Even the best Starfield mods aren’t enough to save Starfield. Here are five reasons why Bethesda’s space epic is beyond the reach of the modding community’s rescue.
Bethesda’s latest role-playing game takes us to a far-flung, restricted corner of the galaxy filled with the wonders of the procedural generation. Its vast and breathtaking world is filled with fantasy projected by a game engine from nearly 20 years ago.
Two months after Starfield’s release, it’s still a bit difficult to rate it. For many, it was a mixture of brilliant moments and glaring problems. But beyond expectations and reality, Starfield is a game that is fundamentally flawed in its open world and exploration, two core elements for which its developer is famous.
This is why those who believe in the divine power of the modding community shouldn’t get their hopes up. Even the best Starfield mods can’t save Bethesda’s latest RPG.
5 Reasons Why Starfield Mods Can’t Save the Game
Starfield mods can only do so much to improve Starfield because the game’s different systems and mechanics are so poorly connected that it keeps breaking down the more you play.
In fact, some Starfield mods can bring huge improvements to the user interface, or slightly increase immersion. But that’s it. Despite knowing what these mods do in a host of other mods, even the most basic Starfield mods couldn’t save this troubled space RPG. Additionally, there’s a lot that Starfield players hate about the game.
1. Star Territory is lagging behind in terms of exploration.
At this point, never completing Skyrim’s main quest feels like Gaming 101. This applies to other Bethesda games as well. They allow you to deviate from the main mission on your own in the open world. In Skyrim, you leave Helgen, turn left, and start running. You’re bound to come across a cave, an abandoned mine, or a quest that lasts several hours.
Skyrim is all about what you experience as you travel to your mission objectives. This journey is the focus of Skyrim.
Starfield, on the other hand, offers a vast galaxy filled with star systems that dwarfs the Skyrim map. But the famous 1,000 planets in these systems lack the best of Bethesda’s open-world formula.
Starfield’s open world incorporates procedurally generated points of interest due to non-existent curated content and poor environmental storytelling. They are not complementary to each other, nor to the planet on which they reside.
Since this is an inherent problem, modders can’t “fix” it. They could improve it by adding more curated content to certain planets. But Starfield’s procedural generation and outdated engine won’t give way to engaging content that enhances a sense of exploration.
2. The starry sky is as wide as the sea and as deep as a puddle, and mods cannot solve this problem.
Although I didn’t make this up, it is a wonderful description of the open world of Starfield.
The theme of “Starfield” is to land on a new planet full of mystery. Most planets have their own ecological wonders, as well as a few abandoned but still functioning bases. But there is no meaningful connection between these locations.
Imagine you bump into a group of scientists and assume they have been there for a while, just for research purposes. But somehow they were unaware of a gravity-defying ecological anomaly occurring just a few miles from their base. How is this possible?
You encounter this quite often in the planets of Bethesda’s space opera. When this happens multiple times on other planets, things get worse. Because the system uses the same points of interest but has a slightly different design, Starfield can’t pilot you to land on and explore another planet. After all, you know the same stuff will be there.
Mods could at some point bring new ships, weapons, space suits, and even planets. But the game’s twisted approach to exploration will always make you feel small and limited.
Yes, Starfield has thousands of planets to explore. But they consist of repetitive and redesigned locations and lack custom content. This is also the reason why the previous illusion of Bethesda slowly disappeared in the star field. Because in Bethesda’s space RPG, the destination is the focus, not the journey to it.
3. Mods can only do so much to improve the game’s poor environmental storytelling.
The lack of environmental storytelling skills in Starfield’s development shows up at every stage of the game.
In the Fallout game, you’ll see a skeleton near a cradle in a subway station with several milk bottles next to it. Maybe it was a mother trying to find shelter with her children before or after nuclear weapons turned America into a radioactive wasteland. Or maybe someone discovered a baby years after nukes ravaged the country and wanted to protect it from ghouls. who knows?
In Skyrim, you’ll find a skeleton who died while trying to take a last sip of their Skooma. Or maybe it’s an antidote that won’t save you. Storytelling elements like this make you ask questions.It’s those questions Make Bethesda’s world more believable.
Starfield’s compartmentalized and restricted open world replaces environmental storytelling with procedural generation. That’s why all the magic is lost, because the design choices here are more about quantity than quality.
4. Fixing non-existent spaceflight is beyond the salary range of Starfield modders.
We know we can’t directly land on planets in a seamless way. Bethesda, and especially studio head Todd Howard, definitely didn’t lie to us. But they’re not entirely transparent on the matter either.
Starfield is a space game where you jump from menu to menu using gravity jumps, traversing steep obstacles created by a crude user interface. There is no other way to travel from one planet to another. In Starfield, the concept of space travel is a spaceship fighting in a starry box.
Perhaps due to its ancient game engine, Starfield doesn’t let you use a ship to travel between planets. This is understandable, considering that traveling through the light-year distances between planets is nearly impossible.
But Starfield also doesn’t do much in the way of immersive planet landing sequences. However, the entire marketing process is based on the concept of “landing on a new and strange planet full of mystery.” Starfield lacks an immersive landing sequence, requiring you to interrupt the game and click on the planet to land.
You could throw all your energy into a giant PNG planet, thinking it might trigger a cutscene. Even that’s better than clicking five buttons to land on a planet, right? No, we don’t understand either. Unfortunately, no amount of creating club content will improve this.
5. Starfield lacks immersion and needs significant improvement.
When you take your first steps into New Atlantis, you will only encounter confusion. The look and feel of the city was a far cry from what we experienced when we first visited Whiterun or the Imperial City. This has nothing to do with the settings of these games. If that were the case, stepping into Freeside in Fallout: New Vegas or opening the doors to Diamond City for the first time in Fallout 4 wouldn’t be nearly as memorable.
No, much like how it’s explored, Starfield doesn’t have an immersive city where you can wind down after a long journey. Of course, the endless loading screens are the cherry on top.
In Skyrim, modders can remove loading screens when entering a city in Skyrim. Arthmoor’s Open Cities mod places cities in the world, allowing us to walk into any city without waiting. Even removing the loading screen at the entrance to the town enhances immersion as much as anything else. Naturally, it becomes a must-have mod in any Skyrim mod list.
Now, let’s consider the sheer number of planets and locations in Starfield. Due to the game’s outdated engine, seamless transition modes are not possible. If possible, it doesn’t have a similar impact on immersion anyway.
wrap up
Still, Bethesda is a studio known for its focus on journeys. They are also known for creating big surprises. The biggest of their titles is The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind. Following the disappointing release of The Elder Scrolls II: Daggerfall, it was the game that propelled the company to the pinnacle of gaming. After launching Daggerfall, Bethesda almost went out of business.
But Morrowind saved the company by offering an unparalleled sense of exploration. It provides them with nearly impeccable gameplay that works regardless of the game’s story and setting.
These games are A huge contribution from the modding community, it has become one of the game’s classics. That’s why we’re still playing Skyrim 13 years after its launch. But Starfield, which was supposed to be the culmination of Bethesda’s years of expertise, lacked almost everything that makes a Bethesda RPG. Therefore, no amount of Starfield mods or creation club content can save the game. Unlike its rather optimistic sci-fi setting, Starfield’s future doesn’t seem so bright.
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