With the recent gameplay deep dive of Bethesda’s latest action-adventure RPG Starfield shown alongside the Xbox showcase many gameplay and story elements were touched upon in Bethesda’s massive new I.P., showing some of what this game has to offer. But with all of the stunning scenery and exciting gameplay being shown there were a few small gameplay features present that you might not have noticed, so we’ve decided to compile a few of these features into this list to better prepare you for your upcoming new space adventure. Without further ado here are 6 things you may have missed in the Starfield Direct.
6. Environmental Hazards and the Various Debuffs
Throughout the deep dive there are multiple moments where you can see various icons on the in-game compass, with four of them being circular, and five of them being triangular. The ones with circular icons appear to be environmental hazards, this confirmed later on the deep dive during the inventory showcase where we see the spacesuits and their resistances to these hazards. A water droplet indicating thermal, a half-filled circle indicating airborne, three lines indicating corrosive, and a biohazard symbol indicating radiation.
However, it is unknown what the effects of these hazards are or whether or not these indicators show that the threats are merely present, or if the player is actively being affected by them.
Then there are the statuses with the triangular icons, these icons for the most part seem to be for debuffs that the player can contract throughout their playthrough. However, these icons (bar one) don’t actually tell us what the status could be, so for these we will merely provide pictures with our best interpretation of what they could be.
This one appears to look vaguely like a pill, which could possibly mean withdrawal.
This one appears to look like a broken bone, which could possibly mean your limbs could be broken.
This one looks to be a triangle emitting beams of light, my best interpretation of this is that it might be for a toggleable flashlight, however the scenes in which this icon is shown don’t seem to have any player produced light present and it wouldn’t coincide with the effects of the other icons of the same shape, so please take this one with a grain of salt.
This one appears to be a collection of water droplets, my best guess for this one is possibly dehydration as in this image the only other status with a water drop icon, thermal, is not present.
And for the final one we see the player actually contract this one in the direct, after the player bludgeons an enemy with their pistol, this one is called soreness and has another much more obvious pill design, my best guess for this effect is that it is a way to dissuade the player from meleeing with ranged weapons equipped and encourages them to have a melee weapon hot keyed for close encounters.
And that’s all for the effects with icons. However, there is another effect shown in the deep dive that doesn’t appear to have an icon. A few times throughout the direct we can see this orange bar or the player’s health bar.
I would assume that this bar is similar to the radiation effect in Fallout 4 whereas the effect is a decrease to your max health pool, however it is not shown what causes this effect, we do not see it increase at any point in the direct.
5. Planets Have Discoverable Traits
During the initial showing of the scanner in the direct we can see a checklist of all the things we can survey on that planet, however two of the items on this checklist are just simple question marks without any indication of what those could be. Later on in the direct when they show off the star map, we can see these two question marks were “traits”.
These share the same name of the optional perks that the player can pick to spice up their build, so while it is most likely that these could possibly be things that are just inherently unique to the planet you're on, there is a possibly that you could maybe unlock special traits from these planets for new character features, or perhaps these could tie into traits you yourself chose and are only there because of the trait you chose. Either way is sure to be an interesting inclusion to the gameplay.
4. Some Enemies Have Multiple Health Bars
In the first combat sequence of the direct we see this space punk, while it may seem similar to the other enemies, what is noticeably different with this enemy is the three red bars under their health bar. The player then attacks this enemy and once the enemy’s health bar is reduced to zero, we can see one of the bars be consumed and the enemy’s health is fully restored.
While this could just be a way to add a bit more challenge to the combat it could also be a way to show an enemy could be of a higher rank and have better loot, and the fact that this enemy has multiple health bars means that we as the player could also possibly get health boosts like that and could also be an explanation for the orange bar on the health bar discussed previously however that might be unlikely.
3. Planets Have Their Own Unique Time Zones
When the pause menu is first shown in the direct, we can see in the upper left hand corner info about the planet the player character is on. Right underneath the planet’s survey completion it shows that planets have unique time zones and the fact there is UT which I'm assuming means universal time. As we can see in the screenshot the local time on the planet is currently 16:54, which if the game is using military time would put the current time just before 5pm. However, what’s interesting about this is that it is entirely possible that most planets won’t have a 24-hour day/night cycle, meaning that there could be interesting and challenging time constraints you would have to navigate during your playthrough.
2. Applicable Status Ailments?
Nearing the end of the combat showcase portion of the direct we see the player fighting an alien creature and some of the robot enemies/NPCs. During these very short combat segments we can see a small gauge above these two enemies’ health bars which fill up with every hit. The icon next to this gauge is the same icon as the electromagnetic damage type.
However, in both of these clips, neither of the weapons being used appear to be electromagnetic weapons, with the first being obviously being the player’s fist, and the second possibly being an energy weapon, judging from the sound it makes and the fact it doesn’t have a barrel targeting laser. What could be causing this is possibly some form of weapon attachment or perk, giving it this applicable status ailment. Sadly, we don’t get what the effect of this condition is, however, this is evidence that the player will be able to cause these status ailments, or possibly be on the receiving end of them.
1. Outpost Management and Cargo Production Could be More Prominent than we Think
Lastly for this list, during the brief segment showcasing the outpost it’s clear that the outpost building has been vastly improved since Fallout 4, and it also appears that it will provide a much more worthwhile service.
Here in this screenshot, we can see two very interesting trackers of note, the production per minute tracker and the cargo storage tracker. Throughout most of the direct we’ve been getting hints that we’d probably want to keep cargo hauling aspects in mind for our ships and be inclined to participate in this feature, for example, the ability to have more than one ship, cargo scans nearing civilized planets, and the ability to scan planets to see what regions have which resources.
With these facts in mind, alongside these trackers being front and centre in the outpost menu, it would seem that the primary reason for building these outposts would be to operate some type of business tycoon, most likely for your main source of currency.
Another thing to note is that on the other side of the screen at the same moment, we can see this.
This clearly says outpost 1 seemingly implying that we can create multiple outposts on the same planet. This would open the door for many interesting things to be done. For instance, if my cargo production tycoon theory is accurate you could set up multiple outposts around the planet and have your crew mine the natural resources, or you could possibly cheat the build limit in theory by placing two outposts near each other, allowing for much bigger, better builds. Either way the possibilities these features bring to the table are quite exciting indeed.
And there you have it, 6 things you may have missed in the Starfield direct. Please keep in mind most of the commentary made on the features presented in this article are purely speculation and could most likely be very different from what is actually in the game. All of us will merely have to wait and see what these features actually in what is certain to be an amazing experience of a game.
Have any thoughts on the features presented in this article? Did you notice anything in the direct yourself that you would like to share? Then please be sure to leave a comment in the section down below.
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