{"id":1831267,"date":"2026-03-17T17:42:27","date_gmt":"2026-03-17T14:42:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/?p=1831267"},"modified":"2026-03-17T17:42:27","modified_gmt":"2026-03-17T14:42:27","slug":"weve-really-done-a-good-job-with-starfield-we-struggled-bethesda-boss-todd-howard-offers-brief-the-elder-scrolls-6-update-hints-at-more-efficient-development-this-time","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/?p=1831267","title":{"rendered":"&#8220;We&#8217;ve really done a good job&#8230; with Starfield, we struggled&#8221; &#8211;\u00a0 Bethesda boss Todd Howard offers brief The Elder Scrolls 6 update, hints at more efficient development this time"},"content":{"rendered":"<article class=\"article \" data-ads=\"true\" data-article-type=\"news\" data-article-group=\"news\" data-paywalled=\"false\" data-premium=\"false\" data-sponsored=\"false\" data-type=\"article\">\n<header class=\"article_header\" data-component=\"article-header\">\n<div class=\"breadcrumbs\">\n<nav class=\"nav_breadcrumbs\" data-component=\"nav-breadcrumbs\" aria-label=\"Breadcrumb\">\n<ul class=\"nav-links\">\n<li>\n                <a href=\"https:\/\/www.eurogamer.net\/\" data-active=\"false\"><br \/>\n                      Home<br \/>\n                <\/a>\n            <\/li>\n<li>\n                <a href=\"https:\/\/www.eurogamer.net\/news\" data-active=\"false\"><br \/>\n                      News<br \/>\n                <\/a>\n            <\/li>\n<li>\n                <a href=\"https:\/\/www.eurogamer.net\/games\/the-elder-scrolls-6\" data-active=\"false\"><br \/>\n                      The Elder Scrolls VI<br \/>\n                <\/a>\n            <\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/nav><\/div>\n<div class=\"headline_details\" id=\"main-content\">\n<h1 class=\"title\">&#8220;We&#8217;ve really done a good job&#8230; with Starfield, we struggled&#8221; &#8211;\u00a0 Bethesda boss Todd Howard offers brief The Elder Scrolls 6 update, hints at more efficient development this time<\/h1>\n<p class=\"strapline\">Try not to scream too loudly.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<div class=\"headline_asset\">\n<figure class=\"headline_image_wrapper\">\n<p>        <img fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"headline_image\" src=\"https:\/\/assetsio.gnwcdn.com\/Todd-Howard-overlaid-on-an-image-from-The-Elder-Scrolls-6-reveal-which-shows-a-fortress-surrounded-by-moutains_KwBrlRf.jpg?width=570&amp;quality=85&amp;format=jpg&amp;dpr=3&amp;auto=webp\" alt=\"Todd Howard overlaid on an image from The Elder Scrolls 6 reveal which shows a fortress surrounded by mountains\" loading=\"eager\" data-uri=\"Todd-Howard-overlaid-on-an-image-from-The-Elder-Scrolls-6-reveal-which-shows-a-fortress-surrounded-by-moutains_KwBrlRf.jpg\" data-lightbox width=\"570\" height=\"321\"><figcaption>\n          <span class=\"attribution\">Image credit: <cite>Eurogamer<\/cite><\/span><br \/>\n        <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<div class=\"metadata\">\n<div class=\"avatar\">\n<p>    <img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" alt=\"Connor Makar avatar\" src=\"https:\/\/assetsio.gnwcdn.com\/tAtwiaBo_400x400.jpg?width=2048&amp;height=2048&amp;fit=bounds&amp;quality=85&amp;format=jpg&amp;auto=webp\" style=\"aspect-ratio: 1\" width=\"374\" height=\"374\"><\/p>\n<p>  <img alt=\"Connor Makar avatar\" data-autosize=\"crop_lossy\" data-uri=\"tAtwiaBo_400x400.jpg\" loading=\"lazy\" style=\"aspect-ratio: 1\" width=\"374\" height=\"374\">\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"text\">\n<div class=\"byline\">\n                  <span class=\"article_type\" data-slug=\"news\"><br \/>\n                    News<br \/>\n                  <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span class=\"by\">by<\/span> <span class=\"author\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.eurogamer.net\/authors\/connor-makar\">Connor Makar<\/a><\/span>                    <span class=\"job_title\"><br \/>\n                      Staff Writer<br \/>\n                    <\/span>\n            <\/div>\n<div class=\"published_at\">\nPublished on <time datetime=\"2026-03-17T17:42:27+00:00\">March 17, 2026<\/time>              <\/div>\n<div class=\"comments\">\n      <a class=\"comments__link comments-bubble\" href=\"https:\/\/www.eurogamer.net\/bethesda-boss-todd-howard-offers-more-elder-scrolls-6-info-more-efficient-development?view=comments\" rel=\"nofollow\"><br \/>\n          30 comments<br \/>\n      <\/a>\n    <\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<div class=\"mypop-header-wrapper\">\n<p><button class=\"mypop-button button wide\" data-state=\"follow\" data-type=\"tag\" data-uuid=\"c37f6bb7-fa4f-4c1c-8a9e-8f9b58b66791\" data-name=\"The Elder Scrolls VI\" data-follow-text=\"Follow The Elder Scrolls VI\" data-unfollow-text=\"Following The Elder Scrolls VI\" data-aria-follow-text=\"Follow The Elder Scrolls VI\" data-aria-unfollow-text=\"Following The Elder Scrolls VI\" data-popup=\"true\" data-force-login=\"true\" aria-label=\"Follow The Elder Scrolls VI\" title=\"Follow The Elder Scrolls VI\"><br \/>\n  Follow The Elder Scrolls VI<br \/>\n<\/button>          <\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/header>\n<div class=\"article_body\" data-component=\"article-content\">\n<div class=\"article_body_content article-styling\">\n<p>Sound the alarms, Bethesda boss <a href=\"https:\/\/www.eurogamer.net\/personas\/todd-howard\">Todd Howard<\/a> has spoken a bit about The Elder Scrolls 6 in a recent interview. While he&#8217;s keeping a lot close to his chest, a few details about <a href=\"https:\/\/www.eurogamer.net\/even-todd-howard-wishes-elder-scrolls-6-development-went-a-little-faster-but-says-its-progressing-really-well\">the game&#8217;s lengthy development<\/a> were revealed that should soothe the eager RPG fan out there.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.ign.com\/articles\/todd-howard-talks-elder-scrolls-6-progress-starfields-ps5-port-and-bethesdas-future-ign-interview?utm_source=bluesky,threads,twitter\">Speaking to IGN<\/a>, Howard was first asked about what he wants and needs from <a href=\"https:\/\/www.eurogamer.net\/xbox-boss-says-microsofts-next-gen-console-project-helix-can-play-both-your-xbox-and-pc-games-and-will-lead-in-performance\">the next generation of console hardware<\/a>, given the fact Bethesda is developing its big new RPG The Elder Scrolls 6 for it.<\/p>\n<p>To this, Howard responded: &#8220;We&#8217;ve been fortunate that we see that stuff really, really early and it&#8217;s tricky for, let&#8217;s say console manufacturers &#8211; whoever they are &#8211; they have to take a very long view of development when you sort of tape out on a chip, how you make that call with timing and cost, and then what does it look like five or 10 years after that? So it&#8217;s a really, really tricky kind of thing to maneuver both technically and business-wise when anyone is making a system like that where you&#8217;re going to lock it down.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Our approach has always been &#8211; and because fortunately we&#8217;ve had such a PC audience\u2026 to cast a wide net technically, to both take advantage of the very high end, but allow the game to scale down and handle [low-spec],&#8221; Howard expanded. &#8220;You look at handhelds now, you look at how popular those are becoming, and I think you&#8217;re going to see more lower-powered devices where, say, you&#8217;re traveling and you want to underclock that thing in a certain way; we want our games to be able to handle that.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Howard also spoke about his newfound consciousness around the timing of game reveals, to which IGN appropriately asked about <a href=\"https:\/\/www.eurogamer.net\/elder-scrolls-6-revealed-so-early-due-to-pitchforks-and-torches\">the 2018 Elder Scrolls 6 reveal<\/a>. To this Howard remarked: &#8220;Just pretend we didn&#8217;t announce it. Doesn&#8217;t exist&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p>When prompted to elaborate on the matter, Howard mused on the ongoing challenge of keeping fans of multiple projects informed: &#8220;If you look back at the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.eurogamer.net\/games\/fallout-76\">Fallout 76<\/a>\/<a href=\"https:\/\/www.eurogamer.net\/starfield-main-story-walkthrough-9352\">Starfield<\/a>\/Elder Scrolls 6 announcements [from Bethesda&#8217;s E3 2018 showcase], that was really about informing our audience, because when you&#8217;re going to do something new, everyone&#8217;s going to ask, &#8216;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.eurogamer.net\/the-majority-of-people-who-made-skyrim-are-still-here-bethesda-boss-on-why-the-elder-scrolls-6-will-be-more-like-skyrim-or-oblivion-than-starfield\">What about Elder Scrolls 6<\/a>? What about a single-player game?&#8217; And we did it that way, but it&#8217;s not my preference,&#8221; Howard said.<\/p>\n<p><span class=\"injection_placeholder\" data-position=\"1\"><\/span><\/p>\n<p>&#8220;And I will say, we struggle with the balance because our fans want to know. They&#8217;re amazing, and are asking like, &#8216;Well, what are you doing?&#8217; And, well, we&#8217;re working on a lot of stuff. I think if you look at the scale of our studio, we could have 10 times the amount of people to do all this. We&#8217;re doing so much and it&#8217;s just finding the right times to tell everybody about it. Look at Starfield today; I feel like the Starfield audience has been like, &#8216;What about us?&#8217; And we had sort of a balance with, like, &#8216;Hey, the end of the Fall was for Fallout the TV show,&#8217; with everything we were doing. And we knew that we were just going to save the Starfield stuff to give it its spotlight during this time. But yeah, it&#8217;s a balance.<\/p>\n<p>Howard was also asked about the progress on Elder Scrolls 6&#8217;s development, to which he joked &#8220;nothing&#8221; and &#8220;never heard of it&#8221;. As a follow up, the Bethesda director was prompted on what lessons learned from Starfield&#8217;s development have been brought over to The Elder Scrolls 6.<\/p>\n<p>This, it turns out, Howard was keen to answer. &#8220;I want to be careful with what I say about The Elder Scrolls 6, too, because I think everybody wants to know and we want to find a time that we&#8217;ll obviously talk about that in depth. But the one thing I&#8217;d say is really in the tech as we&#8217;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&#8217;s integrated into our development cycle.&#8221; He added that the studio is &#8220;in a fortunate position where the builds of the game are really consistently working every day,&#8221; before catching himself. &#8220;Well, not every day, but we&#8217;ve had more days than we&#8217;ve ever had where the build is good, there&#8217;s new stuff in it, and we can play it.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;And when you&#8217;re making those kinds of technical changes as we talked about, often you&#8217;re pulling the rug out from under the team who&#8217;s making content. [You don&#8217;t want] to be like, &#8216;Okay, that doesn&#8217;t work for this period of time, you&#8217;re going to have to wait until we get that working again.&#8217; And we&#8217;ve done a really good job of managing that on this game. And with Starfield, we struggled there for a number of years in terms of when we went through the engine change.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p><span class=\"injection_placeholder\" data-position=\"2\"><\/span><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.eurogamer.net\/the-elder-scrolls-6-is-still-a-long-way-off-says-todd-howard-but-development-is-his-everyday-thing\">The Elder Scrolls 6 may still be a long ways off<\/a>, and is almost certainly <a href=\"https:\/\/www.eurogamer.net\/the-elder-scrolls-6-not-coming-to-playstation-confirms-microsoft-court-document\">not coming out in 2026<\/a>. But still, one hopes this little bit of insight will keep the carnivorous hordes of Bethesda fans sated for a while. One can hope!<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<div class=\"preferred-source\" data-component=\"preferred-source\">\nLove Eurogamer.net? Make us a <a rel=\"nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.google.com\/preferences\/source?q=https:\/\/www.eurogamer.net\">Preferred Source on Google<\/a> and catch more of our coverage in your feeds.  <\/div>\n<\/article>\n<div class=\"article_body\" data-component=\"article-content\">\n<div class=\"article_body_content article-styling\">\n<p>Sound the alarms, Bethesda boss <a href=\"https:\/\/www.eurogamer.net\/personas\/todd-howard\">Todd Howard<\/a> has spoken a bit about The Elder Scrolls 6 in a recent interview. While he&#8217;s keeping a lot close to his chest, a few details about <a href=\"https:\/\/www.eurogamer.net\/even-todd-howard-wishes-elder-scrolls-6-development-went-a-little-faster-but-says-its-progressing-really-well\">the game&#8217;s lengthy development<\/a> were revealed that should soothe the eager RPG fan out there.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.ign.com\/articles\/todd-howard-talks-elder-scrolls-6-progress-starfields-ps5-port-and-bethesdas-future-ign-interview?utm_source=bluesky,threads,twitter\">Speaking to IGN<\/a>, Howard was first asked about what he wants and needs from <a href=\"https:\/\/www.eurogamer.net\/xbox-boss-says-microsofts-next-gen-console-project-helix-can-play-both-your-xbox-and-pc-games-and-will-lead-in-performance\">the next generation of console hardware<\/a>, given the fact Bethesda is developing its big new RPG The Elder Scrolls 6 for it.<\/p>\n<p>To this, Howard responded: &#8220;We&#8217;ve been fortunate that we see that stuff really, really early and it&#8217;s tricky for, let&#8217;s say console manufacturers &#8211; whoever they are &#8211; they have to take a very long view of development when you sort of tape out on a chip, how you make that call with timing and cost, and then what does it look like five or 10 years after that? So it&#8217;s a really, really tricky kind of thing to maneuver both technically and business-wise when anyone is making a system like that where you&#8217;re going to lock it down.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Our approach has always been &#8211; and because fortunately we&#8217;ve had such a PC audience\u2026 to cast a wide net technically, to both take advantage of the very high end, but allow the game to scale down and handle [low-spec],&#8221; Howard expanded. &#8220;You look at handhelds now, you look at how popular those are becoming, and I think you&#8217;re going to see more lower-powered devices where, say, you&#8217;re traveling and you want to underclock that thing in a certain way; we want our games to be able to handle that.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Howard also spoke about his newfound consciousness around the timing of game reveals, to which IGN appropriately asked about <a href=\"https:\/\/www.eurogamer.net\/elder-scrolls-6-revealed-so-early-due-to-pitchforks-and-torches\">the 2018 Elder Scrolls 6 reveal<\/a>. To this Howard remarked: &#8220;Just pretend we didn&#8217;t announce it. Doesn&#8217;t exist&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p>When prompted to elaborate on the matter, Howard mused on the ongoing challenge of keeping fans of multiple projects informed: &#8220;If you look back at the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.eurogamer.net\/games\/fallout-76\">Fallout 76<\/a>\/<a href=\"https:\/\/www.eurogamer.net\/starfield-main-story-walkthrough-9352\">Starfield<\/a>\/Elder Scrolls 6 announcements [from Bethesda&#8217;s E3 2018 showcase], that was really about informing our audience, because when you&#8217;re going to do something new, everyone&#8217;s going to ask, &#8216;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.eurogamer.net\/the-majority-of-people-who-made-skyrim-are-still-here-bethesda-boss-on-why-the-elder-scrolls-6-will-be-more-like-skyrim-or-oblivion-than-starfield\">What about Elder Scrolls 6<\/a>? What about a single-player game?&#8217; And we did it that way, but it&#8217;s not my preference,&#8221; Howard said.<\/p>\n<p><span class=\"injection_placeholder\" data-position=\"1\"><\/span><\/p>\n<p>&#8220;And I will say, we struggle with the balance because our fans want to know. They&#8217;re amazing, and are asking like, &#8216;Well, what are you doing?&#8217; And, well, we&#8217;re working on a lot of stuff. I think if you look at the scale of our studio, we could have 10 times the amount of people to do all this. We&#8217;re doing so much and it&#8217;s just finding the right times to tell everybody about it. Look at Starfield today; I feel like the Starfield audience has been like, &#8216;What about us?&#8217; And we had sort of a balance with, like, &#8216;Hey, the end of the Fall was for Fallout the TV show,&#8217; with everything we were doing. And we knew that we were just going to save the Starfield stuff to give it its spotlight during this time. But yeah, it&#8217;s a balance.<\/p>\n<p>Howard was also asked about the progress on Elder Scrolls 6&#8217;s development, to which he joked &#8220;nothing&#8221; and &#8220;never heard of it&#8221;. As a follow up, the Bethesda director was prompted on what lessons learned from Starfield&#8217;s development have been brought over to The Elder Scrolls 6.<\/p>\n<p>This, it turns out, Howard was keen to answer. &#8220;I want to be careful with what I say about The Elder Scrolls 6, too, because I think everybody wants to know and we want to find a time that we&#8217;ll obviously talk about that in depth. But the one thing I&#8217;d say is really in the tech as we&#8217;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&#8217;s integrated into our development cycle.&#8221; He added that the studio is &#8220;in a fortunate position where the builds of the game are really consistently working every day,&#8221; before catching himself. &#8220;Well, not every day, but we&#8217;ve had more days than we&#8217;ve ever had where the build is good, there&#8217;s new stuff in it, and we can play it.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;And when you&#8217;re making those kinds of technical changes as we talked about, often you&#8217;re pulling the rug out from under the team who&#8217;s making content. [You don&#8217;t want] to be like, &#8216;Okay, that doesn&#8217;t work for this period of time, you&#8217;re going to have to wait until we get that working again.&#8217; And we&#8217;ve done a really good job of managing that on this game. And with Starfield, we struggled there for a number of years in terms of when we went through the engine change.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p><span class=\"injection_placeholder\" data-position=\"2\"><\/span><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.eurogamer.net\/the-elder-scrolls-6-is-still-a-long-way-off-says-todd-howard-but-development-is-his-everyday-thing\">The Elder Scrolls 6 may still be a long ways off<\/a>, and is almost certainly <a href=\"https:\/\/www.eurogamer.net\/the-elder-scrolls-6-not-coming-to-playstation-confirms-microsoft-court-document\">not coming out in 2026<\/a>. But still, one hopes this little bit of insight will keep the carnivorous hordes of Bethesda fans sated for a while. One can hope!<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Home News The Elder Scrolls VI &#8220;We&#8217;ve really done a good job&#8230; with Starfield, we struggled&#8221; &#8211;\u00a0 Bethesda boss Todd Howard offers brief The Elder Scrolls 6 update, hints at more efficient development this time Try not to scream too loudly. Image credit: Eurogamer News by Connor Makar Staff Writer Published on March 17, 2026 [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[226,253],"class_list":["post-1831267","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-crawlmanager","tag-eurogamer-net"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1831267","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1831267"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1831267\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1831267"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1831267"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1831267"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}