It’s probably an ironic award, though I stand by the statement that Starfield isn’t any worse than Bethesda’s other mainstream titles post-Morrowind, except for the fact that it can’t ride on the writing of much better writers who either left the company or made the IP they acquired.

Starfield is the first pure creation of Modern Bethesda, and they can’t rely on the excellent lore and world building of other games like Fallout 1 and 2, Morrowind, etc.

That being said, 90% of issues can be solved by halving the radius for POI generation, adding a huge number of new POIs for the pool, and adding a survival mode to make shipbuilding important, space travel require fuel, and spacesuits necessary for environmental protection.