Featured Image Credit: Bethesda
Topics: Starfield, Bethesda, Xbox, Xbox Series S, Xbox Series X
I’m not sure I’ve ever seen a reception to a game quite like that of Starfield. It truly is turning out to be a love or hate experience.
Personally, I’m in the former camp. In our 10 out of 10 review, we wrote, “Every now and then, a new game comes along that changes our perception of what the industry is capable of. Starfield is that game. This is beyond what we’ve come to know an open-world to be. Bethesda has created a universe that, despite its vast scale, maintains interest and an impressive attention to detail throughout.” Others are less than impressed though, criticising the game’s fast travel, loading screens, and frame rate.
Take a look at our video review of Starfield below.
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Prior to the game’s release, Bethesda confirmed that Starfield would only run at 30fps. This announcement caused a surprising amount of ruckus. A 30fps limit is surely to be expected when you’re dealing with a galaxy of this scale, particularly if that limit results in more stable performance. Many remain disappointed though that Starfield is without a 60fps Performance Mode, something we see in most modern releases.
The team over at Digital Foundry (via GameSpot) have been experimenting with whether the Xbox Series X could feasibly run the game at 60fps - and it might be possible. To test the theory, Digital Foundry had to build a new console that essentially replicated the Series X but using the AMD 4800S Desktop Kit, while also replacing the GPU with the RX 6700 (as there’s no exact equivalent to Xbox’s RDNA 2 core).
It turns out that running Starfield with FSR 2 enabled did result in the occasional showing of 60fps. This is with no dynamic resolution scaling. Digital Foundry was only available to achieve 60fps though in enclosed environments. Most of the game continued to run at between 30 and 40fps.
When the team lowered the resolution to 1440p though, which matches what you’ll experience on the Xbox Series S, the game ran at a stable 40fps with the occasional rise to 60fps. Digital Foundry added that Bethesda could then feasibly release a 40fps mode for a 120Hz display, particularly for those with VRR screens.
It’s not an experiment we can particularly try ourselves, seeing as Starfield remains locked at 30fps, but it’s interesting to see that it has the capability to be pushed further.