Neon City is Absolutely Brilliant + Questing Content Review

[kamyFC]

Disclaimer - I'm only playing my second playthrough and have not yet completed a single faction questline or main quest.

As part of the plan for my ongoing playthrough, I had to complete 16 Neon city quests and start them at Level 20.

Level 1 to 20
Mission Boards at Neon City & Civilian Outposts, Survey Missions from Constellation Boards
Level 20 to 30
Neon City Quests (16 quests)
Level 30 to 35
The Key (2 quests) + The Den (2 Quests) + New Homestead (4 quests)
Level 35 to 40 
Companion Quests - Andreja
Level 40+ 
Ryujin Industries main faction questline 
End of playthrough 

When I first started exploring Neon, I was absolutely blown away by the design and world-building of the city. A floating city on a Water planet. It is such a cool design. I spent a lot of time just walking and exploring.
Pure joy!

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3450762413

As you walk around, you listen to chatter with NPCs giving out a lot of information about the game world. We learn that there are multiple gangs operating in the city. There is a lot of chatter about Aurora, a crazy drink/drug with a lot of regulations and control. This has only resulted in a black market for it. Then there is a competitor drink made right here in the city, which seems to have garnered a slice of the market. The "world building" of the city is great, and there is a lot going on.

All the NPCs you meet have character, and scenes between NPCs add so much to the world. For example, we meet one lady who is looking for a job. She has applied everywhere and has had no luck. We wish her well and move on. A week later we bump into her at a bar, and she is chatting with an NPC about her job search, and we remember. Then there are additional dialogue options with her. The Immersion is fantastic!

Before getting into quests, I would recommend just walking and 'opening up the city', listening to conversations, and understanding the world.
Bethesda really knows how to make living cities and worlds. If you pay attention to the little things, your experience will be great. Most people rush through quests and complain.

Talkin about complaints, my only issue was with the generic "Citizen" NPCs. They had scenes between themselves, and I quiet enjoyed listening to the chatter. But these generic NPCs could have had better designs.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3450763546
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3450764279
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3450764608

Neon totally gives the fifth element and blade runner vibes. Here are three Neon lounges.
Which one is your favourite?

I really enjoyed visiting the shops and companies operating at Neon. The Taiyo ship manufacturer showroom, the Generdyne Industries Utility Company, and others. We often have scenes between visitor NPCs, and we could actually talk to the staff and R&D members who had a decent amount of dialogue.

Oh yeah, I realized that compared to Skyrim or Fallout 4, Starfield has way more dialogue options with every NPC we meet. It almost feels like "Interesting NPCs", the popular Skyrim mod. They definitely have put in some writing effort here. If you bother to talk to NPCs you will find unique personalities and a lot of chatter.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3450766606

My character has completed all the Neon city quests and has reached Level 26 (I expected them to take 10 levels, but it's fine).

All for One - 5/10
Balancing the Books - 6/10
Bare Metal - 6/10
The Audition - 7/10
Display of Power - 5/10
Loose Ends - 6/10
Fishy Business - 8/10
The Showdown - 6/10
Supply Line - 5/10
Dirty Laundry - 5/10
Hard Luck - 6/10
Saburo's Solution - 5/10
Mob Mentality - 6/10
Relief Run - 6/10 
SuperFan - 5/10
Unjustified - 6/10

The 16 Neon City quests were all right. Most of them were simplistic and can be easily solved if you put points in Social skills. Most quests had multiple ways of resolving them with skill, trait and background checks in dialogue, which I liked. The quest design has definitely improved compared to Skyrim and Fallout 4 where you were railroaded into one direction in many cases. Also, you get to make a difference in people's lives which always feels good.

But, I also expected bigger changes to Neon, like dealing with Ambassador Bayu or doing something more about the Aurora problem that is clearly causing issues in the city or making changes to Neon Security or getting involved or working for large companies based out of Neon like Taiyo or Generdyne Industries.
But we have to keep it realistic, I guess. A freelancer in her 20s can only do so much. Our character has no chance against these megacorporations and the people running them.

Also with Volii Alpha being a water planet, how cool would it have been if we had quests that took us to other platforms on the planet or underwater facilities, submarine rides, underwater exploration and more. The world building is fantastic, but Beth was not ambitious with ideas.

But I absolutely loved exploring the variety of characters in the city who all had unique and fun personalities. The city itself, the shops were a blast to explore, and all the scenes between NPCs and the conversations made it super immersive.

Neon was amazing!
Thanks for reading.

[kamyFC]

Some highlights while working on quests

- I liked the conversations between James and his wife Rosa at Newill's Goods. There was some great reactivity from them after the quest was done.

- In the quest, Balancing the Books, we meet a chirpy Huong Le, who lives on the streets and eats garbage for food. While the quest was basic, I thought Huong Le's character with her self-deprecating humor was adorable.

- In the quest, Bare Metal, I liked the scenes between Renich and Styx, his dumb robot. Also, if you chat with Renick, you get to listen to a great story about those Colony war days and how he met Styx. Loved that!

- In the series of quests with the Disciples and the Strikers, I appreciated how we could work for the Strikers or backstab them later. The option was great, but it always felt like you knew what the good choice was. Ultimately, the good choice felt nice with the Strikers thankful to start a new life and hopefully get to do some good.

- In the quest, Loose Ends, we meet Yannick Legrande, who is an awesome character.

- Fishy Business was my favorite Neon City quest. We get an unexpected surprise that results in a totally expected showcase of crony capitalism! Fun dialogue, interesting characters like Valentina Gurov and an unexpected ending.

[sarcastic_godot]

There will eventually come a few more quests giving you reason to visit Neon...

...also I don't see any of the Ryujin-questline stuff. Though this might or might not be classed as a "Neon"-quest. But you do have to start it there...

Also, there's a Crimson Fleet quest playing in Neon, later on. Which I did like quite a bit. You mentioned them in your to-do-list, but didn't give them a score so far...

[RL 101]

I agree with your assessment. It evokes the atmosphere of "The Fifth Element" and "Blade Runner."

[Vlad 254]

One of my favorite cities in Starfield and you just inspired me to make sure I play in it again on my upcoming play through. Excellent review.

[nordmeyerx]

Neon is fun, but I would have liked it to be a bit bigger to be honest. I'm not sure how reasonable it is that one person could control the trade of a powerful hallucinogenic drugs and confine it to one city on one planet. Maybe that will be the topic of a DLC in the future.

[kamyFC]

Originally posted by nordmeyerx:

Neon is fun, but I would have liked it to be a bit bigger to be honest. I'm not sure how reasonable it is that one person could control the trade of a powerful hallucinogenic drugs and confine it to one city on one planet. Maybe that will be the topic of a DLC in the future.

Definitely, there is potential to tell a lot of stories and make changes. I do wonder if Bethesda would bother with new Starfield DLCs looking at the way people have mass-hated Shattered Space. I mean, why put in more money when it is guaranteed to fail and mass hated.
I do feel that Starborn DLC would be the last and they would move on. It's a damn shame, really the game has such great world-building, we could easily have 10 large faction questlines here.

[kamyFC]

Originally posted by Vlad 254:

One of my favorite cities in Starfield and you just inspired me to make sure I play in it again on my upcoming play through. Excellent review.

Do share your new Neon experience, Vlad!

[kamyFC]

Originally posted by sarcastic_godot:

There will eventually come a few more quests giving you reason to visit Neon...

...also I don't see any of the Ryujin-questline stuff. Though this might or might not be classed as a "Neon"-quest. But you do have to start it there...

Also, there's a Crimson Fleet quest playing in Neon, later on. Which I did like quite a bit. You mentioned them in your to-do-list, but didn't give them a score so far...

Cool, so there are other off world quests that get you to Neon! Nice.

Yes, my character will work on some side quests and do some missions until she gets to level 40. Then we work on the Ryujin faction questline.

[nordmeyerx]

Originally posted by kamyFC:

I do wonder if Bethesda would bother with new Starfield DLCs looking at the way people have mass-hated Shattered Space. I mean, why put in more money when it is guaranteed to fail and mass hated.

Mass hated huh? Sounds very 1942.

[Porkhammer]

I would have liked Neon if it wasn't for a loading screen interrupting every 2 minutes.

[Ez Duzit]

Not a quest but when on Neon you have to go to the low platform (at the water level) and go swimming. Or jump in from one of the lower platforms and swim to the water level platform to get out and climb back up.

[Mooman]

Originally posted by RL 101:

I agree with your assessment. It evokes the atmosphere of "The Fifth Element" and "Blade Runner."

Yep, more plagarised crap from the book of Emil. Also add Star Wars Resistance to the list and Cyberpunks own Night City.

But... they all stem from the real Kowloon Walled City in Hong Kong and therefore always a racist interpretation of 'the future' as an Asian dominated society.

[momopovich]

Originally posted by Mooman:

Originally posted by RL 101:

I agree with your assessment. It evokes the atmosphere of "The Fifth Element" and "Blade Runner."

Yep, more plagarised crap from the book of Emil. Also add Star Wars Resistance to the list and Cyberpunks own Night City.

But... they all stem from the real Kowloon Walled City in Hong Kong and therefore always a racist interpretation of 'the future' as an Asian dominated society.

SF plagiarised america because it has guns and capitalism.

[momopovich]

Originally posted by nordmeyerx:

Neon is fun, but I would have liked it to be a bit bigger to be honest. I'm not sure how reasonable it is that one person could control the trade of a powerful hallucinogenic drugs and confine it to one city on one planet. Maybe that will be the topic of a DLC in the future.

Aurora comes from fishes that are only found on Volii alpha.

The premise is that a fishing facility like Neon requires a unique kind of technology (the power grid), that Bayu controls since he owns Generdyne (the company that designed the grid).

As cool as it is Aurora isnt some kind of all powerful resource like the spice in Dune, so it makes sense that the big factions and companies aren't fighting for that drug, considering the cost, the research needed to make a viable facility, and the legal and less legal war they would need to wage against Bayu, who isnt powerful just because of Aurora (his influence is huge).

[Neo]

Yeah I enjoyed Neon. It's one of the things in this game, the more you take your time and explore the more little side quests you pick up. It's the side quests which bring much of the flavour.