they might actually pull this shit off. equal parts legacy bethesda jank and overbearing but attainable ambition. base game is free with game pass on day one

trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kfYEiTdsyas

long-form presentation from SGF 2023: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uMOPoAq5vIA

• looks like they tightened up the movement and combat a bit. animations are definitely improved but still sub-par in 2023

• we're back to elder scrolls and FO3/new vegas-style focus stealing when communicating with npcs. hopefully they learned a lot of lessons from FO4 regarding player avatar and npc communication. also we're back to dead-eyed npcs with weird-looking hair textures

• shipbuilding looks awesome. can't imagine they will have super crisp or detailed flight controls but will probably be good enough considering the scope of the game. looks like planet traveling is just loading screens and not like no man's sky or spore where you can actually fly off the planet and into space. same for picking a landing spot; likely just a loading screen

• frame rate is confirmed on series s/x as locked 30. hopefully will be able to push higher on PC. pretty disappointing for current gen but, again, the scope of the game kind of warrants it

• lighting looks pretty good. a little weird they are bragging about real-time global illumination in the age of ray tracing but we'll take what we can get