What Happened to Earth's Rich Cultures in Starfield
Though I thoroughly enjoy exploring the planets and moons in Starfield, I can’t help but notice that it’s missing something important: Earth’s rich culture. While there is plenty of racial and ethnic diversity throughout the SOL and beyond, the preservation of the culture of various peoples is nowhere to be found. With fifty years to prepare to relocate humans to space colonies and 300 years of settlement and development, what happened to Earth’s culture?
What is culture anyway? Culture encompasses the shared beliefs, values, customs, traditions, and behaviors that distinguish one group of people from another. Language, religion, and social structures all shape culture. But playing through Starfield, even though many ethnicities make up the communities of the four major cities, New Atlantis, Akila, Neon, and Cydonia, NPCs with names from various ethnicities, and British, Spanish, Jamaican, Hindi, African, and other accents, the predominant culture is notably Western and uninteresting.
The Culture That Did Made It to Space
When first reading Starfield players’ criticism about the game's lacking depth, I hadn’t fully explored the planets and had barely cracked the surface of the main and important side quests. But after playing for a while, I noticed that while there’s the Wild West-themed settlement of Akila and the Freestar Collective there are no other distinct cultures in Starfield. The NPCs of the Freestar Collective take on Southern and Midwestern American accents.
And while the Freestar Collective is clearly American, the United Colonies’ New Atlantis is clearly European with an homage to ancient Greek elitism. New Atlantis gives off “Let’s make it a futuristic Grecian society, but bland” vibes. New Atlantis reminds me of a futuristic Western European city.
Inside The Rock - The Freestar Collective HQ
The City of Neon poses another overly done Western, futuristic trope of drugs and corrupt authority in a gritty city. Neon lights, nightclubs, and Aurora are the main draws to this city. Granted, it’s the most interesting of the four major city settlements. But again, the novelty wears off pretty quickly because, like the other cities, there’s no life, no culture. You’d think the fashion and food in Neon would be better than the other cities given that it’s the least rigid of them all. That is, unfortunately, not the case.
Factions Creating Their Own Cultures
One of the reasons for the lack of Earth’s cultures being present within the newly settled systems may be that Bethesda Games Studios wanted to create a new culture in the new world. If that is the case, where is it? What is the culture outside of militarism?
With a lack of culture and social rigidity, it makes sense that factions like The Crimson Fleet, House Va'ruun, and various homesteaders leave the major settlements to create communities of their own. Still, these factions branching out on their own is a seriously missed opportunity, especially for Spacers not affiliated with The Crimson Fleet. Maybe Spacers could have become pirates out of necessity or survival to make money but unwilling to follow the Crimson Fleet.
The Crimson Fleet HQ
Parts of Various Cultures That Could Have Made it to Space
Of course, there’s more to humanity than the overly used American Wild Western-inspired culture. Bethesda Games Studios creating a multi-ethnic society of people without including their ethnic culture is such a missed opportunity. The incorporation of different languages into the main, spoken language – think of the show Firefly and how they incorporated Mandarin into everyday speech – could have added just a bit more depth to the futuristic society of Starfield.
The architecture of New Atlantis is that of a typical, futuristic world that could easily be created by AI. For all the African NPCs in the game, there’s no Afro-futuristic architecture anywhere? We have sushi rolls, mochi, and boba but no Asian-inspired themes? Granted, Asia is a huge continent comprising of many vast but deep and beautiful cultures, but not one piece of Asian culture?
Speaking of food, the cultural gastronomy of Starfield is also lacking. While there are a few cultural foods such as sushi rolls, ramen, mochi, boba, and Ta’Ameya pita, there’s no significance in them, as boba, sushi, and ramen have become Western staples. Still, it’s nice to see these foods in-game. But for all the Jamaican accents, where’s the fufu? No Latin American food? Black Americans aren’t having a cookout somewhere? I know someone in the SOL is making an alien hot pot. Where they at?
Though the game is still fun to play, without the incorporation of the vast cultures of Earth, space settlements do feel lifeless. And the only thing to do is complete quests and explore planets. Hopefully, we will see cultural incorporations in future DLCs and installments of Starfield. There’s so much potential for Starfield to be an exceptional franchise. But its lack of cultural depth is probably part of the reason it was not nominated for The Game Awards Game of the Year.
