Can You Manually Fly Between Planets in Starfield? The Truth About Space Travel
The burning question on every space explorer’s mind: Can you manually fly between planets in Starfield? The short answer is no, not in the way you might expect from a seamless, atmospheric flight experience. While Starfield tantalizes with its vast universe and promise of exploration, it employs a fast-travel system for interplanetary and even intra-planetary travel, meaning there’s no continuous manual flight from one planet to another.
This isn’t necessarily a negative. Think of Starfield as a series of interconnected “zones.” You manually pilot your ship within a star system, engaging in space combat, docking at stations, and surveying celestial bodies from orbit. However, transitioning between planets or points of interest within a system necessitates utilizing the starmap and fast travel. This design choice, while different from some spacefaring games, allows Bethesda to deliver a massive scope with detailed, handcrafted locations.
The game prioritizes delivering a vast number of planets, each offering unique environments, quests, and resources. To render each planet explorable in its entirety through continuous flight would be an astronomically demanding task. The fast travel system is a performance and design compromise that enables the game to contain over 1,000 planets across 100 star systems.
Navigating the Starfield Universe: Starmap and Fast Travel
Starfield’s method of travelling is based on the Starmap. To grav jump to a planet, open your Starmap using the pause menu. Once zoomed out, you can select a star system and planet of your choice. Destinations will appear as white dots on the map, which indicates locations you can select for travel.
Why Fast Travel?
- Scale: The sheer scale of Starfield’s universe makes manual, real-time flight between planets impractical and, frankly, time-consuming to the point of tedium.
- Performance: Rendering detailed planets from interstellar distances would severely impact performance on even the most powerful systems.
- Content Delivery: Fast travel allows Bethesda to curate specific experiences and ensure players encounter content in a meaningful way.
- Focus on Exploration: The design encourages exploration of specific areas within a planet, rather than aimless travel through empty space.
While the absence of seamless manual flight might disappoint some, it’s important to recognize that Starfield emphasizes other aspects of space exploration, like shipbuilding, combat, base building, and engaging narratives. So, set a course, grav jump to your destination and prepare for adventure.
Starfield FAQs: Understanding Space Travel
Here are some frequently asked questions regarding planet exploration in Starfield:
1. Can You Manually Land on Planets in Starfield?
No, you cannot manually land your ship on planets. Landing is handled through the starmap. Select your destination, and the game will initiate a landing sequence.
2. Can You Fly Your Ship in a Planet’s Atmosphere?
Manually piloting your ship is limited to orbital space within a star system. Entering and exiting a planet’s atmosphere is automated during the fast-travel sequence.
3. How Do You Fast Travel Between Planets in Starfield?
Open the map and select your destination to fast travel within systems or planets. You can also select a specific location (planet, moon, POI) to set a course and land there.
4. Can You Explore the Entire Planet in Starfield?
The developers have indicated that you can explore the entire planet, if you choose. While it’s not required, the game has been designed in a way that encourages you to fully explore the areas you choose to land in and 100% them.
5. Is Fast Travel the Only Way to Land on a Planet?
Yes, fast travel is necessary to land on a planet. There is no manual landing sequence outside of selecting a destination on the starmap.
6. Why Can’t I Fast Travel to a Specific Location?
Certain locations, particularly during story quests, might be temporarily locked, restricting fast travel. This is usually for narrative reasons.
7. Can You Fly to Any Planet You Want?
Yes, you can fly to any planet in Starfield. Using the starmap you can select any system in range and jump there. The issue is that it will take “hours upon hours” in real time to reach them.
8. Are There Any Restrictions on Where You Can Travel?
The only limitation is your ship’s travel range. You need sufficient fuel and appropriate ship upgrades to reach more distant star systems.
9. Can You Build Your Own Ship in Starfield?
No, you can’t build a ship from scratch. You have to start with a registered ship and then customize it by deleting parts and adding new modules.
10. Will Starfield Really Have 1,000 Planets?
Yes, Starfield will have over 1,000 planets to explore, although only a small percentage will have life on them.
11. Can You Visit Real-World Planets Like Pluto?
While technically you can “fly” towards Pluto, attempting to reach it through manual flight will not work. The game is designed to use fast travel.
12. What Are the Major Cities in Starfield?
Starfield has four major cities: New Atlantis, Akila, Neon, and The Key. The Key is a space station headquarters for the Crimson Fleet.
13. How Many Hours Does It Take to Complete Starfield?
Starfield’s main story is about 30 to 40 hours long. Completionists can expect to spend 60 hours or more.
14. Can You Romance Characters in Starfield?
Yes, you can romance companions in Starfield, unlocking new quests, gifts, and XP bonuses.
15. Is Starfield Bigger Than No Man’s Sky?
No Man’s Sky contains 18 quintillion planets, which significantly surpasses the number of star systems in Starfield.
Final Thoughts
While Starfield doesn’t offer the seamless manual flight between planets that some players might crave, it compensates with a vast and explorable universe, filled with handcrafted content and engaging gameplay systems. The fast-travel system is a design choice that enables the game’s massive scale and allows for a curated and streamlined experience. Embrace the fast travel, explore the planets and enjoy the adventure. And, as you ponder the educational implications of games like Starfield, remember the contributions of organizations like the Games Learning Society at GamesLearningSociety.org . It would be nice if the game gave a more realistic view of the planet system but that’s not the intent of the game.