Knowing that mods will ultimately be this game's salvation, this review is based off of the shipped experience. I had to mull over it for quite a long while before I could come up with any solid conclusion. **I fully expect that mods will fix most, if not all, of what I am about to say; that experience would warrant a positive review without a doubt.**

It boggles my mind that, even after it got delayed for a year by Microsoft to fix things, this somehow got by QA. Even setting aside some of the fundamental progression-breaking bugs, there are certain design decisions that just don't make sense. And unfortunately, some of those decisions beget some of the bugs.

Design issues:
*Skill progression is counter-intuitive to the intended playstyle in some cases. A perfect example is Stealth, which the game *strongly* encourages you to make use of in various quests to get by unnoticed. However, the only way to progress this skill involves using stealth to get kills instead.
*The world no longer pauses while in a dialog. On paper, this is honestly kind of neat. I also kind of enjoy the realism it adds, to some degree. However, there are multiple scenarios where dialog can start in a hostile area as a result of a scripted event. If the NPC you're speaking with engages in combat, it can soft-lock the game (sometimes to the point that you can't access the console or menu).
*The procedural generation in planets plays against itself. Landing locations seem to generate a localized instance. Though this is fine in most cases, it also means you can prevent yourself from being able to access a planetary landmark if you don't land there directly to generate yet another instance; this applies to having a landing zone directly next to a landmark.
*Following the above bullet, it's fairly often that you'll need to go 500-1500m to reach a location you can see from your scanner, and then will need to travel that distance multiple consecutive times to reach other destinations. Where this was fine in Skyrim or Fallout because there was always *something* to see or do along the way, that's not necessarily the case here. Most of it is barren and may not even have fauna running about. It's left me not wanting to do much exploration, unfortunately.
*You can have a small plethora of houses, but there's no in-game method to properly keep track of them. Keep vigorous notes.
*In a game where you need to scour through star charts, there is no search function. Thankfully there isn't nearly as much to cycle through as No Man's Sky or Elite Dangerous, but this implementation feels less acceptable than the similar system in Mass Effect due to volume.
*Quests for obtaining powers (similar to Skyrim's shouts) just feel lazy. "Go to point, enter temple, kill one simple enemy, likely never return to that planet again." Though the abilities are fun to use, the story tie-ins are lackluster and optional.
*A large number of sounds and animations are reused from Fallout. (IE: You can hear Fallout console sounds when scanning objects, and some of the background combat music is exactly the same.) Though to be fair, this is more a sign of laziness than being a proper issue.
[*Adding this one in post-review: The fact that there are *ten* new-game plus playthroughs and you don't get to retain anything other than memories or perks. All customizations, bases, credits, etc are gone. You will receive new ships and armor each time, but the ships (even when maxed out) aren't worth it.]

Major bugs:
*Some (but not all) menus are coded to run at a lower framerate than the rest of the game. Because of this mismatch trying to interpolate against your framerate setting of choice (in my case, 120), entering into a menu can cause ***the entire game*** to come to a crawl and feel like it's maxing out one of your system's resources. This seems to be resolvable by hitting `Escape` about 80% of the time. Unfortunately, it means that most of the UI is nigh unusable unless you can get a "good" instance.
*One of the main quests will not trigger if you've done a certain amount of progression with any faction other than Constellation. In my case, I was shunted down a faction questline early in the game for stealing half a sandwich and didn't realize this until around 20 hours in. If you're lucky, there are ways around it, but it's *very* random (no two users seem to be able to resolve it the same way).
*The engine is held together by so much bubblegum that even its own console commands don't work right. This is unfortunate, as the current state of the game requires you to use the console in order to progress in some cases.

===But it isn't all bad===
*Though a lot of the game isn't as engaging as I would like it to be, there are numerous spots in the writing that are pretty great.
*The ship building, when it wants to cooperate and give you your full framerate, is honestly really neat. I just wish finding/obtaining ships & parts were tied to your skill levels rather than your character levels. (Though even more ideally, they wouldn't be tied to levels whatsoever.) The relation of availability based on levels isn't clear or explained, it's just something you kind of notice as you play through the game.
*Despite everything, it's still pretty. I think they finally took to heart a lot of criticism about things like Skyrim's rocks or Fallout's various cookie-cutter assets. It's clear that their art team made this a passion project of sorts.

Knowing that mods will ultimately be this game's salvation, this review is based off of the shipped experience. I had to mull over it for quite a long while before I could come up with any solid conclusion. **I fully expect that mods will fix most, if not all, of what I am about to say; that experience would warrant a positive review without a doubt.** It boggles my mind that, even after it got delayed for a year by Microsoft to fix things, this somehow got by QA. Even setting aside some of the fundamental progression-breaking bugs, there are certain design decisions that just don't make sense. And unfortunately, some of those decisions beget some of the bugs. Design issues: *Skill progression is counter-intuitive to the intended playstyle in some cases. A perfect example is Stealth, which the game *strongly* encourages you to make use of in various quests to get by unnoticed. However, the only way to progress this skill involves using stealth to get kills instead. *The world no longer pauses while in a dialog. On paper, this is honestly kind of neat. I also kind of enjoy the realism it adds, to some degree. However, there are multiple scenarios where dialog can start in a hostile area as a result of a scripted event. If the NPC you're speaking with engages in combat, it can soft-lock the game (sometimes to the point that you can't access the console or menu). *The procedural generation in planets plays against itself. Landing locations seem to generate a localized instance. Though this is fine in most cases, it also means you can prevent yourself from being able to access a planetary landmark if you don't land there directly to generate yet another instance; this applies to having a landing zone directly next to a landmark. *Following the above bullet, it's fairly often that you'll need to go 500-1500m to reach a location you can see from your scanner, and then will need to travel that distance multiple consecutive times to reach other destinations. Where this was fine in Skyrim or Fallout because there was always *something* to see or do along the way, that's not necessarily the case here. Most of it is barren and may not even have fauna running about. It's left me not wanting to do much exploration, unfortunately. *You can have a small plethora of houses, but there's no in-game method to properly keep track of them. Keep vigorous notes. *In a game where you need to scour through star charts, there is no search function. Thankfully there isn't nearly as much to cycle through as No Man's Sky or Elite Dangerous, but this implementation feels less acceptable than the similar system in Mass Effect due to volume. *Quests for obtaining powers (similar to Skyrim's shouts) just feel lazy. "Go to point, enter temple, kill one simple enemy, likely never return to that planet again." Though the abilities are fun to use, the story tie-ins are lackluster and optional. *A large number of sounds and animations are reused from Fallout. (IE: You can hear Fallout console sounds when scanning objects, and some of the background combat music is exactly the same.) Though to be fair, this is more a sign of laziness than being a proper issue. [*Adding this one in post-review: The fact that there are *ten* new-game plus playthroughs and you don't get to retain anything other than memories or perks. All customizations, bases, credits, etc are gone. You will receive new ships and armor each time, but the ships (even when maxed out) aren't worth it.] Major bugs: *Some (but not all) menus are coded to run at a lower framerate than the rest of the game. Because of this mismatch trying to interpolate against your framerate setting of choice (in my case, 120), entering into a menu can cause ***the entire game*** to come to a crawl and feel like it's maxing out one of your system's resources. This seems to be resolvable by hitting `Escape` about 80% of the time. Unfortunately, it means that most of the UI is nigh unusable unless you can get a "good" instance. *One of the main quests will not trigger if you've done a certain amount of progression with any faction other than Constellation. In my case, I was shunted down a faction questline early in the game for stealing half a sandwich and didn't realize this until around 20 hours in. If you're lucky, there are ways around it, but it's *very* random (no two users seem to be able to resolve it the same way). *The engine is held together by so much bubblegum that even its own console commands don't work right. This is unfortunate, as the current state of the game requires you to use the console in order to progress in some cases. ===But it isn't all bad=== *Though a lot of the game isn't as engaging as I would like it to be, there are numerous spots in the writing that are pretty great. *The ship building, when it wants to cooperate and give you your full framerate, is honestly really neat. I just wish finding/obtaining ships & parts were tied to your skill levels rather than your character levels. (Though even more ideally, they wouldn't be tied to levels whatsoever.) The relation of availability based on levels isn't clear or explained, it's just something you kind of notice as you play through the game. *Despite everything, it's still pretty. I think they finally took to heart a lot of criticism about things like Skyrim's rocks or Fallout's various cookie-cutter assets. It's clear that their art team made this a passion project of sorts.