Shattered Space Suffers From a Lukewarm Launch That Has Left Fans Disappointed

As a gamer with over two decades under my belt, I can confidently say that the release of Starfield’s Shattered Space expansion was a letdown that left me and many others scratching our heads. The hype for this game was through the roof when it first dropped, but like a comet burning up in Earth’s atmosphere, it quickly faded away.

The primary expansion for Starfield was unveiled not long ago, yet the rollout hasn’t lived up to expectations, leaving numerous players with a bitter aftertaste. In fact, we’ve all been anticipating this first expansion from Bethesda Game Studios for over a year, but since its arrival, it’s been met with swift criticism from fans.

Despite receiving poor reviews, passionate supporters expressing dissatisfaction on social networks, struggling to attract viewers on streaming services, and generating little excitement for upcoming projects, Shattered Space hasn’t managed to take flight.

Shattered Space Didn’t Turn Things Around

About three weeks back, I posed a query to the community: ‘Could Shattered Space potentially rescue Starfield?’

It’s clear as day, considering the passage of time, that the solution lies right before our eyes, in plain sight now that we’ve had some time to contemplate the expansion.

On social platforms, fans have been quite harsh in their appraisals of the initial Starfield expansion pack. Despite providing modest entertainment spanning only a few hours, it continues to struggle with the same concerns that led to mixed opinions about the original game more than a year ago. Notably, even well-known influencers and skilled content creators have identified numerous issues within Shattered Space.

For instance:

It took me five hours to complete the main storyline of Starfield Shattered Space, and I must say, it was quite perplexing compared to some of Bethesda’s other story DLCs, such as Far Harbor. In my opinion, it seemed more like content that had been trimmed from the original game rather than a high-quality main quest. I was really hoping for something better and felt let down by it.
— Michael (@LegacyKillaHD) October 1, 2024

Or how about a take from MrMattyPlays:

I’ll share my thoughts on Starfield: Shattered Space tomorrow, but to put it straightforwardly, this game doesn’t impress. It’s far from excellent.
— MrMattyPlays (@G27Status) October 2, 2024

Also on Twitter, user Luke Stephens wrote:

I completed Shattered Space in an unexpectedly quick afternoon, as I had anticipated a more extensive narrative. To my surprise, the main plot turned out to be quite brief. Essentially, it feels reminiscent of Starfield, with its writing being disappointingly flat and the characters appearing indifferent. Additionally, the game’s optimization leaves much to be desired, making the experience uncomfortable at times.

One of the biggest issues is that users are comparing Shattered Space to expansions released for Fallout 4 and Skyrim. It’s not even a fair contest at that point – some expansions, such as Skyrim’s Dragonborn DLC or Fallout 4’s Nuka-World, offered a huge amount of gameplay and plenty to explore, but Shattered Space doesn’t come close.

In the light of these impressive expansions, Shattered Space couldn’t ever put up a fair fight.

One problem is that Shattered Space’s delivery took such an extended period. It’s puzzling to understand what caused the delay in assembling this project, particularly since Starfield updates have been scarce over the past year. Bethesda Game Studios needed nearly a year just to incorporate a rover into the game.

Additionally, it’s worth mentioning that the user reviews on Steam for Shattered Space are predominantly negative, standing at 58%. Many players have expressed disappointment, stating that the game seems overpriced compared to its features.

Even The Playing (Star)Field

While Shattered Space may have its flaws, it’s important to acknowledge that it hasn’t been universally panned. In fact, on Metacritic, it has managed to secure some favorable reviews for its expansion pack. For instance, XboxEra awarded the expansion a 9/10, praising it as an ‘adventure you don’t want to skip.’ Similarly, GAMINGbible gave it an 8/10.

Things seem to take a turn for the worse after that point, but it still has some positive feedback from authentic players.

I just spent almost 6 hours playing Starfield’s #ShatteredSpace expansion without realizing it.
I’ll be damned, this DLC might just be one of the best games of the year.
— Domagoj Belancic (@hype_domek) September 30, 2024

Examining the figures, it’s clear that Starfield didn’t make any significant mountain-moving impact when Shattered Space was launched. For example, on streaming platforms, there wasn’t any substantial growth noticeable at all. The game started with approximately 12,000 concurrent viewers on Twitch and climbed up to only 38,000. As of today, that number has almost returned to its initial level from a week ago.

To put it simply, while it’s not entirely fair to make direct comparisons, it’s worth noting that Elden Ring’s initial expansion, Shadow of the Erdtree, experienced a significant increase in user base, rising from approximately 30,000 – 40,000 players to over 400,000, shortly after its release. On the other hand, Destiny 2 saw a spike in viewership when The Final Shape expansion was launched in June, with the number of users jumping from around 10,000 to 250,000 within hours.

It’s quite astonishing, considering the strong performance of Starfield at its launch, both in sales and audience engagement, that Shattered Space has struggled so much a year later.

Starfield quickly lost its luster among players. Just weeks after its launch, numerous gamers stopped playing it, and the supposedly distinctive endgame feature failed to captivate them.

From bizarre and boring NPCs to unforgettable factions, and rinse-and-repeat environments to a slew of bugs and performance issues, Starfield might have blasted off well in those first few days, but it broke up short of punching through the stratosphere, and that’s such a shame.

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