Starfield: But why do the fights look so smooth?

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Soft shooting feelings?

Last June, Starfield was the subject of a 45-minute presentation to reveal all of its aspects at the end of the Microsoft Bethesda conference. During this long presentation, we saw character creation as well as exploration or ship customization. Obviously, at the end of the video, the focus was on the fights and the first impressions were confirmed. Among the complaints we find about filming in Starfield is We find that the weapons barely move, lack overall impact, and seem to convey little emotion to the player

. And then it’s no better with laser and magnetic weapons, which benefit from a great deal of stability, which doesn’t exactly help to feel their power. This even causes melee weapons to have pretty flat and unsatisfying animations. And then, given the few images of the fights we’ve seen so far, there’s the question of localizing the damage.

To explain this result, we can first point out that Starfield is a science fiction game and therefore its weapons are futuristic. Since they are optimized They don’t suffer much recoil and are very stable, which makes sense from a story perspective but gives little feeling to players. On the other hand, this result is hardly surprising since Fallout 3 and Fallout 4, also developed by Bethesda, are not known for their sensational feedback. We can go even further and say that melee attacks weren’t The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim’s greatest strength. in the star field, The shooting game promises functionality above all

However, given that the title offers many more game systems, this result is surprising knowing the potential of Bethesda.

FPS expertise at ZeniMax

In 2009, ZeniMax Media, the parent company of Bethesda Softworks, acquired id Software, experts in first-person title games known for Doom, Wolfenstein, and Quake. In the process, the group also acquired Arkane in 2010, a French studio later made famous by Dishonored, Prey and Deathloop. What makes these two companies special is that they specialize in FPS, be it pure action games at id Software or immersive sims at Arkane.

. Without too many surprises, their titles are known for enjoying real sensations with their firearms, which adds to their charm.

I think you see me coming, but One wonders if Bethesda could not have used the expertise of id Software and Arkane to provide better shooting experiences in Starfield. Obviously, we understand that the title wants to convey the feeling of a realistic experience and that adding the edgy animations of a Doom would spoil it. Despite everything, we assume that a compromise could have been found. As one of the developers explained in the Starfield Direct: “There is always a balance between realism, simulation and Hollywood. I think that in general we focus on what the player enjoys the most“. If all the comments we’ve made are based solely on the images shown so far, it’s to be hoped that the shooting sensations in the September 6 final will teach us otherwise.