A lot of people seem to think that a follow-up to last year’s tentpoleBethesdarelease,Starfield, is inevitable. A former Bethesda developerstated earlier this weekthat the sequel would be “one hell of a game” since it could iterate on the original and that he’s “looking forward” to it.
We’ve seen another former developer say thatthe IP is now part of Bethesda’s “Big Three”, alongsideElder ScrollsandFallout.Xboxboss Phil Spencer has stated thathe wants Starfield to have the same longevity as Skyrim, a game that a lot of people still play today. It’s clear that the higher ups involved in Starfield really want the IP to get as big as Bethesda’s others, which necessarily entails a follow-up. But I’m not so sure Starfield deserves that.
Starfield Was Mid
It’s no secret that I didn’t care for Starfield. I played 40 hours of it, hoping with every successive hour that it would eventually get better, and it never did. None of its characters,bar one, struck me as remotely compelling. Itsencumbrance mechanicmade me want to cry. Itsinjury systemwas perplexing.Space travel sucked, and the planets you ended up onsucked even more. The temples wereegregiously boring. Nothing about its main quest was interesting enough to make me power through all of these pain points.
It’s not just me – both Starfield and itsDLChave mixed reviews onSteam.
As far as Bethesda IPs go, Starfield was entirely unable to live up to its hype. The studio has created one of gaming’s most long-lived and iconic franchises, so of course there were unreasonably high expectations, but even leaving aside Bethesda’s reputation and clout with fans, the game just wasn’t that good. And yet it’s being set up as the next big IP, regardless of how players feel about it or whether anybody actually wants more of it, because so much money and time has already been poured into it.
Why Does Starfield Get To Live When Everything Else Dies?
I know I sound a little vindictive here, but when I think of Bethesda, I can’t help but think about this year’s Xbox studio closures. In May, Xbox closed several studios under the Bethesda umbrella, including Arkane Austin and Tango Gameworks. At the time, I wrote about howincredibly stupidit was to close these studios so that Xbox could prioritise Bethesda games, which are high-budget and time-intensive, making them far riskier than double-A games that cost less money and take less time to make.
Starfield is emblematic of the triple-A games that dominate the industry, often unjustly. The team behind Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown was just disbanded,despite the game being critically lauded– good games don’t get sequels, even if they’re smaller in scope, because they aren’t guaranteed hits. Mediocre games do, though, as long as they’re made by studios that have enough name recognition.
I can think of plenty of games that deserve sequels but will never get them, because so much of the money circulating in this industry goes to big games that are guaranteed to pull in more money. Everybody recognises Bethesda, so even if the IP’s already got a weak start, executives will invest in it. Meanwhile, independent studios making great games are being closed down because of a lack of capital. It’s not fair to players or developers that Starfield will likely just keep truckin’ on, buoyed by money that should have gone to smaller, more creative studios. And yet that’s the world we live in.
Starfield
WHERE TO PLAY
Starfield is the first new IP from Bethesda in a quarter of a century, launched for the next-gen Xbox Series X|S and PC. Taking place outside our own Solar System, you play a member of the Constellation, a collective of explorers set on discovering new worlds.
