Starfield Mod Fixes One of the Game’s Most Annoying Aspects

A newly released Starfield mod mounts a valiant attempt at making the game’s Temple puzzles and related quests significantly less annoying. Aptly called Less Annoying Temples, this piece of fan-developed content adds to the list of immensely useful Starfield mods that have emerged online since the galaxy-hopping RPG hit the market in early September.

Warning! NG+ gameplay spoilers for Starfield’s Temple mechanics and Starborn Powers ahead.Temples have been widely touted as one of the grindiest aspects of Bethesda’s latest title since its release. That’s primarily because a singular mini-game requiring the player to quickly reach five shining distortions in a low-gravity environment is required to unlock and subsequently upgrade each Starborn Power in Starfield. Since the game offers 24 powers featuring ten ranks each, players are required to visit 240 Temples across ten or more playthroughs in order to fully max out their character’s abilities. Even going by an optimistic estimate of needing 10 minutes to discover and complete a single temple, completionists are looking at grinding the same mini-game for 40 hours in total.

Alternatively, PC players can now take advantage of the self-explanatory Less Annoying Temples mod. Developed by Nexus Mods user Aurelianis, this modification lives up to its name by significantly shortening Temple puzzles, requiring players to hit only one field distortion instead of five.

Starfield Less Annoying Temples Mod Features

• Fixes for bugs causing temple mapping issues.
• Removed the requirement to return to Vlad to discover new Temple locations.
• Removed tutorial messages on Temple planets.
• Shorter temple puzzles requiring players to hit just one distortion instead of five.

Additionally, the mod eliminates the requirement to return to Vlad in order to discover new Temple locations, which is as big of a time sink as completing their puzzles in the first place. Instead of going back to The Lodge or The Eye between each trip to these ancient structures, Starfield players will now automatically discover another Temple location as soon as they complete their outstanding objective, assuming one is still available in a given playthrough. Aurelianis also fixed a number of bugs causing Temple markers not to show up properly on the map, on top of removing repetitive tutorial messages on Temple planets.

This modification is the second notable attempt at fixing the game’s Temples that has surfaced online to date. However, while the ConnerRia-developed Simple Temple Overhaul outright removes this aspect of Starfield, Less Annoying Temples makes the RPG less grindy while preserving its original gameplay loop.

The newly released mod depends on the Plugins.txt Enabler, which means it’s only compatible with the game’s Steam executable. Uninhibited mod access is one key advantage that the Steam version of Starfield has over its PC Game Pass counterpart, at least for the time being. Bethesda should help standardize the RPG’s modding support with the release of the Starfield Creation Kit in early 2024.

Starfield

Developed by Bethesda Game Studios, Starfield is a sci-fi action role-playing game where players interact with multiple factions, engage in combat, customize their main character and ship, as well as explore a universe that features over 100 systems and 1,000 planets.

Released

September 6, 2023

ESRB

M For Mature 17+ Due To Blood, Suggestive Themes, Use of Drugs, Strong Language, Violence

How Long To Beat

20 Hours

X|S Enhanced

Yes

File Size Xbox Series

101 GB (November 2023)

Metascore

86