Todd Howard has spoken out after The Elder Scrolls 6 failed to appear at the Xbox and Bethesda Showcase over the weekend, validating some of the worst suspicions of fans about the game’s current production status. In 2018, a brief teaser trailer for The Elder Scrolls 6 was released, showing the game’s title over a mountainous setting. Since then, rumors regarding the game’s putative setting and political structures have surfaced, but no new details have been released by Bethesda.
As a result of this, Bethesda Softworks has devoted a significant amount of resources and media attention to the highly anticipated space exploration game, Starfield. As with the Elder Scrolls 6 launch, Starfield was first revealed in a similar method to that of the Elder Scrolls 6. The familiar Bethesda gameplay mechanics and terrifying visuals of space were all that was needed to pique the interest of gamers. This past weekend, the first gameplay video from Starfield was released, but many Elder Scrolls 6 fans were left feeling shortchanged.
Fans will have to wait longer
According to Bethesda’s Todd Howard in a recent interview with IGN, the lengthy wait for The Elder Scrolls 6 might be much longer than first imagined. Fallout 5 was revealed by Howard in an interview that also verified the existence of The Elder Scrolls 6, which was placed on hold to work on Starfield four years after it was first teased. In a statement to supporters, Howard said that he understands their grief. Unfortunately, AAA video games—especially those with increasing complexity and technology—require a protracted production cycle, a point made by Howard in his interview.
Having been postponed from 2022 to 2023, Starfield will have been in development for almost seven years and out of pre-production for more than five years when it finally comes out. Because The Elder Scrolls 6 is still in development and probably won’t get any greater focus until after Starfield is released to players, it’s feasible that fans may have to wait until the late 2020s to get their hands on the Skyrim sequel. A decade after the launch of Skyrim and half a decade after news of The Elder Scrolls 6 was first revealed, there is little reason to expect anything except disappointment from fans of The Elder Scrolls.
