See Starfield Return To RPG Roots In New Update
Bethesda is looking back to move forward!
This article is more than 2 years old
Bethesda Game Studios just revealed that its upcoming action role-playing video game Starfield is the studio’s return to RPG roots during Starfield‘s development update. The studio also offered a peek at the world and mechanics of its next game, some of which are updated gameplay mechanics present in their prominent releases. The update eventually showed very little gameplay but did a fantastic job of delivering insight into the playable characters, companions, and other things players can expect once the game launches.
As reported by Polygon, Todd Howard, the Starfield game director, and Istvan Pely, the game’s lead artist, say Starfield is expected to deliver the same character depth similar to those found in older, hardcore RPGs — some of which were actually made by Bethesda, like The Elder Scrolls video game series. The in-game playable character’s personality, actions, effects, and consequences will be primarily defined by the character’s background and customizable traits. Admittedly, this isn’t a novelty in the RPG genre, but it’s quite rare to see it done so in-depth that the character might conflict themselves presented the opportunity.
Elsewhere in the video, Pely and Will Shen, the lead quest designer for Starfield, discuss the team’s willingness to interlock players in-world choices and factions and how different faction members interact with you and your companions based on your previous in-world choices. Of course, companions aren’t mere NPCs either and have their own degree of autonomy — just like the NPC from the latest update for The Sims 4. Therefore, it’s really important to pay attention to your companions, as their feelings and responsiveness towards you isn’t something you’d want to neglect.
Of course, head creatives also discussed the Starfield persuasion system that lets players influence NPCs in the game. It’s an updated version of the same persuasion system used in The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion based on dialogue interaction. It allows players to gain NPCs’ trust through bribes or persuasion. The exact details suggesting how this system was deployed in Starfield weren’t disclosed, but it’s worth noting that it was very well received in the older game.
Throughout the rest of the video, the creative team broke certain aspects of the game down a bit, granting players insight into Starfield‘s inter-galactic world. Judging by the things shown in the video, character creation will be superb, and Oblivion‘s persuasion mini-game is making a comeback, though likely in a different form. But what we haven’t yet mentioned is the faction system, and four factions players can choose from, including United Colonies, Freestar Collective, Ryujin Industries, and Crimson Fleet. Of course, siding with one won’t prevent you from helping the other, but it may affect your reputation within a certain faction.
It still remains to be seen how all of this will pan out in practice once the game actually hits the digital shelves. Bethesda Studios is known for making absolute hits within the gaming sphere, like the Fallout series or the aforementioned The Elder Scrolls, so there’s very little doubt in Starfield‘s success. As per our previous report, the game is scheduled as an Xbox Game Pass exclusive aimed at PCs and Xbox Series S/X consoles.
