New The Elders Scrolls 6 Release Update Fills Me With Dread

Todd Howard has given a rather positive update on The Elder Scrolls VI, but there’s a part of it that has filled me with dread.

In case you missed it, Todd Howard spoke to IGN earlier this week regarding the status of The Elder Scrolls VI, revealing how the studio had become more efficient at using its internal tools, and also that playable builds of the game were now existing.

“I want to be careful with what I say about The Elder Scrolls VI, too, because I think everybody wants to know and we want to find a time that we'll obviously talk about that in depth,” Howard revealed.

“But the one thing I'd say is really in the tech as we're going to Creation Engine 3. Again, the team has done a really incredible job at not just pushing what it is, but how it's integrated into our development cycle. So, you don't feel that what we're doing on a day-to-day basis, like when the game goes down.

“So, we're in a fortunate position where the builds of the game are really consistently working every day. Well, not every day, but we've had more days than we've ever had where the build is good, there's new stuff in it, and we can play it.”

Essentially, it sounds like The Elder Scrolls VI may be further along in development than we thought, and that the game may not take as long to develop as Starfield, Bethesda Game Studios’ previous game.

I Don't Want Modders To Be The Reason The Elder Scrolls VI Succeeds

This comment has me a little worried though. Starfield took around five years to develop, entering production in 2018 and then releasing in 2023. Meanwhile, The Elder Scrolls VI was announced in 2018, but it’s only really been in full development since Starfield was released.

Basically, if we’re looking at a four or five year release cycle for The Elder Scrolls VI, then it’s possible the game may release somewhere around 2027 or 2028. But I’m hoping that Bethesda only releases The Elder Scrolls VI when it’s actually ready to release.

There’s this meme that gets passed around in Bethesda fan circles which suggests that the publisher releases games “unfinished”, and that it’s up to modders to end up fixing the biggest issues with the game.

It’s mostly a joke reaction to the plethora of bugs and issues that arrive with Bethesda Game Studios games on launch, but there’s always been a noticeable truth to it.

Most Elder Scrolls and Fallout games have unofficial patches released by modders, fixing issues that have gone untouched by Bethesda, and there are plenty of other mods which also revamp certain undercooked features that end up in the final product.

Starfield, Bethesda Softworks

With Starfield, we were seeing mods in the first few months which drastically improved some of the things that people were widely criticising it for. These were mods like Astrogate, which allow you to freely explore the galaxy without entering a bunch of different loading screens, and StarUI, which improved the menus and HUD to make everything a little cleaner and readable.

My biggest fear is that Bethesda releases The Elder Scrolls VI and it becomes the same story of “modders will fix it”. I would hate for the game to be rushed out in that regard—and therefore launch with a huge myriad of issues like Starfield did—it’s going to be a huge game that will consume all of our free time for months on end, no matter whether it launches in 2027 or well beyond that.

Basically, I don't want modders to be the reason the game succeeds. It should be a good enough game in its own right, fun to play right out of the box.

Modders will always be welcome to enhance the experience, but I don’t want it to feel like something that needs to have mods to be enjoyable. That certainly wasn’t the case for Oblivion or Skyrim, but I did feel that with Starfield and Fallout 4.

I guess we’ll see what happens. Howard says that the company is not ready for a full reveal of The Elder Scrolls VI yet, but I imagine it can’t be much longer until we start to see some actual gameplay or in-engine footage.

And hey, if it still takes another few years until the game is ready to release, there are plenty of other games to check out in the meantime.