During the recent Brighton Digital Conference, Todd Howard, a Bethesda executive, gave us some insight into the future of Elder Scrolls 6, as well as the upcoming title Starfield.
Starfield is still coming as a single-player-only experience
While we got our first glimpse at Starfield a few years ago, very little is known about the upcoming single-player game from Bethesda. We do know that the company is trying to use Starfield to say that they can still handle single-player games after the terrible launch of Fallout 76.
Starfield is a pretty huge game, but much is still unknown as of yet. During this interview, Todd made a few statements that are quite interesting, and leave more questions than answers. For starters, there will be no multiplayer aspects in the single-player game of Starfield, similar to that of how Skyrim is played. There will also be procedural generation used here, and while there will be randomly generated in-game content, Todd made sure to state that this doesn’t mean the entire game will be randomized. So, we can expect some of the aspects we see in No Man’s Sky, but not a fully random planet each time you land.
When it comes to size, Todd said that the universe of Starfield will be so much larger than Fallout 76, according to GameInformer. This won’t be easy, and is somewhat hard to comprehend since Fallout 76 was already four times the size of Skyrim…and that was a huge game.
Both Elder Scrolls 6 and Starfield will be day-one launch titles on Game Pass
Something else that Todd confirmed during the interview is that both Elder Scroll 6 and Starfield will be day-one launch tiles on Game Pass. This is thanks to the Microsoft acquisition of Bethesda and is only the tip of the iceberg that we can expect to see with new content going forward. Microsoft is betting big on Game Pass, and this is just the next step in that. Essentially, anyone who is paying for the $15 per month service will enjoy all of the latest Bethesda games at launch for no additional cost, including Elder Scrolls 6 and Starfield.
Still no official ETA on either Elder Scrolls 6 or Starfield
Todd didn’t really give us any solid ETAs one way or the other. While he said that it would “be a while” before we get to enjoy Starfield, but that doesn’t necessarily mean anything. It could be weeks, months, or years before we see the game. But, if history repeats itself, Todd said the same thing about Fallout 4 and then released the game a year later, so that’s an entirely possible outcome here.
On the topic of Elder Scrolls 6, that one will be a while, most likely. I wouldn’t expect to see the next Elder Scrolls game launch for a few years, at least, though Todd and the development team could absolutely surprise us and launch it sooner now that they have Microsoft’s deep pockets to tap into for developmental tasks.
9to5Toys’ take
I’m really excited about both of these upcoming Bethesda titles. Bethesda is one of my favorite game studios, and Skyrim is still among my favorite games even to this day. I can’t wait to go hands-on with Starfield and Elder Scrolls 6, be it next year or in the next five. Are you excited for these upcoming games? Let us know in the comments below.
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