‘Starfield’ and ‘Cyberpunk 2077’ comparisons are “actively harmful”, says developer

6 September, 2023

A developer has criticised the comparisons between Cyberpunk 2077 and Starfield, saying that they offer nothing to the advancement or improvement of the medium.

“How times have changed,” said Patrick K. Mills, senior quest designer on Cyberpunk 2077, in a post to X in reference to a clip comparing how characters dive into and walk through water, react to player actions, and how grenades detonate in both Cyberpunk 2077 and Starfield.

Mills continued to call these videos “fake criticism” that does not prove any point for fans of either Cyberpunk 2077 or Starfield.

“[To be clear] this fake criticism is actively harmful to the way the audience interacts with the medium and I hate it, but it’s very funny to see after how many hundreds of these were made to ridicule [Cyberpunk 2077],” explained the developer.

Another X account argued that the aims of Cyberpunk 2077 and Starfield are different and that the absence of animated swimming, in this example, is a pertinent point of criticism for Starfield.

“There’s no commentary, just a handful of features being compared. What’s the meaning of this comparison? How does this relate to how I should feel about or experience these games?” countered Mills.

Ahead of the launch of Baldur’s Gate 3, a section of game developers said that the game should not set the new standard for that genre.

‘Starfield’ Credit: Bethesda

The fact that Larian Studios started work on Baldur’s Gate 3 in 2017 and had a lengthy early access period that allowed it to collect a lot of fan feedback processed by hundreds of employees made it an “anomaly”, they stated.

Starfield‘s characters have been compared to those in Baldur’s Gate 3 too, with praise for the lifelike performances found in the latter.

In other gaming news, cyberpunk thriller Replaced has been pushed into 2024 so that developer Sad Cat Studios avoids “overpromising and under delivering”.

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