Starfield dev says some of the space RPG's "planets are empty by design - but that's not boring"

nanoUFO@sh.itjust.worksmod to Games@sh.itjust.works – 38 points –
Starfield dev says some of the space RPG's "planets are empty by design - but that's not boring"
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Starfield is a game about a humanity in the early stages of interstellar travel and colonization, a game without living alien civilizationals. A hard science fiction game with deep roots in realistic science (with the exception of the grav drive and the temples/powers/unity).

It would be utterly unrealistic and unimmersive to have all planets full of interesting landmarks, structures or the like. Sure it could host relics/remains of other civilisations or stuff like that, but that would change the game on a fundamental level and would break the story of the game.

I love that space and most planets are utterly boring in Starfield, because that is the truth about space, it is huge, boring and mostly dead.

But I can understand everyone who thinks that this makes Starfield a boring game, there are lots of games out there that I think are boring (GTA 5 for example) which are loved by huge crowds of people.

Having planets with nothing on them isn't a problem.
It's having planets that all have the same exact things on them that's the problem. There's building that have the same exact clutter in the same exact place everywhere, in the same exact layouts, and even the same exact dead bodies in the same exact place and positions.

To be honest this is nothing I really have seen so far but that could be because I don't jump from planet location to planet location in rapid succession. I have hours or even days of real time between visits to those places, so I normally don't remember the layouts of the places or the position of dead body's (especially with all the dead spacers or pirates added).

And that lots of those places have nearly identical layouts is something that I expect, those are often old military facilities, build with layouts defined by military bureaucracy.

And the civilian facilities are all build from the same limited set of easy and cheap available outpost modules, that those are hugely identical is not that far fetched.

In this same vein I actually want Starfield to be even more immersive. When I take off in search of a new planet, I want to leave my computer on for 700 years while my ship travels through space.

What do you mean that's stupid and boring? It's real.

200 years, at least that's what it took for the generation ship without GravDrive in the game.