebeest
Member
You have a studio that sets out to be all things to all men, and it has been going for a while. There is no easy explanation of what different people expect from Starfield or how they will react to it. There is no identifiable "tru BGS fan" other than the people were so into huffing what BGS were producing that they loved Fallout 4 and Fallout 76 from day one.
Chukhopops
Member
Honestly the Starfield « controversy » is a sign of things to come now that you get paid for controversy on Twitter and need the clicks to survive as a media, it will simply lead to more polarization in the console war.
It really feels like at this point there’s no one really honest in this discussion.
It really feels like at this point there’s no one really honest in this discussion.
DenchDeckard
Moderated wildly
"This was a game in which people had enmeshed part of their personal identity, and it needed to be world-changing; it needed to be the game which would catapult Xbox’s game portfolio onto an even playing field with PlayStation’s studio output, the game whose very name would be the mic drop that would settle any fanboy argument about which platform had better software."
Far too many people worrying about bullshit like that. I didn't buy this game to catapult Xbox or even the playing field with PS. I just wanted a kickass game and that's what I got.
This so much!
DenchDeckard
Moderated wildly
Just to catch up on all this madness. Is there articles or bits I can look at where Microsoft, PR, it's fans, journalists reported this game was going to be the second coming?
I guess here we are more level headed and I literally come to this site for all my news. I don't go on twitter etc.
All I remember is people making comments on here of "where is the media discussion on starfield, where is the adverts, the marketing etc" not loads of marketing saying it was going to be the messiah of video games.
I guess here we are more level headed and I literally come to this site for all my news. I don't go on twitter etc.
All I remember is people making comments on here of "where is the media discussion on starfield, where is the adverts, the marketing etc" not loads of marketing saying it was going to be the messiah of video games.
POKEYCLYDE
Member
My biggest complaint is what happens when you NG+.
So, I probably won't NG+. I still love the game. And my hope is that I can just mod in the things I'd miss out on in NG+ without actually having to commit to NG+.
I've spent a large chunk of my time customizing my dream home. Gathered thousands upon thousands of weight in resources to eventually make outstanding outposts and hammer away at the harder research projects. I've sunken hundreds of thousands of credits into spaceship building. Trying to make a Megaman Legends Flutter ship at the moment. In my dream home I am trying to display one of every type of weapon, preferably the uniquely named ones like Gallow's Reach and Ashta Tamer, or gold legendary variants. Might try to do this with the space suits and mannequins as well...
But if I finish the main quest, and New game plus... all that disgustingly hard work is wiped away. Get some cool stuff and maybe some unique interesting moments in the story, but at the cost of all the progress I've made? That's my biggest complaint.
The NG+ thing feels like the antithesis of what is suppose to happen after you beat the main quest of a Bethesda game.
But if I finish the main quest, and New game plus... all that disgustingly hard work is wiped away. Get some cool stuff and maybe some unique interesting moments in the story, but at the cost of all the progress I've made? That's my biggest complaint.
The NG+ thing feels like the antithesis of what is suppose to happen after you beat the main quest of a Bethesda game.
So, I probably won't NG+. I still love the game. And my hope is that I can just mod in the things I'd miss out on in NG+ without actually having to commit to NG+.
DenchDeckard
Moderated wildly
I just brisked through this article and the guy says niche more times than a niche man thread....niche....
While providing no evidence of the claims he is making...niche....
While providing no evidence of the claims he is making...niche....
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Tams
Member
Lol, what? No.
Hogwarts Legacy talk was shut down over at the crazy, looney purple place because the mods and community took immense offence at, not even the game, but the author of the story.
Here has just been getting swamped with threads about Statfield with no substance. There are other games bring played and coming out.
ShadowkillXNA
Member
Who is really sour here? The ones being accused or the ones throwing the accusations around with no evidence at all?
Hmmm I wonder...
Perrott
Member
What is this man talking about? Skyrim is one of the most mainstream and best-selling games of all time, sitting at around 60M copies sold. Niche audience my ass.
And if Fallout 4 did not sell as much, that's because it wasn't good enough in the eyes of the fans, but nonetheless it was still HUGE.
The artful mincer
Member
Decent sized niche audience!!!!!
The pressure of expectation adds a sour note to Starfield’s launch | Opinion
Sign up for the GI Daily here to get the biggest news straight to your inboxwww.gamesindustry.biz
This is by far the best article I've read about Starfield.
It's been a minute since then, and while there’s still plenty of console war idiocy to go around – imagine me here waving a vague hand at pretty much everything that’s been said about Final Fantasy XVI’s commercial performance since launch, for example – most game launches have been spared the worst of the online vitriol.
One vociferous segment of the internet proceeded to lose what little was left of its collective mind – because it’s not enough for Starfield to be a good game. It’s not enough for it to be a pretty great example of Bethesda’s prowess in open-world RPGs. It’s not enough for it to deeply satisfy a niche audience. This was a game in which people had enmeshed part of their personal identity, and it needed to be world-changing; it needed to be the game which would catapult Xbox’s game portfolio onto an even playing field with PlayStation’s studio output, the game whose very name would be the mic drop that would settle any fanboy argument about which platform had better software.
In the minds of many consumers (especially those who are far too online), this isn’t just a game launch – it’s a pivotal battle in the console war. Consequently, any criticism of the game’s imperfections (which are many!) is interpreted as an attack on the Xbox platform; any praise for its achievements (also many!) is dismissed as fanboy raving. The degree of hype focused around Starfield has probably helped its early sales, but it may not serve the game well in the long run.
Both for Starfield’s sake, and for the sake of Xbox itself, I wish expectations had been managed a bit more realistically. It’s great that the Xbox platform has a major exclusive with a significant built-in fanbase – but Starfield would have really shone as a single part of a wider slate of games coming out this autumn, rather than a solo high-profile exclusive that’s expected to carry the platform through to the new year. Bethesda RPGs are not and never will be all things to all gamers; they’re wonderful games beloved by a decent-sized niche audience. Fill in enough decent-sized niches and you get a mainstream platform – this is how the console business has always worked, and for Xbox, Starfield is a good step on that path, but it is only one step.
I wish that Starfield was being given an opportunity to be assessed as a (great, flawed) game, not as a potential platform saviour that the internet’s angriest men are fanatically and personally invested in, and perhaps more broadly, that we could leave behind forever the daft idea that a platform can sink or swim on the strength of any single game.
Fuck off this is from the dev that released the 7th best selling game of all time!
Sorry your past games and budget contextualise your success.
If GTA6 only sells 20 million that would be failure.
What an absolute clown
SmokedMeat
Gamer™
Good article. People are so entrenched in their console warring, that they’ve lost their minds.
Grown men monitoring Steam review percentages like it’s the stock market. I’d like to think that if they took a step back they might realize how embarrassing they look.
People claim to hate politics in gaming, but damn if they go about console warring and platform support like they’re politics now.
Grown men monitoring Steam review percentages like it’s the stock market. I’d like to think that if they took a step back they might realize how embarrassing they look.
People claim to hate politics in gaming, but damn if they go about console warring and platform support like they’re politics now.
DenchDeckard
Moderated wildly
this is exactly what I was thinking. He mentioned niche so many times. The downplaying this guy is trying to do about Bethesda is crazy.
He also doesn't actually show one bit of evidence to support any of his claims.
The article makes some great points but also raises some questions. Why is this guy trying to downplay a new ip from one of the biggest developers out there?
Niche audience. Even their lowest selling games are like 12 to 15 million lol
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poppabk
Cheeks Spread for Digital Only Future
Because the article is predicated on Starfield having huge expectations because MS aren't releasing any other games this year.
"Starfield would have really shone as a single part of a wider slate of games coming out this autumn, rather than a solo high-profile exclusive that’s expected to carry the platform through to the new year."
But we have Forza releasing next month so we have to assume this guy has insider knowledge that it was pushed back.
Chukhopops
Member
I doubt Forza is being pushed back. People on Twitter say they’re already playing the final version (and I don’t mean Jez Corden).
Seems more like some house rules as to what counts as a « high profile exclusive » in the author’s mind.
nowhat
Member
You've honestly never heard of Colt Eastwood?
Topher
Identifies as young
I'm glad they give you the option to step back from NG+ as was said in the OT. I've got a lot of effort in the game as well and I'm no where near ready to say bye bye to all that. I'll probably make note of the date/time of the save prior to that choice and then when I'm ready for a new play through, load that up and see what's what in NG+.
DenchDeckard
Moderated wildly
I've heard of him and seen pictures and links to tweets on here. He's deffo a freak. I guess he was hyping it up then?
I just wish these journalists would actually back up their statements with receipts. Actually link to marketing footage or tweets from Phil Spencer or whatever instead of just claiming that Starfield was being marketed as this massive generation defining game. When all I saw was people asking where the marketing was, like literally two weeks before it came out.
It comes cross as disingenuous and also making claims that Bethesda games are niche, its like how out of touch are you?
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SlimeGooGoo
Banned
Pelta88
Member
80 /85 /87 are great scores for a new IP.
That aside, what we're witnessing is the weight of expectations fizzling out of a community. XBOX astroturfed via influencers. You know their names so I don't have to list them, but they artificially hyped this game up as a gamechanger... Not what it is, ie an actual Bethesda game that came with the normal Bethesda jank. When they hyped the game and we as a community asked for independent gameplay to verify said hype...
The XBOX guys collectively were like...
Insisting that curated cutscenes / gameplay from Bethesda was enough. And asking for the bare minimum aka independent gameplay, was a form of "hate."
The hyped this game as if it was the turning point for XBOX. There's even a thread right here on gaf, claiming the game they hid from independent view, was the "starting gun." For XBOX studios Personally, I feel sympathy for the XB community. It's a community that has been gaslit for years but they refuse to ask the hard questions of Phil Spencer and XBOX leadership. It's like some unwritten rule. Praise without scrutiny. A community where basic questions are discouraged and if you dare to ask those questions, you're seen as 'pushing toxicity.'
My personal review of Starfield: I'm several hours in... And I'm not going to make it to the 12 hour mark where the game supposedly gets a lot better. The game feels hollow and the weird facial animations break the immersion for me. But that's ok. Others finding the game to be great isn't something I'd dispute since that's their personal opinion...
To my XBOX gamers. Challenge your leadership. Also stop allowing "influencers" to gaslight you by trying to convince you a game is perfection... Especially when the studio wont allow a single second of independent gameplay to be showcased. Your disappointment and combative posts online should be aimed directly at your leadership and the overt stream of money and gifts that flow to influencers who in reality, don't have a gamerscore to speak of.
That aside, what we're witnessing is the weight of expectations fizzling out of a community. XBOX astroturfed via influencers. You know their names so I don't have to list them, but they artificially hyped this game up as a gamechanger... Not what it is, ie an actual Bethesda game that came with the normal Bethesda jank. When they hyped the game and we as a community asked for independent gameplay to verify said hype...
The XBOX guys collectively were like...
Insisting that curated cutscenes / gameplay from Bethesda was enough. And asking for the bare minimum aka independent gameplay, was a form of "hate."
The hyped this game as if it was the turning point for XBOX. There's even a thread right here on gaf, claiming the game they hid from independent view, was the "starting gun." For XBOX studios Personally, I feel sympathy for the XB community. It's a community that has been gaslit for years but they refuse to ask the hard questions of Phil Spencer and XBOX leadership. It's like some unwritten rule. Praise without scrutiny. A community where basic questions are discouraged and if you dare to ask those questions, you're seen as 'pushing toxicity.'
My personal review of Starfield: I'm several hours in... And I'm not going to make it to the 12 hour mark where the game supposedly gets a lot better. The game feels hollow and the weird facial animations break the immersion for me. But that's ok. Others finding the game to be great isn't something I'd dispute since that's their personal opinion...
To my XBOX gamers. Challenge your leadership. Also stop allowing "influencers" to gaslight you by trying to convince you a game is perfection... Especially when the studio wont allow a single second of independent gameplay to be showcased. Your disappointment and combative posts online should be aimed directly at your leadership and the overt stream of money and gifts that flow to influencers who in reality, don't have a gamerscore to speak of.
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Havoc2049
Member
The article is just click bait garbage. Media created controversy.
AND WE FIGHT / AGAIN / WE'RE FIGHTING ALL THE TIME / WE'RE FIGHTING THE SNAKE IN ITS DISGUISE / HOW LONG WILL IT TAKE / FOR US TO REALISE / WE ARE VICTIMS OF MEDIAS LIES