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will set the gold standard on space-gaming immersion in many ways, from the scope of its Settled Systems to the distance you can travel on most . But space is seriously vast, and seriously ripe for bolder immersion than arguably any other setting in ꦬgaming.
It tracks, then, that some players will want to do things as realistically as possible. To make the jump between star systems, you need to access the game's menus, but can you fly between planets within a system? Here's what we've found.
Updated on September 15, 2023 by Quinton O'Connor: We've added another section examining a different style of space travel.
Our Attempt To Fly Between Worlds Totally Manually
We respect that some of you are going to want the short answer, not the typing-a-lot-of-words-to-keep-you-reading answer. If that's all you're here for, then no, you can't actually fly between worlds within a star system without accessing the or clicking on one of the other nearby planets or moons.
Travel within a system is a more granular variation on traveling between them; you hover over to the planet or other available location that you wish to reach, and then hold the designated button to lay in a course. A brief animation shows your starship traversing the local 'field, and presto, you're there.
We did try, however. But we also tried landing on a planet, with a similarly dim level of success - and at least planets tend to be in the range of 2500 to 5000 or so kilometers upon your arrival in orbit. Other planets are billions of kilometers away by comparison, so while you may see the 'AU' numbers (very) slowly drop, it would take months in-game to get there on your own. And we don't want you wasting months only to find out you can't do the thing.
So, please don't try. Maybe someone mods in such functionality eventually; Bethesda fans are nothing if not in love with total immersion. For now, lay in a course the automatic way.
Our Attempt To Fly Between Worlds... Semi-Automatically?
That said, things aren't quite so entirely automated as they may at first appear. Within a star system, you will often be able to click on other nearby worlds, and a short scene will kick up once you do, in 💎which your starship heads there without grav-jumping.
It's similar to how, if you have a mission lined up, you can click on wherever that mission takes place, and grav jump there without needing to access the Star Map. Except, in this case, you don't even need to 'go to warp', which does go a long way toward making Starfield's space travel feel a little more immersive than some folks first feared.