After the rise in popularity of shooters and action RPGs, the sci-fi genre will soon have its time to shine when Bethesda’s Starfield and Massive Entertainment’s Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora are released in the not-too-distant future. While both games share surface-level similarities, featuring genre trappings like interstellar travel and an examination of humanity’s place in a wider universe, they are near-total opposites tonally. One glance at the colorful and vibrant landscapes present in Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora screenshots is all that’s needed to see that Massive is offering gamers a wholly different playground than Starfield’s rocky and realistic worlds.
Bethesda’s decision to go with a hard sci-fi setting for Starfield was welcomed by many fans of the underappreciated subgenre. By choosing to go with this sort of realistic setting, though, Bethesda could potentially turn away players looking for something a bit more fantastical. With its action taking place on the vibrant, life-filled world at the centerpiece of the James Cameron film series, Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora may prove to be a far better fit for gamers more interested in gorgeous escapism than scientifically grounded realism.
Avatar’s Pandora is a Stark Contrast to Starfield’s Procedurally-Generated Worlds
One of the biggest differences between the two highly anticipated titles is in the scale of their respective universes. While Bethesda has promised to give players a vast cosmos to explore in its sci-fi RPG, with over 1,000 procedurally generated planets in Starfield ready to be discovered, Massive Entertainment is taking a more singularly-focused approach with Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora. Rather than giving players the whole universe as their playground, Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora looks set to deliver a dense and fully realized version of the planet at the heart of the wildly successful franchise.
The differences between the two titles don’t stop at the number and complexity of their planetary bodies, though. Early trailers for Bethesda’s Starfield suggest that, possibly apart from endgame content, humans will be the only inhabitants of the game’s vast universe. This stands in stark contrast to Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora, which features a planet populated with all manner of colorful and carefully designed alien flora and fauna. Centering the game’s action on the titular planet means that Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora will tie into the films while also offering a different sort of exploration than Starfield ever could.
Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora Can Embrace Exploration in a Way Starfield Can’t
Even though Starfield will feature a vast number of planets for players to discover and explore, trailers and screenshots show many of those planets to be little more than barren, rocky wastelands occasionally interrupted by human outposts. By centering the action on a single planet rather than spreading it out across a collection of mostly randomized worlds, Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora will allow players to get to know the planet in a way that simply won’t be possible with Starfield’s procedurally generated worlds.
This gives Massive the opportunity to let players of Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora thoroughly explore the planet as intimately as its native Na’Vi inhabitants do. Both the original Avatar film and its sequel made showcasing the beauty and variety of Pandora as central to the story as the struggles of its human and Na’Vi protagonists, and the upcoming game should do the same. Letting players hop on the back of a Skimwing to explore Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora by sky and sea would make the alien world feel alive in a way Starfield’s planets would be hard-pressed to match.
While details about Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora’s story and gameplay remain scarce, its version of Pandora already looks to be equally as beautiful and teeming with life as its big-screen counterpart. And as it prepares to face off against the gritty realism of Bethesda’s sprawling Starfield, its vibrant, verdant setting could make it a hit with players looking for a bit more color in the cold dark of space.
Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora is currently in development for PC, PS5, and Xbox Series X/S.
