"Oh, neat! I can't wait to figure out the mystery behind these artifacts!" "Oh neat! There are megalithic scifi temples built too? I bet the reveal will be cool AF!" "Oh, neat! Finally made it to the end to meet The Unity larping as me...can't wait for the reveal, so who built all this and set it all up, putting it all in motion?" "... The...Makers made it." * *Throws keyboard*
yeah it was freaking wild we never learn absolutely anything about these makers and why they build the scorpion compass, the temples and the artifacts.. absolutely nothing gets revealed ever, much bullshit, such wow..
It doesn't put a bow on it, but I think it is vital for letting speculation breathe as we all, as starborn, wonder what it all means. Personally I feel really uncomfortable how a machine is putting humanity's most powerful individuals into an infinite time loop. What is the larger game at play? I speculate that the temples are more like nodes on a network, and every ball of light we fly through is us linking two universes. I think that was the point of the entangled quest, because the secret ending to that quest is merging two events together. Personally I prefer this way of storytelling where we have to think for a long time until an expansion finally reveals if we were right or not.
They temples are clearly older than the human race on earth and leaked info indicates the next expansion will be called Starborn, so perhaps they are saving who build the temples for that.
The apathy of the hunter seems excessive at start. When you meet him at the bar. Till you start running through ng+s and eventually become like the hunter yourself. Its so well done i struggled to believe Bethesda wrote it
Me too. I was about to go to a new universe but wanted to level up pistols. Since none of it mattered anyway in the new universe I just killed everyone on Jemison to improve the skill. Then entered unity with UC trying to kill me
I find the starborn to be depressing, hollow, and an existential nightmare in terms of universal purpose. I think the true victory is never giving into them, the powers, the bs, and their hollow endless struggles.
I think this makes the most sense. It feels like the starborn and the main story in general is designed to show you that it's about the journey, not the destination. When you decide to forsake your character's life, including all your friends and relationships in order to reach the unity, you end up feeling alone and you still don't have the answers you wanted
Yeah, but what happens to the artifacts after we leave the universe? It seems to stay active in the universe. The Hunter is a bad choice because nobody is protecting the armillary. The Emissary essentially creates a Constellation-esque cult to guard the artifacts and presumably create people ready to become starborn. I believe the crazy starborn we encounter are people who wandered into the vortex because of whoever killing both the emissary and the hunter or due to the hunter's ending leading to no one protecting the vortex. The best ending is likely killing both and not NG+ing but guarding the armillary on your ship. I feel like starfield's NG+'s lend more to the different decisions we made in the universe. My first run I was talking my way out of situations, but my second I was picking and choosing which groups/people to kill, all in an attempt at the most orderly universe.
One multiverse theory is that each decision creates infinite new universes. If that's the case in Starfield, then us touching the first artifact could be what creates " our" multiverse. Everything seems the same to us because it is the same until we touch that artifact.
And a reason why we respawn (at least in my head canon) is that you respawn in an alternative universe, where you didn't die in that moment. That would explain why we don't respawn with more power and still try to hunt the artifacts.
My favorite mod for Starfield was "Starfield As Roguelike" - which got started when the author said... _"Hey...what happens to all those Starborn we merk'd?"_ which led to the question _"why doesn't that happen to us?"_ - which led to the author thinking "It should happen to us..." So when you have that mod active - if you die, then you start a new NG+ game in a new universe. It gets interesting if you use the *other* mod that increases the chances that you land in one of the "Alternate" universes from the base 12.5% to something higher (one alternate every 8 NG+ starts...urf...) ...but not TOO high such that you run out of those Alternates and start encountering a bunch of repeats... I found it made me a LOT more careful once I got to a universe that I actually liked.
A minor point: There is at least one other "named" Starborn I have encountered in every universe so far... The Trader. Of course, they are just a "mysterious ship" during the initial playthrough. I definitely am not sure, but IIRC they do seem to recognize your transformation from your initial game when you encounter them in NG+ .. something along the lines of "good to see you made it". There are also alternate universes where you meet some "one-off" named Starborn: one where "Constellation" is made up of different versions of yourself and one with a vengeful Starborn Cora who is hunting down every version of you across universes to avenge her Dad, whose heart you broke. Not sure how those might influence your thoughts on the Starborn.
quick correction on the Cora one, she's specifically hunting the "you" from her universe, because in her universe, that "you" allowed the Hunter to kill Sam
@@41Chewbacca41 It depends on your motivations for going through, and how you reach it in the first place. Would you leave everyone in your life, all your memories, experiences, accomplishments for the chance to do it all over again? Would it be worth it to see a loved one just one more time, and what about again, and again, and again? At what point is enough enough? At what point is an end good enough? Whatever your answer, that is the answer of the unity. Your answer.
To me it never really made sense. You die when leaving this universe, but you enter the new one as a starborn, but thats it. The only gameplay differences are not doing the mainquest from the beginning and being able to skip certain dialogue trees. Its not more like your universe but somehow learning there are other multiverses. what i mean is in your multiverse, there would always be a given chance to touch that artifact since i thing its said that the changes are small and not massive. This would mean that only you can be a starborn, but others also can be one. This means that you don't enter a universe centred around you but around the one who touches the artifact first.
It can be done from a place of hope too. Taking just you out of the universe you came from, you have a chance to make better choices in the new one and save so many.
Bethesda like modern Hollywood don't really get morality. Like Sam says he and Cora are coming with you, he doesn't seem to give any thought to the fact that this would mean her mother would never see her again. Just like in his story you have to support his decision to put her in danger to get his approval, its twisted.
If Bethesda decides to expand the starborn lore in dlc or future games they honestly have the potential to reach the level of well written mindfuckery of the elder scrolls lore
The problem with that is that BGS has long since lost its best lore writers from the Elder Scrolls' heyday, especially the ones who designed the nuances of its cosmogony. In fact, they've even kept their worst quest writer (Emil), who's doubtless a predominant reason why the writing in Starfield stops at the elevator pitch premise.
@@qwuvvy4155 "yeah so we fucked up really bad. How can we make it all canon and not canon all at once so we don't have to think about continuity for future games?" "Why not just make everything canon and call it a dragon break?" "Hot diggity darn Emil I knew we kept you around for a reason.
Unity could be like a tree where everytime you enter it, you spawn into several branches/universes. Which would explain why the hunter is a starborn before you, in all of em. As hes started a lot earlier and is simply so much further up the tree that hes exponentially ahead of you.
Everyone on the ship definitely goes into the unity. If you don't go through, when you talk to them again they will also mention having chosen to stay. Would have been awesome if one or two of your crew were not there when you come back.
I think each person goes to individual version of unity - it is like yes it is the same place but for every mind is only, it is not like they all were on ship and got staying in the same hall
depending on your ending, your romantic partner(s) will follow you. not to say you will actually meet them again but it does mention it. Cora also goes into Unity eventually, not sure about the others
Two things. If you choose neither The Hunter nor The Emissary, when in the unity it says that you keep the way open for those after you, so more than just those on your ship go through. Two, you have to give something of yourself to the old universe to start ng+ that could be reseeding the artifacts.
It's also described as a star going nova, which is a little confusing as an analogy since it kind of explains the term "starborn" and you body being replaced with stardust if you coalesce from a nova, except that the nova happens in the old universe. Maybe it's supposed to happen simultaneously in both, linking the two (or more) universes. Either way, it would have been fun had there been mentions near the start of the game of there being two novae spotted simultaneously, and in ng+ of there being four (one each for the Emissary, Hunter, Trader and player), or potentially more (for variants with, eg, starborn Cora).
When I first saw the Hunter, I kept trying to figure out a way to hire him for my crew. I like the idea that when you go through the unity, you exist everywhere and every when at the same time, only coalescing into the reality that you get more artifacts for. What if that’s the situation? Getting the artifacts solidifies you into the universe, and the Starborn are rabidly searching for the reality they left, or one close enough. Losing everyone and everything just to move forward would probably cause some people to go crazy.
@@aschergamer2213 enlightenment or oblivion… It truly would drive some mad. Especially when you think about how just the monotony of normal day-to-day life can break some people.
Naww more like... You remember having form so you build a form from yourself out of just... matter, stardust whatever. Maybe it takes constant concentration to maintain your form maybe thats why you turn to stardust when you die. your concentration is disrupted and you have to re-constitute yourself. The ship and the spacesuit are interesting though because they suggest before you ended up in New Atlantis you went SOMEWHERE. Somewhere with ships and an armoury.
constelation: its good to have you on board player: i actually dont wanna join constelation: we are so happy to have you hear lets get to work player: i wanna join a different group or just go back to mining constelation: alright now we have these weird artifacts..
I know it's even worse than fallout 4's constant "ya but you def feel some way about your kid right? Man that's rough what happened with your kid, but after serving in the military I'm sure you're pretty tough! Did I mention you're playing Emil's OC? ok just checking because I saw you having fun doing things Emil wouldn't and so Im programmed to remind you this isn't an RPG, it's a vanity project, Te he." To think I thought being locked into having chosen one dragon powers in Skyrim was an unacceptable level of on rails story telling for a role playing game attempting to be a sequel to oblivion where you can be anything from a homeless man that helps a chosen one or become a god of madness and everything in between.
It's almost like you're being placed into a (R)ole to (P)lay a (G)ame. Alternatively: Kratos: "I don't wanna fight you" Some god: "I'm gonna fight you anyway!" You: "oh my God this game is so railroaded"
IIRC I saw one theory that says that: Not only are The Pilgrim, Keeper, and Hunter all the same person, but so is the person who first touched the artifact that pushes humanity to destroy Earth for the Grav Drives. And your "reset" point is always when you first touch the artifact. Meaning that not only is the Hunter someone who has been through the Unity a ton, he has to go through all of human grav drive history to get there again. As I understand it: Time progresses but has the multiverse save point for each Starborn when they touch the artifact. So, the original Hunter touches the first artifact, lives long enough that Humanity gets to the artifacts supremely slowly at the rate we would've without interference. He resets and does it again and again, getting tired of how long it takes and taking shortcuts to get there until he blitzes it and makes us lose Earth to get there faster. As evident by one of the NG+ variants you can end up in a universe where the original you is still there and didn't die. My guess is the timeline WE start in, that happened to the Hunter. The original him still exists and the experienced Starborn him does too. BUT when that version touches an artifact, now that version's reset branch IS there being two of him. Now, one of them goes on to become the pilgrim, one goes on to be the hunter. Fast forward and now there's us, we died in the other resets but this time we didn't. We touch the artifact and set our own reset branching point. So for us, all those other things will always be the base for the universe. They aren't "different" Hunters but the same one from the past every time. That's why he never has a version that remembers us and always says the "huh, you never lived" line. ...Of course this all gets thrown wacky when you try to explain the Emissary or the other Starborn. Maybe when entering the Unity enough some figure out how to enter more specific realities? It's the only way The Emissary's goal of being Bethesda Aeons makes any sense.
Still dislike that the one trying to stop you wasn't YOU from a previous run. Or that annoying aspect where New Game Plus wipes your ship, companions, and all your items. Sure you keep the perks, but what was the POINT in ship customization if it would just be wiped. Same with companions, you should at least be able to bring your main one with you. Imagine the conversations with their double present.
Well, shit. If that's the case, I may not even finish the game. Maybe I'll tell the Unity to go fk itself (which it could probably do). I finally built a starfighter, a capital ship (with the help of mods), and now I'm attempting to build a flying saucer. No way I'm letting the Unity rob me of that. Besides, from what I've heard, most of the NG+ universes are just depressing. I've become really attached to my family at Constellation...
The Starborn are obsessed with the power of the Starborn. It's a step beyond psychotic that we aren't meant to take. That has to break the mind in ways we can't even begin to understand. The emissary is as fruity as the hunter. They're just two sides of the same coin. It's all about power for each of them regardless of what the emissary claims.
Once I got to the reveal of who the starborn are, I got it. Their minds are broken in ways we can't possibly understand, and each starborn processes the unity in their own way
@@bafelix89 Anyone's minds (read: most people's, maybe not literally everyone's) would be broken after going through such an experience, especially several times. A lot, especially in a repeating time frame and not a brand new random one each time, but even then so, would become meaningless or interchangable, no longer special, truly unique, etc. Picture it like this: Imagine you could save or reload to a fixed point in time in reality. At will or after obtaining some things. You'd retain knowledge (and thus skills). You start exploring. You start learning. You amass knowledge, even if you can't retain physical skills or so maybe, assuming said reload doesn't carry that over as well. You'd start trying new things. It'd be curious at first. Then over time your mind would likely somehow take some form of 'damage' or change with it. At some point especially when you were e.g. of poorer origin, you probably would hit the lottery jackpot, amass wealth, maybe found a company, introduce a brand new tech before all others (because money and partly knowledge wouldn't be an issue after a while, right?)...and you keep doing that or going. It's like a vampire or immortal concept that goes throughout the century among humans, always losing loved ones or whatever as they die of old age. I dare say the human mind is hardly made for whatever form of "immortality" you can think of, in most cases. It'd be fun or exciting for a while, possibly a long while. Maybe thousands of attempts or years but at some point you tire. You will inevitably tire. Or, I guess, at some point perish through some means.
@@Unknown-ek1ox Once you're given a universal reset button, you naturally begin to assign less value to the impact of your choices; you stop caring. Nothing matters, because you can just reset it anyway. This leads to people becoming the most extreme personifications of their base ideals and desires.
@@AdmiralKarelia (Sorry slightly longer reply :D) "This leads to people becoming the most extreme personifications of their base ideals and desires." You actually kinda put it in a nice simple and yet elegant or beautiful fashion. At times I actually think of "What would I do if I could 'reset' or 'reload' to a specific time in life, but obviously with the knowledge of what comes after in general?" And I go through some scenarios in my head. But ultimately I notice that what I would consider an interesting attempt or noble goal to pursue isn't really in stark contrast to my morals, views, interests or ideology. Most scenarios are 'just me, but more empowered or able'. I'll keep this basic now but for example when something really bad happened to a lot of people I started aiding them with my voice and wallet. But those - time and money - were or are ultimately limited. If I could go back a few years (just 7-10 years would be enough), I'd know the event would be pretty inevitable and that I couldn't likely avoid it no matter what I did because it's a bit like in the base game of Starfield. You are always set back to a specific point in time. But you're ultimately still right after that Argos artifact gig. Sometimes to change major events you'd need to be another person altogether because it's like rails and tracks and for some things you'd need to be in another "branch" or railways altogether. Anyway, sorry for rambling, point being, I'd likely try to amass wealth by going for the right investment trends right away (I'd just cheaply buy a lot of Bitcoin before they blow up further and then sell them at their peak of roughly 60k per unit). Or I'd just "guess" the lottery numbers right. Then with that added wealth, I'd be better able to pursue my notions or ideals and help others. TL;DR: I'd ultimately still act within my general "operating framework" rather than radically do something else, like IDK, run amok for the heck of it. I can't rule out however that this wild experience of "ground hog day" might change me drastically still. I specifically mentioned obtaining wealth to pursue goals. I always think of myself as relatively level-headed and modest but I've seen people who went 180 when they obtained a lot of wealth, almost in a way they couldn't handle either maintaining it long-term and/or character-wise. Then again we could argue and go back to your original point: It is just their base personality to begin with, amplified.
@@Unknown-ek1ox That's just Undertale Flowey's arc in a nutshell, without the convolution. His and Sans dialog reflects the number of routes and times you've reloaded, resetted, and saved. On the Genocide route, Flowey even talks about when he was reborn into a flower and found he had the power to SAVE and RELOAD and how every time he reloaded, kept memories, and kept trying new things, it soon grew frustrating. "I've done everything this world has to offer. I've read every book. I've burned every book. I've won every game. I've lost every game. I've appeased everyone. I've killed everyone. Sets of numbers... Lines of dialogue... I've seen them all."
My take on the Hunter and the Emissary and by extension all the other Starborn is that there is effectively an infinite number of each of them traversing the multiverse and when the Hunter and Emissary talk about having the same meeting in every universe they are not referring specifically to the other as having been present but rather a different version of the other. The Hunter has ultimately killed every other version of the Emissary he has met when going for the last piece of the armillary and likewise, the Emissary has ultimately killed every other version of the Hunter they have met when going for the last piece of the armillary.
since there are infinite universes, theres infinite hunters. infinite isnt a number its an expression of the unending. there are infinite hunters that succeed and infinite hunters that dont. the only starborn you meet are the ones that have been successful, while the ones that are left behind or die you never see again. both outcomes happen infinitely, thats why the trader girl, the hunter, and the emissary are all there and claim to have won last round even though you clearly won last time from your perspective. you gotta start thinking outside the schrödinger’s box when talking about what infinity means.
I think starfield is a meta commentary on how people play bethesda's games. the different starborn are all examples of the kind of role play we as the player can have in the starfield world. youve got the obvious: be the merciless, kill everything for fun hunter. or the righteous, help people, good guy trying to do whats right emissary. then less obviously: the trader, representing a less common roleplay approach of a merchant. Petrov, "the collector" the captain of the scow being that player who hordes everything, collecting everything in the game. and as for the unexplained hows and why's of the mechanics of the world, keeper aquilas is literally telling us its up to us to come to our own conclusions with his "your truth" speech.
This has always been my thought too. Even a decade ago there were jokes and memes about every quicksave before a decision creating a multiverse; how many of those universes did the Dragonborn give in to violence and tyranny and sack Whiterun singlehandedly just because Nazeem said something rude?
@@bc64100 You can actually do that. Barrett gives you the Frontier, and even though Vasco says you have to go to Jemison, you can actually go wherever you want.
YES. YES. FINALLY. IVE BEEN SCREAMING THIS FROM THE ROOFTOPS. God, the number of skyrim characters I made and seeing how starfield works? It's fucking genius
I gotta' be honest. Seeing your video about this is a breath of fresh air. I have no idea what's up with The Starborn, what their goal is - but I intend to keep asking and keep searching. There's a lot of cynical takes about, "The quality of BGS' writing" and, "How this game is worthless" and "How Starfield is dead and every other space game is better because X reason or Y gameplay concession or Starfield does Z worse" or. Something. But here you are, engaging with the media *on its terms,* asking questions *about it.* You have no idea how much I respect and appreciate that. I'm happy to stay tuned to whatever you have to say about one of my genuinely most favorite games in the future. Thank you.
Yes, Im sure any man that can think will be questioned the same, cause this game gives you some to be thinking of, it is bad people can’t go deep or see through these times - starfield much more complicated than people that just won’t understand it try to simplify it as worse game than NMS/BG3, bad writing or whatever they call it
@@wihx9071 It's really not complicated. If you try to dig in deeper you'll find there's nothing there. It's surface level attention with no real motive behind the whole thing. When you actually look objectively at the Emissary and Hunter - their motives make ZERO sense. If they're here just to go crazy and have fun then why aren't they doing just that? If they're there to help protect lives, then why aren't they doing just that? No, they exist solely to go into the unity for ... reasons. That's all there is to it. They ignore the fact that you equip the thing to a starship and LITERALLY jump to it with everyone on board. So teaming up is the logical thing to do here. Everyone wins, no one has to die. But nope, gotta shoot first ask questions later. Also, think about it for a second. You can leave the unity, ship intact, and revisit the Unity at any time. It's not a single use item. You don't bring your ship with you into the unity, so it can be assumed your ship remains in whatever place it 'jumped' to minus the crew. That again completely destroys any reason for the conflict. As for the game itself, well... it IS objectively bad. Poor writing, zero player agency, utterly soulless NPCs, and only a handful of missions which offer something besides "shoot everything that moves" or "fetch the stick" style quests. If you enjoy that then fine, but let' not pretend it does anything particularly well.
The hunter is just too jaded, I don't think "I'm bored" is a good enough reason to kill everyone. The emissary is a megalomaniac, the unity itself makes no judgement, and yet they feel entitled to judge who gets to the unity, when they themselves were not judged, it's hypocrisy and I won't stand for it, they can both go duck themselves
I don't think it's necessarily that he's bored. I think it's more like he's been to so many universes now that he no longer recognizes them as people. They're probably just obstacles to him after so much time
If you literally seen the same people hundreds of times, human life starts to lose meaning. To him, no one is unique or special. They can be replaced. He lives life like how a player plays a game.
@@notreallydaedalus the game itself even references this with the version of you that kills everyone in constellation HQ before you get there. Thought it was super cool
But you the player eventually become like this, the first few play-through's you keep trying to save people and do things differently, then eventually after a bunch of NG+'s you start to become psychopathic ie doing ridiculous stuff or turning evil just for kicks or speed-running for temple powers. You're only on your 10th run of a universe and you're already becoming the Hunter and he's on his thousandth run.
The Hunter is from a time before Earth is fully evacuated. The reason he is so powerful is because he is likely one of the first humans in history that would have been able to discover the artifacts. The Hunter is also not Keeper Aquilus. The Hunter in our first universe is Keeper Aquilus. The Keeper Aquilus in our first universe is a Hunter who survived long enough to become The Pilgrim, who then becomes The Keeper. The player character, after going through The Unity enough times, becomes The Hunter, because the hunt for power is all we care about. We then, as The Hunter, can decide that chasing power isn't worth it, and instead stay in a universe and create a legacy, thus making us The Keeper. In the time between us being The Hunter and The Keeper, we would be The Pilgrim, questioning our place and our motivation. The Hunter will always exist, because there will always be someone whose ambition for power drives them to the pathology of collecting the artifacts. Due to the inevitability of The Hunter's existence, there will always be those left in the wake of their destructive pursuit, and so there will always be an Emissary who attempts to prevent more Hunters from being born. If you remain in a universe after collecting the artifacts, and keep the armillary built in your base, you are effectively becoming The Emissary because you are gatekeeping who can reach the Unity. Anyone and everyone can reach the Unity. If you grav-jumped a colony ship, everyone on the ship would reach the unity, and they would all become Starborn (if they decided to). Once someone reaches the Unity in a universe, A pulse of energy rings out, infusing that universe with your essence, and in the final shot of the ending, you see flashing light headed toward where we exploded. We know that the universe continues naturally (outside of your infused essence), but we also see that the use of the unity signals or draws some force from deep space toward that point. Perhaps the creators, perhaps intelligent aliens, perhaps Sebastian Banks using the light to guide his way home. ( Tangent ) The House Varuun sigil looks nearly identical to the doors on the temples. The Great Serpent is likely a Starborn, or perhaps a creator entity. Perhaps they are what is called back to the universe with our leaving it, or perhaps the prophesy of its return indicates that The Great Serpent intends to be able to return to universes they have previously visited. Perhaps The Great Serpent is a Hunter that never pursues the self-enlightenment of The Pilgrim, or perhaps the actions of The Great Serpent are what ultimately lead to the creation of The Pilgrim. ( Tangent Over) The Emissary is a dark perversion of the Constellation members. When The Hunter kills one of your companions, everyone left alive reinforces to you that you must not give up on the quest to find the answers. It is the grief of losing us, the player character, that drives The Emissary to commit to their philosophy of gatekeeping. They are unable to let go of their grief, they are controlled by their grief. This is why your first interaction with The Emissary is them telling you to not seek answers, to give up your quest, meanwhile, your still living version of that character is telling you that you must press on. It is why the wake quest is so important, because at the wake you are able to embrace grief as a justification for killing the hunter, perhaps leading you to side with the Emissary. While you are able to decide to feel this way, if you speak to the members of constellation, they will encourage you to overcome your grief, which is why each of their storylines involves unresolved grief. They understand what you are going through, having lost your most important companion. Every aspect of this story is deeply human, and wants you to ask yourself the big questions. The Starborn are physical caricatures of the answers one might derive, given the fantasy presented in the game. This allows for incredible roleplaying depth, as you decide what answers you will give to the universe. Personally, my main character has fully embraced the role of The Hunter. His inner drive comes from his unshakable faith in The Great Serpent's return. The Irony of my character is that he has the weakest justification for his atrocities. In his original universe, he married Andreja after The Hunter killed Sam Coe. He ultimately sided with The Hunter. He and Andreja entered The Unity together, but ever since that day, he regrets doing so because he will never be reunited with the real Andreja. He travels universe to universe, always killing both The Hunter and The Emissary. Now he mindlessly seeks power to better serve his god, which is the only constant among the infinite.
I told people not to expect much from the story of this game because its an Emil Pagirulo special, which means no thought went into it all that went into it is "how can i get a twist? Twists make stories good!"
Added to everything you said in your excellent video - _groups_ of unnamed Starborn pursue the player. How do they even form groups? Do they have a clubhouse universe? Much of the language they use implies that they are working together to stop you. We are certainly never tasked with stopping a "new" starborn, nor a source of authority to task us with anything really (Maybe after 6x9 NG+'s 🤗). Them lil portals in the end quest (and the one with the uncalibrated laser thingy) allow universe hopping without Unity. And the Unnamed are both able and ready to hop right in whenever you complete a temple or snag an artifact. Cynically these are just gameplay elements not fully fleshed out and simply don't make sense. But maybe if there *is* a Starborn DLC next year, the lore will add up.
I’ve often wondered if the star born don’t actually exist that your body is lying in a cryo-pod somewhere while your consciousness is sent out across the Multiverse as a star born
Tbh based on the dialogue from some of those staborn it seems that they're either trying to get the artifacts for themselves, or defending it from its resting place, almost like they're defending the artifacts themselves from power hungry starborn. And since the player seems to be an anomaly in the multiverse, they see you as a threat
It could be that every universe where the player dosen't die is the universe that has the pilgrim, keeper aqualis, and the hunter coexisting. So possibly without those factors the player ends up dead by the hunters hands
You’ve asked the same questions I’ve had since originally “glimpsing the Unity”. My theory is that when the artifacts are assembled into the Armillary and the Unity is activated the artifacts are reset in that Universe as if we never found them or even existed. Restarting the search for the remaining Starborn and explores. Also maybe the time line resetting for our character each time is to give us a chance to live life again, before ours was interrupted by this never ending quest.
That’s an interesting concept - the universe resetting to make up for your success. Maybe that’s the problem with the Starborn, a desperate need to find a place they can fit back into because they are “outside” forever. Hell, that’d probably make me homicidal as well.
@@aschergamer2213 you meet a couple former Starborn like keeper Aquilus with similar story’s, but the one character that made me think this was the Starborn Trader. The way she speaks of the life a Starborn and how they always seem to be the same. She knew the only way to be free and use the gift of a new life was to end her search and just live.
I really don't think that is the case... When you enter the Unity, it states that the Emissary starts her/his our church and ends her/his search. I think I remember a few lines of dialogue that point to the idea that once the armillary is used, there is no way those left behind can move on. They are just forced to accept this as their universe. Of course, I don't know this to be fact... And I kind of feel bad for those left behind if this is the case.
You can meet an adult Cora coe who's a star born so yeah all the people in the ship can enter the unity. Maybe we should commandeer the Constant and get as many people though it as possible 😅
I made the story more dramatic in my first universe before NG+ as my character had just married Sarah and then several in game days later into the story the Hunter had killed her. Then once my character discovered the Emissary was another variant of Sarah this opened up the possibility of getting a 2nd chance of being with her again, so it kind of makes sense that my character would travel to the next universe, then he starts becoming blinded with power and starts entering more universes then eventually like the Pilgrim he decides to stay put after travelling over a dozen universes. I hope future DLCs will add more to the story.
The longer we get into the 5 year delivery schedule and more story is released, i'm sure a lot of these questions will get answered tho i'm sure for the continuing IP be it if it gets a sequel or goes full SaaS, but i think its the meeting with the Creators that will most likely spell out the point in all of this.
@@wihx9071 I think they'll hold off on the Creators until the 5th year. Based on what i'm seeing right now i think that DLC order will go Shattered Space >> Starborn >> Faction War >> Creators/Ending
They're going to spoon feed more crap in the hopes you'll buy it. Don't expect anything resembling deep thought or intuitive gameplay. Just more damage sponges one would assume.
@@mikeymondavi there was a trademark called starborn that called leaked a while back. i don't think they'll keep it for the 5th year DLC. we don't even know if it's going to get that many expansions
@@t.t6294 Nah, that'll be after Shattered Space, so expecting them to pull back a layer or two with the Starborn themselves, but they'll hold off the Creators for the final year and ending most likely. Todd mentioned a 5 year delivery schedule and a 10 year product lifecycle before launch, and it was that approach that made me decide to pre-order rather than wait on a GOTY ed like i was going to when i thought this was going to be the typical BGS 1 and done with DLC approach like Fallout 3, NV, and 4. And thus far they seem to be sticking to that delivery schedule so its lookin like we'll get exactly what they said we'd get before launch. I've yet to see them do or say something that would lead me to believe the plans changed or somehow wont materialize.
I think it’s an interesting concept, I like that we don’t get an exact answer because I think one answer wouldn’t be good enough. There’s something about trying to uncover a mystery only to find more mystery that is a very human experience. It feels natural that the starborn don’t “know” the unity like we hoped to. Like the grav drive technology, the unity is an advancement that humans aren’t ready for, but it’s too late. That being said, it does not feel like Bethesda followed through with these ideas, new game+ feels hollow, Starborn powers feel weightless, outside of a few follower responses, the world isn’t changed by the introduction of magical powers.
I think the easiest way to reconcile "how are there multiple versions of the same person in the same universe?" is that there are probably infinite multiverses. Could also be the hunter is "passing through" while Aquilus has settled down. They're all on a bigass circle, each goes a certain distance, but they all started at different points.
I loved this video it touches so much on positive stuff of Starfield's universe and its lore! And a take of things I didn't consider. I absolutely loved this video!
The film Interstellar came out a year or two before BGS first started working on the concept for Starfield. I think BGS were heavily influenced by that film (Earth is dying & covered in dust; and ‘the Creators’ seem to be like the future humans in Interstellar - guiding past humanity to safety away from Earth with their future tech). Also the Marvel multiverse seems to have played a part. 😅
18:00 if when the ng+ starts, could it be the universes where our player character dips with the ship, never going to the lodge, never doing the main mission?
I loved this. I am just at the end of my first playthrough and am trying to figure out the Starborn and am having no luck. You opened my eyes and will just go through on my own.
There’s a part in one universe where when you get to the unity, the insinuation I got is that, for a starborn to be born, you the person are destroyed and in return, you live on in all universes. The other interesting part is that in most universes the player character dies too. So it almost makes it seem that other than being the main character, there is something important about the character we play as. Kind of like space Highlander. There an only be one.
The biggest flaw of the game is the main story. First playthrough: all is OK, because you are asked to make a choice. You pick one of the 3 options: starborn, hunter or neither. Then all fall apart, because when the game "reset", it simply give you a ship for NG+ and the armor, and the ability to skip the main quest to complete your mission and see the real ending. Sure, there are those random variations when you reach Constellation, but these are one percent of the whole game in terms of variables, right? There is virtually no stake because nothing is really changing. The logic at the base of these choices is meaningless because you affect nothing. You go through unity and there is a new version of the world with the same exact order, same people, same quests. You neither affected the world you are visiting now in some ways (you kill the starborn or the hunter? Make no difference, they will be there again when you reset everything), nor you see changes based on what you do while you are in that world (factions are the same, people are still good or bad as you left them; there is no switch of places or different outcomes or variants of any sort). Now if instead you would influence what is happening, and your actions would cause ripple effects in the next playthrough; that would be meaningful and brilliant. Imagine killing the emissary and have to deal with the consequences by becoming the hunter at that point, and running the universe as the one with that mindset; or killing the hunter and running instead with the emissary mindset the things in the next playthrough. Have the consequences of supporting the pirates factions vs the space soldiers; when you pick one side; or make it so when you are a space ranger or not, that makes the difference. And so on... The game is infuriating... So much potential in how they set up things, and then it feels like all you do is a waste of time, because you reset everything like any other game; but you keep something like your powers; which to an extent are the worst part of the entire game. What else do you keep that has value? Companions are the same, quests are the same, everything is the same no matter if you are good or evil; so what is the point ? Once you understand that, you realize that this game is worth rushing to finish fast, then your second playthrough you build your base, get all the ships you want and basically "finish" the content, and stay in that timeline, as there is no reason to go on anymore at that point, because you can play all the factions missions in one playthrough. I love this game but it does make me so disappointed at the lost opportunity...
I agree. So much potential, wasted by BGS’ usual poor writing when it comes to main quests. Hell, even the side missions felt too short to me but were better written.
@@thejoeker8439 The military faction side quest chain is actually better than the main quest... And that is just to say how bad the main campaign is. If only there was a way to modify it with the editor tools, at least we can fix it ourselves.
I saw myself as a natural antivirus to the Hunter and the Emissary. They had 1000s or millions of copies of themselves and their followers jumping universe to universe. Then there arose me. As they tell us, we never made it this far before. But suddenly here we are not just surviving but making our way to unity. Everytime I ended them both and all their minions. Hoping every version of me would side against both of them and remove them from unity. No more growing numbers for them. They are now slowly being removed from the universes. Millions of me, jumping universe to universe ending the evil reign of the starborn. They are now finite. To me both sides are wrong. The Hunter is clearly a bad guy. While the Emissary while at first seams like the good guy counter to the Hunter, they are just the same thing but with a group of followers. As soon as you don't side with them they immediately plan to kill you. As it is all about the securing the Unity for themselves and controlling who has access. While if done correctly we leave a universe where the Unity can be accessed by anyone that has achieved a certain level of knowledge and readiness.
I believe the keeper aka hunter is actually originally the former chair of constellation "Sir Malcom Livingston". It just makes sense with his unexplained disappearance and the artifact found randomly in the basement.
*SPOILERS* In the endgame part where you can choose to enter or reject the Unity, two of the endings show that anyone can enter the Unity after you do. In the Emissary ending, this group gatekeeps the Unity and allows only the "worthy" from entering it. In the ending where you fight both the Hunter and the Emissary it specifically states that others start to enter it as well. In any ending, your romantic interest enters the Unity "some time later" and becomes Starborn. So, it doesn't seem like there's any limit.
I love your videos! There's an issue that I think will help you understand a lot of issues that you have. Imagine that time does not exist, present, past and future happen at the same time in different universes.:)
I appreciate the ability to make different choices and have done so. I still tend to choose neither and try to reason with them at the end, as that feels "right" to me. The times I have chosen a side have been in alternate realities when my companions aren't a factor. I generally choose to avoid the main quest until I have done some factions first.
It's the illusion of choice. Choose one guy, choose the other guy. Choose neither. It's the same outcome either way, just that one option avoids having to kill them. Personally, I found their motivations for attacking you to be pretty weak so I just offed the pair of them. The universe is better off without super powered psychopaths.
The battle between Emissary vs Hunter seems more like an argument for Order vs Chaos. Or Control vs Freedom. And in the case of Unity, both can be seen as either good or evil
What I like about starborn is how the whole thing is kind of meta. From when I saw my first [starborn] speech option, it became head cannon that starborn are immortal, and the reason you don't see the others reload from the nearest autosave is because it's a different timeline. But that could really explain how the whole, but I've killed the hunter 4 times thing. Either that or the player is in a groundhogs day loop, which also fits since if you do every quest, then the universe just stops doing new things
I think most of the confusing plot holes get patched up if you consider each new universe as a new timeline instead. It really does function more like a time loop rather than a multiverse when you really break it down. Every companion has the exact same backstory in every “universe”, the political state of the galaxy is identical at the start of each ng+, etc. the only time when it feels like a true multiverse is when you get the unique variant universes, like kid constellation, or the one where the lodge is full of different versions of yourself.
The add I got at the beginning of the video was for quaker oats. I’m currently eating straight dry oats that are non quaker oats. The add was thanking me for using there product but I was just like bro you got the wrong guy I’m eating someone else’s oats. 0:16
There are practically infinite different hunters and emissaries, they’re meeting “each other” but it’s not actually the same versions of each other, just other versions filling the same role
My first playthrough I rationalized that the Unity makes of you what you already are. It makes those who are evil worse, and those who are good are given a purpose. My first playthrough my character was a law abiding, caring guy who fell in love with Sarah. He lost her, then went through the unity again to find her. I then stopped my game there. Im gonna start up a new play through though and have this one be ruthless.
One of the things you missed is that more Starborn can be created in the universes you left. The Emissary teaches others to become Starborn if you side with them. Which begs the question: how? You used the artifacts and temples already. Do they respawn somewhere else or what?
What I I’ve so much about that game is it’s somewhat of philosophical allegory for existence in real life. Aristotle’s truth vs necessary is always in effect. So much of what is true is an entirely subjective matter
Love to see someone talking about Starfield lore, more specifically the Starborn. I really hope the next DLC will answer some questions about them. If you didn’t already know, the Artifacts aren’t destroyed when someone goes through the Unity because the “you” from the Unity tells you that your partner from the universe you are leaving eventually goes through, although it’s unknown if they stay assembled on your ship or if they scatter again. While the VA theory is major evidence against it, I personally think Aquilus/The Hunter IS Victor Aiza. If you side with him as a Starborn to go to the buried temple, he mentions being hundreds of years old and living on Earth. Victor Aiza was also misled/manipulated by the person he met when he touched the Mars Artifact, and who gains the most benefit from humanity spreading across the stars? The Hunter, because in many universes rather than tracking down all 24 Artifacts himself, he relies on Constellation and the other Starborn to collect the majority of them for him so he can take them for himself and reach the Unity even faster.
i feel like they are a device to make their NG+ part of the game's lore. The real stories are in the UC/Crimson Fleet/Ryujin and Ranger quests. We might learn more in what may be a future DLC rumored to be called "Starborn". Whether or not they have any answers worked out now, and are just keeping from us until a later date, or if they didn't write any more lore than what we see, who knows :)
As I understand it, you can go through the Unity even after someone did before. This though is something I take from an ending siding with the Emissary, in which it was stated that the Emissary remained in the Universe to guide others into the Unity without violence. This, obviously, seems to collide with why all Starborn fight over the Artifacts to get into the Unity. Unless.... unless only the first one to enter the Unity keeps their powers they gathered in that universe. This would also explain why there are so infinitely many relatively "weak" Starborn. And why there are groups of them working together. Well, that is my theory at least.
I think starborn move in a linear line sort of. The hunter and the emissary always meet because that universe they always meet in is a convergence point. And either the emissary passes through, the hunter, or in very small circumstances, you do. And either the hunter dies, passes through, or stays behind. That's the case for all 3 of them. Either the emissary dies, stays behind, or goes through. The emissary comes from a universe where the character dies, and either the hunter stays or dies. And the further "down the line" either 3 go, they eventually decide to stop and settle.
What I want to understand is even though Father Aquilis is the Hunter, I'm curious to how the Constillation members can become the Hunter or Emissary. My first playthough was Barret and when Father said he was the Hunter I was super confused
The Barrett in your starting universe is not the Barrett who became Starborn FIRST. In the emissary's original universe, he discovered all of the artifacts and entered the unity (and perhaps your character in his universe wasn't even part of constellation ) and became Starborn. From there, he was able to go through the Unity Multiple times, and eventually end up in your Universe. He is still surprised that you are the one to become Starborn, because he has never seen a version of you become Starborn. He is still Barrett (or one of the other Constellation members), just a variation of the Barrett you know.
Have you done Barrett's personal mission? I ask because... spoiler ahead... once you complete it and he gets his power he is able to bring over another version of him to your universe, and they have completely different stories about their lives, and some minor differences between themselves too.
Couple things to add, the armillary does not get used up after you go through it as at the end credits it will say your partner choose to go through it later, so in the game it is clear more than one can go through it, how many is not clear though and they can go through at different times. If you side with the emissary least in my case he choose to stay behind which perhaps made him the pilgrim? I think it puts the player back at the same time in new universe because it was the start of your quest for artifacts and you have a choice to do it again or not. Its not clear when the others come through and they seem to have some collect themselves. The biggest question for me is who built the temples and the artifacts in the first place? This is what I really want to know. They are clearly built before the rise of humanity on earth.
My thinking is that there are an infinite number of hunters, and infinite number of player characters and on every new world the character ends up meeting the hunter, it's the first time that version of the hunter meets you not being an idiot who already died. Hence, it isn't that you defeat the hunter at the end and he spawns again, you just meet another version of that same guy. So I guess too then, that part of the thing that makes you not the idiot who died is that there's a version of the hunter that became the pilgrim and then Aquilus, so apparently on some sort of a chaos theory/butterfly effect thing, that version of the hunter settling down helps the player character succeed.
0:00 "Starfield is a game." I agree. I can't even imagine how attacking Hunter Starfield at the start of your first run changes the game. The (what felt like eleventh-hour at the time) reveal that there is magic in the universe and you, the legendary dragonborn, can use it, was so wacky and out of left field, but knowing it's at least an element of the setting almost from the start must really change your perspective.
The 'hunter' thing was ridiculous. Walter literally backpedals into position so he can be grabbed. It's the most comical thing to watch ever. I literally ran a new play just to shoot him in the face, and all it really does is kick off the chase sequence earlier. He's basically an 'essential' NPC, so shooting him down just brings him to his knees but he'll get back up and chase you some more. The whole game is railroaded from end to end, so you don't get any points for trying to deviate from their beloved script.
@@Crystan I don't see what any of that has to do with my comment. I'm not talking about game progression or Bethesda's script quality. I'm talking about knowledge gained by the player, as in the person sitting in front of a device playing the game. It applies equally to having the plot spoiled by online discussions, but it's remarkable that you can spoil the game's biggest twist (ie "magic exists," not anything to do with the Hunter specifically) by just attacking a weird NPC you encounter early on.
19:42 the unity entity asks can one ever truly experience anything outside themselves, the hint I took from that is all universes and choices are actually happening simultaneously but you can only experience them linearly due to limited perspective. Even the hunter claims it’s all really variables and constants when he tells you that you’ve never came this far in previous realities. So it’s a giant algorithmic process running simultaneous variables and constants. Did victor aiza actually meet a starborn him, or was it the unity speaking to him for twelve days? Never met a starborn that can show you other universe glimpses but the unity “AI “ could. Maybe it got bored waiting on its creators to return from some unknown dimension so it started playing a game with humanity the only other sentient beings out there. What game can a computational system however complex play to pass the time other than this?
People can go through the unity after you do in the same universe. If you stop both of them you will see that inside the final space as one of the small things you can interact with.
Every Starborn leaves a "time stamp" as you put after they collect the very first artifact. The reason the Hunter and the Emissary keep "reappearing" isn't because of their "time stamps" but more so because of yours. When they die, they are gone only from that particular Universe that they were reborn into, but they still follow their own paths of rebirth and what they did until you either side with them or are killed. I would've loved to have a scenario where we were able kill them both before they had the opportunity to become Starborn in the first place and maybe have two other conflicting forces arise up (like two other random named NPCs that both have a convincing stance on the Artifact with followers and they both formed joinable factions or ones we can stand in opposition to...something like that). Either way, they never "truly" die because in every reset, they are there and present by the time we touch our first artifact.
You make a good point about The Pilgrim being another version of Keeper Aquilas. But, I'd like to think that The Pilgrim is another version of the old earth scientist that discovered grav drives and was then visited by himself too; Just a lot further down the line. It would be cool to get hints as to who some of the other Starborn are, or at least why they appear to guard some of the temples and other artifacts.
I hate the Starborn storyline more than any other storyline that’s ever been written in gaming history. “Here’s these super advanced beings that have technology that looks nothing like anything humans would be able to come up with, so they must be alien right?” “No they’re you and everyone you know from a different universe” “Why are they here?” “To collect artifacts so they can go to a different universe” “What are they going to do in that universe?” “Collect all the artifacts so they can leave it” 🤦♂️🤦♂️🤦♂️🤦♂️🤦♂️🤦♂️
When you reach the Unity you're removed from the normal continuum. The reason you pop out when you do is because that's the moment you touched an artifact and communed with it, something that not everyone can do. But that's not the same start point for everyone else. We know this because other starborn can wait for you at the Lodge. The reason you only sometimes encounter yourself is because most people just get vaporized when closely interacting with an artifact like you do, including most versions of yourself.
The armillary isn't used up, the person in the unity tells you as much in the ending where you didn't ally with either the hunter or the emissary. Something about people being free to discover the armillary without the interference of those too.
I just wish this game didn't play it safe to which you're unable to be blocked out of doing any quests. It'd have made the New Game Plus element so much more impactful. If, once you enter the Unity, it functionally resets everything anyway, why not let us do deeper missions with heavier outcomes. It'd have substantially increased replay value. That in mind, I feel like the only thing the Unity amounts to is how impatient and possibly hostile you will get after racing through it, multiple times in a row. Like constantly beating the game multiple times just to see one of the universes/or get better upgrades. That all being said, everything is very much pointless in that game and it could've been better had they a good writer.
there is one other neutral starborn, a random spaceship encounter with a merchant that revals to be starborn if you are in ng+ and sells some legendary and unique weapons
We do know the artifacts in fact stick around/are usable thanks to the unity "epilogue" talking, your romance partner "eventually" chooses to become starborn, the emissary leads people they think should be starborns to be reborn, a certain alternate reality variation has someone hunting you after you went thru.
I genuinely think the writers came up with the plot on some shrooms and forcefully went forward with it rather than realizing how full of holes it actually is
It’s a game about exploring into the unknown. Whenever we as humans find answers to the questions of the universe we also find more questions along the way.
Except nothing is unknown. Literally every planet you can land on has already been visited by someone. Even the unity isn't really an 'unknown' at the end of the day, because the Starborn have already been there. In fact, they could literally have told you exactly what the unity is right from the start and your character probably wouldn't have even bothered looking for it.
One of many things I don't agree with this man is the fact he doesn't know what infinity is and how surprisingly lucky you are to have a lot of new games with hunter
The only answer I came to at the end of Starfield is no one should have the power of the unity and you should learn to accept the choices you made in your original universe. Don't get me wrong I new game plused a few times, upgraded some powers yadda yadda, but everytime I tried to do any type of quest everything felt completely hollow and meaningless. My answer after gathering all the artefacts was kicking Constellation off my ship, hiding the artifacts on an empty world on the edge of the galaxy and ensuring no one could ever abused their power. All of Constellation wanted to single mindedly use the artifacts without a moment of thought put into it of leaving your original universe, family, friends, everyone who ever knew or cared about you and trading it in for a fancy space suit, fancy ship, and lame space magic. It just seems incredibly short sighted at best, and power hungry at its worse.
The hunter says that (you) normally die when the crimson fleet first arrive. We as players are a anomaly there fore we are just one. Its safe to say that the Starborn both as reborn and there normal self's can go true creating more of them each new universe.
I assumed that if you talk the Hunter into giving you the artifacts, that starts him on his path to becoming the Pilgrim. You basically force him to look at things from another point of view.
4:26 I think that, when a starborn is killed, their body rematerializes in their home universe. It makes sense, since they are interlopers in the multiverse, and it's a way of balancing out the multi-cosmic scale.
In my initial Universe I had Sarah as my companion throughout the whole run and we married. Entered the unity and we lost each other. Fast forward to my 8th universe the emissary was Sarah. I sided with her against the Hunter and after beating him she said "it felt like in the old times"...
Accumulation of power, good sir. This is why they fight to get to the Unity. You do so, as well, whether or not that’s your goal. It’s capped out at ten trips through the Unity. But, as far as the story line goes, the Hunter himself states as much. His seemingly endless trips through the Unity were all for accumulation of power. Now, as far as how the Unity and multiple dimensions work? The details are messy, to say the least. You bring up a lot of good points. How does the pilgrim, Aquilas and the Hunter all exist at the same time in seemingly endless universes? You can get a taste of it yourself, in one of the trips through the Unity. You come out the other side, travel to the Lodge to find that universes version of yourself already there. Another time you can find all of the member of the lodge murdered by a psychopath version of yourself donning the same black armor as the Hunter. On the other hand, it’s also possible to traverse the Unity and find yourself in a universe all by yourself. All of the lodge members gone, or alternatively, only find Noel as all other members retired. It seems this game’s version of multiple universes breaks causality and several paradoxes all at the same time. Hell, siding with the Hunter will see him order you to murder Aquilas. Siding with the Emissary leaves that version of whichever constellation member to be the sole decision maker of who gets into the Unity and who doesn’t. Siding with neither means you “leave it open behind you”. So, we can surmise the artifacts remain intact once you leave. Leaving it open behind you is confusing, though. Do people still need to build the armillery? That defeats the purpose of “leaving it open”, doesn’t it? The whole thing is confusing. Best to just not think about it too much. Multiple universes and time travel gets way too ridiculous, in my opinion. Overall, I like the game. It could stand to have a bit more variety in some areas. Maybe answer a few questions or give us a goal besides power accumulation, as our reason for going through the unity. Maybe give us the ability to end the war between Starborn in each universe. That’s a worthy goal, moving forward. Each iteration that we visit, we could end the war between them by either good or evil means. But again, overall, I like the game. Having fun with it, especially with Mods. Good video. Well thought out.
If you marry Sarah Morgan before going into the unity, it is stated that she follows in your footsteps and becomes a Starborn herself when you get there
I wouldn't put too much brain-power into it. Knowing BGS's puddle-deep storytelling skills I wouldn't be surprised if any mysteries popping up is nothing but happy coincidences with no real weight behind them whatsoever.
As they say in game, unity is only half of the answer. The other half was given to the founder of the house of va’run. The great serpent to so degree represents something just as real and important as unity. We’ll have answers after the dlc
@@shahherwan93 Maybe not the full answer. But some of it. I mean we don’t even fully understand the unity so I’m not saying it’ll answer everything. But I think the serpent will be revealed to be a real thing and not just a mythical religious belief
Crack Theory: We're playing through the Redguard Creation Myth. The Great Serpent consumes the universe at its end, but it also creates new ones by shedding its skin. The Starborn are the Et'Ada who've learned to walk outside the world long enough to persist between universes... accumulating power and shaping the universe with what they carry between them. Eternally stuck in a cycle of seeking a deeper understanding. If we branch out into the Lessons of Vivec, it actually parallels a bit more. The only escape from the cycle is realizing the impact of one's own existence as a part of the universe, and loving all as one loves themselves, thereby slipping up and out. The Keeper/Pilgrim is attempting that.
I enjoyed your philosophical meanderings! Regarding the hunter and the emissary, you didn't mention that those are perhaps special creations/representations/agents of whoever created the artifacts and the temples. That creator may have a purpose in elevating humans and giving them ever increasing powers, and they may have created the Hunter and the Emissary in each universe to guide the evolutionary process of the starborn...
Everytime you enter the unity your consciousness is scattered across the multiverse. Your consciousness gets updated across the multiple versions of yourself.
I believe the starborn appear in each new universe at the exact moment they first touched the artifact the first time so they don't all appear in the same place at the same time they just appear at the same place in time as when they first saw their first vision of unity
When you die after becoming starborn, you turn to dust too. And then time shenanigans happen, and you reload... Maybe in a different universe? Maybe death does transport you, but how would you know that if you never experience death before?
"Oh, neat! I can't wait to figure out the mystery behind these artifacts!"
"Oh neat! There are megalithic scifi temples built too? I bet the reveal will be cool AF!"
"Oh, neat! Finally made it to the end to meet The Unity larping as me...can't wait for the reveal, so who built all this and set it all up, putting it all in motion?"
"... The...Makers made it."
* *Throws keyboard*
Literally stopped playing after this.
yeah it was freaking wild we never learn absolutely anything about these makers and why they build the scorpion compass, the temples and the artifacts.. absolutely nothing gets revealed ever, much bullshit, such wow..
Cringe
It doesn't put a bow on it, but I think it is vital for letting speculation breathe as we all, as starborn, wonder what it all means.
Personally I feel really uncomfortable how a machine is putting humanity's most powerful individuals into an infinite time loop.
What is the larger game at play? I speculate that the temples are more like nodes on a network, and every ball of light we fly through is us linking two universes. I think that was the point of the entangled quest, because the secret ending to that quest is merging two events together.
Personally I prefer this way of storytelling where we have to think for a long time until an expansion finally reveals if we were right or not.
They temples are clearly older than the human race on earth and leaked info indicates the next expansion will be called Starborn, so perhaps they are saving who build the temples for that.
The apathy of the hunter seems excessive at start. When you meet him at the bar. Till you start running through ng+s and eventually become like the hunter yourself. Its so well done i struggled to believe Bethesda wrote it
That happened to me too. Lol
Me too. I was about to go to a new universe but wanted to level up pistols. Since none of it mattered anyway in the new universe I just killed everyone on Jemison to improve the skill. Then entered unity with UC trying to kill me
He's Basically Rick Sanchez without the crybaby backstory.
I came to write this. You stop caring after you are yonked from your original galaxy.
@@Xariann_You_ stop caring, maybe. I try to leave each universe better than it was when I arrived.
I find the starborn to be depressing, hollow, and an existential nightmare in terms of universal purpose. I think the true victory is never giving into them, the powers, the bs, and their hollow endless struggles.
I think this makes the most sense. It feels like the starborn and the main story in general is designed to show you that it's about the journey, not the destination. When you decide to forsake your character's life, including all your friends and relationships in order to reach the unity, you end up feeling alone and you still don't have the answers you wanted
Yeah, they're just in a a hamster wheel running as fast as they can.
The Starborn are sad. They've lost touch with their humanity and mortality.
Yeah, but what happens to the artifacts after we leave the universe? It seems to stay active in the universe. The Hunter is a bad choice because nobody is protecting the armillary. The Emissary essentially creates a Constellation-esque cult to guard the artifacts and presumably create people ready to become starborn. I believe the crazy starborn we encounter are people who wandered into the vortex because of whoever killing both the emissary and the hunter or due to the hunter's ending leading to no one protecting the vortex.
The best ending is likely killing both and not NG+ing but guarding the armillary on your ship. I feel like starfield's NG+'s lend more to the different decisions we made in the universe. My first run I was talking my way out of situations, but my second I was picking and choosing which groups/people to kill, all in an attempt at the most orderly universe.
One multiverse theory is that each decision creates infinite new universes. If that's the case in Starfield, then us touching the first artifact could be what creates " our" multiverse. Everything seems the same to us because it is the same until we touch that artifact.
Legit
And a reason why we respawn (at least in my head canon) is that you respawn in an alternative universe, where you didn't die in that moment. That would explain why we don't respawn with more power and still try to hunt the artifacts.
My favorite mod for Starfield was "Starfield As Roguelike" - which got started when the author said... _"Hey...what happens to all those Starborn we merk'd?"_ which led to the question _"why doesn't that happen to us?"_ - which led to the author thinking "It should happen to us..."
So when you have that mod active - if you die, then you start a new NG+ game in a new universe.
It gets interesting if you use the *other* mod that increases the chances that you land in one of the "Alternate" universes from the base 12.5% to something higher (one alternate every 8 NG+ starts...urf...) ...but not TOO high such that you run out of those Alternates and start encountering a bunch of repeats...
I found it made me a LOT more careful once I got to a universe that I actually liked.
If only the Bethesda Writers had thought of this.
@@TheGallantDrake of course they did cause they made the game
A minor point: There is at least one other "named" Starborn I have encountered in every universe so far... The Trader. Of course, they are just a "mysterious ship" during the initial playthrough. I definitely am not sure, but IIRC they do seem to recognize your transformation from your initial game when you encounter them in NG+ .. something along the lines of "good to see you made it".
There are also alternate universes where you meet some "one-off" named Starborn: one where "Constellation" is made up of different versions of yourself and one with a vengeful Starborn Cora who is hunting down every version of you across universes to avenge her Dad, whose heart you broke. Not sure how those might influence your thoughts on the Starborn.
quick correction on the Cora one, she's specifically hunting the "you" from her universe, because in her universe, that "you" allowed the Hunter to kill Sam
Wow I didn’t know about the trader - have never seen this one
When the Cora thing happened, it blew my mind.
@@GinaRanTruthEnforcer There's also the all you constellation, that's six more.
@@vinaypatel8578 what does that have to do with what i said?
Frankly, I'm convinced that the evil option is going through the unity.
@@41Chewbacca41 It depends on your motivations for going through, and how you reach it in the first place.
Would you leave everyone in your life, all your memories, experiences, accomplishments for the chance to do it all over again?
Would it be worth it to see a loved one just one more time, and what about again, and again, and again? At what point is enough enough? At what point is an end good enough?
Whatever your answer, that is the answer of the unity. Your answer.
To me it never really made sense.
You die when leaving this universe, but you enter the new one as a starborn, but thats it.
The only gameplay differences are not doing the mainquest from the beginning and being able to skip certain dialogue trees.
Its not more like your universe but somehow learning there are other multiverses.
what i mean is in your multiverse, there would always be a given chance to touch that artifact since i thing its said that the changes are small and not massive.
This would mean that only you can be a starborn, but others also can be one.
This means that you don't enter a universe centred around you but around the one who touches the artifact first.
It can be done from a place of hope too. Taking just you out of the universe you came from, you have a chance to make better choices in the new one and save so many.
Bethesda like modern Hollywood don't really get morality. Like Sam says he and Cora are coming with you, he doesn't seem to give any thought to the fact that this would mean her mother would never see her again. Just like in his story you have to support his decision to put her in danger to get his approval, its twisted.
It depends on your motivations and decisions in the universe, it can make sense no to do it.
If Bethesda decides to expand the starborn lore in dlc or future games they honestly have the potential to reach the level of well written mindfuckery of the elder scrolls lore
it's pretty hard to explain in a way that isn't totally broken or doesn't go into "reality is just a game yo"
The problem with that is that BGS has long since lost its best lore writers from the Elder Scrolls' heyday, especially the ones who designed the nuances of its cosmogony.
In fact, they've even kept their worst quest writer (Emil), who's doubtless a predominant reason why the writing in Starfield stops at the elevator pitch premise.
@@baitposter Emil “Nate is a war criminal” Pagliarulo lmao
The mindfuckery of the "Dragon Break"
@@qwuvvy4155 "yeah so we fucked up really bad. How can we make it all canon and not canon all at once so we don't have to think about continuity for future games?" "Why not just make everything canon and call it a dragon break?" "Hot diggity darn Emil I knew we kept you around for a reason.
Unity could be like a tree where everytime you enter it, you spawn into several branches/universes. Which would explain why the hunter is a starborn before you, in all of em. As hes started a lot earlier and is simply so much further up the tree that hes exponentially ahead of you.
And the hunter also comments on how he has never seen our character make it to becoming a starborn
You’re wrong about this. The starboard only go through the Unity in hopes TES6 is on the other side. I’m on round 356 and still no Tamriel… lol
Everyone on the ship definitely goes into the unity. If you don't go through, when you talk to them again they will also mention having chosen to stay. Would have been awesome if one or two of your crew were not there when you come back.
I think each person goes to individual version of unity - it is like yes it is the same place but for every mind is only, it is not like they all were on ship and got staying in the same hall
depending on your ending, your romantic partner(s) will follow you. not to say you will actually meet them again but it does mention it. Cora also goes into Unity eventually, not sure about the others
Two things. If you choose neither The Hunter nor The Emissary, when in the unity it says that you keep the way open for those after you, so more than just those on your ship go through. Two, you have to give something of yourself to the old universe to start ng+ that could be reseeding the artifacts.
Like the Dragon Balls?
It's also described as a star going nova, which is a little confusing as an analogy since it kind of explains the term "starborn" and you body being replaced with stardust if you coalesce from a nova, except that the nova happens in the old universe. Maybe it's supposed to happen simultaneously in both, linking the two (or more) universes. Either way, it would have been fun had there been mentions near the start of the game of there being two novae spotted simultaneously, and in ng+ of there being four (one each for the Emissary, Hunter, Trader and player), or potentially more (for variants with, eg, starborn Cora).
When I first saw the Hunter, I kept trying to figure out a way to hire him for my crew.
I like the idea that when you go through the unity, you exist everywhere and every when at the same time, only coalescing into the reality that you get more artifacts for. What if that’s the situation? Getting the artifacts solidifies you into the universe, and the Starborn are rabidly searching for the reality they left, or one close enough. Losing everyone and everything just to move forward would probably cause some people to go crazy.
@@aschergamer2213 enlightenment or oblivion… It truly would drive some mad. Especially when you think about how just the monotony of normal day-to-day life can break some people.
Naww more like... You remember having form so you build a form from yourself out of just... matter, stardust whatever. Maybe it takes constant concentration to maintain your form maybe thats why you turn to stardust when you die. your concentration is disrupted and you have to re-constitute yourself. The ship and the spacesuit are interesting though because they suggest before you ended up in New Atlantis you went SOMEWHERE. Somewhere with ships and an armoury.
i wanted his gear when i first saw it but wasn’t in a mood to fight him as i ran out of ammo due to bounty hunters
You can get him as a companion if you get the right alternate start in ng+
constelation: its good to have you on board
player: i actually dont wanna join
constelation: we are so happy to have you hear lets get to work
player: i wanna join a different group or just go back to mining
constelation: alright now we have these weird artifacts..
I know it's even worse than fallout 4's constant "ya but you def feel some way about your kid right? Man that's rough what happened with your kid, but after serving in the military I'm sure you're pretty tough! Did I mention you're playing Emil's OC? ok just checking because I saw you having fun doing things Emil wouldn't and so Im programmed to remind you this isn't an RPG, it's a vanity project, Te he."
To think I thought being locked into having chosen one dragon powers in Skyrim was an unacceptable level of on rails story telling for a role playing game attempting to be a sequel to oblivion where you can be anything from a homeless man that helps a chosen one or become a god of madness and everything in between.
@@CoperliteConsumeryou need fucking help
It's almost like you're being placed into a (R)ole to (P)lay a (G)ame.
Alternatively:
Kratos: "I don't wanna fight you"
Some god: "I'm gonna fight you anyway!"
You: "oh my God this game is so railroaded"
IIRC I saw one theory that says that:
Not only are The Pilgrim, Keeper, and Hunter all the same person, but so is the person who first touched the artifact that pushes humanity to destroy Earth for the Grav Drives. And your "reset" point is always when you first touch the artifact. Meaning that not only is the Hunter someone who has been through the Unity a ton, he has to go through all of human grav drive history to get there again.
As I understand it:
Time progresses but has the multiverse save point for each Starborn when they touch the artifact. So, the original Hunter touches the first artifact, lives long enough that Humanity gets to the artifacts supremely slowly at the rate we would've without interference. He resets and does it again and again, getting tired of how long it takes and taking shortcuts to get there until he blitzes it and makes us lose Earth to get there faster. As evident by one of the NG+ variants you can end up in a universe where the original you is still there and didn't die. My guess is the timeline WE start in, that happened to the Hunter. The original him still exists and the experienced Starborn him does too. BUT when that version touches an artifact, now that version's reset branch IS there being two of him. Now, one of them goes on to become the pilgrim, one goes on to be the hunter. Fast forward and now there's us, we died in the other resets but this time we didn't. We touch the artifact and set our own reset branching point. So for us, all those other things will always be the base for the universe. They aren't "different" Hunters but the same one from the past every time. That's why he never has a version that remembers us and always says the "huh, you never lived" line.
...Of course this all gets thrown wacky when you try to explain the Emissary or the other Starborn. Maybe when entering the Unity enough some figure out how to enter more specific realities? It's the only way The Emissary's goal of being Bethesda Aeons makes any sense.
They're saying that the Hunter is also Victor Aiza?
This is way more thought than Bethesda ever put into any of this.
Still dislike that the one trying to stop you wasn't YOU from a previous run.
Or that annoying aspect where New Game Plus wipes your ship, companions, and all your items. Sure you keep the perks, but what was the POINT in ship customization if it would just be wiped. Same with companions, you should at least be able to bring your main one with you. Imagine the conversations with their double present.
LMAO spend 15 minutes reading about what monks are. Apparently you think they do it for the sick threads and dope haircuts.
Well, shit. If that's the case, I may not even finish the game. Maybe I'll tell the Unity to go fk itself (which it could probably do).
I finally built a starfighter, a capital ship (with the help of mods), and now I'm attempting to build a flying saucer. No way I'm letting the Unity rob me of that. Besides, from what I've heard, most of the NG+ universes are just depressing. I've become really attached to my family at Constellation...
The Starborn are obsessed with the power of the Starborn. It's a step beyond psychotic that we aren't meant to take. That has to break the mind in ways we can't even begin to understand. The emissary is as fruity as the hunter. They're just two sides of the same coin. It's all about power for each of them regardless of what the emissary claims.
Once I got to the reveal of who the starborn are, I got it.
Their minds are broken in ways we can't possibly understand, and each starborn processes the unity in their own way
@@bafelix89 Anyone's minds (read: most people's, maybe not literally everyone's) would be broken after going through such an experience, especially several times. A lot, especially in a repeating time frame and not a brand new random one each time, but even then so, would become meaningless or interchangable, no longer special, truly unique, etc.
Picture it like this: Imagine you could save or reload to a fixed point in time in reality. At will or after obtaining some things. You'd retain knowledge (and thus skills). You start exploring. You start learning. You amass knowledge, even if you can't retain physical skills or so maybe, assuming said reload doesn't carry that over as well. You'd start trying new things. It'd be curious at first. Then over time your mind would likely somehow take some form of 'damage' or change with it. At some point especially when you were e.g. of poorer origin, you probably would hit the lottery jackpot, amass wealth, maybe found a company, introduce a brand new tech before all others (because money and partly knowledge wouldn't be an issue after a while, right?)...and you keep doing that or going.
It's like a vampire or immortal concept that goes throughout the century among humans, always losing loved ones or whatever as they die of old age.
I dare say the human mind is hardly made for whatever form of "immortality" you can think of, in most cases. It'd be fun or exciting for a while, possibly a long while. Maybe thousands of attempts or years but at some point you tire. You will inevitably tire. Or, I guess, at some point perish through some means.
@@Unknown-ek1ox Once you're given a universal reset button, you naturally begin to assign less value to the impact of your choices; you stop caring. Nothing matters, because you can just reset it anyway. This leads to people becoming the most extreme personifications of their base ideals and desires.
@@AdmiralKarelia (Sorry slightly longer reply :D)
"This leads to people becoming the most extreme personifications of their base ideals and desires."
You actually kinda put it in a nice simple and yet elegant or beautiful fashion.
At times I actually think of "What would I do if I could 'reset' or 'reload' to a specific time in life, but obviously with the knowledge of what comes after in general?"
And I go through some scenarios in my head. But ultimately I notice that what I would consider an interesting attempt or noble goal to pursue isn't really in stark contrast to my morals, views, interests or ideology. Most scenarios are 'just me, but more empowered or able'.
I'll keep this basic now but for example when something really bad happened to a lot of people I started aiding them with my voice and wallet. But those - time and money - were or are ultimately limited.
If I could go back a few years (just 7-10 years would be enough), I'd know the event would be pretty inevitable and that I couldn't likely avoid it no matter what I did because it's a bit like in the base game of Starfield. You are always set back to a specific point in time. But you're ultimately still right after that Argos artifact gig. Sometimes to change major events you'd need to be another person altogether because it's like rails and tracks and for some things you'd need to be in another "branch" or railways altogether.
Anyway, sorry for rambling, point being, I'd likely try to amass wealth by going for the right investment trends right away (I'd just cheaply buy a lot of Bitcoin before they blow up further and then sell them at their peak of roughly 60k per unit). Or I'd just "guess" the lottery numbers right.
Then with that added wealth, I'd be better able to pursue my notions or ideals and help others.
TL;DR: I'd ultimately still act within my general "operating framework" rather than radically do something else, like IDK, run amok for the heck of it.
I can't rule out however that this wild experience of "ground hog day" might change me drastically still. I specifically mentioned obtaining wealth to pursue goals. I always think of myself as relatively level-headed and modest but I've seen people who went 180 when they obtained a lot of wealth, almost in a way they couldn't handle either maintaining it long-term and/or character-wise. Then again we could argue and go back to your original point: It is just their base personality to begin with, amplified.
@@Unknown-ek1ox That's just Undertale Flowey's arc in a nutshell, without the convolution. His and Sans dialog reflects the number of routes and times you've reloaded, resetted, and saved. On the Genocide route, Flowey even talks about when he was reborn into a flower and found he had the power to SAVE and RELOAD and how every time he reloaded, kept memories, and kept trying new things, it soon grew frustrating.
"I've done everything this world has to offer. I've read every book. I've burned every book. I've won every game. I've lost every game. I've appeased everyone. I've killed everyone. Sets of numbers... Lines of dialogue... I've seen them all."
My take on the Hunter and the Emissary and by extension all the other Starborn is that there is effectively an infinite number of each of them traversing the multiverse and when the Hunter and Emissary talk about having the same meeting in every universe they are not referring specifically to the other as having been present but rather a different version of the other. The Hunter has ultimately killed every other version of the Emissary he has met when going for the last piece of the armillary and likewise, the Emissary has ultimately killed every other version of the Hunter they have met when going for the last piece of the armillary.
since there are infinite universes, theres infinite hunters. infinite isnt a number its an expression of the unending. there are infinite hunters that succeed and infinite hunters that dont. the only starborn you meet are the ones that have been successful, while the ones that are left behind or die you never see again. both outcomes happen infinitely, thats why the trader girl, the hunter, and the emissary are all there and claim to have won last round even though you clearly won last time from your perspective. you gotta start thinking outside the schrödinger’s box when talking about what infinity means.
I think starfield is a meta commentary on how people play bethesda's games. the different starborn are all examples of the kind of role play we as the player can have in the starfield world.
youve got the obvious: be the merciless, kill everything for fun hunter. or the righteous, help people, good guy trying to do whats right emissary.
then less obviously: the trader, representing a less common roleplay approach of a merchant. Petrov, "the collector" the captain of the scow being that player who hordes everything, collecting everything in the game.
and as for the unexplained hows and why's of the mechanics of the world, keeper aquilas is literally telling us its up to us to come to our own conclusions with his "your truth" speech.
Honestly it's a meta commentary on the mechanic of new game plus or subsequent playthoughs in general.
This has always been my thought too. Even a decade ago there were jokes and memes about every quicksave before a decision creating a multiverse; how many of those universes did the Dragonborn give in to violence and tyranny and sack Whiterun singlehandedly just because Nazeem said something rude?
if only it was a real rp touch the artifact...nope i'm good goes back to work lol not ever one want to be the hero some just want a pay check
@@bc64100 You can actually do that. Barrett gives you the Frontier, and even though Vasco says you have to go to Jemison, you can actually go wherever you want.
YES. YES. FINALLY. IVE BEEN SCREAMING THIS FROM THE ROOFTOPS. God, the number of skyrim characters I made and seeing how starfield works? It's fucking genius
dude, blink!
Wanted to post it.
Lol
Nah he's hydrated
I gotta' be honest. Seeing your video about this is a breath of fresh air. I have no idea what's up with The Starborn, what their goal is - but I intend to keep asking and keep searching. There's a lot of cynical takes about, "The quality of BGS' writing" and, "How this game is worthless" and "How Starfield is dead and every other space game is better because X reason or Y gameplay concession or Starfield does Z worse" or. Something.
But here you are, engaging with the media *on its terms,* asking questions *about it.* You have no idea how much I respect and appreciate that. I'm happy to stay tuned to whatever you have to say about one of my genuinely most favorite games in the future.
Thank you.
Yes, Im sure any man that can think will be questioned the same, cause this game gives you some to be thinking of, it is bad people can’t go deep or see through these times - starfield much more complicated than people that just won’t understand it try to simplify it as worse game than NMS/BG3, bad writing or whatever they call it
Wut, you mean this is one of your favorite games!
Seconded. Love this guy's thoughts on starfield.
@@wihx9071 It's really not complicated. If you try to dig in deeper you'll find there's nothing there. It's surface level attention with no real motive behind the whole thing. When you actually look objectively at the Emissary and Hunter - their motives make ZERO sense. If they're here just to go crazy and have fun then why aren't they doing just that? If they're there to help protect lives, then why aren't they doing just that? No, they exist solely to go into the unity for ... reasons. That's all there is to it.
They ignore the fact that you equip the thing to a starship and LITERALLY jump to it with everyone on board. So teaming up is the logical thing to do here. Everyone wins, no one has to die. But nope, gotta shoot first ask questions later.
Also, think about it for a second. You can leave the unity, ship intact, and revisit the Unity at any time. It's not a single use item. You don't bring your ship with you into the unity, so it can be assumed your ship remains in whatever place it 'jumped' to minus the crew. That again completely destroys any reason for the conflict.
As for the game itself, well... it IS objectively bad. Poor writing, zero player agency, utterly soulless NPCs, and only a handful of missions which offer something besides "shoot everything that moves" or "fetch the stick" style quests. If you enjoy that then fine, but let' not pretend it does anything particularly well.
we'll most likely get a starborn expansion at some point
The hunter is just too jaded, I don't think "I'm bored" is a good enough reason to kill everyone.
The emissary is a megalomaniac, the unity itself makes no judgement, and yet they feel entitled to judge who gets to the unity, when they themselves were not judged, it's hypocrisy and I won't stand for it, they can both go duck themselves
I don't think it's necessarily that he's bored. I think it's more like he's been to so many universes now that he no longer recognizes them as people. They're probably just obstacles to him after so much time
If you literally seen the same people hundreds of times, human life starts to lose meaning. To him, no one is unique or special. They can be replaced. He lives life like how a player plays a game.
You've never done a "kill everything " run? Ever? The Hunter acts just like the typical gamer.
@@notreallydaedalus the game itself even references this with the version of you that kills everyone in constellation HQ before you get there. Thought it was super cool
But you the player eventually become like this, the first few play-through's you keep trying to save people and do things differently, then eventually after a bunch of NG+'s you start to become psychopathic ie doing ridiculous stuff or turning evil just for kicks or speed-running for temple powers. You're only on your 10th run of a universe and you're already becoming the Hunter and he's on his thousandth run.
The Hunter is from a time before Earth is fully evacuated. The reason he is so powerful is because he is likely one of the first humans in history that would have been able to discover the artifacts. The Hunter is also not Keeper Aquilus. The Hunter in our first universe is Keeper Aquilus. The Keeper Aquilus in our first universe is a Hunter who survived long enough to become The Pilgrim, who then becomes The Keeper. The player character, after going through The Unity enough times, becomes The Hunter, because the hunt for power is all we care about. We then, as The Hunter, can decide that chasing power isn't worth it, and instead stay in a universe and create a legacy, thus making us The Keeper. In the time between us being The Hunter and The Keeper, we would be The Pilgrim, questioning our place and our motivation.
The Hunter will always exist, because there will always be someone whose ambition for power drives them to the pathology of collecting the artifacts. Due to the inevitability of The Hunter's existence, there will always be those left in the wake of their destructive pursuit, and so there will always be an Emissary who attempts to prevent more Hunters from being born. If you remain in a universe after collecting the artifacts, and keep the armillary built in your base, you are effectively becoming The Emissary because you are gatekeeping who can reach the Unity.
Anyone and everyone can reach the Unity. If you grav-jumped a colony ship, everyone on the ship would reach the unity, and they would all become Starborn (if they decided to). Once someone reaches the Unity in a universe, A pulse of energy rings out, infusing that universe with your essence, and in the final shot of the ending, you see flashing light headed toward where we exploded. We know that the universe continues naturally (outside of your infused essence), but we also see that the use of the unity signals or draws some force from deep space toward that point. Perhaps the creators, perhaps intelligent aliens, perhaps Sebastian Banks using the light to guide his way home.
( Tangent ) The House Varuun sigil looks nearly identical to the doors on the temples. The Great Serpent is likely a Starborn, or perhaps a creator entity. Perhaps they are what is called back to the universe with our leaving it, or perhaps the prophesy of its return indicates that The Great Serpent intends to be able to return to universes they have previously visited. Perhaps The Great Serpent is a Hunter that never pursues the self-enlightenment of The Pilgrim, or perhaps the actions of The Great Serpent are what ultimately lead to the creation of The Pilgrim.
( Tangent Over)
The Emissary is a dark perversion of the Constellation members. When The Hunter kills one of your companions, everyone left alive reinforces to you that you must not give up on the quest to find the answers. It is the grief of losing us, the player character, that drives The Emissary to commit to their philosophy of gatekeeping. They are unable to let go of their grief, they are controlled by their grief. This is why your first interaction with The Emissary is them telling you to not seek answers, to give up your quest, meanwhile, your still living version of that character is telling you that you must press on.
It is why the wake quest is so important, because at the wake you are able to embrace grief as a justification for killing the hunter, perhaps leading you to side with the Emissary. While you are able to decide to feel this way, if you speak to the members of constellation, they will encourage you to overcome your grief, which is why each of their storylines involves unresolved grief. They understand what you are going through, having lost your most important companion.
Every aspect of this story is deeply human, and wants you to ask yourself the big questions. The Starborn are physical caricatures of the answers one might derive, given the fantasy presented in the game. This allows for incredible roleplaying depth, as you decide what answers you will give to the universe.
Personally, my main character has fully embraced the role of The Hunter. His inner drive comes from his unshakable faith in The Great Serpent's return. The Irony of my character is that he has the weakest justification for his atrocities. In his original universe, he married Andreja after The Hunter killed Sam Coe. He ultimately sided with The Hunter. He and Andreja entered The Unity together, but ever since that day, he regrets doing so because he will never be reunited with the real Andreja. He travels universe to universe, always killing both The Hunter and The Emissary. Now he mindlessly seeks power to better serve his god, which is the only constant among the infinite.
Love it, thank you
Hey that's my main characters story
@@CyrodiilCome We can share. You are me, anyway.
Better writing than Bethesda
@@Pr0phet_Taker_official They wrote what I am repeating.
I told people not to expect much from the story of this game because its an Emil Pagirulo special, which means no thought went into it all that went into it is "how can i get a twist? Twists make stories good!"
Added to everything you said in your excellent video - _groups_ of unnamed Starborn pursue the player. How do they even form groups? Do they have a clubhouse universe? Much of the language they use implies that they are working together to stop you.
We are certainly never tasked with stopping a "new" starborn, nor a source of authority to task us with anything really (Maybe after 6x9 NG+'s 🤗).
Them lil portals in the end quest (and the one with the uncalibrated laser thingy) allow universe hopping without Unity. And the Unnamed are both able and ready to hop right in whenever you complete a temple or snag an artifact.
Cynically these are just gameplay elements not fully fleshed out and simply don't make sense. But maybe if there *is* a Starborn DLC next year, the lore will add up.
I’ve often wondered if the star born don’t actually exist that your body is lying in a cryo-pod somewhere while your consciousness is sent out across the Multiverse as a star born
Tbh based on the dialogue from some of those staborn it seems that they're either trying to get the artifacts for themselves, or defending it from its resting place, almost like they're defending the artifacts themselves from power hungry starborn. And since the player seems to be an anomaly in the multiverse, they see you as a threat
It could be that every universe where the player dosen't die is the universe that has the pilgrim, keeper aqualis, and the hunter coexisting. So possibly without those factors the player ends up dead by the hunters hands
You’ve asked the same questions I’ve had since originally “glimpsing the Unity”.
My theory is that when the artifacts are assembled into the Armillary and the Unity is activated the artifacts are reset in that Universe as if we never found them or even existed.
Restarting the search for the remaining Starborn and explores.
Also maybe the time line resetting for our character each time is to give us a chance to live life again, before ours was interrupted by this never ending quest.
That’s an interesting concept - the universe resetting to make up for your success. Maybe that’s the problem with the Starborn, a desperate need to find a place they can fit back into because they are “outside” forever. Hell, that’d probably make me homicidal as well.
@@aschergamer2213 you meet a couple former Starborn like keeper Aquilus with similar story’s, but the one character that made me think this was the Starborn Trader. The way she speaks of the life a Starborn and how they always seem to be the same.
She knew the only way to be free and use the gift of a new life was to end her search and just live.
What if the whole point of the Unity in Starfield is to not go j to the Unity? Meta upon meta???
I really don't think that is the case... When you enter the Unity, it states that the Emissary starts her/his our church and ends her/his search. I think I remember a few lines of dialogue that point to the idea that once the armillary is used, there is no way those left behind can move on. They are just forced to accept this as their universe.
Of course, I don't know this to be fact... And I kind of feel bad for those left behind if this is the case.
You can meet an adult Cora coe who's a star born so yeah all the people in the ship can enter the unity. Maybe we should commandeer the Constant and get as many people though it as possible 😅
I made the story more dramatic in my first universe before NG+ as my character had just married Sarah and then several in game days later into the story the Hunter had killed her.
Then once my character discovered the Emissary was another variant of Sarah this opened up the possibility of getting a 2nd chance of being with her again, so it kind of makes sense that my character would travel to the next universe, then he starts becoming blinded with power and starts entering more universes then eventually like the Pilgrim he decides to stay put after travelling over a dozen universes.
I hope future DLCs will add more to the story.
The longer we get into the 5 year delivery schedule and more story is released, i'm sure a lot of these questions will get answered tho i'm sure for the continuing IP be it if it gets a sequel or goes full SaaS, but i think its the meeting with the Creators that will most likely spell out the point in all of this.
They are going to release DLC called starborn so we get creators
@@wihx9071 I think they'll hold off on the Creators until the 5th year. Based on what i'm seeing right now i think that DLC order will go Shattered Space >> Starborn >> Faction War >> Creators/Ending
They're going to spoon feed more crap in the hopes you'll buy it. Don't expect anything resembling deep thought or intuitive gameplay. Just more damage sponges one would assume.
@@mikeymondavi there was a trademark called starborn that called leaked a while back. i don't think they'll keep it for the 5th year DLC. we don't even know if it's going to get that many expansions
@@t.t6294 Nah, that'll be after Shattered Space, so expecting them to pull back a layer or two with the Starborn themselves, but they'll hold off the Creators for the final year and ending most likely.
Todd mentioned a 5 year delivery schedule and a 10 year product lifecycle before launch, and it was that approach that made me decide to pre-order rather than wait on a GOTY ed like i was going to when i thought this was going to be the typical BGS 1 and done with DLC approach like Fallout 3, NV, and 4. And thus far they seem to be sticking to that delivery schedule so its lookin like we'll get exactly what they said we'd get before launch.
I've yet to see them do or say something that would lead me to believe the plans changed or somehow wont materialize.
I think it’s an interesting concept, I like that we don’t get an exact answer because I think one answer wouldn’t be good enough. There’s something about trying to uncover a mystery only to find more mystery that is a very human experience. It feels natural that the starborn don’t “know” the unity like we hoped to. Like the grav drive technology, the unity is an advancement that humans aren’t ready for, but it’s too late. That being said, it does not feel like Bethesda followed through with these ideas, new game+ feels hollow, Starborn powers feel weightless, outside of a few follower responses, the world isn’t changed by the introduction of magical powers.
I think the easiest way to reconcile "how are there multiple versions of the same person in the same universe?" is that there are probably infinite multiverses. Could also be the hunter is "passing through" while Aquilus has settled down. They're all on a bigass circle, each goes a certain distance, but they all started at different points.
I loved this video it touches so much on positive stuff of Starfield's universe and its lore! And a take of things I didn't consider. I absolutely loved this video!
I felt that the hunters apathy is basically the callousness one gets after replaying any game multiple times
The film Interstellar came out a year or two before BGS first started working on the concept for Starfield. I think BGS were heavily influenced by that film (Earth is dying & covered in dust; and ‘the Creators’ seem to be like the future humans in Interstellar - guiding past humanity to safety away from Earth with their future tech). Also the Marvel multiverse seems to have played a part. 😅
Emil literally has marvel brain. So sad
18:00 if when the ng+ starts, could it be the universes where our player character dips with the ship, never going to the lodge, never doing the main mission?
I loved this. I am just at the end of my first playthrough and am trying to figure out the Starborn and am having no luck. You opened my eyes and will just go through on my own.
There’s a part in one universe where when you get to the unity, the insinuation I got is that, for a starborn to be born, you the person are destroyed and in return, you live on in all universes. The other interesting part is that in most universes the player character dies too. So it almost makes it seem that other than being the main character, there is something important about the character we play as. Kind of like space Highlander. There an only be one.
The biggest flaw of the game is the main story.
First playthrough: all is OK, because you are asked to make a choice. You pick one of the 3 options: starborn, hunter or neither.
Then all fall apart, because when the game "reset", it simply give you a ship for NG+ and the armor, and the ability to skip the main quest to complete your mission and see the real ending. Sure, there are those random variations when you reach Constellation, but these are one percent of the whole game in terms of variables, right?
There is virtually no stake because nothing is really changing. The logic at the base of these choices is meaningless because you affect nothing. You go through unity and there is a new version of the world with the same exact order, same people, same quests. You neither affected the world you are visiting now in some ways (you kill the starborn or the hunter? Make no difference, they will be there again when you reset everything), nor you see changes based on what you do while you are in that world (factions are the same, people are still good or bad as you left them; there is no switch of places or different outcomes or variants of any sort).
Now if instead you would influence what is happening, and your actions would cause ripple effects in the next playthrough; that would be meaningful and brilliant. Imagine killing the emissary and have to deal with the consequences by becoming the hunter at that point, and running the universe as the one with that mindset; or killing the hunter and running instead with the emissary mindset the things in the next playthrough. Have the consequences of supporting the pirates factions vs the space soldiers; when you pick one side; or make it so when you are a space ranger or not, that makes the difference. And so on...
The game is infuriating... So much potential in how they set up things, and then it feels like all you do is a waste of time, because you reset everything like any other game; but you keep something like your powers; which to an extent are the worst part of the entire game. What else do you keep that has value? Companions are the same, quests are the same, everything is the same no matter if you are good or evil; so what is the point ? Once you understand that, you realize that this game is worth rushing to finish fast, then your second playthrough you build your base, get all the ships you want and basically "finish" the content, and stay in that timeline, as there is no reason to go on anymore at that point, because you can play all the factions missions in one playthrough.
I love this game but it does make me so disappointed at the lost opportunity...
I agree. So much potential, wasted by BGS’ usual poor writing when it comes to main quests. Hell, even the side missions felt too short to me but were better written.
@@thejoeker8439 The military faction side quest chain is actually better than the main quest... And that is just to say how bad the main campaign is.
If only there was a way to modify it with the editor tools, at least we can fix it ourselves.
I felt the same.
I saw myself as a natural antivirus to the Hunter and the Emissary. They had 1000s or millions of copies of themselves and their followers jumping universe to universe. Then there arose me. As they tell us, we never made it this far before. But suddenly here we are not just surviving but making our way to unity.
Everytime I ended them both and all their minions. Hoping every version of me would side against both of them and remove them from unity. No more growing numbers for them. They are now slowly being removed from the universes. Millions of me, jumping universe to universe ending the evil reign of the starborn. They are now finite.
To me both sides are wrong. The Hunter is clearly a bad guy. While the Emissary while at first seams like the good guy counter to the Hunter, they are just the same thing but with a group of followers. As soon as you don't side with them they immediately plan to kill you. As it is all about the securing the Unity for themselves and controlling who has access.
While if done correctly we leave a universe where the Unity can be accessed by anyone that has achieved a certain level of knowledge and readiness.
My theory is that in every universe, you arriving at the Lodge around the same time, is because it’s a fixed point that needs to happen.
I believe the keeper aka hunter is actually originally the former chair of constellation "Sir Malcom Livingston". It just makes sense with his unexplained disappearance and the artifact found randomly in the basement.
loved the vid! great discussion
*SPOILERS* In the endgame part where you can choose to enter or reject the Unity, two of the endings show that anyone can enter the Unity after you do. In the Emissary ending, this group gatekeeps the Unity and allows only the "worthy" from entering it. In the ending where you fight both the Hunter and the Emissary it specifically states that others start to enter it as well. In any ending, your romantic interest enters the Unity "some time later" and becomes Starborn. So, it doesn't seem like there's any limit.
I love your videos! There's an issue that I think will help you understand a lot of issues that you have. Imagine that time does not exist, present, past and future happen at the same time in different universes.:)
Just subscribed, you're the only person talking about Starfield lore I can find! If anyone has any other suggestions, feel free to reply.
I appreciate the ability to make different choices and have done so. I still tend to choose neither and try to reason with them at the end, as that feels "right" to me. The times I have chosen a side have been in alternate realities when my companions aren't a factor. I generally choose to avoid the main quest until I have done some factions first.
It's the illusion of choice. Choose one guy, choose the other guy. Choose neither. It's the same outcome either way, just that one option avoids having to kill them. Personally, I found their motivations for attacking you to be pretty weak so I just offed the pair of them. The universe is better off without super powered psychopaths.
The battle between Emissary vs Hunter seems more like an argument for Order vs Chaos. Or Control vs Freedom. And in the case of Unity, both can be seen as either good or evil
What I like about starborn is how the whole thing is kind of meta. From when I saw my first [starborn] speech option, it became head cannon that starborn are immortal, and the reason you don't see the others reload from the nearest autosave is because it's a different timeline. But that could really explain how the whole, but I've killed the hunter 4 times thing. Either that or the player is in a groundhogs day loop, which also fits since if you do every quest, then the universe just stops doing new things
I think most of the confusing plot holes get patched up if you consider each new universe as a new timeline instead. It really does function more like a time loop rather than a multiverse when you really break it down. Every companion has the exact same backstory in every “universe”, the political state of the galaxy is identical at the start of each ng+, etc. the only time when it feels like a true multiverse is when you get the unique variant universes, like kid constellation, or the one where the lodge is full of different versions of yourself.
The add I got at the beginning of the video was for quaker oats. I’m currently eating straight dry oats that are non quaker oats. The add was thanking me for using there product but I was just like bro you got the wrong guy I’m eating someone else’s oats. 0:16
There are practically infinite different hunters and emissaries, they’re meeting “each other” but it’s not actually the same versions of each other, just other versions filling the same role
My first playthrough I rationalized that the Unity makes of you what you already are. It makes those who are evil worse, and those who are good are given a purpose. My first playthrough my character was a law abiding, caring guy who fell in love with Sarah. He lost her, then went through the unity again to find her. I then stopped my game there. Im gonna start up a new play through though and have this one be ruthless.
One of the things you missed is that more Starborn can be created in the universes you left. The Emissary teaches others to become Starborn if you side with them. Which begs the question: how? You used the artifacts and temples already. Do they respawn somewhere else or what?
What I I’ve so much about that game is it’s somewhat of philosophical allegory for existence in real life. Aristotle’s truth vs necessary is always in effect. So much of what is true is an entirely subjective matter
they are basically all speed runners after jumping to multiple universes.
Love to see someone talking about Starfield lore, more specifically the Starborn. I really hope the next DLC will answer some questions about them.
If you didn’t already know, the Artifacts aren’t destroyed when someone goes through the Unity because the “you” from the Unity tells you that your partner from the universe you are leaving eventually goes through, although it’s unknown if they stay assembled on your ship or if they scatter again.
While the VA theory is major evidence against it, I personally think Aquilus/The Hunter IS Victor Aiza. If you side with him as a Starborn to go to the buried temple, he mentions being hundreds of years old and living on Earth. Victor Aiza was also misled/manipulated by the person he met when he touched the Mars Artifact, and who gains the most benefit from humanity spreading across the stars? The Hunter, because in many universes rather than tracking down all 24 Artifacts himself, he relies on Constellation and the other Starborn to collect the majority of them for him so he can take them for himself and reach the Unity even faster.
i feel like they are a device to make their NG+ part of the game's lore. The real stories are in the UC/Crimson Fleet/Ryujin and Ranger quests. We might learn more in what may be a future DLC rumored to be called "Starborn".
Whether or not they have any answers worked out now, and are just keeping from us until a later date, or if they didn't write any more lore than what we see, who knows :)
As I understand it, you can go through the Unity even after someone did before. This though is something I take from an ending siding with the Emissary, in which it was stated that the Emissary remained in the Universe to guide others into the Unity without violence.
This, obviously, seems to collide with why all Starborn fight over the Artifacts to get into the Unity. Unless.... unless only the first one to enter the Unity keeps their powers they gathered in that universe. This would also explain why there are so infinitely many relatively "weak" Starborn. And why there are groups of them working together.
Well, that is my theory at least.
I think starborn move in a linear line sort of. The hunter and the emissary always meet because that universe they always meet in is a convergence point. And either the emissary passes through, the hunter, or in very small circumstances, you do. And either the hunter dies, passes through, or stays behind. That's the case for all 3 of them. Either the emissary dies, stays behind, or goes through. The emissary comes from a universe where the character dies, and either the hunter stays or dies. And the further "down the line" either 3 go, they eventually decide to stop and settle.
What I want to understand is even though Father Aquilis is the Hunter, I'm curious to how the Constillation members can become the Hunter or Emissary. My first playthough was Barret and when Father said he was the Hunter I was super confused
The Barrett in your starting universe is not the Barrett who became Starborn FIRST. In the emissary's original universe, he discovered all of the artifacts and entered the unity (and perhaps your character in his universe wasn't even part of constellation ) and became Starborn. From there, he was able to go through the Unity Multiple times, and eventually end up in your Universe. He is still surprised that you are the one to become Starborn, because he has never seen a version of you become Starborn.
He is still Barrett (or one of the other Constellation members), just a variation of the Barrett you know.
@@yesteryearr that's actually super cool! I never realized or thought of it that way!
Have you done Barrett's personal mission? I ask because... spoiler ahead... once you complete it and he gets his power he is able to bring over another version of him to your universe, and they have completely different stories about their lives, and some minor differences between themselves too.
Couple things to add, the armillary does not get used up after you go through it as at the end credits it will say your partner choose to go through it later, so in the game it is clear more than one can go through it, how many is not clear though and they can go through at different times. If you side with the emissary least in my case he choose to stay behind which perhaps made him the pilgrim?
I think it puts the player back at the same time in new universe because it was the start of your quest for artifacts and you have a choice to do it again or not. Its not clear when the others come through and they seem to have some collect themselves.
The biggest question for me is who built the temples and the artifacts in the first place? This is what I really want to know. They are clearly built before the rise of humanity on earth.
Finally some lore videos please keep posting
My thinking is that there are an infinite number of hunters, and infinite number of player characters and on every new world the character ends up meeting the hunter, it's the first time that version of the hunter meets you not being an idiot who already died. Hence, it isn't that you defeat the hunter at the end and he spawns again, you just meet another version of that same guy.
So I guess too then, that part of the thing that makes you not the idiot who died is that there's a version of the hunter that became the pilgrim and then Aquilus, so apparently on some sort of a chaos theory/butterfly effect thing, that version of the hunter settling down helps the player character succeed.
0:00 "Starfield is a game." I agree.
I can't even imagine how attacking Hunter Starfield at the start of your first run changes the game. The (what felt like eleventh-hour at the time) reveal that there is magic in the universe and you, the legendary dragonborn, can use it, was so wacky and out of left field, but knowing it's at least an element of the setting almost from the start must really change your perspective.
The 'hunter' thing was ridiculous. Walter literally backpedals into position so he can be grabbed. It's the most comical thing to watch ever. I literally ran a new play just to shoot him in the face, and all it really does is kick off the chase sequence earlier. He's basically an 'essential' NPC, so shooting him down just brings him to his knees but he'll get back up and chase you some more.
The whole game is railroaded from end to end, so you don't get any points for trying to deviate from their beloved script.
@@Crystan I don't see what any of that has to do with my comment. I'm not talking about game progression or Bethesda's script quality. I'm talking about knowledge gained by the player, as in the person sitting in front of a device playing the game. It applies equally to having the plot spoiled by online discussions, but it's remarkable that you can spoil the game's biggest twist (ie "magic exists," not anything to do with the Hunter specifically) by just attacking a weird NPC you encounter early on.
19:42 the unity entity asks can one ever truly experience anything outside themselves, the hint I took from that is all universes and choices are actually happening simultaneously but you can only experience them linearly due to limited perspective. Even the hunter claims it’s all really variables and constants when he tells you that you’ve never came this far in previous realities. So it’s a giant algorithmic process running simultaneous variables and constants. Did victor aiza actually meet a starborn him, or was it the unity speaking to him for twelve days? Never met a starborn that can show you other universe glimpses but the unity “AI “ could. Maybe it got bored waiting on its creators to return from some unknown dimension so it started playing a game with humanity the only other sentient beings out there. What game can a computational system however complex play to pass the time other than this?
People can go through the unity after you do in the same universe. If you stop both of them you will see that inside the final space as one of the small things you can interact with.
Every Starborn leaves a "time stamp" as you put after they collect the very first artifact. The reason the Hunter and the Emissary keep "reappearing" isn't because of their "time stamps" but more so because of yours. When they die, they are gone only from that particular Universe that they were reborn into, but they still follow their own paths of rebirth and what they did until you either side with them or are killed. I would've loved to have a scenario where we were able kill them both before they had the opportunity to become Starborn in the first place and maybe have two other conflicting forces arise up (like two other random named NPCs that both have a convincing stance on the Artifact with followers and they both formed joinable factions or ones we can stand in opposition to...something like that). Either way, they never "truly" die because in every reset, they are there and present by the time we touch our first artifact.
You make a good point about The Pilgrim being another version of Keeper Aquilas. But, I'd like to think that The Pilgrim is another version of the old earth scientist that discovered grav drives and was then visited by himself too; Just a lot further down the line. It would be cool to get hints as to who some of the other Starborn are, or at least why they appear to guard some of the temples and other artifacts.
I hate the Starborn storyline more than any other storyline that’s ever been written in gaming history.
“Here’s these super advanced beings that have technology that looks nothing like anything humans would be able to come up with, so they must be alien right?”
“No they’re you and everyone you know from a different universe”
“Why are they here?”
“To collect artifacts so they can go to a different universe”
“What are they going to do in that universe?”
“Collect all the artifacts so they can leave it”
🤦♂️🤦♂️🤦♂️🤦♂️🤦♂️🤦♂️
When you reach the Unity you're removed from the normal continuum. The reason you pop out when you do is because that's the moment you touched an artifact and communed with it, something that not everyone can do. But that's not the same start point for everyone else. We know this because other starborn can wait for you at the Lodge. The reason you only sometimes encounter yourself is because most people just get vaporized when closely interacting with an artifact like you do, including most versions of yourself.
The armillary isn't used up, the person in the unity tells you as much in the ending where you didn't ally with either the hunter or the emissary. Something about people being free to discover the armillary without the interference of those too.
With how the main mission was done, and with how it’s so free… I think I might just have myself a star wars starfield experience 💀
I just wish this game didn't play it safe to which you're unable to be blocked out of doing any quests.
It'd have made the New Game Plus element so much more impactful. If, once you enter the Unity, it functionally resets everything anyway, why not let us do deeper missions with heavier outcomes. It'd have substantially increased replay value.
That in mind, I feel like the only thing the Unity amounts to is how impatient and possibly hostile you will get after racing through it, multiple times in a row.
Like constantly beating the game multiple times just to see one of the universes/or get better upgrades. That all being said, everything is very much pointless in that game and it could've been better had they a good writer.
there is one other neutral starborn, a random spaceship encounter with a merchant that revals to be starborn if you are in ng+ and sells some legendary and unique weapons
When I first encountered the Hunter, I thought: "Oh, nice! A reference to the ebony warrior from Skyrim!"
Of course, I was wrong
We do know the artifacts in fact stick around/are usable thanks to the unity "epilogue" talking, your romance partner "eventually" chooses to become starborn, the emissary leads people they think should be starborns to be reborn, a certain alternate reality variation has someone hunting you after you went thru.
Apparently there is pattern filled by ZeniMax called "starborn". Perhaps we'll get expansion that will fill the gaps and answer some questions
Another great video about Starfield? Thanks for this.
I genuinely think the writers came up with the plot on some shrooms and forcefully went forward with it rather than realizing how full of holes it actually is
Ngl, a starborn Ark full of starborn monks trying to decipher the origins & meaning of the Unity sounds SO cool.
It’s a game about exploring into the unknown. Whenever we as humans find answers to the questions of the universe we also find more questions along the way.
Except nothing is unknown. Literally every planet you can land on has already been visited by someone. Even the unity isn't really an 'unknown' at the end of the day, because the Starborn have already been there. In fact, they could literally have told you exactly what the unity is right from the start and your character probably wouldn't have even bothered looking for it.
Wow! You have really given this a lot of thought.
This was such a great video, made me start questioning even more than I thought I already did with this strange but similar universe, thank you 🙏
One of many things I don't agree with this man is the fact he doesn't know what infinity is and how surprisingly lucky you are to have a lot of new games with hunter
The only answer I came to at the end of Starfield is no one should have the power of the unity and you should learn to accept the choices you made in your original universe. Don't get me wrong I new game plused a few times, upgraded some powers yadda yadda, but everytime I tried to do any type of quest everything felt completely hollow and meaningless. My answer after gathering all the artefacts was kicking Constellation off my ship, hiding the artifacts on an empty world on the edge of the galaxy and ensuring no one could ever abused their power. All of Constellation wanted to single mindedly use the artifacts without a moment of thought put into it of leaving your original universe, family, friends, everyone who ever knew or cared about you and trading it in for a fancy space suit, fancy ship, and lame space magic. It just seems incredibly short sighted at best, and power hungry at its worse.
The hunter says that (you) normally die when the crimson fleet first arrive. We as players are a anomaly there fore we are just one. Its safe to say that the Starborn both as reborn and there normal self's can go true creating more of them each new universe.
I assumed that if you talk the Hunter into giving you the artifacts, that starts him on his path to becoming the Pilgrim. You basically force him to look at things from another point of view.
4:26 I think that, when a starborn is killed, their body rematerializes in their home universe. It makes sense, since they are interlopers in the multiverse, and it's a way of balancing out the multi-cosmic scale.
In my initial Universe I had Sarah as my companion throughout the whole run and we married. Entered the unity and we lost each other. Fast forward to my 8th universe the emissary was Sarah. I sided with her against the Hunter and after beating him she said "it felt like in the old times"...
is that the man melter from tf2?
You can run into yourself in some universes.
In one you can encounter yourself at Constellation and he becomes a companion option
Accumulation of power, good sir.
This is why they fight to get to the Unity. You do so, as well, whether or not that’s your goal.
It’s capped out at ten trips through the Unity. But, as far as the story line goes, the Hunter himself states as much. His seemingly endless trips through the Unity were all for accumulation of power.
Now, as far as how the Unity and multiple dimensions work? The details are messy, to say the least.
You bring up a lot of good points. How does the pilgrim, Aquilas and the Hunter all exist at the same time in seemingly endless universes? You can get a taste of it yourself, in one of the trips through the Unity. You come out the other side, travel to the Lodge to find that universes version of yourself already there. Another time you can find all of the member of the lodge murdered by a psychopath version of yourself donning the same black armor as the Hunter. On the other hand, it’s also possible to traverse the Unity and find yourself in a universe all by yourself. All of the lodge members gone, or alternatively, only find Noel as all other members retired.
It seems this game’s version of multiple universes breaks causality and several paradoxes all at the same time. Hell, siding with the Hunter will see him order you to murder Aquilas. Siding with the Emissary leaves that version of whichever constellation member to be the sole decision maker of who gets into the Unity and who doesn’t. Siding with neither means you “leave it open behind you”.
So, we can surmise the artifacts remain intact once you leave. Leaving it open behind you is confusing, though. Do people still need to build the armillery? That defeats the purpose of “leaving it open”, doesn’t it? The whole thing is confusing. Best to just not think about it too much. Multiple universes and time travel gets way too ridiculous, in my opinion.
Overall, I like the game. It could stand to have a bit more variety in some areas. Maybe answer a few questions or give us a goal besides power accumulation, as our reason for going through the unity. Maybe give us the ability to end the war between Starborn in each universe. That’s a worthy goal, moving forward. Each iteration that we visit, we could end the war between them by either good or evil means. But again, overall, I like the game. Having fun with it, especially with Mods.
Good video. Well thought out.
If you marry Sarah Morgan before going into the unity, it is stated that she follows in your footsteps and becomes a Starborn herself when you get there
I wouldn't put too much brain-power into it. Knowing BGS's puddle-deep storytelling skills I wouldn't be surprised if any mysteries popping up is nothing but happy coincidences with no real weight behind them whatsoever.
As they say in game, unity is only half of the answer. The other half was given to the founder of the house of va’run. The great serpent to so degree represents something just as real and important as unity. We’ll have answers after the dlc
I doubt the dlc has the full answer.
@@shahherwan93 Maybe not the full answer. But some of it. I mean we don’t even fully understand the unity so I’m not saying it’ll answer everything. But I think the serpent will be revealed to be a real thing and not just a mythical religious belief
Crack Theory: We're playing through the Redguard Creation Myth.
The Great Serpent consumes the universe at its end, but it also creates new ones by shedding its skin.
The Starborn are the Et'Ada who've learned to walk outside the world long enough to persist between universes... accumulating power and shaping the universe with what they carry between them. Eternally stuck in a cycle of seeking a deeper understanding.
If we branch out into the Lessons of Vivec, it actually parallels a bit more. The only escape from the cycle is realizing the impact of one's own existence as a part of the universe, and loving all as one loves themselves, thereby slipping up and out. The Keeper/Pilgrim is attempting that.
You can find the hunter at the Hitching post in Akila after talking with him at the Viewport
I enjoyed your philosophical meanderings! Regarding the hunter and the emissary, you didn't mention that those are perhaps special creations/representations/agents of whoever created the artifacts and the temples. That creator may have a purpose in elevating humans and giving them ever increasing powers, and they may have created the Hunter and the Emissary in each universe to guide the evolutionary process of the starborn...
Everytime you enter the unity your consciousness is scattered across the multiverse. Your consciousness gets updated across the multiple versions of yourself.
I believe the starborn appear in each new universe at the exact moment they first touched the artifact the first time so they don't all appear in the same place at the same time they just appear at the same place in time as when they first saw their first vision of unity
When you die after becoming starborn, you turn to dust too. And then time shenanigans happen, and you reload... Maybe in a different universe? Maybe death does transport you, but how would you know that if you never experience death before?