Video Gamers Podcast - [Review] Starfield - Video Games Podcast

Episode Date: September 4, 2023

Video Games hosts Josh, Ryan, and Paul are bringing you our thoughts and initial impressions on the new hit video game Starfield. We’ve been playing nonstop since the early access release and with nearly 80 hours of Starfield play time combined, we’re here to give our thoughts on one of the year’s biggest gaming releases. Is Starfield fun? Are we impressed? Is it living up to our lofty expectations? We break it all down in this gaming episode! Thanks to our LEGENDARY Supporters: Redletter and Gaius214 Connect with the show: Support us on Patreon: patreon.com/videogamerspod Join our Gaming Discord: https://discord.gg/Dsx2rgEEbz Follow us on Instagram: instagram.com/videogamerspod Follow us on Twitter: twitter.com/videogamerspod Subscribe to us on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCU12YOMnAQwqFZEdfXv9c3Q Visit us on the web: https://videogamerspod.com/ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Riders, ready, set, go! Riding a bike in the Ride to Conquer Cancer is like being part of humanity's greatest. The money you raise, the time you spend, the energy that you give is helping people live. It's giving people hope and that's just so beautiful. Care the fire for cancer research. Join the ride at ridetoconquer.ca Hello fellow gamers and astronauts. Welcome to the Video Gamers Podcast where we cover all things gaming we are so ecstatic to record this episode we finally get to talk about starfield probably the most anticipated game since cyberpunk 2077 i am your host paul and joining me are my two gamers in

crime first up you can find him scrambling to hide all his contraband before his ship is done being scanned. It's Josh. Ask me how many times I've tried to smuggle contraband past the patrols. It's a few. Yeah. I can't wait until we get to talk about it. I want to know if you guys have been arrested. What's happened with contraband?

I think we're going to have some fun stories. Have I been arrested? And then joining Josh and me, for some reason, he's always walking crouched in stealth behind his favorite companion, Sarah Morgan. It's Ryan. Paul said he was going to say a good one before we started recording. Yeah. And that was right on brand that was oh gosh that got me man that got me good my my wife's name is sarah just so everybody knows

you know so she hears you saying sarah in in your dreams you don't have to worry that's all it is what i'm hearing i swear honey i love you okay all right you can find us on socials everywhere at video gamers pod and you can also see support options with awesome perks like bonus episodes through Patreon. You can check it out at MultiplayerSquad.com. All right, guys. Numerous delays. All these years later, we've been waiting for new IP from Bethesda for 25 years. We finally have it in early access.

It is going to schedule for a full release tomorrow how excited were you guys to finally get to launch starfield so you remember how i kept saying that my hype level was kind of mid for starfield after like remnant 2 and balder skate 3 and all that and i was kind of like guys i want to be more Dude, when it came time to actually play, like I was clicking the icon, man. I started geeking like big time, man. Because it was just like, it's finally happening. Like we, I remember taking off of work last year when it was supposed to be, what was it?

11, 11, 22 or something. November. Yeah. I asked for that day off and then they're like, okay, well, we're delaying it. And I'm like, dang it off and then they're like okay well we're delaying it and i'm like dang it and then they're like a full year and then i was like oh that's probably a good idea if they really bumped it back that far um but yeah dude i i got really really excited yeah if you gotta if you gotta delay it for a year it was definitely a good decision for sure yeah honestly there are a couple things that probably could have been delayed further, but there is just so much to talk about.

So basically, we're primarily going to talk about our initial impressions. This is a game that is incredibly large. I think anyone who has played this, even for a few minutes, realizes how massive of a game this is. We're going to get down into the deep and dirty specifics throughout the episode, but let's just get this out of the way now from the outset. Are you guys going to give this a thumbs up or a thumbs down? And what's your 10-second review of the game?

Ooh, Ryan's giving it the thumbs up, so hit us with that. Wait, that's two wiggly thumbs up. That's to show how many times I'm going to up it. Oh, I got you. What's your 10-second review, Ryan? 10-second review is this is so far pretty much everything I wanted it to be. Fallout in space.

A lot more to dive into, but I am having an absolute blast. It's kind of like taking off uh you know the vr headset like i'm just getting out of the world when i when i played for a long series so yeah it's it's awesome and we'll we'll get into it more you got to readjust to real life when you close the game dude what about you josh um i am giving this a thumbs up for sure my 10 second review oh man there's no way it's gonna be more i'm not good at like not talking I am giving this a thumbs up for sure. My 10-second review... Oh, man. There's no way.

This is going to be more... I'm not good at not talking a lot, guys. I know. Started off slow. Got really, really good after the initial two hours. I would say that for me, the biggest thing is realizing that there's no other game out that is like this game. And honestly, that's the difference.

And I think it took a little getting used to for me was just remembering that this is a completely unique experience, way different than anything else out there. Yeah, I totally give it a thumbs up. I have been having so much fun playing Starfield. I mean, I love space games. I know you guys do. We all love RPGs. We all love Bethesda. I mean, this is right in our wheelhouse, absolutely for sure. My 10-second review, it's kind of funny, Josh. It's almost the opposite of what you said. I said that I think it's a really exciting space adventure that just really borrows from all the

other best games. I'm going to stop short from saying that they pickpocketed No Man's Sky and Mass Effect and the movie Contact, but almost everything that I've done in Starfield reminds me of something else. But it's like they grabbed the best parts of 10 different games, mashed them together, and it's just an absolute blast.

I don't know that I would call this game like wholly original in that sense, but man, and it's just an absolute blast. I don't know that I would call this game wholly original in that sense, but man, I'm just so excited to be able to play it. It's been so much fun. All right, so let's talk a little bit about the setup of the story. That way, if there's anyone out there that doesn't really know what this game is about, or maybe they've only seen a little bit of gameplay. Josh, do you want to kind of set up the story for our listeners?

Yeah, I was actually really curious about this when I started playing. Like, we know we're in for this grand adventure, but how does it all begin? Well, it basically begins as you as a miner, you're doing a mining job, you're walking through caves with your boss, she's kind of explaining things to you, and they want you to go get this artifact that they found. And obviously that's what they've been looking for, so you're like, okay, well, I'm the new guy, I to go get this artifact that they found. And obviously that's what they'd been looking for. So you were like, okay, well, I'm the new guy. I'll go grab the artifact. And that kind of triggers a series of events. You then wind up under attack because pirates

want to come steal the artifact. And then some people fly in, they're helping you out. And then that's how you meet this group called Constellation. And they've talked about this in the trailers and things like that. But Constellation is basically this group that wants to research the artifact. And they say, hey, you helped get it and something happened and we want to know more. So come with us. And you say, okay. And that's really how the story begins. I mean, you go back to this big city.

So it's within the first hour or so of the game. You're in New Atlantis. And there you are. And you're talking to Constellation. They're kind of explaining, go forth into the galaxy. And you're like, okay, cool. I'll hunt artifacts. Yeah. Let's do it. Yeah. So Ryan, you and I are big story people. We both said we're not crazy about games like Bloodborne because we need that carrot to keep us in the action do you find the story of Starfield compelling enough to keep you involved in the action I definitely do especially uh with how many Bethesda games I've

played I kind of know how it builds how the story kind of develops and, and how these, you know, it may not be super enticing in the very, very beginning or these certain parts of it, but with everything combined, it makes a really, really great story. So as we played the game, I mean, I got 29 hours so far since, um, you know, Thursday, you know, a few days. So we cracked out pretty hard and we got some hours in. And so obviously we liked it and we enjoyed it. But I'm, you know, just like you, big story guy. I've been enticed by it. I've been drawn to it.

And I've been honing mainly on the main story, you know, most of the time so far. Yeah, I've been, I've tried to do roughly do roughly 50 50 like half of it has been the main quest line and if i start on a side quest that seems interesting i'll stick with it and see it all the way through i don't like starting quest lines and leaving them hanging um i think for me i i have really enjoyed the story i think it's very similar to the movie contact where there are these artifacts that have been left around. And when you put the artifacts next to each other, they start to form something. But we don't know what it is initially.

And so there's this big mystery of who left these artifacts? Why do they have this power? What are we actually building when this all goes together? Is this going to be some kind of portal? Is this going to be some kind of portal? Is this going to be some kind of new technology? And that's kind of what's driving you to keep going in the world. Have you been into the story side as well, Josh? Or do you find that to be a little slower? Here's the thing. The story to me is a hundred stories that just kind of crisscross and intermingle. I know that there's the main campaign,

and that's what I focused on initially. And then I went, okay, I kind of have my feet under me. Let me start looking at some of these side quests. And dude, the stories in the side quests in this game rival the main campaign. Now, you can say that's good or bad. Does it mean the main campaign doesn't stand out? I mean, I'm almost 30 hours in at this point. So it's like, you decide whether that's good or bad. Does it mean the main campaign doesn't stand out? I mean, I'm almost 30 hours in at this point. So it's like, you know, you decide whether that's good or bad. I think it's good because all of these freaking things that I come across and you come

across a lot of them, I'm like, Oh, I probably should help that farmer in need. Let me, let me go help that guy. And then I help him for two hours. And then it's like, Oh, this ship's in trouble and they need my help. Okay, let me go do that. And then that takes me on some crazy quest line for the next two hours. And there's stories for all of them. So for me, yes, they keep me engaged. They keep me going. I don't know how they compare to the main campaign because I haven't beaten the main

campaign yet. So I have a feeling like I'm in for a big twist or something there. I just haven't gotten to that point yet i actually thought it was really funny because i messaged you guys and said oh my goodness there is so much side content let alone exploration and main campaign i said i bet we've all played totally different stuff it turned out josh you and i went all the way down that farmer quest line where you just you enter one system and right off the bat there's like a distress call next thing i know i'm 15

missions deep with helping this farmer's defense alliance and you said you went down the same path i couldn't believe it because this game hits you with probably a side mission every three minutes that you're running around major cities you You just stand around and hear a conversation. Some woman wants you to go get her a coffee because she's tired. Like that's literally one of the side missions. Or some guy gets arrested in the city of Neon and you're going to go visit him in prison. And the fact that we kind of each ended up doing that full quest line was just so funny. I've also been running missions for the Rangers.

I just finished that today that ended up being several missions long but i think for like the first 30 hours you play everyone's going to experience a lot of really different content which i think is a really good thing well there's yeah go ahead ryan i was just gonna say there's there's so many different kind of avenues to take like you said doesn't matter what city you're walking in. As you're walking, those text icons pop up and you overhear a conversation. And if you're like, huh, what? You turn, stop, listen.

And then they start asking you, hey, can you help us? Can you help us? And that happens everywhere. Every freaking 15 feet, somebody else is like,'s a whole nother section that can take you off on a different path and that's what was so cool and and it's hard because i know myself i'm add as well um so i i would i would just bounce between all these different like side missions but you you can't you can't do it without you know finishing one so you got to kind of stay on a path to knock one out.

But it's hard to do because everywhere you go, there's somebody else like, hey, hey, what's going on over here? Can you help me? And so, yeah, it was just there was there's so much there's if you have nothing going on and you have a lot of time in your life, play this game. Oh, yeah, absolutely. You can you can put every second of every day into this game for months yeah and you you won't run out of content there's that much stuff to do in this game all right so let's talk a little bit about character creation so i know none of us really care all that much about what our characters look like i'm a little bit more uh concerned about like choosing your

background and choosing your traits. So there are 21 backgrounds to choose from. And ultimately, what it really matters is that each different background will give you three skill points in tier one on your skill tree. So for example, I picked up the industrialist background. That gave me points into persuasion, because I love being able to talk my way in or out of things, a point into security, which gives you lockpicking, and one into research methods to let you complete projects quicker. That's what I chose. The one thing I will say was a little bit disappointing is that it doesn't come into play very often. I think I've only seen two prompts where I could

have dialogue specific to my industrial background. But I was curious to hear your guys' thoughts. What were the backgrounds that you picked and how do you feel about it? It's just shaking his head. Yeah, I'm shaking my head. I don't know because Paul says it doesn't really come into effect. I, because I hate these things because there's so many choices and I'm so indecisive that I can't figure out exactly what I want to do. So I'm like, oh, I'll just go on the Google machine. Let's see here. What should I do on Starfield? What's the best background?

Yeah, what's the best backgrounds to do? I don't remember the other ones, but one of them, I think one I did was Empath, which helped me a lot with negotiations and other things like that. But the other one was the Hero Worship. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. And so they're like, oh, you'll get a guy that'll meet you up. He'll give you things, and he'll be a character that'll follow you around. I'm like, okay, cool. I'll get a guy right off the bat.

He'll help me on these missions right away by the time i met this guy and he's supposed to be a super fan by the time i met this guy i already had two or three characters with me you know following me around and then i met this guy and i'm like all right hop on board you can come with us too he is the most annoying guy i ever he's got a faux hawk and he's like you're the greatest can i follow one meter or two meters behind you like if i ask him to come out and then like when i go out with him he gives me the same crap that everybody else does they're like here's a piece of iron here's a piece of argon like oh so it's not worth it it's not worth it it's nothing special now you're encumbered now yeah now i'm encumbered and i got this guy that yeah that's

my super fan and all i do every time i leave him in the ship and every time i walk back in the ship he's like oh man you're so amazing he just praises me as i walk in it's it's horrible i made the wrong decision people if you can avoid it trust me do not pick that skill. So just to clarify, there are backgrounds and there are traits. That is a trait to have hero worship and empath. The background is where I wish it was just baked a little bit more into the story, where someone would make a comment about running their business, and then my character should be able to have something to say about that. And that's where they don't do it a whole lot lot i will say the traits are way more interesting than the backgrounds

one of the traits that i picked was alien dna did either of you guys pick that one up by chance no i got really scared off by the health packs not working very well so here's here's the thing when you pick alien dna it says that you consented to some scientific experimentation and now you have more health and you also have more oxygen which lets you run longer but the downside is that health packs and food do not heal you as much so guess who's always hurting for med packs guys i am constantly on the search for healing, and I just eat all food I find at all times. Any traits you picked, Josh, that are kind of funny? Background-wise, I went the Cyber Runner, which gives you stealth, the ability to pick locks,

because I absolutely have to know what's behind that door, and then pickpocketing, so theft. So I went basically like your thief route for that. I, oddly enough, did not take any of the traits. I got a little scared off by all the negative aspects on them. And I was just like, I don't think I want to have to deal with any of this stuff, man. I just want to be in space. And so I just said, hey, you know what? I don't like any of these traits. I'm not going to go with them. Um, so yeah, I just kind of went the bland route there. I did also pick the kid stuff trait. Cause I remembered hearing about this. And I remember the one thing I heard is that they will take your character's look and it will generate your mom and

your dad to try to make them look like you. And I was like, oh, that's kind of neat. And the funny thing is that it just says with kid stuff, you can go visit your parents, but you do also have to send them money every week or every month. 2% of your income. Yeah. So I was so excited when I got the option to go visit my parents. And I don't know if this is going to change down the road. They have mailed me a few gifts in the mail and they've sent me a couple notes, but it was so disappointing. Like I go to visit my parents and they're just like, oh honey, you visited us. Your dad just retired and your mom thinks you're really special.

And then that's it. There's nothing else to do. You pick up your old backpack, which you can wear and it increases your carry capacity. And that's like all There's nothing else to do. You pick up your old backpack, which you can wear and it increases your carry capacity and that's like all it offered. So I'm not sure kid stuff's really all that worth it, but maybe I'll get some good gifts down the road. Yeah, I'm glad I didn't take any of these things after hearing you guys tell me how terrible they both are.

Well, I don't even know which one's which apparently. Yeah, backgrounds. Ryan just wanted to tell everybody that he had a fan. That's all he wanted to do. It's like, guys, somebody loves me, and they follow me around everywhere. I played 30 hours of this game in two days, so come on, give me a break. It's all good. All right, well, with that being said, we're going to take our short first break and then we're going to come back and talk about combat and gameplay.

Behold, my name is Maximus Intertanius, and I come to you with big stars in big dramas like Gladiator 2, Dexter, Original Sin and 1923. Stream Paramount Plus for $6.99 a month. Okay, guys. Meat and potatoes time. Let's start talking about gameplay. And there's so much stuff we could break down here. But let's start off with combat. I want to hear a little bit. How are you guys approaching combat?

How are you playing this game? Bang, bang, baby. Don't tick me off because you're going to take two to the face. So despite taking stealth, are you just going in guns blazing or are you playing any kind of stealth? I am not playing any stealth because every time I try to stealth, people see me right away and I go, well, this is pointless. Yeah. I just, yeah, man, I like shooting people in this game. I will say like the combat is not anything incredible, but for what we're used to

for a Bethesda game, especially the Fallout games, I always abhorred the shooting in Fallout. This is very serviceable. It's not going to feel crazy good like some games would, but it's serviceable in the sense that it's like the guns feel different i have different weapons that i gravitate towards i can go in guns blazing if i want i have to kind of duck between cover because i'm getting shot from eight different guys like it's it's decent and it's decent enough that i don't mind it or find it distracting in any way yeah no i i agree i was gonna say i think out of the bethesda games for me, it's the best, uh, combat,

uh, you know, activity that they have. I, I love the different, I wish, I wish there wasn't so many different types of ammo. There's like 800 types of ammo,

which is ridiculous. Cause I can't tell you how many times all my, I go and i buy ammo thinking it's for my gun and then i realized it wasn't for this gun it was for another gun because they have 762 and 777 and 6.5 and they have a million different types of ammunition which i get there's a lot of different types of guns but you know it's a video game come on streamline it for us guys make it a little bit easier there are 19 ammo types which is far too many there you go and one time i got so mad because i had two shotguns and the one that i had out had

350 rounds like i had so much ammo so i go and i sell that shotgun and i go to equip the other different ammo type zero ammo and i, dude, this is so frustrating. I carried around. I found this amazing gun. It was like a Desert Eagle pistol. It was like so much more damage. I did not find any ammo for it until I'd say like six hours later into the game. I just kept carrying it with me.

That was the old 45 Ultramag. That's super rare. You know how many ammos have numbers in front of them in this game? They all do. Oh, man yeah it's i was definitely worried i thought that the gunplay was going to be poor my fear is that it was going to be fallout with no vats and yeah thankfully it is not that yeah it's not that bad it's it's not great but it's highly serviceable they don't even explain to you that you can peek out from cover. I just kind of discovered that on my own. That's another big thing about this game is that they explain probably 5% of the things you can do in this game.

This is kind of the epitome where you find out you can do something after playing 200 hours, and you can't believe that you never learned you can do something in this game so paul wait you can peek out from cover you can peek out from cover i know you know what i was always doing 30 hours in paul 30 hours yeah were you guys doing the strafe yes that's 100 what i was doing pop out and back in that's what i was doing at first what's funny is if you walk out with your gun, when you get close to cover, you'll see him tilt his gun in. And then if you right click to ADS, he'll lean out from cover and then you can fire. Oh my goodness. And this is all stuff they do not teach you. I am trying this tonight.

What a time to be alive. All right, let's go, baby. That should help a little bit with your combat and staying alive a little longer. Oh, I will say there are some really cool effects on the guns, too. Like, I remember the first time I got a legendary gun. It said that if I shot people, it would lower their morale. And I pulled out that gun and I shot a female pirate pirate and she just started freaking out and she started screaming there's just so much blood everywhere and then like i just kept shooting her and then she was like stunned for like two seconds and then came

back to her senses and started fighting again so i was like oh that's so funny that like that's actually a debuff that my gun can apply yeah i love that that is my favorite part about the combat is the fact that it's almost borderlands like in the sense that you get all these weapons that have all these different variables on them and i love that part because it's like you're always excited when that next like colored weapon drops you know and it's like oh there's a new blue one maybe it sucks maybe it doesn't but yeah i mean poison or you know different elemental effects demoralizing uh i mean there's i feel like there's 50 different modifiers for guns so far yeah yeah there's yeah they have the they have the electric one where um gosh i forget what the

name is though but when you shoot every every so often it'll give, oh, it's Tesla. It's the Tesla modifier or whatever. Okay, so anyone who gets this, please be careful around your companions. Because they will get very, very pissed at you if you shoot the enemies and then they get electrocuted and they will leave you. Which is another cool little wrinkle in the game is i had i had sarah at one point you know and also save often so you can reload i had her yes she was so mad at me and she's like i need to speak with you and on the top right corner and it's like sarah disliked that sarah's leaving your companionship sarah blah blah and i was like oh no and i wasn't

even i wasn't even messing with her and then it was done. And I went and talked to her. She's like, what do you think you're doing? I thought I could fix it. And then at the end of it, I was like, whatever. I'm just going to reload. I'm like, screw you. I'm on Sarah's side here, because if I kept getting shot with electricity, I would leave too. Yeah, I don't want to get electrocuted.

I was shooting the enemies, and it just kind of jumped over, man. It's electricity. I got no control. There you go. Be careful with that chain lightning. This game also has this huge element of exploration you can pretty much go and explore anywhere you want ryan i know that you mentioned that you spent like three hours just running around on the moon uh do you want to speak to what elements of exploration you like in this game um well as long as you don't try to use the map to explore

then uh you should be able to find a lot um you mean the map's not terribly helpful in this game oh no yeah no it's it's so great man i love just looking at blue dots what map there's no map in this game oh yeah exactly hold on hold on we're getting off on a tangent we'll we'll go back to that later so so exploration um there's so much in this every world not just this world every world every moon every lunar surface every you know just area where you're you're even just flying your ship around um you can explore and see so much it's it's it's hard to describe honestly like I hopped to the moon

there was a little section of the story in the beginning where they talk about oh you know the old moon and earth when you know what happened to earth and why it's not you know populated anymore what not so I was like oh I'll go check out the moon and then I look and I see an abandoned facility and then I see another one

over here and I'm just wandering this desolate wasteland of the moon. But I'm going to all these facilities. I'm gathering materials. I'm gathering ammunition. I'm gathering firearms. But I'm fighting at the same time. There's so much in every area that it's kind of hard to comprehend.

Because there's little intricacies within every facility as well. They'll have notes on lockers. They'll have one of the stations I got into. There was a note on front of a locker and it said taco Tuesday night or something like that. Potato tacos. And I opened the locker and there was potatoes and there was non-bread. And I was like, well, I'm snatching those. guess i'm not having tacos tomorrow oh you know exactly and there's there's just so many little things like that where if you stop and you read the bulletin board or the

message board or just i i don't know even how to describe it just like skyrim or fallout or any of these games the exploration there's so many more hours if you just take the time to look and smell the roses than you could ever dream of yeah the exploration in this game is where I think I'm having like the most fun in that regard because I was talking to you guys before we hit record but but it's like, I just get so sidetracked from exploring and finding some crazy mission out in the middle of nowhere, starting that mission, which then goes to another mission and then getting sidetracked on that one. And before you know it, I'm, you know, eight missions deep into this quest line or something like that, that I had no idea I was even about to come across. And for me, that exploration that leads to that stuff is...

I mean, it's really just fantastic, man. It can be a little distracting. I'm going to have to force myself to go back to the main story. But I love landing on some random planet. And I'm sure this stuff is procedurally generated or pulls from a list. But anytime you land on a planet, there's usually two major points of interest that you can see off in the distance and it's like here's an abandoned facility in a monster cave and it's like you know plus the main reason i'm

at the planet in the first place so i have checked out a couple of those like just little side areas um you know there's always something there usually a chest at the end where you get a good piece of gear so it feels rewarding to actually go and do that stuff too but yeah i love the exploration You know, there's always something there, usually a chest at the end where you get a good piece of gear. So it feels rewarding to actually go and do that stuff, too. But yeah, I love the exploration in this game. Yeah, I believe the way they did it is they handcrafted a whole bunch of those facilities. But then anytime you land, it'll procedurally grab a couple. So I don't know how many iterations there are of those.

I'm sure eventually you would start to recognize repeats. Yeah. But as far as I can tell up to this point, I certainly have not experienced any repetition yet. Yeah, I haven't either. Yeah. All right. So let's talk a little bit about lock picking because, Josh, you and I say we have to be able to pick every lock. I don't know if Ryan's engaged in any either.

What's in the box? I got to know, Ryan's engaged in any either. What's in the box? I gotta know, man. I know. Like, knowing that there's loot right there that I just can't touch drives me crazy. So I always have to be able to do it. Every game like this has its own lockpicking system. Sometimes it's kind of goofy where, you know, you just angle your lockpick and then you try to turn it. And then if you try too many times, it'll break the lock pick.

In this game, you use digi picks and it's like a mini game puzzle that you have to play. How would you guys describe the lock picking puzzle? And do you think it's fun or do you find it to be a nuisance? I think it's fun, man. Honestly, it's a little mini puzzle. It makes you, it's visually, you have to see. So the way that it works, this is going to be hard to describe, so the way that it works this is going to be hard to describe but the way that it works is there's two circles but there's little segments of of those circles that are missing and on the side of the screen you have these like small circle images and they have like little blocks in different positions on the outer part of that circle so basically what you're trying to do is like plug the holes in the circle that is the lock itself using these digi picks that have the plugs for the holes, but they're, they have

to line up. And sometimes you may have three on one and then two on another. And so you spin them around until they line up, but you have another layer that you have to worry about. And that's where the puzzle part comes in. Cause it's like, uh, you know, a key might fit on the outer ring, but if you put it there now now nothing else will line up. So you actually have to kind of visually think, okay, this one goes here, this one goes there. And then let me think about the inner ring now. Okay, if I turn this one and it goes there, then this one is the last piece. And then you just kind of click them all and be done with it.

But I like it. I think it's a fun minigame. It makes you think every time um some of them are harder because then they start throwing in fake uh like fake like like blah i don't what the heck are we calling these things man like like the teeth yeah teeth on the ring it's very hard to describe i think one of the things oh and by the way you also start getting third rings and more as you get more advanced locks but one of the coolest things about it is you first unlock lock picking just by spending a skill point in it but in order to start doing advanced locks now you first have to

break into a couple beginner locks then it unlocks the ability to level up your lock picking using another skill point so i love when a game forces you to use that ability and once you've used it enough you get to then unlock the next level of difficulty so if you want to level up in lock picking you can't just put four consecutive points you have to actually do the challenges to unlock the next tier which i think is great it's like you're actually learning the skill which i love that system yeah yes and it was cool too because as you're doing the lock picking if you are trying it out and you get one and then you're like oh wait you know i'm gonna need that one later there is like kind of a reset you can go back one and it costs a lot though yeah so yeah it does

yeah it costs you a loss pick lock pick but then you can go back and you can try it again but i love this i i you know i i played a million hours of skyrim i got really really really good at the lock picking system with skyrim but i honestly love this more because there's a little more to it it's not just that kind of little click click click so there's there's a little thought involved it. It's not just that kind of little click, click, click. So there's a little thought involved. I wish, honestly, they didn't have that kind of reverse system. So if you crapped out, you crapped out. Too bad.

Sorry. Oh, yeah. You want to go hardcore, huh? Yeah, hardcore, man. Oh, man. If you don't look at what you got there and you don't run it up right. I'll reload. I just reload.

I want to know what's in that safe, man. Sounds about right. If you guys didn't know, as you switch between the key rings, as you move them, it saves your position. So you can click through all of them and line everything up before you actually engage any of them. That's what I do. So that way you can kind of solve the whole thing. And that way you know you won't have to reverse back at all. But they do get progressively harder.

Sometimes they take a while. Yeah, they're not easy at the harder levels, which I like because it's like this is a master lock. And I'm like, well, I'm a master lock picker. And then I spend 15 minutes figuring out the puzzle. And then I'm like, OK, I got this. The best was one time I started. I started breaking into a guy's safe safe but it was right next to him he goes he's like hey don't go in there that's my safe i'm just like playing this mini game for

eight minutes trying to break it open oh it's too funny what about pickpocketing and stealing have you guys done much of that because like all bethesda games this does drive me a little crazy you can loot every pencil notepad folder piece of toilet paper anything sitting around in the world you can loot you can steal to your heart's content you can pickpocket have you guys done much of that i have um i haven't pickpocketed like everybody but if i know like somebody's probably got a key or it's like the you know the mercenary captain or whatever it's, he probably has something good on him, so let me see what he's got.

So I'm not confessing to any crimes, but I may have dabbled in the arts a little bit. I've never stolen more in my life than I have accidentally in Bethesda games. I will go to click, oh, look, a sandwich, or oh, this or that and i click and i just steal i just take everything else like around because anything like you said anything that's there you can take so there's a million times where i'm just trying to get the one thing

i need a potion or or this or that and i just take everything else and i'm like just clicking just clicking just clicking and all of a sudden i have like four things in my inventory so i i haven't stolen anything in particular yet uh still getting used to the game but back you know in the old skyrim days i would steal quite a bit so for me i have not had any issues with contraband on my ship i have not tried carrying anything i i did hear if you you're one of those i did hear if you ever steal a ship be very careful because a lot of times it'll have contraband and that's how people get caught because they'll steal a ship they won't think about it that's fly to a new area and then they'll scan you and you'll get caught i i did unlock pickpocketing earlier today just to test it

and i immediately just in the middle of broad daylight tried to pickpocket a guard just to see what would happen he immediately turned and said that's against the law and then i said i won't put up a fight so then he he arrested me and put me in jail and so it just like fast forwarded time it said 500 xp has been deducted i had pay a $300 fine and then I walked out the front door and then I reloaded cause I didn't want to lose the XP. But I did think that it's funny that you'll actually get arrested. Now is that, is that new with the XP?

Cause I don't remember that happening before that you actually lose XP when you're arrested. Not that I remember, but you definitely do in this one. So don't get caught. I may have been smuggling some harvested organs. Okay? Again, cannot

confirm or deny this, but they were worth a lot of money. And I was like, I need to go sell these things. And I was like, they're not going to find them. So I warp into the system, and they're like, we're scanning your ship. And I'm like, they're not going to find you know so i warp into the system and they're like we're scanning your ship and i'm like they're not gonna find them and then they were like power down your ship we see illegal contraband and i was like ah busted ships full of kidneys so yes i did get arrested but but like everything else in this game you getting arrested leads to like massive massive quest lines man you know so

it's like you kind of want to get arrested at some point though that's kind of the whole point of everything in this game is you want to experiment you want to see what happens because something will yeah you just got to go test everything out experience everything the game has to offer yeah yeah absolutely uh let's yeah we got a little bit of time for one last subject here and then we'll take our last break inventory in this game i will say can be very frustrating it sucks there are a lot of inventory systems between your ship and your person um you are constantly getting encumbered you cannot escape that i have pumped a lot of points into i think they call it weight lifting so that way you can carry more

still end up encumbered all the time um my guy is so buff yeah i'm shredded shredded man because i have like six points in weight lifting at this point and you're still encumbered yes oh it's very hard and then you're like building outposts that gather mats and you got to worry about that being stored and like it's not easy to manage all these inventory systems and it still operates mostly like previous bethesda games like fallout it was always so hard to go in all these different menus. It's no different in Starfield. They definitely could have improved the inventory system. Dude, I hate this system.

I'll be honest. It's my major complaint about the game right now. I have FOMO. If I found this stuff, dude, if I found this rare element, it tells me this is a rare or legendary crafting component. And I'm like, oh, I better hang on to that. And then I'm encumbered all the time, all the time. And this is after hitting the gym for like 12 hours straight. There's menus upon menus. The only way to manage this is to give your companions gear so that you're not constantly encumbered all the time.

But they keep the gear you give them. I don't remember who's got what at this point, man. I'm going around patting people down like, who's got that armor, man? Who's got that armor? And there's so many companions. They're all loaded up. There's Barret. There's Sarah.

There's Vasco. There's Andresia. There's Vladimir. Give me a storage chest. Just give me a chest in my ship where I can put everything and I'd be okay. But you can't, you can store it in your ship, but then if you're at a crafting station, it doesn't auto pull materials from your ship inventory. So then I'm like, I have 200 of those, but I'm not going back to my ship for that. Yeah, the inventory system sucks.

And the first ship has really bad inventory. It can only hold like 500 kilograms or whatever. It's like 450 or something like that. Yeah, 426 or something. Yeah, it's not a lot. Yeah. Luckily, I finally got my second ship and it holds 2,600. So I'm like, oh, wow, I got plenty of space now.

Yeah, but it is hard because you got to chase down all your companions and get your stuff back yeah i don't know how you design this bad of an inventory system and then the rest of your game is the way that it is man if our biggest complaints are map and inventory i guess you can work around it i was gonna say the same way they designed the map that's how they designed which is they didn't they're like they're almost done they're like oh crap we gotta do a map in the inventory system well here we go yeah just give it to the interns interns are freaking out all right well let's go ahead and take our second break and then we'll be right back to finish up the show all right we are back this is my favorite question of the day and i think this is going to be the most fun thing to talk about what are some memorable moments or memorable quests that you have engaged on up to this point

ryan i want to hear about grandma oh you don't even know about grandma ryan asked us if we ran into grandma and we said no i don't even know what grandma ryan asked us if we ran into grandma and we said no i don't even know what you're talking about i want to hear this so i don't remember where but i i warped to some area and i ran into grandma and i got a distress signal hey can you help me come on down you want dinner and i'm like let me see what this is all about worst case i'll just jack this lady's ship so i go in i hop aboard and i'm like looking for this grandma and i can't see nobody but i see uh tikka masala and and beef stroganoff and all these like meals everywhere and all these food items and i'm just taking everything in this ship. I'm walking up.

I go to the upper level. I climb up the ladder. I go up to the top where the deck is. Nothing, nothing. And then finally I look over and I'm like, oh, this lady's on her bed. The grandma was asleep and it says her name is Grandma. And I'm like, okay. So then I go and I activate her.

And just like any Bethesda game, she wakes up and stands up and starts talking to me immediately like she's been awake forever. And she's like, hey, honey, how are you doing? And she gives me this backstory about how her husband died. And she's just exploring and her grandkids are worried. So I end up giving her like a thousand credits because it was on the chat line. I'm like, you know, I took a lot of stuff out of this lady's ship already. And so then I give her a thousand credits and she goes, oh, well, take whatever you need. And I'm like, in my head, I'm like, I already took it all, lady.

There's nothing left. Yeah, it was just one of those things that's such a weird interaction in this game. But it made me laugh and I spent like 20 30 minutes there i was talking to her i was i was walking around her ship looking at stuff reading things it was it was so cool and it was uh just something that was just so different so i was like here's your credits um have a safe travel i got back in my ship and i left a lot fuller than when i got there and and it was awesome oh i was so ready for you to say someone's waiting to harvest your organs and the food is poisoned i did not expect this to end on a wholesome note no it was so good it was a wholesome awesome it's just a grandma cruising around the galaxy trying to feed people man

like yeah that's awesome what they're gonna do is they're gonna there's gonna be another grandma It's just a grandma cruising around the galaxy trying to feed people, man. Yeah. Like, yeah, that's awesome. What they're going to do is there's going to be another grandma, because everybody's going to hear this and tell their friends and family about the video game podcast. Imposter grandma. Yeah. And then there's going to be imposter grandma, and she's going to kill him. That's what's going to happen.

What about you, Josh? Anything memorable? Dude, a lot in this game is memorable. I came across this, and again, completely random event. I'm doing this quest. I warp into this new planetary system, and I get a hail from the planet and a hail from a ship at the same time. And the planet's like, hey, can you help us?

There's this unknown ship in orbit. We don't know what it is, and we can't reach it. And then I get hailed from the ship at the same time, but it's all garble. So then I'm like, Ooh, well, what's going on here? So I fly up to the ship, board the ship, and it's a human colony that left earth 200 years ago. They didn't know about interstellar travel at the time. So they've been flying for 200 years they finally get to this planet where they're supposed to settle down and like maintain the human race and there's like a the planet is a tourist paradise planet it's all built up and everything already and it's like

they want you they can't talk because the the systems on the 200 year old ship are so old that they can't communicate with anybody on the planet. So nobody knows what's going on. You go down to the planet, you're talking to those people. They're just CEOs and they want you to blow up the ship. So it won't be in the way of when they take photos from orbit of the, this paradise planet. So they're like,

if it goes away, it's fine with us. And you're like, do you want me to blow this up? And they're like, no, no away, it's fine with us. And you're like, do you want me to blow this up? And they're like, no, no, no, we would never say that. But if somebody messed with the thermal override on their reactors, it probably wouldn't end well. And you're like, oh, okay. So it was really neat because it's like, how do I get around blowing the ship up, but I have to solve this problem?

Well, eventually you can go and buy a new warp drive and have it like fitted to this really old ship but it costs you like 25 000 credits which is a lot of credits so it's like i seriously contemplate i'm like dude if i blow all them up who's gonna know you know and then i was like i can't i can't so i spent all that money then you have to do this little mini quest to like like retrofit the ship and everything. But to me, that stood out because it's like, I could have made a really good decision or a really bad decision in this case. I don't know how it would have turned out. I paid to do the right thing in this regard. But this just happened because I warped into some rando

system, dude. To me, that's what you find in this game oh there's a lot of stuff like that have have you guys been hailed by a ship trying to reach you about your ship's extended warranty oh no really and i would shoot them down instantly i will blow that ship up can you oh oh you absolutely can they they they pull you just you enter a new system and a ship just hails you and they're like hello sir or madam we've been trying to reach you about your ship's extended warranty which has expired or is expiring soon would you like to hear more and i said yes and then they said it sounds like you want to hear more and then i just kept listening to everything and then they try they try to sell you on a 100,000 credit extended warranty for your ship.

And then finally they're just like, attack. And then you can just fight them. But I thought that was so funny. And then also, Josh, you may have done this because I know you and I were doing a lot of missions for the Rangers. Have you run the Red Mile? That was the other one I was going to mention. Yes, I absolutely did run it. And that was such a cool little mission to just have in this game. I was like, they're not going to make me. And then they did. And I was like, all right.

Yeah. So you go to this bar. I think the bar might even be called the Red Mile. The Red Mile it is. And you basically go inside. Yeah yeah and you find out that basically they take runners they will hire people and they have to run on foot from the bar out in the freezing cold you actually have to run pretty far distance activate a beacon and then make your way back and the whole area is filled with dangerous wildlife that will come attack you and basically you have to earn favor with the person running the bar and they basically say the only way i'm going to give it to you is if you run the red mile yourself and the game does such a good job building the anxiety and anticipation of it there's like notes written this is your last chance turn back you finally take the elevator

down to the bottom and it opens and there's already just dead bodies littering the ground and i was like oh man how intense is this gonna be so i check my inventory i start popping all these drugs to give me like oh to regen let me run faster my guy's taking all these you know substances and it actually wasn't all that hard i just sprinted past everything and then ran back. But it was just still really funny where it kind of builds almost like the movie Running Man, which we were just talking about the other day. A little bit of shades of that. But yeah, there's a lot of stuff like that that I just found so funny.

Because as soon as you hear the red mile, it's like, all right, it's just a matter of time. They're going to make me run it and sure enough you know you do i was so glad that they actually did too though oh yeah absolutely i just want to say like josh you talked a big game about being a pirate and you were going to kill everybody and then you went man dude i i have video game guilt i come on legitimately contemplated blowing that ship up. But, you know, Ryan, you weren't in that ship meeting the people and talking to them and then realizing their backstory. Yeah. And then, you know, like, I can't kill all these poor, innocent people. They've been traveling through space for 200 years needlessly. I think the only other thing that I wanted to mention is that the game doesn't have a ton of humor, but when they do hit you with it, it can be quite funny.

I don't know if it's part of the main quest or if it's just random. But one time I went back to the lodge, which is your headquarters for Constellation, and someone had reprogrammed Vasco just to mess with barrett so when barrett would talk to him he'd be like hey vasco can you uh run some calculation and he would go well of course mr muscles let me get right on that and he kept calling him like mr handsome mr muscles and i thought it was so funny and finally barrett's like isolate any code that's been changed in the last 24 hours and like just to get rid of it but i just love little things like that where you just walk into a building you get to hear ambient stuff like this and it can be very funny at times well well that's what that's what bethesda does so well is they they put those little kind of things in the game

like all throughout from beginning to the end like the little little kind of tweaks that that just get you to think and laugh and and you know yeah it's the perfect seasoning honestly because it's like you put too much in you're gonna ruin things but just the right amount and it man it just makes it so much better yeah so uh last major question here what else do you guys want to cover it can be anything positive or negative about the game anything that has stood out up to this point i will say performance wise it's okay um i know that some people said they worried about performance is it buggy you know how buggy is it it's a bethesda game all that stuff

i'm running at 4k, pretty much ultra settings. I'm pulling about 40 frames a second, which is not great, but it's not the end of the world. I mean, if I drop a few things down, I'm getting right at 60 frames a second in 4K. So I'm fine with that. I mean, it's not like it's that fast paced of a game. I really have not run into very many bugs. I mean, I get the odd, if I I'm changing gear, it's not updating my look or there's a couple of graphical glitches here and there. I had one crash like the very first time that I tried playing and I haven't had any since then.

So overall, I mean, it's in pretty good shape, you know, I mean, especially for a Bethesda game. But what I have encountered has not been that distracting which is nice yeah for bethesda game i always say let's give six months for the model to take you know take a hold of it and then it'll be good but for for from launch especially like early launch like we got um it's been good uh i had a had a couple, like I had, I recorded it. I'll, I'll probably send it to you guys, but I had one where I was in an area and,

and, uh, I threw a couple nades and then I look over at a computer chair and then there's like a food tray and it's just rattling along. It's just like, you know, just sitting there just, and I jumped up and I'm looking, looking at it and I shoot it and I shoot it and it's still just rattling

there and it's stuck. And there's a couple of times where Sarah was out in the open with me in a horrible planet with no oxygen and she had nothing on but her space pack. And no helmet, no space suit, nothing. And she's running around shooting a gun. And so I took a screenshot of that and sent it to you guys. So just a couple little things

those are totally minor didn't take away from the game for me at all but like you know just things that the modders will fix you know per the per the usual i've definitely run into the same thing ryan i'll be running on the moon and all of a sudden i'll turn around and Barret is just running around in street clothes. Yeah, pretty funny. I will say one thing, and this is not, it's going to sound negative about Starfield, and I don't mean it to, but one thing that Starfield does not have that some other RPG or open worlds do have is starfield has a lack of clever interactions between characters and this is like where you really see larian studios shine whether it's balder's gate 3 or dos 2 or you even see this in like red dead redemption 2 if you bring a certain character into a certain context there will be changed dialogue and things that change. And this game does do it sometimes, but there are times when you think it would and it doesn't. So like when

I first met Vladimir, he's so worried about Andresia and I went and I rescued her. And now you have to go back to the eye. And I brought her with me because I thought, oh, Vladimir is going to be so happy to see her. Doesn't care. He doesn't address her. It doesn't matter at all. I took Sarah to meet my parents. Never once did they talk to one another. She's just standing around awkwardly in the corner while I'm catching up with my parents. And I thought that was kind of a little bit disappointing

because it just would have been so cool to have it. It's not necessary. The only time I did have it, it actually was really neat. I took Barret with me to a ship that serves as a hospital. And it turns out that the ranger on duty says, hey, I remember you. Didn't I bust you for smuggling 20 years ago? And Barret says, yes, and you let me go. And that's when I changed my whole life. And I left that behind. And I thought that was really neat, where if I had taken a different companion, I would have missed out on all that

dialogue. So there is some stuff like that in there. I just I do wish there was a little bit more because Larian in particular really knocks that out of the park. Yeah, they raise the bar on that for sure. I get you on that. I mean, the people do talk and interact, but sometimes it just feels kind of like dull or lifeless or like it's not super on point or something. But then there are times like I didn't bring Barrett with me on that mission. And so I didn't get any of that because I had somebody else different with me. So that is really cool that like these little things can happen just depending on some of the choices you randomly make at the same time. Yeah, pretty neat. Just a couple last things while we wrap up the show here. We did just a couple days ago predict what we thought the Metacritic score would be. Josh and I both wanted to guess 89. But since Josh said that first, I bumped it up to 90.

Ryan said 91. Turns out it's an 88 so we were we were very close all three of us in guessing where it would be um very very good game and then do you guys think it's worth the 70 price tag yes yeah i do for sure i mean i'm 30 hours in and i legitimately feel like i'm still doing like the introductory missions to the game yep which I know sounds crazy but that's the way I feel you know so it's kind of like I'm sure it's a Bethesda game I'm sure there's going to be another cool moment that is going to happen or big reveal or something like that I mentioned that earlier in the show but yeah I mean I can't

imagine you're not getting your money's worth for this i mean if you have xbox you can get this on game pass as well so then i mean that's even better but it's easily worth the 70 price tag yeah i mean 70 70 bucks i i you know i'm the same i got 30 hours in already in every area i went to i'm like trying to okay i gotta get far enough for the pod. I got to get far enough to where we can record and I know something. And I still kept feeling like I didn't know enough. Like as far as I went,

I feel like, oh my gosh, this is even more, even more, even more. So there's so much that I haven't even experienced 30 hours in, you know, for 70 70 bucks that's a no-brainer just get it i mean there are still videos that come out now where people discover stuff in red dead 2 that they didn't know it's gonna be like that with starfield there are gonna be videos still releasing five years from now if people you know discovering new weird interactions between characters and posting it online i have no doubt i feel like i already got my 70 well in our case we paid the full 100

i feel like i already got my money's worth and i'm gonna i'm gonna play it a lot more i 100 agree we did pay so that we could play the game and have this ready for the listeners and it's like i it was well worth that amount of money, you know, it was worth our listeners money. I mean, let's be honest. Thank you everybody. But yeah, I mean,

but yeah, I mean, I, if, if somebody asked me, is this game worth a hundred bucks at this point, I'd be like, yeah,

it is. Do you guys think it'll be nominated for game of the year at the game awards? I don't. Yes. I don't think so. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. I think it'll be nominated nominated i do not think it will win yeah i don't think it'll win but i think it'll be in that third place

i think a lot of people will expect balder's gate 3 or tears of the kingdom but i think starfield will be nominated but i don't see it winning just because like Baldur's Gate 3 is kind of an all-timer. I think Baldur's Gate 3 has changed the future of RPGs. And I think Tears of the Kingdom has changed open world games moving forward. I don't know that Starfield will necessarily change gaming as we know it, despite being a fantastic experience, if that makes sense. Yeah, I agree with that. It's just it's not innovating anything it's just really finally honing everything that's kind of already been done yes yes like like apple you know taking stuff that's already out there packaging it together

making it look nice you mean just you know and doing what others can't and putting it into a perfect package paul is that what you're saying yeah borrow okay borrow slash steal borrow make it all make it overpriced put it in a fancy box like get it for people to just buy for no reason other than clout there it is all right well this was so much fun to record i mean thank you bethesda for giving us a launch that was not fall 76. We're finally able to rinse that bad taste out of our mouth. Right, Josh? Yeah. Oh, my goodness, man.

Thank you. Yeah, I would have lost it if this wound up being like Fallout 76, man. I would have been so sad. I just I would have been I wouldn't have been mad. I just would have been so sad and disappointed. All right. Well, thank you so much to all of our listeners. As a reminder, make sure to swing by MultiplayerSquad.com to check out support options. Starts at five bucks

a month. And then our next episode will be on Thursday when we break down recent gaming news. Just want to say thank you once again to everyone. Hope you all enjoy Starfield. And until next time, happy gaming. See ya. All right. See ya, everybody.