Starfield is officially coming to PlayStation 5, allowing Bethesda to now focus on The Elder Scrolls 6. Todd Howard recently discussed the highly anticipated title.
Todd Howard revisited the topic of “The Elder Scrolls 6” in an interview with IGN, and did so with characteristic caution. The head of Bethesda first joked about the game’s announcement, suggesting it would be best to simply erase it from memory: “Just pretend we didn’t announce it. The game doesn’t exist.”
This jest wasn’t unfounded. Howard openly admitted that the 2018 presentation was far too early, and he doesn’t favor that approach today. Bethesda wanted to reassure fans who were constantly inquiring about the series’ future and the next major RPG, but in retrospect, the studio recognizes it wasn’t an ideal move. The early reveal of game projects is a common challenge for developers balancing fan excitement with realistic development timelines.
If you look at the announcements of Fallout 76, Starfield, and The Elder Scrolls 6 from E3 2018, it was mainly about informing our community. When you do something new, everyone asks: ‘What about The Elder Scrolls 6? What about a single-player game?’. We did it that way, but it’s not my preferred approach.
Howard as well emphasized that the studio continues to grapple with the challenge of communicating with fans – on one hand, players want to know what Bethesda is working on, while on the other, developers don’t want to present projects too early. Maintaining transparency while managing expectations is a delicate balance for game studios.
We’re struggling with that balance, because our fans are amazing and constantly question: ‘What are you working on?’. And we’re doing a lot of things. Even if we had ten times the team, we’d still have plenty to do. It’s about finding the right time to talk about all of this.
Despite the lighthearted tone, there were also specifics that may reassure fans. Howard confirmed that work on The Elder Scrolls 6 is ongoing and a strong emphasis has been placed on technological development. The game is being built on Creation Engine 3, and the studio is striving to better integrate engine development with the content creation process.
I want to be careful about what I say about The Elder Scrolls 6, because everyone wants to know more and the time will approach when we’ll show it more broadly. But one thing I can say is – when it comes to technology and the transition to Creation Engine 3, the team has done a really great job. Not only developing the engine itself, but also integrating it with our production cycle.
Howard suggested that development is progressing more smoothly than with previous projects, which was one of the biggest problems during the production of Starfield.
We’re in a situation where game builds work for us really regularly. Well… not every day, but we have more days than ever before when the build is stable, contains new elements, and we can play it.
The developer also directly addressed past issues – technological changes can literally upend the entire production process, and Bethesda wants to avoid that this time around.
When you introduce such large technological changes, you often literally pull the rug out from under the content creation team. Suddenly something stops working and you have to wait until it’s ready again. With this game, we’ve managed to control that much better. With Starfield, we really struggled with that for several years.
A full presentation of The Elder Scrolls 6 is still to come, but one thing is certain – despite Todd Howard’s jokes, the project is alive, developing, and… it looks like Bethesda wants to avoid past mistakes this time around.
