I think I’ve sunk enough hours into Starfield to determine that, for me, this game is pretty mid. What really turned the corner for me, actually, is the hours I haven’t been playing—since baseball season ended, I’ve sunk more hours into Fallout 76 than Starfield. I think FO76 has a really bad rap; there are certainly things about it that I’m not a fan of (being constantly online is the biggest one), but the core exploration elements that make me love Bethesda games really stand out in FO76 in a way that just seems stale in Starfield. I'm level 47 in FO76, and I just got a mission that sent me into a part of the map that I've never explored--I've got to worry about my loadout, my chems, what sort of creatures I might encounter, how much ammo I have (which is pretty scarce), and a bunch of other things. Then I travel to the edge of my explored map and slowly probe into the new area, which is quite different than anything else I've seen before. In Starfield, I'm given a mission, I get sent to a moon that looks like lots of other moons, and I've got so many bullets that I just shoot hundred of rounds at enemies until I'm given another checkpoint. Some of the stories in Starfield are good, and I think it looks beautiful, but I got the feeling much more quickly that it all just feels the same. I'll probably finish the main quest, but knowing how the New Game+ish stuff works, I don't think I'll sink lots of time into it after that. I'm glad it was a Game Pass game and not something I had to buy, and I don't regret my time in it, but there are other games out there that I'm more excited to try.

Based on expectations and the quality of the competition, this game feels like a massive, dated misfire. It needed another couple years of development.

I’m just over here praying that Elder Scrolls VI returns to one huge map and that they don’t try doing anything funky with exploration or procedural generation.

It's dropped pretty hard on Steam.

Well, it’s a single player game that’s been out a while, so that’s not exactly a big surprise. Will be interesting to see what happens once the mod community gets bigger.

I still loved it.

I mean in terms of user reviews.

We know what you meant and we don't want to hear it!

No Man's Sky is just better and people were hoping this was going to be.

Haven't really seen this game in any major Game of the Year list which has to be a major disappointment to Xbox.

In fairness, how long did it take No Man's Sky to get there? That game had a disastrous launch. Granted, I don't know how much they're going to change to this game, although they have made some updates.