Few games make themselves as hard to love as Starfield. I say that as someone who’s sunk tons of hours into it – and continues to do so. Maybe it’s masochism, maybe it’s just a love for the kind of RPG Bethesda makes, but there’s something about Starfield which draws me back time and time again. There’s plenty of others like me out there too, but a recent addition has proved extremely controversial with the already badly bruised community.
Over the weekend a huge update dropped for Starfield which added one of the game’s most requested features; the ability to easily create mods. Bethesda RPGs are renowned for being moddable, so not having a dedicated set of modding tools has been a bit of a problem for a fanbase raring to dive in and start making changes. The game’s Creation Club is now available, letting players download and install mods – both for free and some which require a fee. It’s that last part which is causing problems.
For those who’ve played Fallout 4 or some of the Skyrim re-releases, you may be familiar with the Creation Club and it works much the same way in Starfield. If you want to grab a paid creation, you buy a currency from Bethesda, then use that to shell out for the mod. There’s one creation, however, that’s causing quite a furore among the community.
In the latest update a brand new quest type and associated mechanic has been added, finally letting players take missions for the bounty hunting organization Trackers Alliance. The problem is that it only adds one kind of repeatable mission, to access the second type you’ll have to pay for it. The Vulture is being sold for 700 credits, which means buying the 1,000 credit pack in order to pay for it. That’ll set you back $9.99 / £8.99, a move that has not gone down well with fans.
Understandably the issue isn’t so much about the quest in particular, though there are certainly enough grumbles about it on the Starfield Steam discussion forum and the subreddit, but about the potential precedent this sets. To some parts of the community, it smacks of giving the players something for free, with follow-ups being paywalled. The worry is that in the future new mechanics and quests will drop in-game with free updates, but to experience the full questline or get the most out of features, you’ll have to shell out for it.
“If people accept this as okay it gives Bethesda no reason to stop doing this in future,” Reddit user u/The_IrishTurtle says on the game’s subreddit. “So they’ve now given you essentially the bounty hunters guild but chopped up and sold to you mission by mission. What if they add a smugglers guild and do the same, you have to buy it a mission at a time.”
At the moment there’s been no word from Bethesda about this latest community kerfuffle but fan sentiment continues to sour, despite the general excitement for the upcoming Shattered Space DLC.
In the meantime while you wait for the expansion, why not check out our best space games guide, or our recommendations for the best open-world games you can play.