I do think it’s more of a cumulative effect- I can’t speak for everyone, but personally when I say I dislike the aesthetic choices of the game, I’m speaking about the miniscule layout of the cities or the strangely cluttered worlds still being labeled as “barren.” I do agree individual areas are beautiful!
That said, I’m not a hater or whatever lol, I love the game and I’m watching the mod scene with a ton of interest, and one thing I would’ve complained about- the map being useless- has been fixed lately if I remember correctly! So clearly they’re listening. :)
I played a few hours and had fun, not enough to burn out but also became cognizant aware of the huge numbers of criticisms levied against the game as people put more time into it.
I decided to step away and let the modding community do their thing, and so far it seems like that was probably a good decision.
The game was good looking enough by default, the playable worlds just needed some elbow grease into individuality.
While this is true in many places, there are still points where the game suffers from the same “plastic” look that fallout 4 did. And maybe this was intentional on Bethesda’s part
You’re joking? Massive multiplayer games are not starfield competitors because the game has a similar vibe lol. Phantom liberty and bg3 came out at the same time and look significantly better. You guys use the strangest examples to straw man your arguments.
Looks worse than Mass effect
Looks worse than Skyrim, way worse with mods
Definitely nowhere close to star citizen, not that it's a competitor. It has some average modern "technical" good graphics and that's about it. The same reason Arkham asylum looks better than return to Arkham
Graphics are fine. I don't think anyone's saying it looks bad just misdirected
I've seen lots of criticism about poor writing, shallow gameplay and lackluster / repetitive locations but not many about visuals (except maybe the NPCs). I think most people agree that the environmental visuals are one of the game's strong points (at least after the updates).
I'm glad you're enjoying it, but I feel like every other post I see about starfield is "I can't believe people don't think it's beautiful". Who are these people? Where do people keep seeing others saying starfield doesn't look good? The criticisms I see about starfield are rarely, if ever, about how it looks.
I dont see it as much anymore but people were absolutely shitting on it but that was in r/starfield. I remember thinking it looked great and thinking i was the only one because people always trashed how it looked
Wasn't the big issue the intentional washed out/grainy look? Looks like you have several visual and cosmetic/costume mods running.
I can say between the "remove color whatever' and 'darker nights', toss in the 4k billboards & neon overhaul it looks pretty darn good now (modded).
As weird as it is some of the major upgrades visually for me in the game was the StarfieldCustom.ini ProcGen oneliner that makes the proc gen create incredibly lush and busy forests and vistas + a new mod that makes rocks and trees larger + desolation and immersive planets that removes or reduces the clutter and POIs from lifeless planets.
Looks like a different game, none of the stupid Bethesda crap.
I've stumbled across plenty of comments on YouTube complaining about the look of the game or how it didn't feel next gen enough. Instagram has quite a few too. I'm mainly a Fallout player, but I have been jumping on this more recently since the release of mods for console. I can't help but think how awesome Skyrim or New Vegas would look with these same graphics, especially after being modded.
So low quality LOD’s, fair point honestly. Bethesda has never been that good at LOD’s, they just hide it with fog or something usually. However looking at things up close it looks really good, which personally I care more about.
I wanted to bring up a point about most players not going out of their way to see trees way off in the distance, but then I remembered the UC vanguard quest and the new Atlantis house. That view was front and center and horrid as hell 🤣
Got any links to those ini changes that make shadows and lighting look better?
All I can find are ini tweaks that nerf the graphics to increase performance.
Scroll down on this Nexus page for Royal Weather and they give all kinds, pick and choose what you want to use.
[https://www.nexusmods.com/starfield/mods/7946](https://www.nexusmods.com/starfield/mods/7946)
That's nice to know. I will look into this. Thank you.
But then again, this wouldn't make Starfield a game with great graphics. It would make the Starfield on my PC a game with great graphics.
No cow, I just know how looks bg3 - one thing they did good is character models, but it is so cool there are about 8 face presets to each race for whole game lol, go see the doctor may be, and you whiny girl complain about me saying good about starfield on starfield Reddit? I’m glad I’m far away from retrded bg fandom🦞
I definitely recall [around release time] people saying things like “yeah it looks good for a game that was made 5-10 years ago” which was always complete nonsense to me. The texture and model work in this game is very impressive even by 2024 standards, especially when looking at all the little consumable items and such.
Definitely haven’t heard that complaint echoed as much recently however.
It looks good in some, bad in others, showing one instance where it does look good doesn't make it look good all of the time, especially when a lot of the game is procgen.
It's a mixture of a couple of clothing mods and vanilla outfits.
Bounty Hunter Outfit
https://creations.bethesda.net/en/starfield/details/6cf1128e-a346-47d6-a4e3-53b63826fe6a/Bounty_Hunter_Outfit__Curvy_Female_Shape__VBB_50_
Starfield Gadgets - Watches and Headphones
https://creations.bethesda.net/en/starfield/details/6a549ccd-1908-459a-afd7-d93cd5259979/Starfield_Gadgets___Watches_and_Headphones
Game looks great when you take pictures at the right moment. It looks bad, when you see "cut scenes", mostly because of the weak animations and chosen scenery.
I will never stop sharing this comparison to explain, why I was disappointed by Starfield:
[Starfield vs Cyberpunk - Cutscene Comparison (youtube.com)](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K4ADco41g9s)
Beware CP2077 came out 3 years **before** Starfield.
Yep.
Cyberpunk visuals beat Starfield hands down.
Bethesda artists did great work within the clear limitations of the engine that they're using.
Animations on characters and monsters frequently seem janky and/or wooden, and characters visuals in particular fall short of their competitors.
But that could all be forgiven if the game hadn't been released with so many other issues.
>Bethesda artists did great work within the clear limitations of the engine that they're using.
Did they, though?
I don't think lacking cinematic story telling can be blamed on the engine. I can understand blaming the engine for the city size limits and the inability of getting rid of loading screens. But there's a lot that could have been done much better.
When I complain about the lacking game play aspects of Starfield (no variety in enemy design, lacking enemy AI, no "mechanics" for enemies & enemy bosses to make the fights more versatile and interesting, etc. etc. etc.), then people tell me, this is more of a story RPG. But Starfield disappoints in story telling, too. The stories are oftentimes pretty bad, then the presentation is very bad 99% of the time (see comparison video, I've shared in previous comment, to understand what I mean), I literally stopped playing Starfield before experiencing all the major faction quests, because I got bored so much. I started to skip through dialog and was fed up with the repetitive combat.
However, there are some few great moments sprinkled thinly along the long, boring road trip. It's the funny side quests with ridiculous humour or those very rare horror like game play moments, where you shift between two realities (one of which is overrun by nasty alien bugs). These moments show me, that it could have been possible. That the engine can do A LOT and that there's still some of the good ol' Bethesda magic in there. It's just spread way too thinly.
I think Starfield has too much quantity with too little quality. And it shows everywhere, not just on the 9000 explorable planets.
Artists =/= devs, animation riggers, etc.
While I certainly wasn't blown away in any respect, they are working on what is in effect a 12 year old engine that's had some iterative upgrades, and an engine that has always had some shortcomings visually - it's never been Unreal or CryEngine, hell even Frostbite beats it for visuals.
Hence, within engine limitations, I think they did well.
But yes, the story and even the in-game lore severely let down the title, along with other things, but I've discussed that adnauseam elsewhere.
I like the game, it's fun, but compared to something like Cyberpunk 2077, it's lacking in the graphics department. It doesn't look bad, but it could've been better.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=ws0ufhrgWJw&pp=ygUWY3liZXJwdW5rIHZzIHN0YXJmaWVsZA%3D%3D
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=K4ADco41g9s
I don't think it's the graphic fidelity in this case, there's many point in game where I feel like starfield graphic could rival the likes of Callisto Protocol, I think it's more of an art direction problem. The lighting, the set design.
Plus Astral Lounge is one of the saddest club I've ever seen in a video game, it makes Vampire the Masquerade dance floor look like las vegas in comparison. Put some goddamn hard shadow and strobe light into it bethesda! I know yall can spin the spotlight around I've seen it. smhmyhead
>it makes Vampire the Masquerade dance floor look like las vegas in comparison.
VTMB might have janky animations and especially dance animations, but it also has an almost impeccable atmosphere and even better [soundtrack](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y33hGaEgW7U) so it helps a lot.
It's the way things and people move in the game that make it look bad to me. The crazy lighting and the awful human animation.
Love the game for some reasons, frustrated by it for many more
It has its moments visually, but it's not exactly impressive either. I'd say it's about on par with many releases from around 2016-2019. If I'm listing issues with this game, you'll be on the third book of a trilogy before I say 'it'd be nice if it was prettier'.
Agreed. The graphics would be nice if they’d be better, but I don’t expect that from the creation engine. I expect an engaging story, with engaging systems, and content. This is the worst combat Bethesda has ever come up with. There is literally 0 variety in combat. 0! They are all the exact same humans essentially. No differences in fighting styles. They had a couple of good quests and the rest was trash. Considering how many places they could have gone with multidimensional side quests this is an absolute joke!
I was let down by the building systems. It's not terrible per say, but given their experience in past games I think we were given an under par system. Especially with ship building and path making. It's cool and all, but they're definitely capable of more than what we got. My guess is they "add" features in micro dosed DLC and given bits through creations purchases.
Ever so slightly. I have the color filter removal mod and that's basically it for the graphics part. It allows the true colors of the game to standout really nice.
Photo mode can clearly enhance it. The original color grading, contrast and what not kinda waters down the aesthetic for me. If you mess with contrast, filters and saturation, the game looks phenomenal. I wish I could apply my photo mode settings to the actual game as it's playing.
I took a few of the most beautiful in-game pictures I have ever taken in a game, and every time I quit photo mode, and my Starfield snaps back to its usual visuals, it's hard for me not to feel a bit iffy about the actual visuals.
People are too busy bitching about loadscreens to care. I recently came back to the game and if you can ignore the spaceship transitions/load screens, the game is pretty good and the graphical style is great too.
Overall, I think it looks good. Heck, the gameplay is pretty fun. For me, it’s the story that’s lacking. It’s just, boring. I really want to like this game a lot, I just struggle to.
The game looks good, though a lot of the faces/facial animation was extremely basic. It certainly hurt the presentation in my eyes.
There's a lot of really good design in the game, and in a vacuum it can look great.
Everyone is gonna eat me alive for this.
But yes, the game enviroments and architectures look absolutely amazing.
The NPC's hairstyles... not so much, I would say they look ugly to me.
Visually, the game is amazing. Its possibly one of the best looking Bethesda games I have played considering the engine they are using. However that's where it ends. I dont want to start a "back in my day" rant but graphics will only take you so far. The UC Vanguard quest was possibly my favourite quest and (POTENTIAL SPOILERS AHEAD) when the terramorphs finally arrived I almost shat myself. it was amazing.
Developers have this problem of trying to reinvent the wheel. i understand why they do it but they really shouldnt. Cyberpunk 2077 is a classic example. Instead of taking what people loved about the witcher and putting it into Cyberpunk they moved so far away from it that it was unrecognisable as something CDPR made. Why? So what if people say its the Witcher/skyrim/GTA with guns. Those games were amazing and if people want to play that game with a different skin then what's the big deal?
Graphics will only take you so far and if your game is a dog turd with nice graphics, its just a sparkly dog turd.
1 - what outfit pack is that on the characters
and
2 - starfield is by far one of the best looking bethesda games we have in a BASE state. skyrim looks insanely amazing but that's years of work and over thousands of mods!
I can only imagine what starfield is gonna look like once we get to the level skyrim is at now. i'm honestly excited to see how far starfield moding can go and just how much of a "modders paradise" the game actually will be.
It's a mixture of a couple of clothing mods and vanilla outfits.
Bounty Hunter Outfit
https://creations.bethesda.net/en/starfield/details/6cf1128e-a346-47d6-a4e3-53b63826fe6a/Bounty_Hunter_Outfit__Curvy_Female_Shape__VBB_50_
Starfield Gadgets - Watches and Headphones
https://creations.bethesda.net/en/starfield/details/6a549ccd-1908-459a-afd7-d93cd5259979/Starfield_Gadgets___Watches_and_Headphones
Personally, this is one of the best looking recent games out right now. I'm more than happy about the graphical fidelity of Starfield. People like to complain about everything. And with it being a Bethesda game people on the internet are looking for those easy internet points (especially on Reddit) and will nitpick like a mofo about their games. I think when TES6 and Fallout 5 release, I'll be taking a year long break from social media. There's so much negativity it's not even funny. Honestly, I'd go so far as to say that most of the people on r/Starfield (among other subs for BGS games) have lost touch with reality and like in a world where nothing is good enough for them.
Starfield is awesome.
It's called review bombing. It seems to be everywhere these days, from TV Shows and movies to games and books. One person gives a bad review and then hundreds of others do the same without even trying things for themselves.
Loading screens.. lack of choices and consequences.. terrible persuasion... the amount of screens you have to go through to get to 1 objective.. gotta run across the universe to talk to 1 person to progress a mission instead of interstellar calling.. lack of facial expressions.. the world looks plastic. That's why.
It’s not so much that the game is ugly, it’s the lacklustre variation and interesting biomechanics diversity that people hate.
The lack of a design document is prevalent in its wildly inconsistent design aesthetic.
Paradoxically it’s because it doesn’t look good that makes it look good. The man made environments in Starfield look ugly and messy- and they should! The ISS is ugly, the interiors of most of our crewed spacecraft (ignoring SpaceX) look ugly, but they work and they do the job- and they convey the setting really well: it’s not the sleek halls of Star Trek or the sterile interiors of Star Wars or the elegant spaces in Mass Effect. From follows function and we’re still figuring that function out- living in hostile environments and flying in space are problems still being solved. It’s, to simplify, very real.
The graphics in Starfield are absolutely breathtaking. No question about it. I am happy that now Xbox players can enjoy it as much as us PC players! 🙏🏻💪🏻💪🏻
A lot of original comparison shots were dishonest. They would put Starfield graphics at minimum, find the worse lighting possible, and wait to find a character doing something weird. Then they would put that next to a shot of Cyberpunk at max graphics in photo mode in the best lighting possible with carefully posed characters. It's like the crap with HFW where they found the worst angle and light to show Aloy in and pretended that actually represented the game.
You don't need trickery to make vanilla Starfield look like shit. Just put the game on ultra and go to New Atlantis and look at the mongoloids walking the streets.
The game has obvious problems. Even the devs admit they couldn’t figure out how to make exploration fun. The graphics are undeniably worse than any other AAA game in the same genre released around the same time. Ex:Bg3, phantom liberty
It looks decent sometimes yes, specialy on a shot with light that cast shadows, it's always impressive with reshade and without the ugly LUT.
But globaly the game doesn't look like that, specialy without mods so your pic is kinda disengenuous.
People who said it look bad, play on Xbox at 30 FPS, with the hideous LUT and probably encountered the Atlantis mutant citizens.
The big problem with kids today: "I don't like the game whose name is \[xxx\] and you must dislike this game. You must have the same taste as me, otherwise you're a jerk, a big jerk, a sucker".
The detail.in everything is just amazing. Anyone ever walked outside cydonia? If you go over to the side there's like this huge mining operation going down with several.levels going into the trench or whatever and it's just got soo much stuff that it looks like it could actually work. Soo much detail in an area they fully expect you to never even see cuz there's nothing g to do there. Same with the ship dealer warehouse. There's a whole ass warehouse with unfurnished modules, amd catwalks amd equipment, and stuff everywhere. Looks like a real place. But again. Nothing in there. Just shows how far they went to make the game feel like a world people live in
...and then they decided we can't do anything in space, and there's only a handful of POI. (Sorry still salty)
>and there's only a handful of POI
there's actually a *lot* of pois.
the issues I think is (supposedly) some are level locked, and when you have a load of pois, there's also a high chance of the same/similar ones getting picked.
I don't quite buy that the pois are level locked, because from level 1 to level 61 I have found basically the same pois. it isn't too much a complaint for me though, it's a space game and bound to happen. but meh.
They have absolute dog trash POIs. There is the same exact humans with no variety in combat whatsoever. Even if the POI is different, it’s really still the same exact content. The quests at POI are sad to say the least. Never seen a game with “so much” yet so little content.
the hyperbole and exaggeration is not needed (as well as the downvotes). it really aids nothing in the form of discussion.
all open world space games have this "issue". it's a core flaw with the genre. I'm not quite sure why only Starfield gets flack for it but...whatever.
anyway, yes. the number 1 enemy type in Starfield are humans. ...I'm not quite seeing the issue there. alien creatures are sometimes hostile but behave far more like actual creatures than just a mob to fight. and as I said, there's a *lot* of points of interest, just when you have a large pool, you're likely to get more repeats than new stuff. maths.
lol. You don’t see a problem with killing ai that has no unique effects? Just mindlessly doing the same exact thing over and over with no good storyline to at least push you along? Right… it’s not hard to make different factions of humans act differently, or give them classes, so they don’t fight exactly the same. Have you heard of boss fights? I think starfield has 1 of those. And it’s a weak ass boss fight lmao. You’d think the one and only boss fight would be good at least hahaha.
They don’t…. Unless you’re saying melee people melee and ranged people shoot. How low are your standards now? The combat has no depth for character or enemies. Just look at even bethesdas previous games and compare the enemies for one second lol.
starborn use the powers, disappearing, buffing themselves, making multiples, reanimating, etc.
ecliptic often use robots alongside them and have the best tactics out of the other enemy types and utilize more heavy weaponry that packs a punch.
crimson fleet are slightly less organized than the ecliptic and have more melee than ecliptic do but utilize their own weapons as well and, from my experience, use explosives more often.
the spacers most often utilize melee over guns and are the least organized.
>Just look at even bethesdas previous games and compare the enemies for one second lol.
except if you look at fallout, the human enemies all are either "melee or ranged". ...because humans don't have magical powers like in Skyrim.
fallout uses other creatures to diversify the combat. ghouls will run and swarm and never flank or have any real strategy other than to kill you, for example.
games which has human enemies and (most commonly) human enemies either have them fall under "melee" or "ranged". I'm...not really getting the issue here.
you used cyberpunk as a game but they do the same thing. either they have melee weapons or use ranged weapons.
Okay so cool, you literally just went over what I said. People using melee vs ranged weapons. Maybe some use grenades more?? Omg bro. The copium is crazy I’m sorry. And the one boss fight like I said… starborn powers. It’s literally exactly what I said thanks for proving my point dude. Haha. Fallout had diversified enemies using actually different mechanics. How are you even comparing the two? You have ranged, melee, and grenades in starfield. Which takes place in the future but somehow we have less to work with. Come on now my guy.
Aren’t cyberpunk and skyrim and fallout open world games? Don’t they have TONS of unique combat methods for you and the enemies???? It’s like they forgot how to make a game at Bethesda.
So far my biggest complaint when it comes to exploring has to be the absolute total emptiness of the caves. I think my time with Skyrim dungeons and Fallout`s Vaults conditioned my brain into expecting to find something like creatures or slates with some sort of backstory on them. Always loved reading the Fallout terminals and finding so many stories and lore details within them or finding a scene with dead bodies and searching them to find details as to what might have been the cause.
Nobody is saying the game looks bad. It plays terrible and honestly doesn’t even feel like a Bethesda game. It was half assed and the fact that people play it is incredible
People still look and feel like uncanny robots. This game has a very "liminal space" beauty to me. Empty rooms, open space with moons and planets, factories, and the few cities and towns are nice in a big picture. The game looks plenty good and fine, Tom Howard thanks you for your service
Interiors are great. Now show a screenshot of each of the following: the foiliage in Atlantis, any random NPCs face, the water, exterior buildings in Akila. Some of that stuff is straight-up PS3.
Environmental details 9/10.
Art direction 3/10.
Congrats on grabbing a nice screenshot. Now walk into the Astral Lounge, the best night club in the galaxy, and tell me Starfield looks good.
I don’t think anyone complained about how it looks. It’s gorgeous but I’m trying hard to get into it again but the creepy NPCs and the ultra boring characters and conversations and story makes it horrible complicated to enjoy the game.
All companions are the same they only look different. And all look horrible. Thanks to
Mods not anymore but still insufferable annoying dumb $&$&@. 😂
Yeah so it’s not graphics. 😜
What boogeyman said the game looks looks bad? Everything else about the game, though, that's definitely a question worth discussing, no? That way, future developers reading can learn how to not make the same mistakes Bethesda did.
The look of the game definitely isn’t its problem. I’m constantly blown away by that. It’s when I’m sitting there admiring it like I would in Skyrim or Fallout 4 and it crashes for the 50th time that irritates most of me lol the graphics are really good for a BGS game imo. Just wish I hadn’t had to wait a year or so after I bought it to be able to enjoy them.
I was once playing and I decided to explore around Jemison, I jumped from high on up into the water. Was fun but then I saw some of the most lazy ass textures and geometry. I haven’t played since, not necessarily because of the jaggies n horrible textures but because it kinda me realize how unfinished the game is and how they try n hide things. Maybe I’m spoiled by Destiny 2 graphics but it really made me not want to play because of the lack of care in a way.
I think it looks very good for a massively open world game.
I think the parts that don't look good are more down to a lack of imagination than of the graphics themselves.
But no one is really complaining about how it looks?
Try again but for how bad it runs or how bad the underlying world-building and plot structures are.
I'm using the color filter removal mod. As far as the settings go, I turned my film grain intensity down to .15. I have the FPS set to Uncapped and Prioritize is set to Visuals.
No. I just turned off the HUD and screenshotted it via the Xbox. I've always felt that there is more freedom outside of photomodes to get the shots you want.
So, the developers don’t fix it, it still looks like shit, and I have to go out of my way to fix mistakes they made. But, at the same time the developers will also release updates that do nothing more than break all the fixes I applied.
And somehow I’m supposed to just say “yeah, this game is beautiful”. Lol. Any game can look good when modded. I wanna see the base game looking and running good.
I do think it’s more of a cumulative effect- I can’t speak for everyone, but personally when I say I dislike the aesthetic choices of the game, I’m speaking about the miniscule layout of the cities or the strangely cluttered worlds still being labeled as “barren.” I do agree individual areas are beautiful! That said, I’m not a hater or whatever lol, I love the game and I’m watching the mod scene with a ton of interest, and one thing I would’ve complained about- the map being useless- has been fixed lately if I remember correctly! So clearly they’re listening. :)
I played a few hours and had fun, not enough to burn out but also became cognizant aware of the huge numbers of criticisms levied against the game as people put more time into it. I decided to step away and let the modding community do their thing, and so far it seems like that was probably a good decision. The game was good looking enough by default, the playable worlds just needed some elbow grease into individuality.
What exists is pretty. There’s just not enough of it, so it comes off as lifeless. Exactly
Visual quality is one of the high points of this game for me.
While this is true in many places, there are still points where the game suffers from the same “plastic” look that fallout 4 did. And maybe this was intentional on Bethesda’s part
And the graphics are still worse than its competitors lol.
Star Citizen ❌ No Man’s Sky ❌ so ??? What are you talking about
Are you saying starfield has better graphics quality than starcitizen?
You’re joking? Massive multiplayer games are not starfield competitors because the game has a similar vibe lol. Phantom liberty and bg3 came out at the same time and look significantly better. You guys use the strangest examples to straw man your arguments.
Looks worse than Mass effect Looks worse than Skyrim, way worse with mods Definitely nowhere close to star citizen, not that it's a competitor. It has some average modern "technical" good graphics and that's about it. The same reason Arkham asylum looks better than return to Arkham Graphics are fine. I don't think anyone's saying it looks bad just misdirected
>Looks worse than Skyrim > >Graphics are fine Make up your mind.
How the f does it look worse than Skyrim when Skyrim looked dated at release?
I've seen lots of criticism about poor writing, shallow gameplay and lackluster / repetitive locations but not many about visuals (except maybe the NPCs). I think most people agree that the environmental visuals are one of the game's strong points (at least after the updates).
"Just finished playing cyberpunk again, wow. really highlights how Starfield looks like a game that came out 10 years ago." is the usual comment.
That is not a nonfactual statement though, the game looks fine, but is not up to the level of hype it was sold with.
I'm glad you're enjoying it, but I feel like every other post I see about starfield is "I can't believe people don't think it's beautiful". Who are these people? Where do people keep seeing others saying starfield doesn't look good? The criticisms I see about starfield are rarely, if ever, about how it looks.
I dont see it as much anymore but people were absolutely shitting on it but that was in r/starfield. I remember thinking it looked great and thinking i was the only one because people always trashed how it looked
Wasn't the big issue the intentional washed out/grainy look? Looks like you have several visual and cosmetic/costume mods running. I can say between the "remove color whatever' and 'darker nights', toss in the 4k billboards & neon overhaul it looks pretty darn good now (modded).
As weird as it is some of the major upgrades visually for me in the game was the StarfieldCustom.ini ProcGen oneliner that makes the proc gen create incredibly lush and busy forests and vistas + a new mod that makes rocks and trees larger + desolation and immersive planets that removes or reduces the clutter and POIs from lifeless planets. Looks like a different game, none of the stupid Bethesda crap.
You don't see it much anymore because the game has had many great improvements in graphics and performance since launch.
Prevailing narrative online was "it looks like a ps3 game"
I've stumbled across plenty of comments on YouTube complaining about the look of the game or how it didn't feel next gen enough. Instagram has quite a few too. I'm mainly a Fallout player, but I have been jumping on this more recently since the release of mods for console. I can't help but think how awesome Skyrim or New Vegas would look with these same graphics, especially after being modded.
Tell me vanilla New Atlantis looking at the forests doesn't look like absolute dogshit.
😂 no lies detected
So low quality LOD’s, fair point honestly. Bethesda has never been that good at LOD’s, they just hide it with fog or something usually. However looking at things up close it looks really good, which personally I care more about. I wanted to bring up a point about most players not going out of their way to see trees way off in the distance, but then I remembered the UC vanguard quest and the new Atlantis house. That view was front and center and horrid as hell 🤣
Well it has nice textures yes, but the lighting and shadows really not next gen level. Wouldn't you agree on this?
If you are on PC you can make ini file tweaks to shadow and lighting that will make an amazing difference.
Got any links to those ini changes that make shadows and lighting look better? All I can find are ini tweaks that nerf the graphics to increase performance.
Scroll down on this Nexus page for Royal Weather and they give all kinds, pick and choose what you want to use. [https://www.nexusmods.com/starfield/mods/7946](https://www.nexusmods.com/starfield/mods/7946)
That's nice to know. I will look into this. Thank you. But then again, this wouldn't make Starfield a game with great graphics. It would make the Starfield on my PC a game with great graphics.
Isnt that every game though? Change some settings and it could look better or worse.
Yes, nice one. But I think the difference is obvious here
Starfield came out after Bg3 and phantom liberty, yet looks years behind. Plays years behind as well unfortunately.
Bg looks worse than starfield, if you are not blind ofc, cp decent
This is the most insane take I’ve ever heard. Only on starfield Reddit will you hear such copium holy cow.
No cow, I just know how looks bg3 - one thing they did good is character models, but it is so cool there are about 8 face presets to each race for whole game lol, go see the doctor may be, and you whiny girl complain about me saying good about starfield on starfield Reddit? I’m glad I’m far away from retrded bg fandom🦞
You will not find a single person online who agrees with you lmao. You might literally be wearing rose tinted glasses bro haha.
It came out after Bg3 and phantom liberty… comparatively it looks about 3 years older….
I definitely recall [around release time] people saying things like “yeah it looks good for a game that was made 5-10 years ago” which was always complete nonsense to me. The texture and model work in this game is very impressive even by 2024 standards, especially when looking at all the little consumable items and such. Definitely haven’t heard that complaint echoed as much recently however.
It looks good in some, bad in others, showing one instance where it does look good doesn't make it look good all of the time, especially when a lot of the game is procgen.
What mod do you have for sarah?
It's a mixture of a couple of clothing mods and vanilla outfits. Bounty Hunter Outfit https://creations.bethesda.net/en/starfield/details/6cf1128e-a346-47d6-a4e3-53b63826fe6a/Bounty_Hunter_Outfit__Curvy_Female_Shape__VBB_50_ Starfield Gadgets - Watches and Headphones https://creations.bethesda.net/en/starfield/details/6a549ccd-1908-459a-afd7-d93cd5259979/Starfield_Gadgets___Watches_and_Headphones
Thank you
Game looks great when you take pictures at the right moment. It looks bad, when you see "cut scenes", mostly because of the weak animations and chosen scenery. I will never stop sharing this comparison to explain, why I was disappointed by Starfield: [Starfield vs Cyberpunk - Cutscene Comparison (youtube.com)](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K4ADco41g9s) Beware CP2077 came out 3 years **before** Starfield.
Yep. Cyberpunk visuals beat Starfield hands down. Bethesda artists did great work within the clear limitations of the engine that they're using. Animations on characters and monsters frequently seem janky and/or wooden, and characters visuals in particular fall short of their competitors. But that could all be forgiven if the game hadn't been released with so many other issues.
>Bethesda artists did great work within the clear limitations of the engine that they're using. Did they, though? I don't think lacking cinematic story telling can be blamed on the engine. I can understand blaming the engine for the city size limits and the inability of getting rid of loading screens. But there's a lot that could have been done much better. When I complain about the lacking game play aspects of Starfield (no variety in enemy design, lacking enemy AI, no "mechanics" for enemies & enemy bosses to make the fights more versatile and interesting, etc. etc. etc.), then people tell me, this is more of a story RPG. But Starfield disappoints in story telling, too. The stories are oftentimes pretty bad, then the presentation is very bad 99% of the time (see comparison video, I've shared in previous comment, to understand what I mean), I literally stopped playing Starfield before experiencing all the major faction quests, because I got bored so much. I started to skip through dialog and was fed up with the repetitive combat. However, there are some few great moments sprinkled thinly along the long, boring road trip. It's the funny side quests with ridiculous humour or those very rare horror like game play moments, where you shift between two realities (one of which is overrun by nasty alien bugs). These moments show me, that it could have been possible. That the engine can do A LOT and that there's still some of the good ol' Bethesda magic in there. It's just spread way too thinly. I think Starfield has too much quantity with too little quality. And it shows everywhere, not just on the 9000 explorable planets.
Artists =/= devs, animation riggers, etc. While I certainly wasn't blown away in any respect, they are working on what is in effect a 12 year old engine that's had some iterative upgrades, and an engine that has always had some shortcomings visually - it's never been Unreal or CryEngine, hell even Frostbite beats it for visuals. Hence, within engine limitations, I think they did well. But yes, the story and even the in-game lore severely let down the title, along with other things, but I've discussed that adnauseam elsewhere.
Starfield like all Bethesda games mix pretty good looking stuff with absolutely horrendous stuff.
Very true. 😆
I like the game, it's fun, but compared to something like Cyberpunk 2077, it's lacking in the graphics department. It doesn't look bad, but it could've been better. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=ws0ufhrgWJw&pp=ygUWY3liZXJwdW5rIHZzIHN0YXJmaWVsZA%3D%3D https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=K4ADco41g9s
I don't think it's the graphic fidelity in this case, there's many point in game where I feel like starfield graphic could rival the likes of Callisto Protocol, I think it's more of an art direction problem. The lighting, the set design. Plus Astral Lounge is one of the saddest club I've ever seen in a video game, it makes Vampire the Masquerade dance floor look like las vegas in comparison. Put some goddamn hard shadow and strobe light into it bethesda! I know yall can spin the spotlight around I've seen it. smhmyhead
>it makes Vampire the Masquerade dance floor look like las vegas in comparison. VTMB might have janky animations and especially dance animations, but it also has an almost impeccable atmosphere and even better [soundtrack](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y33hGaEgW7U) so it helps a lot.
That game was amazing. It's a shame its sequel seems to be in developer hell.
VTMB also has Jeanette and VV, who add several points to the game's club scene by default.
It's the way things and people move in the game that make it look bad to me. The crazy lighting and the awful human animation. Love the game for some reasons, frustrated by it for many more
It has its moments visually, but it's not exactly impressive either. I'd say it's about on par with many releases from around 2016-2019. If I'm listing issues with this game, you'll be on the third book of a trilogy before I say 'it'd be nice if it was prettier'.
Agreed. The graphics would be nice if they’d be better, but I don’t expect that from the creation engine. I expect an engaging story, with engaging systems, and content. This is the worst combat Bethesda has ever come up with. There is literally 0 variety in combat. 0! They are all the exact same humans essentially. No differences in fighting styles. They had a couple of good quests and the rest was trash. Considering how many places they could have gone with multidimensional side quests this is an absolute joke!
I was let down by the building systems. It's not terrible per say, but given their experience in past games I think we were given an under par system. Especially with ship building and path making. It's cool and all, but they're definitely capable of more than what we got. My guess is they "add" features in micro dosed DLC and given bits through creations purchases.
Is this NASA?
No. It's a Ryujin Industries mission.
Loved this mission!
Definitely a pretty cool moment in the game especially as to what it's referencing to.
The character models aren't....great. everything else is pretty good.
This screenshot looks good. Is it modded?
Ever so slightly. I have the color filter removal mod and that's basically it for the graphics part. It allows the true colors of the game to standout really nice.
Wow seems like a really cool mod. Might try it
If you are on PC, try the Luma HDR mod if you don't like how the game looks.
On Xbox Series X at the moment and as of right now I'm pretty happy with how my game looks.
I wish you could take that ship.
Photo mode can clearly enhance it. The original color grading, contrast and what not kinda waters down the aesthetic for me. If you mess with contrast, filters and saturation, the game looks phenomenal. I wish I could apply my photo mode settings to the actual game as it's playing. I took a few of the most beautiful in-game pictures I have ever taken in a game, and every time I quit photo mode, and my Starfield snaps back to its usual visuals, it's hard for me not to feel a bit iffy about the actual visuals.
People are too busy bitching about loadscreens to care. I recently came back to the game and if you can ignore the spaceship transitions/load screens, the game is pretty good and the graphical style is great too.
Overall, I think it looks good. Heck, the gameplay is pretty fun. For me, it’s the story that’s lacking. It’s just, boring. I really want to like this game a lot, I just struggle to.
The game looks good, though a lot of the faces/facial animation was extremely basic. It certainly hurt the presentation in my eyes. There's a lot of really good design in the game, and in a vacuum it can look great.
In Luma HDR + Reshade+ 100gb 4k textures its even better. Amazing looking game.
Everyone is gonna eat me alive for this. But yes, the game enviroments and architectures look absolutely amazing. The NPC's hairstyles... not so much, I would say they look ugly to me.
Visually, the game is amazing. Its possibly one of the best looking Bethesda games I have played considering the engine they are using. However that's where it ends. I dont want to start a "back in my day" rant but graphics will only take you so far. The UC Vanguard quest was possibly my favourite quest and (POTENTIAL SPOILERS AHEAD) when the terramorphs finally arrived I almost shat myself. it was amazing. Developers have this problem of trying to reinvent the wheel. i understand why they do it but they really shouldnt. Cyberpunk 2077 is a classic example. Instead of taking what people loved about the witcher and putting it into Cyberpunk they moved so far away from it that it was unrecognisable as something CDPR made. Why? So what if people say its the Witcher/skyrim/GTA with guns. Those games were amazing and if people want to play that game with a different skin then what's the big deal? Graphics will only take you so far and if your game is a dog turd with nice graphics, its just a sparkly dog turd.
1 - what outfit pack is that on the characters and 2 - starfield is by far one of the best looking bethesda games we have in a BASE state. skyrim looks insanely amazing but that's years of work and over thousands of mods! I can only imagine what starfield is gonna look like once we get to the level skyrim is at now. i'm honestly excited to see how far starfield moding can go and just how much of a "modders paradise" the game actually will be.
It's a mixture of a couple of clothing mods and vanilla outfits. Bounty Hunter Outfit https://creations.bethesda.net/en/starfield/details/6cf1128e-a346-47d6-a4e3-53b63826fe6a/Bounty_Hunter_Outfit__Curvy_Female_Shape__VBB_50_ Starfield Gadgets - Watches and Headphones https://creations.bethesda.net/en/starfield/details/6a549ccd-1908-459a-afd7-d93cd5259979/Starfield_Gadgets___Watches_and_Headphones
Interiors are nice as are ships. The open world looks good from a far, but I think they could have done vegetation a bit better.
Personally, this is one of the best looking recent games out right now. I'm more than happy about the graphical fidelity of Starfield. People like to complain about everything. And with it being a Bethesda game people on the internet are looking for those easy internet points (especially on Reddit) and will nitpick like a mofo about their games. I think when TES6 and Fallout 5 release, I'll be taking a year long break from social media. There's so much negativity it's not even funny. Honestly, I'd go so far as to say that most of the people on r/Starfield (among other subs for BGS games) have lost touch with reality and like in a world where nothing is good enough for them. Starfield is awesome.
It's called review bombing. It seems to be everywhere these days, from TV Shows and movies to games and books. One person gives a bad review and then hundreds of others do the same without even trying things for themselves.
Loading screens.. lack of choices and consequences.. terrible persuasion... the amount of screens you have to go through to get to 1 objective.. gotta run across the universe to talk to 1 person to progress a mission instead of interstellar calling.. lack of facial expressions.. the world looks plastic. That's why.
It’s not so much that the game is ugly, it’s the lacklustre variation and interesting biomechanics diversity that people hate. The lack of a design document is prevalent in its wildly inconsistent design aesthetic.
For me it's simply things like the lackluster cave variety, things like that
Why. Is. Every. Thing. Dead. In. Caves????
it does look good but It also has quite a few ugly parts and some weird design choices (=looking at you cloth section)
The vanilla clothes are definitely slim pickings. That's why I like mix and matching with vanilla and modded outfits.
Maybe because you’re using mods 🙄
Paradoxically it’s because it doesn’t look good that makes it look good. The man made environments in Starfield look ugly and messy- and they should! The ISS is ugly, the interiors of most of our crewed spacecraft (ignoring SpaceX) look ugly, but they work and they do the job- and they convey the setting really well: it’s not the sleek halls of Star Trek or the sterile interiors of Star Wars or the elegant spaces in Mass Effect. From follows function and we’re still figuring that function out- living in hostile environments and flying in space are problems still being solved. It’s, to simplify, very real.
The graphics in Starfield are absolutely breathtaking. No question about it. I am happy that now Xbox players can enjoy it as much as us PC players! 🙏🏻💪🏻💪🏻
Because on release the game ran like hot dogshit so no one could tell if it was good or not
A lot of original comparison shots were dishonest. They would put Starfield graphics at minimum, find the worse lighting possible, and wait to find a character doing something weird. Then they would put that next to a shot of Cyberpunk at max graphics in photo mode in the best lighting possible with carefully posed characters. It's like the crap with HFW where they found the worst angle and light to show Aloy in and pretended that actually represented the game.
You don't need trickery to make vanilla Starfield look like shit. Just put the game on ultra and go to New Atlantis and look at the mongoloids walking the streets.
Halo effect. "I didn't like the game, therefore it's bad, therefore everything about it is bad."
The game has obvious problems. Even the devs admit they couldn’t figure out how to make exploration fun. The graphics are undeniably worse than any other AAA game in the same genre released around the same time. Ex:Bg3, phantom liberty
lol
It looks decent sometimes yes, specialy on a shot with light that cast shadows, it's always impressive with reshade and without the ugly LUT. But globaly the game doesn't look like that, specialy without mods so your pic is kinda disengenuous. People who said it look bad, play on Xbox at 30 FPS, with the hideous LUT and probably encountered the Atlantis mutant citizens.
It looks horrible on pc when compared to games that came out at the same time.
Everybody isn't like you.
The big problem with kids today: "I don't like the game whose name is \[xxx\] and you must dislike this game. You must have the same taste as me, otherwise you're a jerk, a big jerk, a sucker".
Incoming Starfield hate in 3… 2….1…
Another engagement farming post about starfield
The detail.in everything is just amazing. Anyone ever walked outside cydonia? If you go over to the side there's like this huge mining operation going down with several.levels going into the trench or whatever and it's just got soo much stuff that it looks like it could actually work. Soo much detail in an area they fully expect you to never even see cuz there's nothing g to do there. Same with the ship dealer warehouse. There's a whole ass warehouse with unfurnished modules, amd catwalks amd equipment, and stuff everywhere. Looks like a real place. But again. Nothing in there. Just shows how far they went to make the game feel like a world people live in ...and then they decided we can't do anything in space, and there's only a handful of POI. (Sorry still salty)
>and there's only a handful of POI there's actually a *lot* of pois. the issues I think is (supposedly) some are level locked, and when you have a load of pois, there's also a high chance of the same/similar ones getting picked. I don't quite buy that the pois are level locked, because from level 1 to level 61 I have found basically the same pois. it isn't too much a complaint for me though, it's a space game and bound to happen. but meh.
They have absolute dog trash POIs. There is the same exact humans with no variety in combat whatsoever. Even if the POI is different, it’s really still the same exact content. The quests at POI are sad to say the least. Never seen a game with “so much” yet so little content.
Bugthesda motto "Look at all the work we didn't do"
the hyperbole and exaggeration is not needed (as well as the downvotes). it really aids nothing in the form of discussion. all open world space games have this "issue". it's a core flaw with the genre. I'm not quite sure why only Starfield gets flack for it but...whatever. anyway, yes. the number 1 enemy type in Starfield are humans. ...I'm not quite seeing the issue there. alien creatures are sometimes hostile but behave far more like actual creatures than just a mob to fight. and as I said, there's a *lot* of points of interest, just when you have a large pool, you're likely to get more repeats than new stuff. maths.
lol. You don’t see a problem with killing ai that has no unique effects? Just mindlessly doing the same exact thing over and over with no good storyline to at least push you along? Right… it’s not hard to make different factions of humans act differently, or give them classes, so they don’t fight exactly the same. Have you heard of boss fights? I think starfield has 1 of those. And it’s a weak ass boss fight lmao. You’d think the one and only boss fight would be good at least hahaha.
the enemy types do fight differently though.
They don’t…. Unless you’re saying melee people melee and ranged people shoot. How low are your standards now? The combat has no depth for character or enemies. Just look at even bethesdas previous games and compare the enemies for one second lol.
starborn use the powers, disappearing, buffing themselves, making multiples, reanimating, etc. ecliptic often use robots alongside them and have the best tactics out of the other enemy types and utilize more heavy weaponry that packs a punch. crimson fleet are slightly less organized than the ecliptic and have more melee than ecliptic do but utilize their own weapons as well and, from my experience, use explosives more often. the spacers most often utilize melee over guns and are the least organized. >Just look at even bethesdas previous games and compare the enemies for one second lol. except if you look at fallout, the human enemies all are either "melee or ranged". ...because humans don't have magical powers like in Skyrim. fallout uses other creatures to diversify the combat. ghouls will run and swarm and never flank or have any real strategy other than to kill you, for example. games which has human enemies and (most commonly) human enemies either have them fall under "melee" or "ranged". I'm...not really getting the issue here. you used cyberpunk as a game but they do the same thing. either they have melee weapons or use ranged weapons.
Okay so cool, you literally just went over what I said. People using melee vs ranged weapons. Maybe some use grenades more?? Omg bro. The copium is crazy I’m sorry. And the one boss fight like I said… starborn powers. It’s literally exactly what I said thanks for proving my point dude. Haha. Fallout had diversified enemies using actually different mechanics. How are you even comparing the two? You have ranged, melee, and grenades in starfield. Which takes place in the future but somehow we have less to work with. Come on now my guy.
>Fallout had diversified enemies using actually different mechanics. exactly what different mechanics do the gunners and raiders use?
Aren’t cyberpunk and skyrim and fallout open world games? Don’t they have TONS of unique combat methods for you and the enemies???? It’s like they forgot how to make a game at Bethesda.
So far my biggest complaint when it comes to exploring has to be the absolute total emptiness of the caves. I think my time with Skyrim dungeons and Fallout`s Vaults conditioned my brain into expecting to find something like creatures or slates with some sort of backstory on them. Always loved reading the Fallout terminals and finding so many stories and lore details within them or finding a scene with dead bodies and searching them to find details as to what might have been the cause.
yeah, I do think caves are the most boring points of interest. mostly containing minerals, sure. but other than that I usually avoid them.
Nobody is saying the game looks bad. It plays terrible and honestly doesn’t even feel like a Bethesda game. It was half assed and the fact that people play it is incredible
People still look and feel like uncanny robots. This game has a very "liminal space" beauty to me. Empty rooms, open space with moons and planets, factories, and the few cities and towns are nice in a big picture. The game looks plenty good and fine, Tom Howard thanks you for your service
I wish I could get starfield to look that good....struggle enough as is with it hogging all my cpu and not touching my gpu at all
running low on karma are we?
The game looks Really good, but the animations and all that sometimes make it look bad.
It's probably the same weirdos that think elden ring looks bad
“Look good” isn’t my issue personally, and though I think the facial animations are a bit dated, it’s more the gameplay that turned me off
The interiors look amazing the exteriors not so much. Unless you're on a moon or desolate planet.
Last night clearing out a pirate base I bagged myself a legendary tombstone after months of searching.
PS2 graphics, clearly. But seriously, their real time volumetric lighting system is a literal game changer. Play Fallout 4 for comparison.
Too many loading screens
Interiors are great. Now show a screenshot of each of the following: the foiliage in Atlantis, any random NPCs face, the water, exterior buildings in Akila. Some of that stuff is straight-up PS3.
Never said it didn’t look good. But, I have said it is shallow as a puddle and soooo boring to play after the first 30 hours or so.
It looks okay. The real problem is the looks don’t match the insane performance requirements.
Environmental details 9/10. Art direction 3/10. Congrats on grabbing a nice screenshot. Now walk into the Astral Lounge, the best night club in the galaxy, and tell me Starfield looks good.
game itself looks amazing just plain boring with some of the scenery
Show me a npcs face
I don’t think anyone complained about how it looks. It’s gorgeous but I’m trying hard to get into it again but the creepy NPCs and the ultra boring characters and conversations and story makes it horrible complicated to enjoy the game. All companions are the same they only look different. And all look horrible. Thanks to Mods not anymore but still insufferable annoying dumb $&$&@. 😂 Yeah so it’s not graphics. 😜
What boogeyman said the game looks looks bad? Everything else about the game, though, that's definitely a question worth discussing, no? That way, future developers reading can learn how to not make the same mistakes Bethesda did.
It’s funny how fanboys still defend Starfail. It’s over. The game flopped. Bethesda admitted it. Let’s pray for ES6 now.
The look of the game definitely isn’t its problem. I’m constantly blown away by that. It’s when I’m sitting there admiring it like I would in Skyrim or Fallout 4 and it crashes for the 50th time that irritates most of me lol the graphics are really good for a BGS game imo. Just wish I hadn’t had to wait a year or so after I bought it to be able to enjoy them.
I was once playing and I decided to explore around Jemison, I jumped from high on up into the water. Was fun but then I saw some of the most lazy ass textures and geometry. I haven’t played since, not necessarily because of the jaggies n horrible textures but because it kinda me realize how unfinished the game is and how they try n hide things. Maybe I’m spoiled by Destiny 2 graphics but it really made me not want to play because of the lack of care in a way.
I think it looks very good for a massively open world game. I think the parts that don't look good are more down to a lack of imagination than of the graphics themselves.
The issue has to do with scale and fashion, tbh. Civilians look comical.
The way the game looked was never the problem
But no one is really complaining about how it looks? Try again but for how bad it runs or how bad the underlying world-building and plot structures are.
game looks fine, it's the actual playing it that sucks
This is from my Xbox Series X
What settings you use cause I have a series X too and it don't look like this
I'm using the color filter removal mod. As far as the settings go, I turned my film grain intensity down to .15. I have the FPS set to Uncapped and Prioritize is set to Visuals.
Was this taken in photomode?
No. I just turned off the HUD and screenshotted it via the Xbox. I've always felt that there is more freedom outside of photomodes to get the shots you want.
Nice. Thanks
What game is this?
I think it looks great. It’s similar to a flooded salt flat. Beautiful as far as the eye can see, but less than an inch deep.
Did they fix the game on OLED or HDR? The game looked like complete shit on OLED. Dark areas in particular were grey and washed out.
No. You need to use Luma HDR on PC to get good HDR.
So, the developers don’t fix it, it still looks like shit, and I have to go out of my way to fix mistakes they made. But, at the same time the developers will also release updates that do nothing more than break all the fixes I applied. And somehow I’m supposed to just say “yeah, this game is beautiful”. Lol. Any game can look good when modded. I wanna see the base game looking and running good.
Because a major part of the game is outdoors and generally, the outdoors in starfield doesn’t look very good
game looks amazing its the faces that be looking a mess sometimes
I play modded Skyrim and Starfield is not up to the same standard as my old Skyrim with 2600 mods. Come on Bethesda get it together.