Remember Starfield? That space game we got all excited about in 2023? I wouldn’t blame you if you’d forgotten all about it by now; I haven’t touched the game in months myself and I have no real plans to go back to it. Any lingering feelings of positivity I might’ve had toward the game – and developer Bethesda Game Studios in a more general sense – evaporated pretty quickly when microtransactions and paid mods were added to this single-player title, so I’ve pretty much moved on.
But the launch of Shattered Space – the first of several larger pieces of DLC that are planned for the game – has dragged up the shambling corpse of Starfield for me once again, and I couldn’t let it pass by without sharing my thoughts on what I’ve seen… and offering some unsolicited advice to Bethesda and parent company Microsoft. There are things to consider for both Starfield’s future as well as any potential new games that Bethesda may be lucky enough to make. Let’s get into all of that today.
The reaction to Shattered Space has been mediocre at best outside of Bethesda and Starfield mega-fans. The expansion is currently sitting at a “mixed” rating on Steam… but far more worrying for Microsoft and Bethesda should be the real lack of engagement that Shattered Space is driving. There are, at time of writing, fewer than 1,000 reviews of Shattered Space on Steam – a number that seems pitifully small for the first major expansion pack for the newest Bethesda role-playing game. And the release of Shattered Space didn’t give the game much of a boost in terms of player numbers, either; Starfield was beaten by both Fallout 4 and Skyrim on the day the expansion launched and every day since.
This is even more alarming when you consider that many players will have already pre-purchased Shattered Space last year. In order to pick up the “deluxe” version of Starfield (or whatever it was called), which gave players access to the game on its real release date instead of almost a week later, players had to fork over an additional £35 on Xbox, Steam, and even Game Pass. Included in that price was Shattered Space, so even players left underwhelmed by the base game should have still had access to this DLC. The fact that so few of them could be bothered to even download it or check it out should be ringing alarm bells at Bethesda HQ and for Xbox, too.
Image Credit: SteamDB (above) and Steam (below).
The mixed reception to Shattered Space from those who did bother to fire it up is something that I think could’ve been avoided – and could at least be mitigated in the future. But it would require a change in approach from Bethesda. I’ll try to explain what I mean.
Over the last few weeks and months, Bethesda has been rolling out updates to Starfield. Among the biggest of these have been the rover/buggy, which allows players to traverse the game’s maps more quickly, and also the ability to decorate the interior of spaceships. Both of these were highly-requested by players, and the fact that Bethesda added them is a positive thing.
But part of the disappointment some players and critics are noting with Shattered Space is that it’s “only” a story expansion. The DLC doesn’t add anything of substance to Starfield beyond one new planet and some quests, and that’s leaving some people feeling underwhelmed yet again.
A few months ago, I wrote a piece here on the website in which I argued that Starfield’s first piece of DLC needed to be comparable in how transformative it is to Cyberpunk 2077′s Phantom Liberty, which was released last year. That expansion came with a new area of the map and new quests – just like Shattered Space. But it also came with a major update that overhauled whole in-game systems, completely fixed some of the biggest disappointments with the game, and significantly improved the experience. That’s what Starfield needed… and that’s what it still needs.
The conversation around Shattered Space might’ve been different if things like detailed city maps, interior ship decorating, and the rover vehicle had all arrived along with it. It wouldn’t have fundamentally “fixed” Starfield, but it might’ve given the game more of a boost and gotten more players talking about the game in a positive light for a change. Instead, this opportunity was missed.
So here’s my advice for Microsoft and Bethesda: stop the trickle of minor updates. Obviously you’ve gotta keep working on fixing bugs, so there can’t be a total lack of patches, but from now on, everything should be saved up for the next DLC. The next and final DLC.
Take two years – or three, if that’s what you need. Use that time to craft a larger expansion to Starfield’s world and story – perhaps one with an actual ending to the game’s main quest. But save up all of the smaller things that might’ve been added along the way, and add them all at once. Instead of trying to wring as much money as possible out of a disappointed and shrinking player base, focus on transforming the game into something that more people might actually want to buy. For me, that also means stripping out the entire microtransaction marketplace… but since that doesn’t seem realistic, at the very least focus on making one significantly larger expansion that can launch alongside overhauls to in-game systems. In a word, make Phantom Liberty… but for Starfield.
Starfield feels like a very greedy game right now, and £35 for a single expansion pack that only really adds one new location and questline isn’t doing anything to change the narrative. A “single-player live service” type of game – which is clearly what Bethesda wanted to create – is absolutely not my thing and never will be, and for that reason I’m almost certainly never going to play Starfield again. But even knowing that, and knowing what kind of penny-pinching game this is… Shattered Space still seems pretty unexceptional.
There should be a way around this, but only if Bethesda and Microsoft are willing to listen to feedback. Right now, Starfield is on its last legs. It’s been surpassed in so many ways by its contemporaries, and most players have just moved on already. Shattered Space, because of how it was designed and launched, was never going to bring them back en masse. And part of that is because of the way the DLC was structured and how these other free updates have been drip-fed to players over the months since Starfield launched. At a time when the game needed a win, decisions taken earlier in the year tripped up Shattered Space’s launch… and the end result seems to be that most players just aren’t paying attention any more.
For me, Starfield would only become playable again if the microtransactions and paid mods were removed and all of that content added either totally for free or as part of the next expansion. Given the lack of things like costumes, skins, and other cosmetic items in both the base game and Shattered Space, I’d argue that all of those should be added for free. But rather than doing so bit by bit in small updates over the span of months, what Starfield really needs is one big update and one big expansion that can get players talking about the game once again. Phantom Liberty for Cyberpunk 2077 is my go-to point of comparison, but I’m sure you can think of other similarly large and similarly transformative expansion packs that have been released over the years.
As to the content of Shattered Space itself… I have to say that, based on what I remember of the game, this House Va’Ruun stuff seems like it should’ve been part of the base game from day one. I mean, you literally have a companion character who’s an ex-member of this faction, and they’re mentioned multiple times across the main quest. Shattered Space, having been planned and developed alongside Starfield, basically feels like cut content to me.
I’m not surprised that Shattered Space hasn’t turned things around for Starfield based on what I’ve seen. And as someone who was genuinely looking forward to this game once upon a time, my concern now is that Bethesda is running out of chances to make Starfield into the game that I thought it should’ve been. Without a serious re-think and complete change in approach, I don’t see that happening. And given how brutal Microsoft can be when games and studios aren’t performing to their high expectations… well, let’s just say it probably isn’t a great time to be a Bethesda executive right now.
Despite how I feel, I will be keeping up with the latest Starfield news to see if there are going to be changes or improvements in the future. I sincerely hope that Bethesda takes its time with the next update and expansion, because that feels like the game’s best chance to come back strong and re-capture at least some of its lapsed players.
But I have to be honest: the microtransaction marketplace has killed any residual support I had for the game, and it will be a weight around its neck for as long as it continues to exist. Charging £10 for a single mission, £7 or £8 for a tiny pack of cosmetic items, and selling in-game currency at the usual awkward exchange rate are all truly scummy, shitty things for a massive company to try to get away with. I loathe Starfield’s microtransactions, and seeing the way Bethesda has behaved not only with this game but with Skyrim’s “creation club” and Fallout 76 too… it’s really put me off The Elder Scrolls VI. I can’t root for Starfield’s redemption as long as this stupid live service marketplace remains in a single-player game.
Starfield and the Shattered Space DLC are out now for PC and Xbox Series consoles. Starfield, Shattered Space, and all other properties discussed above are the copyright of Bethesda Softworks, Bethesda Game Studios, Xbox Game Studios, and/or Microsoft. This article contains the thoughts and opinions of one person only and is not intended to cause any offence.
Trekking with Dennis 