Photo: Bethesda
Starfield is undoubtedly one of the year's biggest releases. There have been some bumps along the way, but Game Director Todd Howard and the 500+ developers at Bethesda Game Studios have landed the game safely on people's PCs and consoles, albeit in 30fps for the latter case. As for the PC Master Race version, things are all right, but they could be even better with mods.
Due to the partnership between Bethesda/Microsoft and AMD, Starfield is mainly optimized for Radeon cards and their respective upscaling technology, like FSR (FidelityFX Super Resolution).
FSR is meant to run your game at a lower resolution than your monitor's while trying to offer a clearer picture than it would have been at native resolution. It's a fancy way of saying upscaling.
FSR is compatible with AMD cards but can also work on Nvidia GPUs with no limitations, at least in theory. Nvidia has its own upscaling tech called DLSS (Deep Learning Super Sampling). It does the same thing but much better. I tested both in different games, and the results were the same almost every time: DLSS looks crisp and clearer, while FSR is a bit blurrier.
Because of the abovementioned partnership between Starfield's makers and AMD, the game was released without DLSS support. As you can imagine, Nvidia owners like myself are bummed out that the superior technology isn't available at launch. At least, we hope it's only during the release window. It would be a shame to never get DLSS.
However, as with all Bethesda games, the modding community comes to the rescue. That's exactly what "PureDark" thought when they created the "Starfield Upscaler - Replacing FSR 2 with DLSS or XeSS" mod.
It's a mouthful, but marketing doesn't have to be their strong suit. PureDark managed to deliver what Todd Howard didn't: choice. This is ironic because we're discussing an RPG experience based chiefly on player choices.
It's completely free, and you can find it on the trusty NexusMods website, like with all great mods. If you are inclined to support PureDark, you can toss them a donation on the webpage. Also, you'll see the installation instructions if you scroll down a bit.
They're not complicated, but I advise maximum caution if you've never done this before. Take your time; you're not hacking into the Pentagon.
Starfield wasn't released to rave reviews, but it still got an 87 score on Metacritic on Xbox Series X|S and an 88 on PC. On OpenCritic, it's also holding steady with a firm 88 Top Critic Average and a 94% "Critics Recommend" score.
This year's top spot on Metacritic for RPGs is Baldur's Gate III, sitting pretty with a 96 and a 9.0 User Score. For a while, it scored 97, but someone knocked it down a notch.
FSR is meant to run your game at a lower resolution than your monitor's while trying to offer a clearer picture than it would have been at native resolution. It's a fancy way of saying upscaling.
FSR is compatible with AMD cards but can also work on Nvidia GPUs with no limitations, at least in theory. Nvidia has its own upscaling tech called DLSS (Deep Learning Super Sampling). It does the same thing but much better. I tested both in different games, and the results were the same almost every time: DLSS looks crisp and clearer, while FSR is a bit blurrier.
Because of the abovementioned partnership between Starfield's makers and AMD, the game was released without DLSS support. As you can imagine, Nvidia owners like myself are bummed out that the superior technology isn't available at launch. At least, we hope it's only during the release window. It would be a shame to never get DLSS.
However, as with all Bethesda games, the modding community comes to the rescue. That's exactly what "PureDark" thought when they created the "Starfield Upscaler - Replacing FSR 2 with DLSS or XeSS" mod.
It's a mouthful, but marketing doesn't have to be their strong suit. PureDark managed to deliver what Todd Howard didn't: choice. This is ironic because we're discussing an RPG experience based chiefly on player choices.
It's completely free, and you can find it on the trusty NexusMods website, like with all great mods. If you are inclined to support PureDark, you can toss them a donation on the webpage. Also, you'll see the installation instructions if you scroll down a bit.
They're not complicated, but I advise maximum caution if you've never done this before. Take your time; you're not hacking into the Pentagon.
Starfield wasn't released to rave reviews, but it still got an 87 score on Metacritic on Xbox Series X|S and an 88 on PC. On OpenCritic, it's also holding steady with a firm 88 Top Critic Average and a 94% "Critics Recommend" score.
This year's top spot on Metacritic for RPGs is Baldur's Gate III, sitting pretty with a 96 and a 9.0 User Score. For a while, it scored 97, but someone knocked it down a notch.
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