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Starfield is one of the worst written RPGs of all time

Blendernaut

Neo Member
The poor writing, boring characters and bad pacing of the main quest are major reasons why I’ve quit playing it after about 50hrs. It’s a very dull and uninteresting place to be from a character and story perspective. I have other problems with it but these ones are some of the major ones.

I have been playing through Mass Effect 2 for the first time and so far the gulf in writing quality and characters is huge between the two games.
:messenger_hushed: I mean, I havent even tried to play it because I know I wont like this game.. But you have played about 50 hours! I couldn't last 50 hours in an "uninterseting" place to be
 

Zuzu

Member
:messenger_hushed: I mean, I havent even tried to play it because I know I wont like this game.. But you have played about 50 hours! I couldn't last 50 hours in an "uninterseting" place to be

I did enjoy the gameplay for the first 20-24 hours or so but yeah the last approx 25 hours were a waste of time (I’ve explained in more detail on page 3 and page 11 why I played so long)
 

Robbinhood

Banned
Funny how this game got me hyped to go back to CP2077, coincidentally with 2.0 dropping. I'm having a great time now after a rough reintroduction to the mechanics.

Starfield should have probably been advertised as Mass Effect instead of Skyrim in space. Maybe it would have been better received.
 

PotatoBoy

Member
Funny how this game got me hyped to go back to CP2077, coincidentally with 2.0 dropping. I'm having a great time now after a rough reintroduction to the mechanics.

Starfield should have probably been advertised as Mass Effect instead of Skyrim in space. Maybe it would have been better received.
Are you kidding me? Play the first 5 hours of each back-to-back. I did and had never played ME1 before. ME1 was like a Michelin-starred restaurant to Starfield's bag of Wendy's someone left in their car overnight.
 

Zheph

Member
Funny how this game got me hyped to go back to CP2077, coincidentally with 2.0 dropping. I'm having a great time now after a rough reintroduction to the mechanics.

Starfield should have probably been advertised as Mass Effect instead of Skyrim in space. Maybe it would have been better received.
Mass Effect deserve a bit of respect
 

violence

Member
I took some screen shots after on xbox after I made made my original post lol... These on on two totally different planets. and not even all the times its happened! lol

MzBN6Q1.jpg

jjlaCJT.jpg
It’s a big galaxy. Some girls are free spirits.
 

Sleepwalker

Member
Funny how this game got me hyped to go back to CP2077, coincidentally with 2.0 dropping. I'm having a great time now after a rough reintroduction to the mechanics.

Starfield should have probably been advertised as Mass Effect instead of Skyrim in space. Maybe it would have been better received.
Mass effect has decent writing tho
 

STARSBarry

Gold Member
I think the standard Starfield players experience transfers across this as they play

Slow and boring
Exciting and new
Repetitive and dull

Like you get past the first slog where the game then opens up a bit and you can do what you like and your having fun, then eventually you realise that everything is the same and the companions fucking suck.
 
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Topher

Gold Member
Funny how this game got me hyped to go back to CP2077, coincidentally with 2.0 dropping. I'm having a great time now after a rough reintroduction to the mechanics.

Starfield should have probably been advertised as Mass Effect instead of Skyrim in space. Maybe it would have been better received.

Not really since there just isn't very much that is comparable to Mass Effect. You can literally see the Skyrim underpinnings in Starfield and the Bethesda template is pretty obvious. Only commonality with Mass Effect is setting.
 

PotatoBoy

Member
I think the standard Starfield players experience transfers across this as they play

Slow and boring
Exciting and new
Repetitive and dull

Like you get past the first slog where the game then opens up a bit and you can do what you like and your having fun, then eventually you realise that everything is the same and the companions fucking suck.

As soon as I reached constellation and talked to the NPCs I knew the companions were all going to be a bunch of annoying losers. Compare to someone like Wrex, holy shit. What a joke of a game.
 
The problem is that there's so many ways to be woke but also interesting.

Stuff like anti slavery and anti colonial messaging and storylines involving indeginious planet populations. Or stories involving metahumans and intolerance towards them and whatnot. From what I've gathered there aren't even any trans people in starfield. Let alone non binary romance options. So for a woke game, it isn't really that woke.

Like sure some people are complaining that there's no sexy ladies in the game. But if they did fix that would it really make the game any better?

Starfields problem is that it's bland. They created a universe that feels like it's completely devoid of any personality
You bring up a few interesting points. First, I should say that I agree that "woke" doesn't automatically mean your product sucks, although things can certainly go that way. I think The Boys on Amazon is a good example of a fairly woke television show that still manages to be well written and quite entertaining, for example. Another example would be The Witcher on Amazon. If they would have just stuck to the books, the casting for that show could have been what it was, but it would have still have been very entertaining.

I'd also strongly disagree that storylines related to prejudice, or racism, or slavery are inherently "woke," but that's another example of the subjectivity of the term, and another reason not to use it. Star Trek and X-Men are good examples of media that has told stories about those subjects years before "woke," "SJW," or even "politically correct" were a thing.

Lastly, I think Starfield is a good example of a modern "woke" game in that it's often less about what is in the game, and more about what has clearly been left out. And that's true of most media. I think even writers and directors understand that putting too much lecturing in a game isn't a good idea for a product you wish to sell. If it's true that nearly every faction has a woman leader, that's a good example. It's frequently all the choices that are made in the creation of a game or movie, rather than the storyline itself.
 

Meifu

Member
Mass effect has decent writing tho
Mass Effect has GREAT writing compared to this, and just in general.

I'd say the only points where Mass Effect writing is semi weak is in parts of ME3 where they no longer had Drew Karpynshyn. Go talk to any side quest character on the citadel in ME1 and it will be better written and more believable than most of the main quest stuff in Starfield
 

EviLore

Expansive Ellipses
Staff Member
Quite an interesting read Boss !

I don't know if others pointed out these deeply troubling problems, but certainly not the game jounos.
It seems that all the systems Bethesda developped long ago for better games (elder's scroll, fallout 3, etc.) became nothing more than checklist entries that the devs have to strike without even understanding what they bring to the game and the gameplay. Every exemples you give show me that the devs don't understand what made those gameplay elements interesting in a rpg context. The companions actively ruining your game is the perfect exemple. All the cultural performative bullshit is just the cherry on top ("trusting the science" :messenger_grinning_sweat: i wish they had Earth president or whatever stands for a supreme leader in this game tells you that he believes in truth not facts, if you argue with him that maybe a microbial plague is not the best plan possible and far more dangerous than trusting mother nature...)

If you had the time to do some kind of editorial thread once a week, talking a bit more in depth about something gaming related or not, i'm sure it would be pretty cool.

I know you post threads that are often really good, but i mean more like you do here : your take on something directly, no link to anything else needed.
Thanks Toots! I don't have as much time to game these days, so once a week is a big ask haha, but I'll post more thoughts when inspiration strikes.
 
I thought about playing starfield because tons of people at my job were playing it and it would be a good way to fit in, but in the end I decided to buy and play Guild Wars 1 instead. I dont regret my decision.
 

Happosai

Hold onto your panties
Starfield displays time and time again, without fail, that it fundamentally lacks understanding of the human condition. You land on worlds with the premise of a dystopian cyberpunk society where hard drugs are legal and everything is available for a price. When you arrive, though, all you’ll find is some tepid fully clothed dancing at a bland nightclub and a few people talking about how cu-raaazy everything is. It’s a game unwilling to explore humanity’s faults and genuine human drama on any level. At the futuristic fashionista clothing stores your only options are literally unisex tarps. Everyone is of varied ethnicity but there is no ethnic culture whatsoever. Women are purely masculine, leaving no one left to be feminine. This is not a demand for T&A by any means. In the real world, men and women don’t wear tarps and talk in monotone at a safe distance, defined purely by their profession. Life is messy and dramatic, desires and egos clash, stars rise and fall, people love and lust and hate and trust and betray. But not in Starfield, a corporate-sanitized ideological bog too afraid to include one iota of humanity in its storytelling.

RPGs are doing so much more elsewhere, from Baldur's Gate 3 to Cyberpunk 2077, but even looking back at Bethesda's own games, this one is a step backwards. The Elder Scrolls games incorporate different ethnic backgrounds and intense religious beliefs, ugly racial prejudice and morally gray deities. Starfield reeks of design by committee resulting in a product too afraid to take any storytelling risks. Nothing can ever be well-written when it is this extraordinarily conformist and risk-averse, particularly when the expectations for political correctness are so narrow in 2023.

You can do better.
Something I've noticed with these games in 2023 (or just in the past couple years) is they really do want to be somewhat of an Elder Scrolls trope but fall flat by their result being 'a message' rather than, a game. Also making this 'yet another' open world game, the audience finds themselves wandering endlessly around and it gets tedious. Devoid of the thrill a great story, characters and innovation seems to have not even been considered given all the time these games spend in development.

Western RPGs like Fable really had that thrill or with JRPGs, I think Final Fantasy 16 brought that back for some. My outside GAF role is marketing strategy and we constantly look for a competitive edge as a value prop and really remain consistent to that. Makes me wonder if these studios consider that before launching these games and after.
 
You bring up a few interesting points. First, I should say that I agree that "woke" doesn't automatically mean your product sucks, although things can certainly go that way. I think The Boys on Amazon is a good example of a fairly woke television show that still manages to be well written and quite entertaining, for example. Another example would be The Witcher on Amazon. If they would have just stuck to the books, the casting for that show could have been what it was, but it would have still have been very entertaining.

I'd also strongly disagree that storylines related to prejudice, or racism, or slavery are inherently "woke," but that's another example of the subjectivity of the term, and another reason not to use it. Star Trek and X-Men are good examples of media that has told stories about those subjects years before "woke," "SJW," or even "politically correct" were a thing.

Lastly, I think Starfield is a good example of a modern "woke" game in that it's often less about what is in the game, and more about what has clearly been left out. And that's true of most media. I think even writers and directors understand that putting too much lecturing in a game isn't a good idea for a product you wish to sell. If it's true that nearly every faction has a woman leader, that's a good example. It's frequently all the choices that are made in the creation of a game or movie, rather than the storyline itself.
agree with you generally but when TNG came out political correctness was huuuuuuuge - they had a counsellor on the command bridge for a reason.

The way they tackled things was class, though. Think of that gender episode with Riker struggling to comprehend and empathise and ultimately being destructive compared to how that would be written now.
 

FunkMiller

Gold Member
agree with you generally but when TNG came out political correctness was huuuuuuuge - they had a counsellor on the command bridge for a reason.

The way they tackled things was class, though. Think of that gender episode with Riker struggling to comprehend and empathise and ultimately being destructive compared to how that would be written now.

Quite simply, old school Star Trek prioritised the story telling and character, and allowed the political messaging to come organically from it. Nu-Trek puts the political messaging first, and the story second.

That's what 'woke' is, when used as a derogatory term for modern TV and movies. It's writing that puts agendas first, and story and character second.

Good writing always does it the other way around.
 

JackMcGunns

Member
I laughed out loud at the romance with Sarah section of your post, now that's great writing... wait a minute, is Besethda hiring? :messenger_winking_tongue:
 
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ShaiKhulud1989

Gold Member
Starfields problem is that it's bland. They created a universe that feels like it's completely devoid of any personality
This.

We have a generic fantasy cult (lol what), a generic Firefly space cowboys, a generic Galactic Federation a-la Starship Troopers and bland as hell Cyberpunk corpo. Oh, and some secret sect. It's not even properly interconnected, let alone fleshed-out. There's no economics, religion, culture. Not even the basic layers of human interactions are embedded into the story. It's almost like writers had no empathy on a basic level of understanding to even ask the obvious questions.

A few days ago I've returned to Outer Worlds and my god, after Strafield it's like New Vegas after F4. Yes, everything is smaller and on a bugdet, but the writing and the universe in on a whole another level. There's religion here, there's human emotions, there's coprorate dynamics and human struggle for survival. The Halcyon is small and kinda campy, but very much alive. Despite the satire you can believe in the world of Halcyon, engage with it, be immersed within it. Murder Whodunit DLC is brilliant too, shame I've missed it earlier.

Starfield, on the other hand, is like a bland collection of a checklist form a "Sci-fi setting to-do list". Honestly, not once I've felt that the writers were acually interested with the stuff they were writing. Best stories here are literally sci-fi classics retellings (from books to shows), only way more empty and toothless. Devoid of gray morals and actual attention to the developed concepts. You can't even quote a single charater, that's how sterile writing here is. Huge chunks of a basic world-building are just missing (now written or glossed over). Some in-your face questions are not answered or ignored altogether. There is no truly deep lore whatsoever too, there's nothing to explore about this world in stiry and narrative department because deep storytelling is as thin as it gets. You'll maybe get a book or a passive voiced-over presetnation. PArt of the reason why Starfield doesn't use proper cutscenes with quality direction and really good setpieces. There's just nothing to tell here, that's all.

It's just corporate writing and storytelling as it finest. Game that was made not because the majority of writers wanted to write and develop it (see Mass Effect Trilogy, Disco Elysium, Horizon, CP2077 despite it's flaws), but because your boss tasked you with making a 'dunno, rpg with spaceships, go figure it out'. There is no passion to be found behind every nook and cranny in the writing department and that's why things are kind falling apart when the shooting stops.

P.S. This is written by a D&D DM and maybe it hurts my feelings too much, but oh well.
 

ANDS

King of Gaslighting
Quite simply, old school Star Trek prioritised the story telling and character, and allowed the political messaging to come organically from it. Nu-Trek puts the political messaging first, and the story second.

That's what 'woke' is, when used as a derogatory term for modern TV and movies. It's writing that puts agendas first, and story and character second.

Good writing always does it the other way around.

Complete and utter nonsense. STAR TREK is literally about humanity - and by extension the Federation - moving beyond "categories" and allowing anyone to succeed within this "utopia." ST:TNG especially went in on themes like this HARD, and this is a show that debuted decades before anyone was talking about "wokeness." If you think Rodenberry didn't know what he was doing casting Nichols and Takei in a broadcast show in the mid-60's for roles that were not about the race of their characters. . .I dunno.

. . .I mean the idea that sci-fi (hard or otherwise) isn't first pulling from the current cultural zeitgeist - or even just using it as a jumping off point - to tell stories second (and not this "Oh they're just telling good stories that cowinkydinky offer parallels to the modern world") is insane.
 
I thought about playing starfield because tons of people at my job were playing it and it would be a good way to fit in, but in the end I decided to buy and play Guild Wars 1 instead. I dont regret my decision.
I'm playing Baldur's Gate 2 right now and just shaking my head in disbelief whenever I read Starfield accounts like this. Poor Korgan would have been arrested for hate crimes within the first 30 minutes of Starfield...
 

Reave

Member
You definitely make some valid points — particularly with romancing and the two-dimensional nature of the supporting characters.

However, I can’t really agree with the notion that this was ever marketed as a ‘Han Solo Simulator.’ If I’m being honest, that comes off as more of a misinterpretation of Bethesda’s actual intent.

There were quite clear that the objective of the game revolves around supporting Constellation’s objective, with the usual detours/distractions that offer a few good/evil paths. So, I suppose I can’t see how that could be internalized as inherently Han Solo-like. Frankly, nothing Star Wars-related ever crossed my mind during the Starfield Direct or anytime thereafter.

Ultimately, while I agree that Starfield isn’t particularly well-written, I respectfully disagree that this is among the worst of its kind in the RPG genre. I found plenty of quests and dialogue enhances that were written adequately and left me satisfied.
 
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ResurrectedContrarian

Suffers with mild autism
P.S. This is written by a D&D DM and maybe it hurts my feelings too much, but oh well.
Serious DMing experience should be a required resume bullet for anyone writing these games, but I would wager that 99% of the writing staff couldn't handle negotiating player actions and complex scenarios live at a table... they'd go for the modules that are 100% railroaded into little sequences of events so that the DM never has to think on the fly or reason about consequences in a sandbox world.
 

EviLore

Expansive Ellipses
Staff Member
You definitely make some valid points — particularly with romancing and the two-dimensional nature of the supporting characters.

However, I can’t really agree with the notion that this was ever marketed as a ‘Han Solo Simulator.’ If I’m being honest, that comes off as more of a misinterpretation of Bethesda’s actual intent.

There were quite clear that the objective of the game revolves around supporting Constellation’s objective, with the usual detours/distractions that offer a few good/evil paths. So, I suppose I can’t see how that could be internalized as inherently Han Solo-like.

Ultimately, while I agree that Starfield isn’t particularly well-written, I respectfully disagree that this is among the worst of its kind in the RPG genre. I found plenty of quests and dialogue enhances that were written adequately and left me satisfied.
"For me, Starfield is the Han Solo simulator." -Todd Howard
 

Topher

Gold Member
If you think Rodenberry didn't know what he was doing casting Nichols and Takei in a broadcast show in the mid-60's for roles that were not about the race of their characters. . .I dunno.

Isn't that exactly what FunkMiller FunkMiller is saying though...."old school Star Trek prioritised the story telling and character, and allowed the political messaging to come organically from it.".
 

Reave

Member
"For me, Starfield is the Han Solo simulator." -Todd Howard
Hmm. The full quote apparently is as follows:

“For me, Starfield is the Han Solo simulator. Get in a ship, explore the galaxy, do fun stuff."

Would you say that Starfield doesn’t effectively accomplish that? He doesn’t seem to point to anything from a narrative standpoint, unless I’m missing some additional context.
 

Panajev2001a

GAF's Pleasant Genius
Hmm. The full quote apparently is as follows:

“For me, Starfield is the Han Solo simulator. Get in a ship, explore the galaxy, do fun stuff."

Would you say that Starfield doesn’t effectively accomplish that? He doesn’t seem to point to anything from a narrative standpoint, unless I’m missing some additional context.
Ok, so the new “lens” we use to explain it is “forget about the first part of the quote, the second part erases the first part of the quote like Thanos’s snap and let’s focus of that technically you can explore even though wink wink nudge nudge you clearly knew people would not have thought jumping from menu to menu to menu with lots of loading screens for a next generation only title” right ;)?

Your statement was: “However, I can’t really agree with the notion that this was ever marketed as a ‘Han Solo Simulator.’ If I’m being honest, that comes off as more of a misinterpretation of Bethesda’s actual intent.”



“You honour, I said ‘I will stab you thirty seven times’ in the chest to the victim and she was stabbed that many times exactly, but I also said ‘you stupid c*^t’” and that is evident they behaved like a c+*t… so… innocent right?”.
 
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Reave

Member
Ok, so the new “lens” we use to explain it is “forget about the first part of the quote, the second part erases the first part of the quote like Thanos’s snap and let’s focus of that technically you can explore even though wink wink nudge nudge you clearly knew people would not have thought jumping from menu to menu to menu with lots of loading screens for a next generation only title” right ;)?
Not sure what you're on about. I stand corrected about the quote since I wasn't aware it existed. I'm only curious to learn more about what the Han Solo comparison meant to EvilLore in a narrative context since it sounded like more of a gameplay loop-related quote from Todd Howard.

You can relax.
 
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Gp1

Member
I'm using Andreja as my partner and... Besides her trying to being the edgy "Han Solo" of the troupe, she still is lawful good and a well of insecurities too.

Does every companion in this game has self affirmation problems?
 
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gothmog

Gold Member
I played 2077 and Starfield this weekend. 2077 grabbed a ton of my time because it was just more interesting. Writing is better and the game feels good. Starfield's issue is that you have to slog through the game often to get to the good stuff. I find myself just saving and quitting more often than moving on to the next quest because it just was boring.
 

IntentionalPun

Ask me about my wife's perfect butthole
It's pretty dull.

I wish there was a "looter shooter" mode that upped the amount of powerful shit you find and killed all dialog options. Any time I end up in a dialog driven mission I am bored to tears and just wanting it to end so I can try to find a mission that's more about going off and battling bad guys, because I do really like the combat. And IF there was more meaning full loot that would be better too.

The companions all being different varieties of lawful good is really fucking dumb, but it seems guaranteed that will be solved by a DLC.

In the end though you realize you are being sent off to fight in like the 3 same copy-pasted places... mines that are all the same, research centers that are all the same, etc.

Really poor design TBH. A real waste how much effort went into such a middling game.
 
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R6Rider

Gold Member
The companions all being different varieties of lawful good is really fucking dumb
It's especially dumb when you consider the fact you can join a huge pirate faction and still have no option for an evil/bad leaning companion.

They could have done something fun with a robot companion and made it so you could program them to be good, evil, or even how they react to different types of interactions and crimes.
-
Speaking of the pirate faction: If you join them, you can completely break a quest in which they aren't attacking another character's ship and thus you can't save them and continue the quest. Bethesda didn't even think the faction choices through.
 
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JackMcGunns

Member
lol okay then

First. There is literally no way what so ever to create or meet a woman in this game with bigger bust than like C cups without it being a fat person. The body morph sliders are completely broken. Hour glass figure don’t exist in this world. Go for a thin waist and the ass gets flatter than on some marathon runner. Literally the biologically preferred body type with wide hips don’t exist. Only if it’s a fat person. No pear shapes. No wide hips and thin waist. Can’t even have a round bigger butt or thicker thighs, and this is in a game made in 2023 when everybody including their grandmas are working out doing a million squats per day specifically to build that type of body. Don’t know if it’s some western politically correct sexualization or objectification protest or whatever it is but it’s quite possibly the most boring character design tool ever and since they use the same tool for all characters it means the whole universe is boring. Can’t believe nobody on the team of 500 or whatever devs hasn’t noticed it.

Secondly. There is no clothes anywhere in this game that in any way trigger anyone to be turned on. Not even in the night club. It’s like some office space unisex casual friday every day in the whole universe at the same time. They even messed up Andreja’s fairly nice black default clothes where you can get hints of some nice legs hiding underneath and placed some wrinkle on the skirt thing on the front so it looks like she’s sporting a hard-on if you look at her from the side. 🤦‍♂️

There is more but I need breakfast


They're scared of having this outside their office

KOG0zn.gif
 

Thabass

Member
I'm using Andreja as my partner and... Besides her trying to being the edgy "Han Solo" of the troupe, she still is lawful good and well of insecurities too.

Does every companion in this game has self affirmation problems?
Sarah certainly does. Constantly.
 

Fredrik

Member
They're scared of having this outside their office

KOG0zn.gif
Is it better to be ridiculed all over the net for having the most boring character design ever in a big budget game?

I really don’t understand what they’re trying to achieve here.
Imagine if you’re making a car game and you deliberately make every car look bad and boring and making the complete collection of cars lack variety.

Help me understand. This can’t be what the concept artists had in mind.
 

ResurrectedContrarian

Suffers with mild autism
First. There is literally no way what so ever to create or meet a woman in this game with bigger bust than like C cups without it being a fat person. The body morph sliders are completely broken. Hour glass figure don’t exist in this world. Go for a thin waist and the ass gets flatter than on some marathon runner. Literally the biologically preferred body type with wide hips don’t exist. Only if it’s a fat person. No pear shapes. No wide hips and thin waist. Can’t even have a round bigger butt or thicker thighs, and this is in a game made in 2023 when everybody including their grandmas are working out doing a million squats per day specifically to build that type of body. Don’t know if it’s some western politically correct sexualization or objectification protest or whatever it is but it’s quite possibly the most boring character design tool ever and since they use the same tool for all characters it means the whole universe is boring. Can’t believe nobody on the team of 500 or whatever devs hasn’t noticed it.

Secondly. There is no clothes anywhere in this game that in any way trigger anyone to be turned on. Not even in the night club. It’s like some office space unisex casual friday every day in the whole universe at the same time. They even messed up Andreja’s fairly nice black default clothes where you can get hints of some nice legs hiding underneath and placed some wrinkle on the skirt thing on the front so it looks like she’s sporting a hard-on if you look at her from the side. 🤦‍♂️
lol, this is exactly how I imagined the characters without having played yet.

Sci-fi is dead in corporate hands. Look at Disney... the prequels were bad, but what they've turned it into after purchase is even worse. It's not just badly done, it's brain cancer on screen, a totally lifeless and sanitized universe devoid of real characters.
 
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