Bethesda Game Studios’ RPG formula is well-established and became the developer’s undeniable trademark when it first acquired theFalloutfranchise and transformed it into a first-person RPG series in the style ofThe Elder Scrolls. AlthoughStarfieldis set to be the studio’s first new IP in over twenty-five years, Todd Howard has suggested that its structure will resembleSkyrim’s in some ways, and the game’s release date—exactly eleven years afterSkyrim’s 11-11-11 release—is clearly designed to draw comparisons.
Many fans are assuming thatStarfieldwill be an RPG that, likeFalloutandThe Elder Scrolls, will allow the player to switch between first and third-person perspectives, explore a large open-world, and maintain a focus on the player’s freedom of exploration and roleplay. Those assumptions are all well and good, but there’s a major part ofStarfieldthat could make or break its open-world: spaceflight. Here’s why, some of the different ways spaceflight might manifest in the game, and what it could all mean for Bethesda’s latest endeavor.
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Multiple Planets And Open Worlds
Spaceflight poses some huge challenges forStarfieldwhen it comes to creating the kind of seamless open world that Bethesda had built the studio’s name on, and so far the studio has revealed very little about how it will work in the game. There have been plenty ofRPGs set in space, but unless they are set in space alone without players landing on any planets their in-game worlds are rarely seamless.
The difficulty dealing with spaceflight in an open-world RPG can be seen even when looking at two very different styles of space-set RPG and the ways they handle the parts of their story set in space versus the parts set planet-side. TheMass Effectseries is far more character-driven and story-focused than most Bethesda games, while Obsidian’sThe Outer Worldsis more in line with Bethesda’s format.
In both games, however, spaceflight is part of the setting and story, but not really a mechanic. Players go to their ship, and after a briefloading screen, their ship is in space. From their ship they can then access a map that acts as an overworld, letting them travel between different planets, space stations, and occasionally boarding other ships.
Another loading screen and they’ve landed. The game’s explorable areas are divided into many parts. It makes sense; trying to make a seamless open-worldgame likeSkyrimthat takes place across multiple planets raises a huge number of challenges.
Seamless Spaceflight
It’s unlikely that Bethesda will be able to create an in-game world that spans multiple planets and space stations which is actually seamless. However, handling spaceflight in a different way to RPGslikeMass EffectandThe Outer Worldscould go a long way towards capturing the sense of freedom that open-world Bethesda games are known for.
Instead of the player simply boarding their ship, seeing a loading screen or short cutscene, and then going into the game’s overworld map,Starfieldcould find subtle ways to make that whole process more immersive. The game might remain in the player’s perspective the entire time, for example, while the blur of a planet’s atmosphere helps hide a loading transition between that planet and space.Mass Effect 1pulled a similar trick with its Citadel elevators.
Once in space, players could pilot their ship from their player character’s perspective as well, instead of space simply being an overworld map. When it comes to long-distance space travel, the kind of FTL effects seen inStar Wars’ Hyperspace orStar Trek’s warp speed could also help hide transitions between different areas. As long as the game never broke away from the player character’s perspective, Bethesda could retain the illusion that the game’s universe was rendered as a single environment rather than a collection of distinct zones.
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Dogfights And Landing
WhileMass EffectandThe Outer Worldshave space battles in their stories, they don’t actually have mechanics in place to realize those battles in gameplay.Starfieldcould have dogfights that take place in space and need to be managed from the player’s perspective in the cockpit.
TheStarfieldE3 2021 trailershowed a cockpit UI that seemed to display shields, what looked like three separate weapons, radars, and more. Hopefully, these aren’t just for show, and if they are directly related to mechanics, hopefully, spaceflight and space combat doesn’t feel like a totally separate part of the game to exploring planets on foot. Bethesda needs to find ways to afford the player the same freedom and perspective in space as they have when they leave their ship.
IfStarfieldinstead goes theMass EffectorThe Outer Worldsroute, taking players between a series ofSolstheim-sized planets, it could risk feeling like a step back from the worlds players could get lost in other Bethesda RPGs. When players land their ship, they should also have more freedom than the systems found inMass EffectandThe Outer Worlds.
In those RPGs, the ship lands at a preset point on the planet, and the player has no control. IfStarfieldis going to capture the free-roaming gameplay ofSkyrimor the BethesdaFalloutgames, players should be able to land on any viable spot on the planet whether it’s for exploration, to make repairs from a battle, or simply for their convenience.
Exploring in the player’s ship needs to feel like it’s as freeform as exploring on foot, otherwise,Starfieldwill feel more like a game with a story set in space than a trueopen-world Bethesdagame. Ultimately, it’s unlikely that Bethesda will be able to create a galaxy that is truly as seamless as some of the studio’s other titles, but there are still plenty of ways it could makeStarfield’s universe stand out from some of the competition to deliver a space-set game which captures the freedom of Bethesda’s best RPGs within the limits of its genre.
Starfieldreleases July 17, 2025 for PC and Xbox Series X/S.
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