Fans are still in awe of Starfield's recent gameplay reveal, and one Reddit user has decided to take a closer look at how far Bethesda's graphics have come since the last major single-player release, Fallout 4. Bethesda has a notable reputation for single-player open-world RPGs like Skyrim and the Fallout series. When the developer announced that its next single-player game would allow players to explore the vastness of space, many fans of the developer's games took interest.
The developer of Starfield and The Elder Scrolls games was recently bought by Microsoft. Fans received little to no updates regarding the latest game until last week's Xbox and Bethesda Games Showcase. The showcase revealed that not only will Starfield be released in the first half of 2023, but it will be available to play for free on the Xbox Game Pass the day it releases. Gameplay footage for the highly anticipated game was finally shown at the end of the showcase, displaying some of the title's combat and giving fans an idea of the scope of the game's explorable galaxy.
The facial animations shown during Starfield's gameplay reveal trailers are a dramatic upgrade from Fallout 4's, proving that the next-gen title may be worth the wait. As reported by Game Rant, Reddit user _eldrone recently posted a GIF cut from Starfield's impressive reveal trailer. The clip details one character's facial animation while they are blinking, causing the realistic-looking skin to fold where it believably should. Wrinkles and muscles can also be seen moving thanks to Starfield's vastly improved gameplay engine. This demonstrates how much the game developer has improved facial animations over the years.
animated skinfolds and wrinkles on characters in starfield, quite the update from fallout 4. from Starfield
While Bethesda's character models haven't always been the most impressive, the high level of customization its games have offered remains a strong selling point. With the many releases of Skyrim and the popular post-apocalyptic Fallout games, fans continue to make new discoveries and have fun with those games more than ten years after their release. Creative mods have also upgraded and added hundreds of hours of extra content to many of Bethesda's games. According to Bethesda's producer and director Todd Howard, Starfield will fully support mods, potentially adding more content to the already massive space RPG.
Fans will likely be receiving more details and a better look at the game as it gets close to its 2023 release. It remains to be seen if the game can live up to the high standard for the genre set by games like Breath of the Wild and Elden Ring. At the same time, Bethesda likely hopes to avoid the mistakes made with Cyberpunk 2077's disastrous launch and release Starfield when it's ready, hopefully in the first half of 2023.
Starfield will be released for Xbox Series X|S and PC in 2023.
Sources: Game Rant, _eldrone/Reddit