this post was submitted on 12 Apr 2026
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[–] cerebralhawks@lemmy.dbzer0.com 13 points 4 days ago (2 children)

Because influencers tell them to? It’s not like Xbox players haven’t been taking about the bugs and other issues for the last few years.

But really though. The gun play is fun ads hell, just like any Bethesda game. And, it’s true, you can build a ship, take off, walk around in it… there’s a certain appeal to that. The guts are there to make a decent game. They just don’t love it quite as much as the least of the four fans who still play it.

[–] deranger@sh.itjust.works 14 points 4 days ago (3 children)

Bethesda games notoriously have shitty gun play.

[–] RightHandOfIkaros@lemmy.world 7 points 4 days ago (2 children)

True, but developers from id Software helped Bethesda specifically for Starfield's gunplay, which is actually fun this time around compared to Fallout 4.

[–] Cethin@lemmy.zip 1 points 2 days ago

Id helped with FO4 too. Sure, it's a lot better than 3, but, compared to any other shooter, it's pretty horrible.

The gun play in Fallout 4 was actually good. It's 3 and New Vegas where it sucked

[–] cerebralhawks@lemmy.dbzer0.com 4 points 3 days ago (2 children)

How so? They're fun, and the guns, while silly, are fun to shoot.

Do you mean they're historically inaccurate?

Or do we just have incompatible views of fun (i.e. it's subjective)?

The only Bethesda game I can think of with shitty gun play is Skyrim, because then we're talking about archery. And then, it's shitty because the way arrows work is, they are spawned at the player's feet, elevated to the bow, and then fired relatively accurately in an arc. The problem is, the ground is not completely flat, which is why if you're firing uphill, or there's a ridge at your feet, you fire into the ground despite very obviously clearing it.

And the only problem I have with guns in Bethesda games applies to just about any game with machine guns: bullets become far less deadly when you can shoot a lot of them in a short amount of time than when you can only fire one at a time. This is categorically false: every bullet from a machine gun is just as deadly as that same bullet would have been, had it been fired from a single-shot weapon. They just make machine guns do less damage per hit to balance the gun, so it's not overly powerful, and that is stupid. Sometimes they at least make these guns cheaper to shoot, so they're balanced to cost as well as damage, but in a world where the minimum cost of one bullet (or arrow) is one {CURRENCY} (bottle cap, Septim, whatever), they aren't nearly cheap enough to justify the damage reduction.

But, maybe next time instead of saying "no you're wrong," give us some context. It's fine to have a differing opinion if you can back it up with some examples.

[–] deranger@sh.itjust.works 3 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago) (1 children)

This is one of the most common criticisms of the Bethesda Fallout games, so I didn’t think I had to qualify my opinion. I am far from the first person to make this claim. Even Bethesda realized the gunplay was lacking in their Fallout games, which is why they hired people from Doom to work on Starfield.

The guns have little feeling of impact or weight, they lack good animations, and there is little variety in the types of recoil or spread. Most of the time you just end up spraying at the enemy, and it takes too many rounds. The guns feel more like squirt guns than real guns.

[–] cerebralhawks@lemmy.dbzer0.com 1 points 2 days ago (2 children)

So you're saying each bullet should be fatal? That's how I played Deus Ex (1), but DX1 was a very different game to a modern action RPG (though, it was one as well). Easy and Hard meant your weapons did more or less damage than the enemy. Medium meant it was equal, and Realistic meant it was equal, but each hit mattered more. You could get hit once, maybe twice, but not three times without healing. Also, headshots were lethal. They tell you headshots are lethal, but if you're playing on anything but realistic... they're not. ("And remember JC, a headshot is a lethal takedown." Lies!) So, I knew where the enemies were, and I didn't get hit. You can't really play that way in Fallout, especially during the bigger battles. You're going to get hit, a lot, and you're supposed to make it to the end somehow. So the player gets a little bullet spongey, and depending on the setting, the enemies may be, too.

You may not be the first to criticise the gunplay, but a lot of people also do like the gunplay, so I guess it's a fair point either way and a matter of what you like. I just hadn't heard much from the other side.

[–] deranger@sh.itjust.works 1 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago)

No I’m saying the guns should feel different, have some heft and weight to them. Use the revolver in half life 2 for an example of a gun with weight behind the shots.

You’re free to enjoy whatever you like, I’m not saying you shouldn’t. I just think it’s odd for the OP of this comment thread to say “it’s got good gunplay, it’s a Bethesda game” because the general opinion was that Bethesda games were lacking in this very area until Starfield. Bethesda themselves realized they needed to improve the gunplay from the Fallout games, they brought people over from Doom for this specific reason.

[–] Cethin@lemmy.zip 0 points 2 days ago (1 children)

Dude, no one is asking for realism. Why are you strawmaning?

Play a modern shooter, and compare that to Starfield or FO4. They just don't feel good. Weapons don't have weight to them, and there's no impact to them being fired. Your character barely reacts. You just run around spraying bullets, and it doesn't feel like anything.

What it needs are good animations, recoil systems, camera punch, VFX, and things like that. Starfield and FO4 have almost none of that. It's the bare minimum to not be absolute trash. If you're comparing it to FO3, they're fairly good. If you're comparing it to something like Battlefield, Escape from Tarkov, or anything modern, not so much.

That's not to say there's nothing to enjoy. I think FO4 was reasonably good, and FO3 and NV were good too. I just didn't enjoy them for the gunplay. It's everything around that that makes them good.

Personally though, I think Starfield sucks. The story is bland as hell if you know much sci-fi (if you're failing to appeal to the audience that follows the genre, you failed). Exoring sucks. Clearing dungeons is pretty boring after you've done the five dungeons a few times. The loading screens, even on an NVMe SSD, constantly take you out of the experience. I just don't understand what there is to like. I'd rather play FO4 with a bunch of cool mods if I'm playing something like it, or Morrowind if I want a good Bethesda RPG.

Why are you moving goalposts and whining when the person can't keep up? Just say what you mean. You're being needlessly hostile, and for what? I'm some big shot you feel the need to take down a peg? Congrats, you sound smart. I tried to jump through your hoop but you pulled it away too soon. Now what? You just point and laugh? Okay, now that's done, where does that leave us? You've shown everyone you're an asshole, and I tried to argue in good faith. Does that make you better than me? Or just provide you with some entertainment?

We agree on Starfield though, so there's that.

[–] I_Jedi@lemmy.today 1 points 3 days ago (1 children)

Bethesda still hasn't provided the fun of knocking someone on their ass with a point blank shotgun blast. Manhunt did that 20 years ago.

I would have said Resident Evil (maybe not "knocking them on their ass" but satisfying result of using a shotgun), but, fair point.

[–] THE_GR8_MIKE@lemmy.world 1 points 3 days ago

Eh, Starfield feels the same as any other regular modern shooter, so like COD. It doesn't feel like Doom, of course, but that's it's own thing.

[–] mnemonicmonkeys@sh.itjust.works 0 points 3 days ago (1 children)

The gun play is fun ads hell, just like any Bethesda game

You must not have played Fallout 3 or New Vegas. The gunplay was pretty bad before Fallout 4, to the point where you were better off using V.A.T.S. most of the time.

That being said, the gunplay since Fallout 4 has been pretty good. Especially the auto-lean around corners when you use ADS