‘About 10%’ of Starfield’s 1000+ planets have life on them because the game tries to seize ‘the magnificent desolation’ of area, says Todd Howard
On: June 22, 2023
Starfield game director Todd Howard continues to make the rounds upfront of Starfield’s September launch, giving us slightly extra perception into simply what the sci-fi epic goes to be when it lastly comes out. Seems that it is going to be fairly lonely, apparently: Howard says that “about 10 %” of the game’s 1000+ planets may have life on them as Bethesda tries to seize “the magnificent desolation” of the universe.
Howard was chatting Starfield in right this moment’s episode of the Kinda Humorous Xcast when the query of the game’s many, many procgen planets got here up. Requested about how a lot handcrafted content material there could be on these planets, and whether or not there would actually be a lot for gamers to do, Howard answered, “there is no approach we will go and handcraft a whole planet”.
As a substitute, Bethesda handcrafts “particular person areas and a few of these are positioned particularly,” that means stuff like cities and areas related to quests, “after which we have now a set of them which might be generated or positioned while you land relying on that planet”.
To me, it nearly sounds just like the planets from the primary Mass Impact, which have been largely barren save for a couple of positioned mercenary and bandit bases. Fingers crossed that Starfield’s “suite” of stuff is a little more different than ME1’s was, although.
Howard factors out that having 10% of Starfield’s planets harbour life truly makes it fairly busy from a scientific viewpoint. “We’re pushing [science],” stated Howard, “About 10 % of these planets have life on them. We’re pushing it to the sting of what do folks assume, what planets are in that Goldilocks Zone versus planets which have assets”.
However largely, it feels like Starfield is attempting to seize the wonder and the loneliness of our precise, real-life universe. “We’ll generate sure issues so that you can discover on [barren planets],” stated Howard, “however should you have a look at a planet … there’s—I like the Buzz Aldrin quote—’the magnificent desolation’.
“I feel there is a sure magnificence to touchdown on these and feeling ‘I am one of many solely folks or the one particular person to ever go to this planet,'” stated Howard. “We hope all people enjoys it for what it’s, however it’s an exploration totally different than we have had”.
As an inveterate fan of area trucking in Elite: Harmful, this all sounds fairly acquainted, and I’ve to say it sounds fairly intriguing. I am all for wandering the huge and lonely wastes of the galaxy, however I am curious if followers coming to this straight from Skyrim or Fallout 4 may discover themselves put out of types. Nonetheless, Howard says Bethesda has tried onerous to stability the “gamey” parts across the exploratory vibe, and that the studio has “dialled that in fairly properly”. I suppose we’ll discover out come September.
