STARFIELD

No Man’s Sky meets Skyrim, with a touch of FreeSpace

- Ian Evenden

NEED TO KNOW

RELEASE 2023

DEVELOPER Bethesda Game Studios

PUBLISHER Bethesda Softworks

LINK bethesda.net

The first new IP created by Bethesda for 25 years, so they say, and more specifically described as "Skyrim in space" by its director Todd Howard, Starfield represents a lot of the hopes for the future of triple-A single-player PC gaming-perhaps even pointing the way for single-player RPGs.

This is, after all, the game we will still be talking about in 2032, following its enhanced re-release on the Xbox VR Xtreme console, and fully expect the next Elder Scrolls instalment to be described as "Starfield in, like, a medieval fantasy world. Can you imagine that?" Following its delay-we're not getting it until next year now-the game was all over this year's Xbox and Bethesda Showcase event, letting us see everything from space combat to character creation to planetary exploration and a little of what ties it all together. "It's hard to express," said Howard, who looks more like Jon Bernthal every day and was wearing a futuristic brown PVC jacket and matching shoes that must have been murder under the stage lights, "how excited all of us are at Bethesda to be here with you today... we know you've waited a long time to finally see Starfield". It's certainly been a while since the game's 2018 E3 announcement, but five years is nothing these days.