If you're anything like me, your immediate reaction to the Oblivion Remaster on Switch 2 might be, "Hmm... how... huh?" Of course, I'm referring to how, on God's miserable Earth, this is going to run on a Nintendo Switch 2.

To be fair, I recently covered comments from Digital Foundry, who spoke quite highly of the Xbox Series S and how it has served as a great piece of hardware for helping developers optimize games for the Switch 2. While performance isn't apples to apples, it's not exactly apples to oranges either. In testing, the Series S and Switch 2 perform surprisingly closely in some scenarios, largely thanks to NVIDIA's DLSS upscaling technology.

Now, I'm sure Oblivion needs no introduction. It's one of Bethesda's most beloved RPGs, and its remaster, which launched last year, surpassed 9 million players in its first three months. It's no surprise to see it making its way to the Switch 2. The console has performed well for Nintendo, and perhaps most interestingly for Switch 2 fans, it appears the physical cartridge contains the full game, something I'm sure collectors will appreciate.

We don't get many more details beyond what's included in each edition, but I am hopeful that the Switch 2 release also leads to improvements and fixes for the existing versions of the game. After all, the last update for Oblivion Remastered was back in July last year with update 1.2.

The lack of updates since release has been a sore spot for many fans, leaving some feeling abandoned while several issues remain unresolved. Fortunately, they won't have to wait long to see whether the Nintendo Switch 2 release also brings fixes to the existing versions. Oblivion Remastered launches on August 11, 2026, and will retail for $49.99 for the standard digital edition and $59.99 for the physical edition.

Let me know your thoughts on Oblivion Remastered coming to the Nintendo Switch 2. Are you planning to pick it up, or does the release not interest you? Share your thoughts in the comments, and be sure to take part in our poll below:

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Before I continue, can we all just let out a collective sigh? Okay, now that's done, let's jump into it.

Just a week or so ago, I covered a few stories on Marvel's Blade. Todd Howard had recently seen the project and said it was progressing well, and the game's lead concept artist spoke on X regarding the game, both of which gave us a glimmer of hope that perhaps Arkane was safe and the game would eventually see the light of day.

Unfortunately, I have some bad news if this report from The Verge turns out to be accurate.

According to The Verge, Microsoft's next wave of Xbox layoffs is set for next week and could include studio closures or spin-offs, potential studio mergers, and canceled games. One of those games, according to the report, could be Marvel's Blade.

Now, it's important to mention that this is only something Microsoft is reportedly considering. The report also claims Xbox is exploring the possibility of selling Arkane.

In what is admittedly a bad situation all around, that would probably be the better outcome. I'd much rather see Xbox stick with the project and see it through, but Asha Sharma's reset appears to be focused on restructuring Xbox and returning the business to profitability.

The report also claims we could have seen Marvel's Blade as early as later this year before its internal release target reportedly slipped to late 2027. To me, that suggests the game may have been further along than many of us expected, although game development is unpredictable, so that's purely my own speculation.

I don't really want to drone on, because I think we're all painfully aware of what's potentially coming. It's going to be a difficult few weeks for Xbox fans, employees, and the wider games industry.

Gaming is supposed to be a hobby that helps us escape from everything else going on in the world, so it really does suck when those same problems keep finding their way into the industry we all enjoy so much.

With that said, I genuinely hope this remains something that's only being considered and that Arkane gets the chance to finish Marvel's Blade. Let me know your thoughts in the comments, and be sure to take part in our poll.

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It feels a little strange talking about an update on Marvel and Xbox's Blade given the recent rumors surrounding studio closures and certain teams potentially going independent. One of the studios caught up in that speculation is Arkane Lyon, the very team developing Blade.

Despite all of that uncertainty, we've actually received a fairly positive update on the game. During a recent interview with Entertainment Weekly, Blade came up in conversation with Todd Howard, who offered a surprisingly encouraging update. Here's what he had to say:

“I'm not at liberty to say when [we'll see more], but I saw some stuff just yesterday [on May 21] and the folks at Arkane [Studios, the developers] are doing a really, really great job.”

Of course, Todd Howard may not necessarily be privy to the full scope of any potential changes happening across Xbox, but a positive update is still a positive update. More importantly, it lines up with comments we've heard elsewhere recently.

I recently covered comments from one of Blade's lead concept artists, who told fans on X (formerly Twitter) to "let us cook," seemingly suggesting development is progressing well. On top of that, Xbox Chief Content Officer Matt Booty was recently asked about Blade's absence from the Xbox Games Showcase, where he said:

“It’s a big show, I can’t fit everything in. It’s a big show, and there’s other beats coming up in the year… there’s always potential to hear more about things that didn’t show up today.”

That certainly gives fans reason to believe we could see the game again sooner rather than later, perhaps even before the end of the year.

As I've said before, it's difficult to discuss projects like Blade without acknowledging the uncertainty surrounding Xbox right now. Hopefully Arkane and its teams are safe, and we'll get to see the fruits of their labor sooner rather than later.

For now, though, Blade appears to be very much alive and well, and that's worth celebrating. Let me know your thoughts in the comments, and be sure to take part in our poll!

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It's been exactly eight years to the day since The Elder Scrolls developer Bethesda officially announced The Elder Scrolls 6 during an extremely short teaser trailer at E3 2018. Since then, we've heard and seen nothing more about the upcoming RPG outside of the fact that it will be a "classic" Bethesda game made with Creation Engine 3, the latest iteration of the engine used for Skyrim, Fallout 4, and Starfield.

Bethesda's game director and executive producer Todd Howard has attempted to assuage concerns about the game's development by commenting that "it's progressing really well" and noting that it's gone smoother than Starfield's did. Still, many have grown frustrated with the overall silence, especially after The Elder Scrolls 6 didn't appear during last weekend's Xbox Games Showcase.

In a new interview with Variety, Xbox's chief content officer Matt Booty took some time to discuss The Elder Scrolls 6, explaining that Microsoft and Xbox don't want to show more of the game "till the right moment" while asserting that what he's seen of it "looks amazing."

"I would say one of the more challenging balancing acts of someone in a job like mine is balancing that you want to go show the world all the cool stuff you’re working on, and you want to get them excited early, but we also know that we want to wait till the right moment," he said. "And when you decide to show it, you want it to be the best you’ve got. And also that when you show the game, you’re also giving them a promise of, 'Hey, it’s coming soon.'"

"So I can tell you, having visited Bethesda and sat with [Todd Howard] and seen [Elder Scrolls 6] playing, it looks amazing, and it’s coming along well," Booty continued. "And we’ll make sure to announce it and really reveal it at the right time."

Unfortunately, Todd Howard noted that The Elder Scrolls 6 is still "a long ways off" in November last year, which strongly suggests it's still a few years out from its long, long-awaited launch.

Between that information and Booty's comment about Xbox trying not to reveal games that aren't coming soon, I'd say it's pretty unlikely we'll see more of Bethesda's open-world RPG until its release date draws closer. That's pretty vexing for a game first announced eight years ago; I imagine Howard regrets confirming its development so early, now.

Still, I am happy to see Booty echoing several of Howard's previous comments that suggest The Elder Scrolls 6 is coming along nicely and "looks amazing," even if I know we wouldn't hear about it if development was rough. I've waited ages and ages for a proper Skyrim sequel already; as long as the project isn't in development hell, I can wait a little longer.

When it comes out, The Elder Scrolls 6 is all-but-guaranteed to be available on Xbox Game Pass across Xbox and PC, as it's a first-party Microsoft game. Whether or not it will be Xbox exclusive remains to be seen; Xbox CEO Asha Sharma is warming up to their return, so I wouldn't be surprised if it ends up missing PS5.

Are you looking forward to The Elder Scrolls 6? Share your thoughts below.

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One of the strongest evergreen projects in Microsoft's Xbox Game Studios portfolio is Fallout 76, the popular multiplayer MMO-lite RPG from Bethesda that's been running since 2018 and retains a healthy community of players across Xbox, PC, and PlayStation to this day.

Over the years, the Appalachia-based Fallout title has received well over 60 free content updates that've each brought new stories, quests, locations, enemies, gear, and more to the game — and just recently, Bethesda launched its 68th, Infestations, alongside news that the next-gen version of the RPG is getting public testing in June.

To celebrate, the studio showed off a brand new trailer for the Infestations update during the Xbox Games Showcase that primarily features a song themed after the patch coupled with a nifty rubber hose-style animation that fits right in with Fallout's typical marketing style. It's a fun watch; you can check it out below.

The Infestations update itself brings a huge variety of intense combat encounters to numerous different locations in Appalachia, with players encouraged to team up with one another in these open-world events and cut down hordes of everything from Super Mutants and raiders to rogue military robots and the deadly wildlife that roams the wasteland.

Successfully doing so will net you various rewards, the best of these being pieces of four-star Legendary gear exclusive to Infestation events. I imagine farming them will be a great way for players to get a large arsenal of quality weapons and armor.

Notably, the trailer also revealed that from June 7 (today!) to June 15, players can log in every day for free daily rewards, which could be everything from new cosmetics to useful gameplay items.

On top of that, Fallout 1st — Fallout 76's controversial premium subscription option that gives members access to exclusive cosmetics, unlimited crafting storage, monthly in-game currency for microtransaction purchases, and private servers to play on — also has a free trial running from June 8 to June 15, effectively giving you a week of it for no cost.

Ultimately, these are some nice offers, and the Infestations update itself brings plenty of chaotic action to Fallout 76. I'm always glad to see the game doing well and getting more content, myself.

How about you, though? What do you think of Fallout 76? I'm curious, so let me know below.

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There's a good chance that, like me, you never even knew that The Elder Scrolls: Blades still existed. There's also a good chance that, like me, you've never actually played it. Which might not necessarily be a bad thing, but it has largely faded into the background since its launch.

Released in 2020 for Android, iOS, and, somewhat surprisingly, Nintendo Switch, The Elder Scrolls: Blades was a free-to-play spin-off designed specifically for mobile devices. The game never really resonated with critics or players, however, and currently sits at a Metacritic score of 42 alongside a user score of 2.7.

The game itself is set to be "permanently shut down on June 30, 2026" (via Reddit). Between now and then, the developers have made everything in the in-game store available for one gem or one sigil, with all players receiving a free bundle of gems and sigils.

I recently covered other games shutting down for Xbox, and in that, I mentioned how important I believe the Stop Killing Games campaign is. The initiative aims to prevent publishers from releasing games only to later shut them down with no way for players to access them again.

It's an issue that continues to affect the industry. Looking at games like Concord and Highguard, even if a game isn't particularly well-received, it's still disappointing when access disappears entirely. There are always players who spent money on the game itself, purchased microtransactions, or simply enjoyed the experience and want to revisit it at some point.

It's hard for me to comment too much on Blades itself being taken down, simply because I've never actually played it. I don't really have any witty anecdotes or personal stories to share about my time with it, because there wasn't one.

Still, I'm generally a big fan of studios branching out and trying new things, even when they don't always land. I look at Halo as a good example. Microsoft released Halo: Spartan Assault and Halo: Spartan Strike for mobile, and while neither was groundbreaking, I thought they were pretty decent for what they were. However, Microsoft is arguably wasting Halo's potential right now.

On that note, it's a little disappointing that we never got more games in that style, especially since they offered something different from the mainline Halo experience. Those are just my thoughts, though.

Let me know what you think about The Elder Scrolls: Blades and its upcoming shutdown. Did you ever play it, or is this the first time you're hearing about it? Be sure to leave a comment and take part in our poll!

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Late last year, Fallout steward Bethesda announced that a next-gen update was coming to its 2018 MMO-lite multiplayer title Fallout 76, promising players on Xbox Series X|S and PS5 systems an elevated version of the game with better visual fidelity.

We haven't heard anything about this update for a while, but in the patch notes for the new Infestations update and the launch of Season 25, we finally got some news about the upcoming patch. Not only have we learned that the next-gen update is coming out this summer and will have public testing in June, but we've also gotten full details about the improvements it's making.

On Xbox Series X|S and PS5 consoles, Bethesda is improving draw distances and shadow quality, with support for 4K resolution on Xbox Series X|S and PS5 Pro and 1440p on PS5. On top of that, all Xbox Series X|S and PS5 versions will also support variable refresh rate (VRR) with compatible displays to prevent screen tearing. The studio is targeting 60 FPS performance for all next-gen (current gen, really) systems.

Certain last-gen consoles will benefit slightly from the update, too. Specifically, Xbox One X will get support for 4K — something that even the PS5 doesn't have — with PS4 Pro getting a bump up to 1440p from 1080p. Notably, Bethesda also left out mention of the Xbox Series S here beyond stating that its targeting 60 FPS performance on the system, which likely means that it's remaining at 1080p.

While PS5 still enjoys a higher framerate — 60 FPS instead of 30 — it is interesting that 2017's Xbox One X is getting support for 4K and Sony's baseline next-gen console isn't, and it shows just how frontloaded the former system's specs are with GPU power. Also, the lack of 1440p support for Xbox Series S is a bit disappointing; evidently Bethesda has chosen to prioritize framerate over fidelity for the more affordable console.

It's unclear when exactly the next-gen update is releasing this summer, or when public testing for it will begin this month. Bethesda says it will announce details as they come on its social channels, though, so keep an eye on those. Note that when they do come, the testing versions of next-gen Fallout 76 will be freely available to all owners of the game on the Xbox and PlayStation marketplaces.

As for the Infestations and Season 25 (dubbed "Appalachia Under Siege") update itself, the patch is live now across Xbox, PC, and PlayStation, and adds combat-focused Infestations activities where you have to "clear out Infestations of challenging enemies for 4-Star Rewards." These rewards include powerful gear, with Season 25's reward path also giving you various outfits, C.A.M.P. items, and other goodies (see those above).

All in all, Infestations and Season 25 seems like a pretty solid update for Fallout 76, though choosing to focus on marketing all the new C.A.M.P. decorations more than its actual gameplay content was certainly a choice. Regardless, it's always nice to see that Bethesda's experimental multiplayer Fallout title is still going strong. You can check out its full patch notes here.

What's your opinion of Fallout 76? Do you plan on checking out the Infestations update? Let me know below.

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One of the most biggest and most impactful updates in Fallout 4 history was scheduled to come to Bethesda's beloved classic 2015 post-apocalyptic RPG last year in November, but ended up getting delayed due to technical issues. For months, it's been relatively silent about it since then outside of a confirmation it's still being worked on — but thanks to a new announcement, we finally know when it's coming.

The update in question is a massive mod storage increase to the amount of space Xbox and PlayStation players can dedicate towards the player-made "Creations" mods you can download and install from Fallout 4's main menu. A new communication from Bethesda confirms it's coming to Xbox Series X|S, Xbox One, PS5, and PS4 on May 27, which is just a week from now.

"We're excited to share the Fallout 4 Creations storage expansion will arrive for consoles on May 27th. Console players will soon have more space to download content, including larger, more ambitious Creations," the developer wrote in its social media post.

Specifically, the amount of storage available to Xbox Series X|S users will skyrocket from 2GB to 100GB, while those on Xbox One, PS5, and PS4 will jump from 1-2GB to 15GB (last-gen and Sony-imposed limitations mean these systems won't get as much extra space as Xbox Series X|S systems will).

While this update ultimately won't mean anything for players that don't use mods, Fallout 4 is radically changing for those on console that do. Even having 15GB available for mods opens up a ton of possibilities for Xbox and PlayStation players, and Xbox Series X|S users with 100GB of space will be able to put together load orders comparable to what PC players have enjoyed for years.

With that much available storage, console users will be able to use high-quality graphics improvement mods without issue, and will still have plenty of room left over for countless other smaller mods that overhaul gameplay, add new weapons and armors, introduce new quests and storylines, and more. Advanced projects that rely on the PC-exclusive Fallout 4 Script Extender still won't be on the table, but that's it.

As someone who's enjoyed modding Fallout 4 extensively over the years, I'm stoked that my fellow Sole Survivors over on Xbox and PlayStation will finally be able to mod the RPG on a deeper level as I have. Something you need to be aware of, though, is that the update will wipe existing load orders. Thankfully, you can save yours and then restore it after the patch.

Bethesda published an article explaining how to do this, but I'll write out the process here too. In the Fallout 4 Creations menu, go into your Load Order and then select the Load Order Archive button. In the box that opens, select "Save Load Order to Bethesda.net" and let the process complete. Then, after the update, go to the same location and choose "Restore Load Order from Bethesda.net" instead.

It's unfortunate that this update is coming to Fallout 4 six months late, but ultimately, I'm just glad to see it's finally almost here and didn't end up getting scrapped. After the disaster of the Anniversary Edition, the popular Fallout game really needed a win.

Will you take advantage of the mod storage increase patch for Fallout 4? Let me know in the comments, and vote in our poll, too.

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While video game adaptations in film or TV are often quite disappointing, one incredibly enjoyable outlier these past few years has been the Fallout TV show that Amazon's been producing in collaboration with Fallout shepherd Bethesda. Both Season 1 and Season 2 have been a massive hit with longtime fans of the franchise and series newcomers alike, and have brought about not one, but two resurgences for the IP.

Indeed, it's no exaggeration to say that the record-breaking and chart-topping show has had a phenomenal reception — and now, everyone is eagerly awaiting the next chapter of the story that's coming with Season 3. The third season reportedly just began filming and is expected to come near the end of 2027 or the start of 2028.

We've got a bit of a wait ahead of us — and for me, something that's guaranteed it's going to be a painful one is the new announcement that Aaron Paul is joining the Fallout show's already star-studded cast in Season 3. Amazon revealed the news on Monday on social media.

Aaron Paul is one of my favorite actors, and starred as Jesse Pinkman for five years in my favorite TV show Breaking Bad (as well as in its follow-up movie El Camino). You may also know him as Caleb Nichols in the popular HBO drama Westworld, or as the voice of Todd Chavez in BoJack Horseman.

Paul was nothing short of terrific in Breaking Bad and El Camino, to the point where Jesse Pinkman became my favorite character out of all of the incredibly written individuals in that series. I've also loved him in just about everything else I've ever seen him in, so I'm ecstatic to see what role he plays in Fallout.

Some fans speculate that he could play Courier 6, the title of the playable character you control in Obsidian Entertainment's fan-favorite 2010 title Fallout: New Vegas; I personally find this unlikely since the showrunners have stated they don't want to infringe upon player choices with their story, and making Courier 6 a defined character in any way would go against that. Unless the character just makes a short cameo, I don't see it.

In the end, we have no details at all to work off of, so any predictions are pure guesses. Still, I'm sure Paul will do an amazing job in whatever role he's playing, given his talent. I look forward to seeing him in Fallout Season 3, and I can't wait for its arrival in the next year and a half or so.

Oh, and fun fact: Aaron Paul is a huge fan of video games, and has previously discussed his fondness for franchises like Resident Evil and Halo. He also had a lead role in 2025's narrative adventure game Dispatch, and has expressed interest in further gaming roles too.

What do you think about Aaron Paul? Are you a fan of his performances in projects like Breaking Bad and Westworld? Did you like him in Dispatch, if you played that game? Who do you think he'll be in the Fallout TV show? Let me know in the comments, and in our poll.

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For its 2023 space exploration Xbox RPG Starfield, Fallout and The Elder Scrolls developer Bethesda created an upgraded version of the Creation Engine used for Skyrim and Fallout 4 simply called the Creation Engine 2. This updated variant of the studio's proprietary engine vastly improved visual fidelity and optimization, among many other things.

According to former Bethesda senior artist Heather Cerlan — now CEO and head of NEARstudios, the developer making the upcoming multiplayer sandbox RPG Hawthorn — though, the studio had seriously considered making the swap from Creation Engine over to Unreal Engine 5 (UE5) in the midst of Starfield's development.

"There was a lot of pressure internally to push to Unreal [Engine 5], especially when Nanite and Lumen and all these amazing features were coming out," she told Reece Reilly of KIWI TALKZ in a recent episode. "People were like, 'Why don't we just use Unreal?'"

Nanite makes importing extremely high-quality assets into UE5 very easy, while Lumen offers advanced lighting effects and rendering that go a long way in helping to achieve cutting-edge visuals. Both are very desirable features of UE5, which first launched in Early Access in Spring 2021 — two years ahead of Starfield's release.

That would have left Bethesda with a sizable amount of time to transition their existing work on Starfield over to UE5, though doing so likely wouldn't have been easy. Still, the potential was there to reap major benefits from the switch...yet in the end, the developers ultimately chose to stick with Creation Engine 2.

Why? Cerlan says that the decision was largely motivated by the desire to keep Starfield as mod friendly as possible for Bethesda's community.

"The real reason that Bethesda holds onto the Creation Engine is because of all the modding capabilities," she said. "The whole modding community that's built around those tools and those systems, it wouldn't make a whole lot of sense for Bethesda to switch over to any other engine, because they've already built up a whole community that sustains the success of their titles."

Indeed, the modding scene in Bethesda's games has thrived for many years, with countless talented modders having worked with the Creation Engine for upwards of 20 years now. It's not surprising that the developers had no wish to disrupt their creative process with an entirely new engine to learn.

It does seem like there would be upsides to an UE5 switch, of course, but it's important to note that Bethesda is continuing to upgrade and refine the Creation Engine. Recently, studio director Todd Howard confirmed The Elder Scrolls 6 is using a new version called Creation Engine 3 that sports major improvements across the board.

He also said Creation Engine 3 will power projects "beyond" the long-awaited The Elder Scrolls sequel, which likely means Fallout 5 will use it as well. Bad news if you were hoping future Bethesda games would push for maximum graphical quality, perhaps, but good news if you want the studio's titles to be as moddable as the ones that came before it.

Are you glad that Bethesda chose to stick with the Creation Engine in the end, or would you have preferred it to have moved over to Unreal Engine 5? I'm curious to hear your thoughts, so share them in the comments and vote in our poll below.

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Starfield’s reported PS5 sales have surfaced via Alinea Analytics, a firm that often reports on game sales. While its estimates cannot be verified, the figures raise some obvious questions.

According to Alinea, Starfield has sold around 140,000 copies on Sony’s PlayStation 5. If accurate, that is a relatively weak showing for what is supposed to be Bethesda Game Studios' premier RPG and its first real new IP, whatever that actually means.

It also brings the exclusivity debate back into focus, which remains a constant talking point among Xbox fans and haters alike.

If accurate, 140,000 sales would put Starfield behind the likes of even The Outer Worlds 2 on PlayStation 5, which Alinea estimates has sold 160,000 copies. It would also fall further behind titles like Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024 and Ninja Gaiden 4, both of which are said to have surpassed 240K copies on PlayStation 5.

With that said though, this is still early days for Starfield's PS5 release, and according to Alinea, the game is currently selling faster than those titles.

I’m not sure whether Alinea’s estimates are accurate or not, and realistically we’ll never know for certain unless Todd Howard descends from the heavens and confirms it himself. If the figures are correct, though, it does, at least to me, raise a bigger question about whether Xbox’s multiplatform strategy has actually been worth it.

It’s great that more players can access these games, and some Xbox titles have performed well, such as Sea of Thieves and Forza Horizon 5. At the same time, it does raise a valid concern about why someone would even invest in Xbox hardware if those same games are available elsewhere.

I’m not trying to say which approach is right or wrong here. I’ve largely moved to PC myself, but I still enjoy my Series X, especially for its extensive backward compatibility library going all the way back to the original Xbox.

For now though, it feels like Xbox fans are in a bit of a standoff, unsure what direction Xbox might take next. I’m genuinely more excited about the brand than I’ve been in a long time, and whether it commits to exclusives, leans on timed exclusivity, or does something totally different, I’ll be watching closely until we find out.

If you haven’t already, weigh in on the exclusivity debate yourself, and if you have, there’s no harm in doing it again for what is probably the millionth time if you’re anything like me.

Let me know your thoughts in the comments, and be sure to take part in our poll below!

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While the Fallout and The Elder Scrolls developer Bethesda is renowned in the gaming community for its large, content-dense open-world RPG titles, its latest projects — 2018's Fallout 76 and 2023's Xbox game Starfield — were departures from the studio's norm. The former is a multiplayer MMO-lite take on the post-apocalyptic franchise, while the latter has a significantly grander scale than any Bethesda title before it.

The developer getting more experimental in recent years has made many curious about the reasons why, and in a recent interview, Bethesda game director and executive producer Todd Howard explained that Fallout 76 and Starfield were "creatively different" by design, as the studio wanted to play around with different ideas and directions.

"I think it's true that Fallout 76 and Starfield clearly — they're creatively different than what we had done. And we really wanted to do that. When you're doing a certain type of thing for, in my case, 20 years, we want to try some other things and learn from that. We have ideas that we want to get out there," he told GamesRadar+.

Howard is thankful that these two releases have performed well despite the fact that they veer away from Bethesda's usual style, and that the studio as a whole was able to take some risks with its recent creations.

"We're fortunate those games have found, in the scheme of things, giant audiences that let us keep doing things in them," he added. "Even though they're a bit off the core path of the single-player games that we have been doing, we're just fortunate to have the success that we've had with them."

Indeed, Fallout 76 and Starfield both have passionate fanbases, though both games are undeniably more divisive than more traditional Bethesda titles like, say, Fallout 4 or Skyrim. Howard acknowledges this, though ultimately points out that at one point, people felt the same way about The Elder Scrolls and Fallout compared to other competing RPGs or the old-school '90s Fallout games from Interplay Entertainment.

"If you look back at the beginning of Elder Scrolls, beginning of Fallout, they're a little bit the same. And then, you find an audience that loves that," he commented.

In Fallout 76's case, most criticism of the game was centered around performance and bugs at launch, though many were also frustrated by the lack of NPCs in its world. These issues were ironed out with time, though, and it's grown into a fairly popular live-service game that's quite successful, especially after Amazon's Fallout TV show kicked off a series-wide resurgence.

Starfield, I would argue, has deeper problems. The space exploration RPG may have over 1,000 planets to explore across 100 star systems, sure, but tons of them are bland and empty, only sparsely populated with repetitive and reused structures and landmarks. On the whole, it's painfully shallow compared to Bethesda's other single player titles, and neither the Shattered Space expansion or the new Terran Armada DLC change that.

I'll never say a studio shouldn't take risks or try something new, but with Starfield, I think Bethesda got too far away from what makes their games fun. The magic of a well-crafted open world isn't just its size, but also how all that space is used, and what it's filled with for players to discover. Howard mentioned learning from its experimentative titles; I believe valuing handcrafted content over scale is the lesson to take from Starfield.

The game's lack of depth and engaging experiences has me worried about The Elder Scrolls 6, though my concerns have been assuaged somewhat by Howard saying that it will be a "classic" Bethesda game. I like Fallout 76 and I respect the devs for their ambitions with Starfield, but I've been waiting for Skyrim's sequel for 15 years now, and I'm glad it's not trying to change a winning formula.

How do you feel about experimental Bethesda games like Fallout 76 and Starfield? Are you glad The Elder Scrolls 6 will be more of a traditional RPG? Share your thoughts in the comments, and vote which Bethesda franchise is your favorite in our poll, too.

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Pete Hines is the former Head of Publishing at Bethesda, staying with the company from 1999 through to 2023. He left following Microsoft’s acquisition, and in a recent interview with Firezide Chat, he has some strong words to share.

That said, it is not all negative. Hines also reflects positively on his time at Bethesda, including his long-standing relationship with Todd Howard, who he says remains one of his best friends. However, when the interview turns to the period following the acquisition, the tone becomes noticeably more critical. So let’s jump in.

Pete Hines questions Bethesda’s direction under Microsoft

Pete Hines doesn’t hold back in this interview, but it’s worth being clear about the context. Rather than directly targeting Microsoft, his comments seem to reflect his experience during the period after the acquisition.

So instead of padding this out, let’s go straight to what he said in a recent Firezide Gaming interview.

In the interview, Hines states:

It’s a striking take on Bethesda’s current position. While he doesn’t explicitly mention Microsoft here, the timing and broader discussion suggest he is reflecting on the post-acquisition period.

He also explains why he stayed on for a time after the deal, stating:

That sense of frustration continues as he adds:

"When I couldn't protect it, and I saw how it was getting damaged and broken apart and frankly mistreated, abused, whatever word you want to use, I said I am not going to sit here and watch this happen right in front of me."

Hines also states his “mental health was so deplorable” that he ultimately had to leave.

Taken together, the comments point to a broader shift in environment and responsibilities following the acquisition, alongside his declining mental health, rather than a direct, explicit criticism of Microsoft itself, at least that's how I read it anyway.

Now, these aren't exactly kind words from Hines overall, but they do reflect how strongly he feels about Bethesda and the changes he believes took place.

With all that said, let me know your thoughts on what Hines has said by leaving a comment and taking part in our poll below:

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Few individual developers in the gaming industry are as well-known by both players as well as other game devs as well ass Todd Howard is. He's been at The Elder Scrolls and Fallout studio Bethesda for over 30 years, and as its game director and executive producer, has led development on legendary titles like Oblivion, Skyrim, Fallout 3, and Fallout 4, among others.

To say that his influence on the industry is massive is an understatement — but that hardly means he's infallible. It's a point that former Bethesda senior artist Dennis Mejillones, known for his work on Skyrim, Fallout 4, and Xbox's Starfield, made in a recently dug up interview with Kiwi Talkz.

"He's a phenomenal person. Is he perfect? No. Does he call all the shots perfectly? No," Mejillones said of Howard. "I can't tell you how many times I told Todd, 'Oh, that's not a good idea, that's bad, that's not good.' Or, I kind of kept my mouth shut about it. I'm like, 'Eugh, I don't think that's so great,' you know?"

Mejillones went on to explain that in most cases, he would share his criticism of Howard's ideas or strategies with him to provide feedback. According to him, though, many others tend to be "yes men" around him, and don't challenge his direction because they don't want to seem like they're opposing a legendary developer.

"Typically, though, I would communicate if I felt really strongly about it, you know? Me and Todd could at least communicate — a lot of people were afraid to say no to Todd, and I think that hurt him," he said. "It's like George Lucas. I think George Lucas is a genius. I think geniuses come up with terrible ideas too. They're not all gonna be hits, but if you don't have somebody to help you filter through these things and give you an honest assessment because they're afraid to tell you what they really think, it actually does hurt you. And I think that kinda happens to Todd in some regards."

That's quite an interesting take to hear from one of Howard's former colleagues, and considering the fact that Mejillones worked at Bethesda for 11 years from 2009 to 2021, it's safe to say that he's likely seen countless examples of these yes man tendencies from employees at the studio.

Hearing this, I can't help but wonder about Bethesda's recent, more controversial games like Fallout 76 and Starfield, and if their contentious qualities — the arguable lack of satisfying depth in the latter, for example — might have been improved if devs gave more critical feedback of Howard's ideas and drove refinement.

Then again, earlier this year, former Bethesda lore specialist and Skyrim co-lead Kurt Kuhlmann told PC Gamer that Starfield's development suffered when Howard wasn't able to focus on the game, noting that "when he would get pulled away from the game that would really hurt the game."

Ultimately, it sounds like Howard is a "very good project lead" whose presence is very beneficial, even if Bethesda's devs could perhaps stand to give him more constructive feedback instead of just agreeing with him all the time. From the outside looking in, though, it's hard to say anything for sure — especially since these are the views of just two people who've worked at a very large studio.

With all of that said, I do hope Howard's calls are met with a healthy amount of scrutiny moving forward, as without criticism, you risk getting caught in an echo chamber of toxic positivity. Quality, honest feedback is crucial for refining and improving ideas, and I want The Elder Scrolls 6 and Fallout 5 to be as refined as they can be.

🗨️ Over to you!

The comments from Mejillones in this interview are very interesting, and suggest that Todd Howard's suggestions may not be getting a healthy amount of pushback and constructive feedback from Bethesda's developers. One can't help but wonder how much that may have influenced Fallout 76 and Starfield, as well as if it's actively influencing the creation of The Elder Scrolls 6.

Are you worried that it is? I'd like to hear from you, so share your take in the comments and vote in our poll about Bethesda's various IPs.

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Though The Elder Scrolls developer Bethesda Game Studios has served as the shepherd of Fallout ever since the company acquired the series from Interplay Entertainment in 2007, the game often regarded as the best in the franchise is ironically one that wasn't developed by Bethesda at all.

That title is Fallout: New Vegas, the 2010 entry made by the storied RPG studio Obsidian Entertainment during the gap between the 2008 release of Bethesda's Fallout 3 and its direct sequel, 2015's Fallout 4 (between them, it made a little game called Skyrim you may have heard about).

Over the years, many have come to feel that New Vegas is a cut above the rest of the series, with the game's player freedom, narrative depth, complex interconnected quests, and rich RPG systems all winning the hearts of countless players. One Bethesda dev, though, "initially felt a little touchy" about the glowing reputation of Obsidian's take on Fallout because it used the work done for Fallout 3 as a base.

"You always get those guys jumping out of the woodwork to say, 'New Vegas is the best! Bethesda sucks!', and I’m like, 'Okay,'" began character artist Jonah Lobe, speaking on the KIWI TALKZ podcast. "I initially felt a little touchy about it, because I was like, 'We made 90% of the art, we built the engine.'" We did all that stuff [and] we did it in a very limited window of time and they got to just work on the stories."

Indeed, New Vegas utilizes the same version of Bethesda's Gamebryo tech — the predecessor to the Creation Engine and its own variants that would go on to power Skyrim, Fallout 4, Starfield, and the upcoming The Elder Scrolls 6 — that it created for Fallout 3, and also reuses a significant amount of Fallout 3's assets for its textures, in-game items, and more.

But while Lobe says he felt like "it's a little unfair that we were being judged on not having the storylines [that New Vegas had]," he made it clear that he still greatly enjoys and respects New Vegas, believes Obsidian did an excellent job with the RPG, and even wishes Fallout 3's story and writing had similar depth and nuance.

"But with that said ... Obsidian killed it. Like, I think they did a beautiful job, and it did make me feel a little bit sad that our design team could not envision the same kind of — maybe they just didn't have time or bandwidth. Like, they just didn't implement the same scale of really ambitious of 'huge arc, multi-choices' kind of thing."

When Lobe sought out the opinions of some of the other devs present on the podcast, ex-Bethesda artist Nate Purkeypile said he likes New Vegas a lot, but thinks it stumbles some with dungeons and world design.

"I do think Vegas is a really good game, but it also does some things worse. I think its dungeons and world design are not as good," he commented. "So, it's like, from a writing and design perspective I think they did better, but I do not feel the same way about their dungeons."

Lobe, though, raised another valuable point: Obsidian had to develop New Vegas in a very short timeframe of just 18 months. "We should also say they had a limited window of time to work. They were very pressed for time — an unfair amount of time, honestly."

I love New Vegas to pieces, but it's true that Bethesda's work on the foundation Obsidian built it on tends to go unrecognized, and shouldn't. That being said, Fallout 3 was incredibly well-received too.

In the end, both games are fantastic RPGs, which is why I'm stoked to play the upcoming Fallout 3 and New Vegas remasters we know are coming. Haven't checked the games out yet? Every Fallout title is playable on Xbox and PC through Xbox Game Pass.

🗨️ Which Fallout game is your favorite?

It's interesting to hear Bethesda developers that previously worked on Fallout discuss their thoughts on Fallout: New Vegas, and some of the things they think others games in the series do better while acknowledging the impressive narrative depth and design of Obsidian's RPG.

New Vegas is definitely my favorite Fallout game, but I'm curious to hear from you about yours. Give your take in the comments, and vote in our ongoing poll!

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Gone are the days of Xbox sitting in last place, or so I’d like to say if you squint hard enough and ignore hardware sales. Still, a win's a win! And win Xbox has, or rather Microsoft, having been ranked the 5th best game publisher based on Metacritic scores, landing at 305.7 points.

Now, 305.7 points doesn’t mean much on its own, so here’s what that actually represents. Metacritic ranks publishers using a 400-point system based entirely on critic reviews.

The biggest factor is the average Metascore, worth up to 150 points, calculated at 1.5 times the average score. Consistency also plays an important role here, with up to 100 points awarded based on how many games score 75 or higher, and another 100 tied to avoiding low scores below 50.

As well as that, each game scoring 90 or higher adds a small 5-point bonus, rewarding standout hits. Only publishers with at least five releases in the year are included.

Xbox has had a very solid 2025, averaging a Metascore of 80 thanks to releases like Avowed, Hellblade 2, The Outer Worlds 2, Ninja Gaiden 4, and DOOM: The Dark Ages.

However, as Metacritic notes, two of its highest-scoring games came from PlayStation 5 releases. Indiana Jones and the Great Circle and Forza Horizon 5 both count toward Xbox’s overall score here.

Turning away from Xbox, Nintendo lands in 12th place with a Metascore of 77. That comes from releases like the latest Donkey Kong, though it is dragged down by Nintendo Switch 2 Welcome Tour, which still feels like it should have been a free pack-in.

Much further down the list is Sony, with an average Metascore of 74. Despite standout releases like Death Stranding 2 and Ghost of Yotei, it couldn’t match its previous year’s performance, dropping to 21st place with 268.5 points.

For those wondering, in first place is Square Enix! A surprise for sure and also their first time ever being ranked number 1 on Metacritic's publisher rankings.

Does Xbox deserve 5th place on Metacritic's 2025 list of best publishers?

It’s hard to deny that Xbox has found its stride lately with game releases and overall output, and while arguments can be made that it’s too late, those are questions for another day.

Here, I think Xbox has earned its spot. It had a strong 2025, delivering one solid release after another.

Let me know your thoughts by leaving a comment and take part in our poll below:

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Given that The Elder Scrolls and Fallout developer Bethesda first announced The Elder Scrolls 6 eight years ago now and the fact it still doesn't have a release date, I'd forgive you for thinking that the game has been through a lot of tumultuous development at the studio.

However, according to Bethesda's game director and executive producer Todd Howard, the process of creating the next big Tamriel-based fantasy adventure has actually gone quite a bit smoother than development of the studio's latest title, 2023's Xbox and PC space exploration RPG Starfield (also on Xbox Game Pass, and coming soon to PS5 as well).

Specifically, while speaking with IGN in a new interview, Howard explained that Bethesda's move from Creation Engine 2 — Starfield's engine, and an upgraded version of the one used for Skyrim and Fallout 4 in its own right — to Creation Engine 3, the latest iteration of its proprietary tech, has proven to be a major boon for the company's workflow.

"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," said Howard, when asked about lessons learned from Starfield that Bethesda is applying to The Elder Scrolls 6. "So, you don't feel [issues in] 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."

"And when you're making those kinds of technical changes as we talked about, often you're pulling the rug out from under the team who's making content. [You don't want] to be like, ‘Okay, that doesn't work for this period of time, you're going to have to wait until we get that working again.’ And we've done a really good job of managing that on this game," he added. "And with Starfield, we struggled there for a number of years in terms of when we went through the engine change."

But why, then, have we seen or heard next to nothing of The Elder Scrolls 6 for upwards of a decade after it was first announced at E3 2018? Well, many forget that Bethesda also revealed Starfield at the same time, and overall, it seems clear that the studio simply wanted to confirm the next The Elder Scrolls game would eventually come.

In the end, though, it seems all these years later, Howard actually regrets doing so. "Just pretend we didn't announce it. Doesn't exist," he said dismissively, of the reveal. "Nothing. I've never heard of it," he later jokingly added on the topic of the game itself.

Regardless, it's good to hear that the improvements made with Creation Engine 3 have made it easier for Bethesda to build the highly anticipated title without its developers stepping on each other's toes, which sounds like an issue it dealt with while making Starfield.

It's the first update on The Elder Scrolls 6's development we've gotten since Howard said "It's progressing really well" in December, and that "the majority of the studio's on VI." In November, he commented that it's still "a long ways off," so even though Bethesda is pleased with how things are coming along, you still shouldn't expect the game any time soon.

Notably, Howard's comments come on the same day as Xbox and Bethesda announced Starfield is getting a new Free Lanes update as well as a $10 Terran Armada story DLC (it's included in the Deluxe Edition, if you have it). Both are coming out on April 7, which is also the same time Starfield is arriving on PS5 (this was previously leaked, and is now confirmed).

🗨️ Are you hyped for The Elder Scrolls 6?

Hearing that Creation Engine 3 has made developing The Elder Scrolls 6 easier for Bethesda makes me more excited to eventually get my hands on it, even if it's still a long ways away.

How about you, though? Are you hyped to play The Elder Scrolls 6? Share your thoughts in the comments, and vote in our poll!

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On Monday afternoon, GPU manufacturer and leading graphics innovator NVIDIA officially announced DLSS 5 at the ongoing Game Developers Conference (GDC), and boy oh boy has it proven to be quite controversial. The latest version of the company's Super Resolution tech — exclusive to NVIDIA's RTX 50-series GPUs — uses AI to render photorealistic lighting and enhancements and then adds them to a scene, and is intended to make the games you play look more natural and high-fidelity.

The problem? In nearly all of the screenshots and footage we've seen from NVIDIA of DLSS 5 running in existing titles like Resident Evil Requiem and Hogwarts Legacy, the technology makes some aggressive changes to character skin and facial appearance in particular, to the point where comment sections across social media are flooded with comparisons to the generative AI beautification filters you'll find in smartphone apps.

DLSS 5 seems to effectively homogenize the way individual characters across games look, eliminating nuance from art direction and applying some universal standards (more pronounced laugh lines and fuller lips for young female characters, more and deeper wrinkles for older characters, etc.).

As a result, the overall reception to the technology thus far has been extremely negative, and many believe most developers won't even want to support it in their games. One big-name dev, though, was excited to see DLSS 5 running in their game: Todd Howard, game director and executive producer at Bethesda Game Studios.

Howard had this to say about how DLSS 5 looks in Bethesda's latest game, Xbox's Starfield: "When they showed us DLSS 5 and we got it running in Starfield, it was amazing how it brought [it] to life. We've played it; we can't wait for all of you to do so as well."

Now, while DLSS 5's character faces immediately trigger the feeling of uncanny valley in me, I will admit that the way it improves the quality of lighting and textures in the environment is arguably pretty impressive. Starfield in particular — a game that's a bit notorious for having flat visuals in scenes without dramatic lighting effects — pops quite a bit more with DLSS 5. Check out Digital Foundry's comparisons in the above video for examples.

I imagine this is largely what Howard was impressed by, because the way DLSS 5 changes NPC faces is pretty jarring, and makes everyone look a little too perfect. Again, it's that same uncanny look you'd expect from an AI filter...and ultimately, that's kind of what DLSS 5 is.

Notably, according to Digital Foundry, NVIDIA says the system doesn't touch the game's actual assets like textures and models whatsoever, which I find pretty wild considering how different they look with it on. Assuming the truth is being told, it goes to show just how much of a difference lighting can make — for better or for worse. So far, we're seeing both with DLSS 5.

The good news, though, is that DLSS 5 is still in its early stages, and that developers will be able to tweak the effect the technology has in their games how they see fit if they choose to support it. Hopefully with further development and per-game fine tuning, the system can get away from this AI slop look.

As for when DLSS 5 is coming out, NVIDIA says it's scheduled to launch this fall and is coming to its RTX 50-series graphics cards, so you'll have to wait until then if you're curious to try it out yourself.

🗨️ How do you feel about DLSS 5?

The initial reactions to NVIDIA's upcoming DLSS 5 tech are, overall, very negative. But I'm curious: do you feel the same way? Or do you think the comparisons to AI slop and beautification filters are overly dramatic?

I'd love to hear from you, so let me know in the comments, and vote in our poll, too:

Join us on Reddit at r/WindowsCentral to share your insights and discuss our latest news, reviews, and more.

If you're a big fan of the music in the Fallout series, you have composer Inon Zur to thank for quite a bit of it. Though he's worked on tons of different video games, films, and TV shows over the years, Zur is arguably best known for the soundtracks he's made for Bethesda's fan-favorite post-nuclear RPG series.

He composed for Fallout 3, Fallout: New Vegas, Fallout 4, and Fallout 76, with the main theme of Fallout 4 in particular standing out as one of his most iconic creations. He also did some work on Amazon's Fallout TV show, and he composed the soundtrack for Bethesda's 2023 Xbox, PC, and Xbox Game Pass RPG Starfield, too.

Most players love Starfield's music, though the same can't be said about the actual game, which proved unusually divisive for a single player Bethesda title. For lots of players — yours truly included — Starfield felt very boring and shallow despite having over 1,000 planets to explore, and lacked the rich depth and world design found in the studio's other games.

Zur, though, believes that players "were just not ready" for Starfield when it released, and thinks that in time, we'll all consider the game to be a "legendary" title when we look back at it. He also says Bethesda's game director Todd Howard is a "visionary," and one of the most creative individuals in the gaming industry.

"Todd is one, if not the most creative and invigorating human beings in the industry. He just doesn't stop. He always has new ideas. He always knows what he wants. He is very persuasive and has a very strong character," he told RPG Site in a recent interview. "He will also find ways to describe what he wants without really calling it a name. He knows how to allow freedom of creativity on one hand, but also how to steer it to his own vision. He is a visionary. He sees things that people will start to find out years later."

"This also applies to Starfield. When Starfield released, I believe people were just not ready for it. It's a different way of looking at it, but Todd is really strong, and he said very, very lightly, 'Look, if you don't like it, then you don't like it, but this is the new thing that we're doing, and we're sticking to it,'" he continued. "He believes in his way, and it just has proven time and time again that eventually people will understand his vision. It just takes time and this is a common thing for all the big visionaries."

"Sometimes people really don't understand them correctly, but they were strong enough to stay on course, and Todd will stay on course on Starfield. Starfield will eventually become something that will be legendary. I have no doubt. It's just a matter of time," he continued.

While I do think the bones of a good game are there — the writing is decent, the background lore is great, Starfield's combat systems and ship mechanics are enjoyable, and there's some solid RPG crunch in the game's larger main areas — there's very little meat on them, and ultimately, there's not much about Starfield that feels truly remarkable.

Ultimately, I'm not sure what brilliance I'm missing here, and I don't think what's next for Starfield will change my mind, either; Todd Howard has said that the game's next big content drop won't be a transformative "Starfield 2.0" that fundamentally reworks it, and will instead be something aimed at people who really like the RPG as it is.

With that said, I do think the outright contempt many hold Starfield in is harsher than what it deserves. I don't think I'll ever call Starfield a "legendary" game, but it's not a terrible one, either. It's just...fine.

🗨️ What do you think of Starfield?

While I can't say I agree with Inon Zur that Starfield was misunderstood, that we "were just not ready" for it, or that the game will one day be regarded as a "legendary" title, his stance does make me curious: what's your opinion of Starfield?

I'd love to hear your thoughts about Bethesda's space exploration RPG below, so please share them in the comments, and make sure to vote in our poll as well:

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Fallout 3 Remastered has been rumored for a long time, and after the success of the Fallout TV series, it is no surprise that fans are hoping for an Oblivion-style remaster for the franchise.

We recently saw talk of a Fallout: New Vegas remaster, although that was quickly shut down, and we have also reported that if a Fallout 3 remaster is real, it likely would not be shadow-dropped following the finale of the show's second season.

Now, though, we seemingly have even more evidence in the form of a McFarlane Toys leak. The real question is whether it is credible or just a mistake. Let’s dig into the details.

What the McFarlane Toys listing actually shows

In a new set of toy listings from McFarlane on ToyNewsI, the toy news site found a listing of a figure named “ELITE EDITION 7IN – FALLOUT 3 REMASTERED – #13 T-45B NUKA COLA.”

That listing has led many to speculate that a Fallout 3 Remastered reveal might not be far away.

This is also not the first time a game or character has leaked through merchandise listings. It happens occasionally, especially when toy manufacturers receive licensing information ahead of a public reveal.

Five Nights at Freddy’s saw leaks through Funko before certain characters were officially shown, while Overwatch accidentally revealed the hero Sombra after merchandise appeared in listings ahead of its announcement.

As for McFarlane Toys, it has released figures based on the Fallout TV series ahead of wider marketing pushes, with characters like Maximus, The Ghoul, and Hank MacLean appearing in early figure previews and pre-order listings tied to the show

Most commonly, though, McFarlane leaks tend to involve DC or game-related figures appearing in retail listings before release, giving keen-eyed fans an early glimpse at upcoming characters or designs.

With that all said, it’s not out of the question for this leak to be genuine; however, as with most things online, it’s best to take it with a grain of salt and wait for any official announcement.

🗨️ Are you excited by the prospects of a Fallout 3: Remastered?

While Fallout 3 Remastered has long been rumored, we still have not seen any official confirmation from Xbox or Bethesda that it exists.

The Oblivion remaster proved to be a major success and was even shadow-dropped, so it is easy to see why fans are expecting an announcement at any moment. With this latest toy leak, it feels like anticipation is only growing.

With all that said, let me know your thoughts in the comments, and make sure to take part in our poll below:

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Recently, a LinkedIn post from Iron Galaxy Studios has been making big waves in the Fallout community, with many ultimately believing a snapshot of the iconic Fallout "Please Stand By" loading screen at the start of the developer's latest company meeting presentation is a hint that the studio is making the remasters of Fallout 3 and Fallout: New Vegas that we know are on the way.

It's a pretty strong piece of evidence, with the theory reinforced by the fact that Iron Galaxy has previously worked with Fallout steward Bethesda Game Studios on several of its RPGs, including Skyrim, The Elder Scrolls Online, Fallout 4 VR, and Fallout 76. However, the developer has now come forward to deny involvement with the remasters...or has it?

I question the refutation because, well — you'll see. Here's the studio's full statement:

"Nope! There is nothing to see here. Sorry to disturb the volcanoes, but that was just a BTS [behind the scenes] look at our company meeting. We use that slide every month and has nothing to do with anything Fallout being worked on. As you can imagine, we love Fallout, too. Now pardon us as we retreat back into our vault."

The phrase "There is nothing to see here" is one I'd argue is far more often associated with flippant and tongue-in-cheek denials than genuine and serious ones, and that little mention of the studio loving Fallout definitely raises an eyebrow. Oh, and "retreat back into our vault?" Come on.

This post is arguably as much of an additional tease as it is a rebuttal. There's always a chance that the developer really isn't working on the Fallout 3 and New Vegas remasters, of course, but I won't believe that until we officially learn who's behind those projects. I certainly won't be persuaded by a cheeky "denial" like this one. You can't fool me, Iron Galaxy Studios.

As for the remasters themselves? Next to nothing else is known right now, other than the fact that they'll be designed "in the vein of Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion Remastered." Microsoft and Xbox shadow dropped that game last year to great success; it utilized Unreal Engine 5 to give the beloved 2006 RPG a huge graphical overhaul, though its core gameplay logic was still handled by Bethesda's original Gamebryo engine (the predecessor to the Creation Engine used by Skyrim, Fallout 4, Fallout 76, and Starfield).

It sounds like the Fallout 3 and New Vegas remasters — both games used Gamebryo originally as well, notably — will be built in a similar way, which should keep them feeling the same even if they look completely different. I wouldn't be surprised if we saw sprint come to the games, though, as it was implemented into Oblivion Remastered and most players appreciated the addition.

It will likely be some time until we hear more details about the remasters given that they haven't even been officially announced yet, but as first-party Xbox games, they'll be available to play through Xbox Game Pass whenever they do come out. Note that all of the currently available Fallout games, including the original versions of Fallout 3 and New Vegas, are playable on the service on Xbox and PC now.

Do you believe Iron Galaxy Studios?

I'm curious to hear your thoughts. Do you believe Iron Galaxy's denial that it's working on the Fallout 3 and New Vegas remasters, or do you think it's developing them and just being cheeky about it? Let me know in the comments.

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Bethesda's 2023 sci-fi space exploration RPG Starfield has remained exclusively available on Xbox Series X|S, Windows PC systems, and Xbox Game Pass since it was released two and a half years ago. However, there have been widespread rumors of a PS5 version for months now — and a new leak suggests that it may only be a few weeks away from launching.

That leak comes from the credible industry insider billbil-kun of the French outlet Dealabs, who reports that Starfield will release on PS5 on April 7, 2026 after investigating a similar report from the Polish site PPE.pl. It's also been said that preorders for the PS5 version will go live on March 17 at 8 a.m. PT / 11 a.m. ET, which is exactly two weeks from now.

Just as it is on Xbox and PC, the PS5 edition of Starfield will allegedly be purchasable in a Standard Edition or a Premium Edition, with the former coming in at $49.99 / €49.99 / £44.99 and the latter costing $69.99 / €69.99 / £59.99. Presumably, the Premium Edition will include access to the Shattered Space DLC, a Constellation skin pack, and 1,000 Creation Credits as it does on the game's original platforms.

Whispers of a PS5 version of Starfield began coming late last year when Bethesda gave media and creators a behind-closed-doors look at what's coming next to the RPG, and gained further traction when the well-known insider Shinobi602 reported official news about the PS5 release and what's next for the game would come in March.

Then, not long afterwards, Bethesda's Todd Howard announced that more details about Starfield's next big content update were "coming soon," lending credence to the theory that we will indeed get some big news about the title later this month.

Given that this leak suggests we'll get preorders for the PS5 version of Starfield on March 17, I expect that we'll see Bethesda showcase what's next for its expansive sci-fi RPG the day before or on the day of that release, with the studio then announcing the PS5 edition and its preorders as an "oh, and one more thing" twist.

Assuming that's the plan, the surprise has been spoiled, though admittedly it never would've really been much of a surprise at all — though it's still coming to PS5 faster than I thought it would. Xbox has brought pretty much every new game it's published in the last few years to PS5 either at launch or with post-release ports, and several of them have performed very well on the platform; Starfield making the jump feels rather inevitable.

With Xbox hinting at a shift on exclusives, it's hard to say whether or not we'll continue to see Xbox Game Studios titles come to PS5 under the new CEO Asha Sharma. But I'd argue that at least for Starfield, it seems extremely likely that a port is coming, and coming soon at that.

As for the upcoming new content that players on all platforms will be able to enjoy, Todd Howard has went out of his way to state that it's not a Cyberpunk 2077-style "Starfield 2.0" revamp and won't change the game fundamentally, and will instead include "updates that change the game not in an isolated way, but sort of, you know, meta, using outer space and things in ways that we haven't."

Many fans are expecting Starfield's long-awaited second DLC expansion, and based on Howard's comments, it'll be centered around some creative new experiences in space. Only time will tell more specific details, but hopefully we won't be waiting long for them.

Do you believe Starfield is coming to PS5 soon?

What's your read on this leak? Do you believe Starfield really is coming to PS5 in early April, or do you think the insiders have this one wrong? Let me know in the comments.

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The last few years have been a pretty great time to be a Fallout fan, what with Amazon's acclaimed Fallout TV show renewing interest in Bethesda's long-running RPG franchise and breathing new life into its most recent titles, Fallout 4 and Fallout 76. Older games like Fallout 3 and Fallout: New Vegas have benefitted from the renaissance, too.

One particularly exciting revelation that came as Fallout Season 2 aired earlier this year was the news that there are official Fallout 3 and New Vegas remasters on the way, with the overhauled versions of these games reportedly "in the vein of Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion Remastered." That suggests that like the 2025 remaster, these ones will use Unreal Engine 5 for a fresh coat of modern graphical paint, with Bethesda's original Gamebryo engine still used for gameplay mechanics, physics, and other systems.

Those details aren't exactly clear, though, and we know next to nothing about the remasters beyond that — including which game studio is making them. A new tease from one developer, however, has the Fallout community wondering if it's figured out which team is working on the projects.

The developer in question is Iron Galaxy Studios, which recently shared a post on LinkedIn on the day of its February company meeting held "to catch up with what the company’s been up to and what’s coming up next for IG." The post shows the beginning slide of a presentation, and notably, that slide is of the "Please Stand By" notice often seen at the beginning of Fallout trailers. You can see it for yourself below:

This appears to be a clear hint at Iron Galaxy making something Fallout-related, and with Bethesda confirmed to be in early development stages with Fallout 5 (it's the studio's next game after The Elder Scrolls 6, whenever that comes out), the natural assumption is that it's working on the Fallout 3 and New Vegas remasters.

Lending further credence to that conclusion is the fact that the developer has worked on Bethesda's franchises before, including Fallout; specifically, it's contributed on The Elder Scrolls Online MMO, helped bring Skyrim to Nintendo Switch, helped with Skyrim and Fallout 4 VR, and aided in the development of Fallout 76.

Iron Galaxy is also currently in charge of the 2013 Xbox and PC fighting game exclusive Killer Instinct, having taken over development from its creator Double Helix Games after it was acquired by Amazon. It's responsible for Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 3 + 4, too, as well as a myriad of game ports.

Keep in mind that Iron Galaxy's involvement hasn't been officially confirmed, and it's still possible that this tease is indicative of a separate Fallout project (or something else entirely). It's also worth noting that the studio could be co-developing the Fallout 3 and New Vegas remasters with one or more other teams, such as Oblivion Remastered developer Virtuos.

Still, given Iron Galaxy's development history and the fact that we know these remasters are coming, it wouldn't surprise me if it was indeed contributing to these titles. Remember that since Fallout is a first-party property for Microsoft and Xbox, the remasters will be available to play through Xbox Game Pass once they're out.

Over to you!

Do you think Iron Galaxy Studios is hinting that it's working on the Fallout 3 and New Vegas remasters, or do you believe this tease is indicative of a different Fallout project? How about something else entirely? Share your thoughts in the comments.

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With the rise of AI in the tech industry in recent years — generative AI, in particular — it's hardly a surprise that its use in gaming has quickly become a hot-button issue. Just a few months ago, Baldur's Gate 3 developer Larian Studios came under fire for revealing it uses generative AI for ideation for its upcoming RPG Divinity, and many game dev executives like Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2's director have weighed in on the topic.

In December, Todd Howard — the executive producer and game director at The Elder Scrolls, Fallout, and Starfield developer Bethesda — shared his thoughts on AI, explaining that he views it as a tool that can and should be used to aid the development process instead of replace human art and creativity. Now, he's further elaborated on what he means.

"Look, it's certainly not a fad. The AI answer now becomes, 'ask me in six months,' right? It changes so much what you're seeing out there. For us, we're being incredibly cautious, kind of viewing it like a tool, like an analyst. [Using it to] look at the data in our games," Howard told Kinda Funny Games in a recent podcast. "We're not using it to generate anything — there's such an element of artistic intention that is essential to what we do and what others do ... this idea of craftsmen. I still think craftsmen and handcrafted human intention is what makes things special, and that's where we want to be."

Ultimately, Howard and Bethesda as a studio consider human creativity and intention to be extremely important, and say they have no plans to use AI to generate in-game content for its upcoming games. With that said, he does say it has potential to help the developers with "big data tasks."

"But you can't ignore it, in terms of, 'it's coming, it's changing' — every few months there's a new model, particularly in the tech side with code or productivity or other things, and I'll just say we're looking at that stuff," Howard continued. "We're not fully ignoring it because where it can help us get better at some big data tasks that take us a lot of time that we just wish were done now so we can move on to the creative stuff — that's kinda where our heads are. But I think it's still very very early days."

"We just have so much data in our games ... with our own procedural systems, or long-term play analysis, and using those systems to help us with that or validate some things that we're thinking, I think has a lot of use today. But, again, this is something that's changing really rapidly, and we'll see where it goes," he added.

These comments should assuage fears from some players that the next major Starfield update or future games like The Elder Scrolls 6 and Fallout 5 will have AI-generated content in them, which has become an increasingly relevant concern in general with how prominent AI use has become.

As for what you can expect from what's next for Starfield, Howard says it's not "Starfield 2.0," but he thinks "it's the kind of thing where if you love Starfield, we think you're gonna love this." It's thought to be the game's second paid DLC expansion, and more details are "coming soon."

Howard also noted that The Elder Scrolls 6 will be more of a "classic" Bethesda game, and more like the likes of Skyrim and Fallout 4 than Starfield and Fallout 76 were. Basically, you can expect it to forgo exceptionally huge maps or a multiplayer focus in favor of a singular, densely packed open world to explore in single player.

The Elder Scrolls 6 is still "a long ways off," though Howard has previously noted that "the majority of the studio's" now working on the grand fantasy RPG. Whenever it comes out, we know you'll be able to play it on Xbox and PC, and that it will be available on Xbox Game Pass.

Todd Howard takes a firm stance on AI content

These comments make it clear Todd Howard and Bethesda have no interest in using AI-generated content in its games. Are you glad to hear him take this position? Are you worried Bethesda will change its mind at some point? Let me know in the comments.

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While the first season of Amazon's acclaimed Fallout TV show was set in California around the ruins of Los Angeles and Season 2 prominently featured the Mojave Wasteland and the city of New Vegas, it's been revealed that at originally, its writers wanted to do New Vegas from the get go.

That revelation comes from Todd Howard, executive producer and game director at Fallout developer Bethesda Game Studios. Howard says he told the showrunners to hold off on going to New Vegas until "the base" of the series' story was established, as the setting — the primary location that Fallout: New Vegas took place in — is "tricky" and a "minefield" due to all the events that previously happened there, and because Obsidian Entertainment's 2010 entry is widely considered the best Fallout game.

"The writers really wanted to go to New Vegas. They actually wanted to go there in the early early pitches of Season 1, and I said, 'I would save that. That's such an iconic thing for Fallout — let's establish the base, and then we can go to New Vegas,'" he explained in a new Kinda Funny Games interview.

"And I thought they did a really really good job in taking it there because it's tricky. You have an iconic area, a beloved game, particular storylines [that] end in different ways, really strong characters...and there's a million ways to f**ck that up. And so it can be a bit of a minefield, right? And I thought they did a great job," he continued.

Howard then went on to note that Amazon and Bethesda approached the narrative of Season 2 very carefully, aiming to not "refute" any of Fallout: New Vegas' potential endings while simultaneously focusing on parts of the story that they felt it would be appropriate to "push forward." This is the "fog of war" approach that the showrunners have talked about previously.

"We spent a lot of time saying, like, 'let's not refute anything that happened in the games, but let's see if there's some areas that the writers really wanna push forward' ... I thought they did a fabulous job," he said. "And, you know, you do kinda worry about sophomore slump, you see it in some other things that you all love in entertainment, [but] fortunately people loved it, and we're on to Season 3."

Indeed, people did love it; long before the entirety of Season 2 and its New Vegas-centric story aired, it was already breaking Rotten Tomatoes records, and it's currently the highest-rated Season 2 of any live-action video game adaptation. The Fallout show overall is also now the highest rated live-action video game adaptation, beating out HBO's The Last of Us and others.

Notably, like Season 1 did back in Spring 2024, Season 2 gave the Fallout games it's based on a huge player count boost, kicking off a resurgence for the legendary RPG franchise. Fallout 4, Fallout 76, and Fallout: New Vegas benefitted the most from this renaissance, though all of the games did to varying degrees.

Its popularity reinforces my belief that Bethesda and Todd Howard ultimately made the right call in saving New Vegas for Season 2, as first establishing the show's core narrative and taking time to figure out how to carry the conflicts of New Vegas forward in a fitting way undoubtedly helped the showrunners safely navigate the "minefield."

If you haven't played New Vegas yourself yet, I can't recommend it enough — both because it provides significant context for the Fallout show, and because it's a terrific game. Like all the other Fallout titles, it's playable through Xbox Game Pass on Xbox and PC.

Did Todd Howard make the right call?

Do you believe Bethesda and Todd Howard were right to tell the Fallout TV showrunners to wait until Season 2 to do New Vegas? Are you a big fan of the show? How about of the Fallout RPGs? Let me know in the comments.

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The Elder Scrolls and Fallout developer Bethesda may be full steam ahead on The Elder Scrolls 6 right now, but that doesn't mean it's stopped working on its Xbox and PC space exploration RPG Starfield. In fact, the studio is gearing up to talk about its next big content update for the game soon, according to its game director Todd Howard.

Early last year, Bethesda teased big things for Starfield before going dark, with only a few more hints coming later in 2025. Then, amid reports of special preview event that showed attendees what's next for Starfield, rumors began to circulate that it would get something of a "Cyberpunk 2.0" moment in 2026, with some comparing it to the way the Phantom Liberty DLC massively overhauled Cyberpunk 2077.

Now, speaking with Kinda Funny Games in a new interview, Howard has revealed that more news about what Bethesda has in store for Starfield fans is "coming soon" — and that it's not "Starfield 2.0" in terms of overall scope.

"I can tell everybody we're gonna be talking about it really soon. We're moving into a phase where we're ready to talk about Starfield, and really show that in the right way, and what's coming to the game. We've been doing a lot of work that we like a lot," he said. "It is not 'Starfield 2.0' — you know, I've seen some of that ... for expectation setting, I think it's the kind of thing where if you love Starfield, we think you're gonna love this. It's updates that change the game not in an isolated way, but sort of, you know, meta, using outer space and things in ways that we haven't."

"But look, if Starfield's something that didn't connect with you right away, or you bounced off it, or found it boring in places, I don't think this is gonna change that fundamentally, but if you're someone who loves Starfield ... we're really happy with it, we like it a lot," he continued.

When asked how close Bethesda is to unveiling what it's been working on, Howard confirmed that "It's soonish, it is soonish. I don't wanna spoil the day, but it's coming soon, yep."

The news that Starfield isn't getting a big game-wide revamp will certainly disappoint some. It definitely disappoints me; I very much did not like Starfield and how bland and empty it felt compared to Bethesda's other RPGs (thankfully, Howard said The Elder Scrolls 6 will be a "classic" Bethesda game).

If you enjoyed Starfield more than I did, though, it sounds like you'll enjoy what Bethesda is announcing soon, too. Whatever it is, Howard's comments reveal it's going to utilize outer space in some new ways.

As for what it is exactly, the most likely answer is Starfield's next DLC expansion, which has been confirmed to be in development. The first one, Shattered Space, was met with a pretty lukewarm reception, so hopefully the next one does more to impress and move the needle. I also expect that Bethesda will continue supporting Starfield with free updates.

As always, only time will tell — but Howard's comments suggest the wait won't be long at all. Perhaps we'll finally get to see what's next for Starfield in March, which is notably the same month Bethesda began to tease what's coming last year.

Note that in addition to being available for direct purchase on Xbox Series X|S and Windows PC (it's just $38.59 at Loaded thanks to a nice deal), Starfield is also accessible with an active Xbox Game Pass membership.

What's your opinion of Starfield? How about Bethesda's other games, like The Elder Scrolls and Fallout? Would a new DLC expansion motivate you to come back to Starfield, or check it out if you haven't yet? Hit me with your take in the comments.

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Though Xbox and Bethesda Game Studios are still working on more updates and content for Starfield and Fallout 76, the majority of the developer's staff are focused on the long-awaited The Elder Scrolls 6 that was announced over seven years ago in 2018.

Extremely little is known about the highly anticipated fantasy RPG and Skyrim sequel right now, though we just learned some major new details about the game from a Kinda Funny Games interview with Bethesda's executive producer and game director, Todd Howard.

Specifically, Howard revealed that The Elder Scrolls 6 will be more of a "classic" Bethesda game compared to more experimental titles like Fallout 76 and Starfield. Additionally, he also confirmed that it will use "Creation Engine 3," the latest iteration of the proprietary software it's used to build its RPGs since 2002's Morrowind.

"We do have a certain style that we like and our fans like that we want to get better and better at. I think in many ways, Fallout 76 and Starfield are a little bit of a creative detour from that classic Elder Scrolls, Fallout ... where you're exploring a world in a certain way," Howard told Kinda Funny host Greg Miller when asked if Bethesda plans to stick to its approach to RPG design, and its Creation Engine. "And you know, as we come back to Elder Scrolls 6 that we're doing now, we're coming back to that kind of classic style that we've missed, that we know really really well."

"We have a style of game that we really really like that I think people expect from us, and there's a lot of innovation to be done there still, so that when you step into a world you feel like you're experiencing it for the first time, a game like that, and we're happy with where it's headed right now. That's what I can say," he continued.

And on the Creation Engine: "We spent the last several years bringing Creation Engine 2 — which powers Starfield — up to Creation Engine 3; that's gonna power Elder Scrolls 6 and beyond," Howard announced. "And you know, obviously we do all the rendering things, we're really happy with the new stuff that we're doing, but also world systems, loading, how we bring things into the world, how we get that detail close to the camera immediately."

Though Bethesda continuing to upgrade and use their in-house engine for The Elder Scrolls 6 and other upcoming titles (Fallout 5, perhaps?) was expected, it wasn't officially confirmed until now. Some are worried about this since Creation is notorious for bugginess and its reliance on loading screens; hopefully Bethesda's improvements address these issues effectively.

I have mixed feelings about the Creation Engine, but what I'm definitely happy about is that The Elder Scrolls 6 will be more of a traditional Bethesda game. I wasn't really a fan of Starfield and found it to be as wide as an ocean but as shallow as a puddle, so I'm glad it sounds like the upcoming RPG will be denser and richer with things to do, even if that means it'll also be smaller.

Previously, Howard has commented that The Elder Scrolls 6 is "progressing really well," though it's still "a long ways off." Ultimately, we still don't know when it's coming out, but when it does, it'll be playable on Xbox and PC, and through Xbox Game Pass.

Are you looking forward to The Elder Scrolls 6? Are you glad it's going to be more of a classic Bethesda game, or would you have preferred for the studio to try something experimental? Let me know in the comments.

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Despite its extremely rocky start and the fact it launched nearly eight years ago now, Bethesda's experimental multiplayer RPG Fallout 76 has ended up becoming quite a long-lasting success across Xbox, PC, and PlayStation. A huge reason why is the game's frequent, seasonal content updates — and with December's Burning Springs expansion now in the rearview, its developers have revealed the upcoming Season 24 update, along with its release date.

Fallout 76 Season 24 is officially Rip Daring and the Cryptids from Beyond the Cosmos, themed after the in-universe Astoundingly Awesome Tales comic book action hero and an alien invasion of Earth. It's launching alongside a new major update called The Backwoods; both are scheduled to release on March 3 in just a few weeks.

Bethesda first announced The Backwoods with a short teaser on social media (watch it here or below) that shows a hazy, found footage-style recording of Bigfoot (AKA Sasquatch), the mythical ape-like creature of North American folklore. We then see a small effigy made from human bones, along with text that says "Big things are coming to Fallout 76."

Bigfoot will be Fallout 76's next Cryptid — miniboss-like beasts that draw inspiration from mythology. Previous Cryptids have included the Wendigo, Grafton Monsters, the Mothman, and the Sheepsquatch. The series' Zetan aliens are included in this group, too.

Based on the focus on Bigfoot as well as the key art at the end of the trailer that depicts the Fallout mascot Vault Boy with hunting gear and a double-barrel shotgun, it's clear that the overall theme of The Backwoods update will be hunting in the Appalachian forests, and hunting down Bigfoot in particular.

A new Community Calendar shows that Season 24 will run until its end date of April 7, at which point Fallout 76's next season will kick off. The first week of the season, March 3-10, will feature an event called "Bigfoot's Bash," with an Invaders from Beyond event that's likely centered around Zetan aliens set to follow it up from March 10-24.

At the moment, we know next to nothing about specific items and changes coming in The Backwoods update and Season 24...officially, anyway. Datamines and leaks have shown tweaks to armor stats, updated reward pools for activities, the addition of C.A.M.P. titles, and updates for perks, weapons, and gear mods. Bethesda will surely reveal more of what's coming soon.

Notably, The Backwoods and Season 24 are the first major updates coming to Fallout 76 following the conclusion of Season 2 of the Fallout TV show. As its first season did in 2024, the series has given the Fallout games a major player count boost, with Fallout 4, Fallout: New Vegas, and Fallout 76 benefitting seeing the biggest engagement gains.

If you've never played Fallout 76 before or are considering coming back to the game, now seems a great time to do so. It, along with every other Fallout game, is available to play on Microsoft's buffet-style gaming service Xbox Game Pass.

Are you a big fan of Fallout 76? Are you looking forward to The Backwoods update and Season 24? Will you come back to the game to check them out, or start playing it if you haven't before? Let me know in the comments.

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The long-running, fan-favorite post-apocalyptic RPG franchise Fallout is now one year shy of its 30th anniversary, and it's gone through a lot of change and growth throughout its nearly three-decade long history. From humble beginnings at Interplay Entertainment and the 1997 release of the very first game to the blockbuster success of Fallout 4 and the Fallout TV show, the series has become an absolute megahit.

Alongside spinoffs like Fallout Tactics and Fallout Shelter, we've gotten six mainline Fallout RPGs over the years, including Fallout 1, Fallout 2, Fallout 3, Fallout: New Vegas, Fallout 4, and Fallout 76. Developer Bethesda is working on Fallout 5, too, though it's a long way off, as the studio's next game will be The Elder Scrolls 6.

The games have always been popular, but there's been a major resurgence in the last few months in particular thanks to Season 2 of the TV show driving player interest. That hype has brought plenty of interesting news and insight about the franchise, including our exclusive report that remasters for Fallout 3 and New Vegas are coming, and Game Informer's wonderful An Oral History of Fallout multi-part interview.

As I've covered the latest on the series these past few weeks, I've been running a poll across all my articles to see which of the main Fallout games you, our readers, think is the best of them all. As I write this, 1,501 of you have given your answer — and it's a clear one, with one RPG far above the rest.

That title, probably to the surprise of very few, is Fallout: New Vegas, Obsidian Entertainment's 2010 entry in the franchise that took players to the Mojave Wasteland. 869 of the folks who voted in the poll — 58% of the group — say New Vegas is their favorite game, with Fallout 4 and Fallout 3 neck and neck below it at roughly 17% with 259 and 248 votes, respectively.

In online discussions about the Fallout games, New Vegas is very often listed as a favorite due to its impressive RPG depth, complete with multiple major and minor factions, countless potential quest outcomes, advanced speech and dialogue systems, and a high degree of reactivity to the player's actions. The overall story and setting are top-notch, too, and allows you to do do pretty much anything you want without putting roadblocks in your way.

Thus, I was hardly surprised to see it take the win by a large margin here. I was surprised to see Fallout 3 so close to Fallout 4's position, though. Fallout 4 is the latest single player entry in the series with the smoothest, most modern gameplay and combat mechanics. On top of that, it's the most stable game for modding, and has gotten a ton of mod content — both free and sold as curated DLC in the Creations store — since its 2015 release.

But Fallout 4 is also often criticized for lacking the RPG "crunch" Interplay's original games and New Vegas had, while Bethesda retained much of it with Fallout 3. So even though Fallout 4 is easier to get into, more polished, and serves as a better foundation for user-generated content, Fallout 3 features a direction that players prefer more overall.

Another unexpected result was Fallout 76 coming in below even Fallout 1 and Fallout 2, both of which are old-school CRPGs from the '90s with rather archaic control schemes that make them difficult to smoothly engage with. The takeaway here seems to be that multiplayer is rarely anyone's favorite way to experience Fallout, even though Fallout 76 still has a healthy player base even eight years post-launch.

No matter which Fallout game is your favorite, it's a great time to be a Fallout fan — especially since every game in the series is available to play on Xbox and/or PC through Xbox Game Pass. Even Fallout 1, 2, and Tactics are on PC Game Pass and Xbox Game Pass Ultimate.

What's your favorite Fallout game? Do you agree with everyone that thinks Fallout: New Vegas is the best, or do you feel differently? Share your thoughts in the comments, and make sure to vote in the poll yourself below.

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Bethesda's long-running 2018 MMO-lite RPG Fallout 76 is still going strong, with the experimental multiplayer spinoff of the beloved post-apocalyptic franchise maintaining a healthy community of players through regular content updates. The latest of these was the Burning Springs expansion that prominently features The Ghoul from the Fallout TV show; another very notable release was the Gleaming Depths update that came in late 2024.

Gleaming Depths featured a special four-player endgame raid of the same name, and challenged a squad of Vault Dwellers to progress through an arduous, lengthy dungeon that requires communication and ends with a climactic boss battle. Compared to everything else in Fallout 76, Gleaming Depths was a huge step up both in terms of difficulty and rewards, with players able to walk away from completions with 4-star Legendary gear, unique crafting blueprints, tons of XP and materials, and more.

In several ways, it's reminiscent of a raid from Bungie's Destiny 2, one of Fallout 76's live-service rivals — and it got a strong reception from fans, prompting Bethesda to consider how it might improve the experience if a second raid was to come. One idea is "encouraging players to play through the whole raid, or maybe dispersing the rewards across bosses a little more evenly, so it's not so concentrated on one boss or another," creative director Jon Rush told PCGamesN in a recent interview.

But ultimately, what matters most to Rush is that any new raid content is challenging, drives players to team up and work together, and sufficiently rewards them for the effort required to properly gear up for, learn, and successfully complete encounters. "As long as players are challenged, and they're encouraged to play with their friends or in a group, and that they are greatly rewarded for being successful," he said.

Notably, one thing Bethesda wants to avoid is having too much of a meta for the raid, and specific types of builds feeling required in order for you to efficiently make progress. "I'd hate to set something up where it's like, you have to be this [build], or else you'll just fall flat on your face. I'd rather let people see a new problem or something they need to overcome and let them choose how they want to do it," Rush explained.

That desire for many different kinds of setups to be viable, however, shines light on one of Fallout 76's biggest issues: the amount of time you have to spend in menus if you want to swap your build. Though the RPG is actually the first in Fallout history to support full and unlimited respecs, there's no way to quickly switch between loadouts. Thankfully, Bethesda is exploring ways to address this.

"We also want to figure out ways to make changing out loadouts — and changing full loadouts, meaning armor and things like that — a little bit easier for players, so you can do that without the time sink that is required for it," lead producer Bill LaCoste commented. "I really do want people to have multiple loadouts and outfits that go along with the content they're trying to engage in."

"We need to make it a little bit easier and make some adjustments, either on the job board side, or maybe some other tools that we can add for players too," he continued. The studio's overall goal is "to give people more time playing the game rather than dealing with their inventory," because the developer is "very much against 'playing the UI,' we want to play the game."

Be that as it may, though, it's important to note that Bethesda may still explore nudging people towards trying out new setups or tweaking their builds with future gameplay obstacles. "With that said, you know, hypothetically, if there was another raid, maybe the challenges would be skewed a bit differently so that people would need to think of other ways to play through it or gear up for it, you know?" Rush added.

Whether you're interested in new Fallout 76 raids or not, it's great to hear that the developers want to make changing builds easier. A system they should look to to try and emulate, in my opinion, is Destiny 2's Loadout mechanic; it allows you to save and swap between builds with the click of a button, automatically changing everything from your chosen subclass abilities and modifiers to your gear and all the mods you've equipped on them.

Are you a fan of Fallout 76? Would you be excited to see another raid similar to Gleaming Depths come to Bethesda's multiplayer RPG? Let me know in the comments.

After acquiring the complete rights to the Fallout series from Interplay Entertainment and Black Isle Studios in 2007, The Elder Scrolls developer Bethesda took its first crack at the post-nuclear RPG franchise with 2008's Fallout 3. Released across Xbox, Windows PC, and PlayStation, it was a critical and commercial success, with players greatly appreciating how well it translated the isometric series into 3D spaces.

"The sort of vindication for us was, when we did PAX, we had this big live demo of Fallout 3 where everyone could play for, like, a half hour or something. ... We were very nervous. Like, 'Hopefully this goes off without a hitch,'" lead designer Emil Pagliarulo told Game Informer in its excellent An Oral History of Fallout interview.

"The line to play Fallout 3 was around the corner. We were like, 'Oh, we’ve got something here,'" he added. "Then it was the excitement of people playing and then people leaving. That’s when it was, like, it felt great! Like, whoa. People are buying what we’re selling. They like this vision that we have."

Indeed, everything from the game's open-world environments and its huge variety of side quests to its gameplay systems and writing was praised highly. One aspect of the title that was near-universally disliked, though, was its ending, and how players couldn't continue exploring the Capital Wasteland after the credits rolled in particular.

That overwhelmingly negative feedback, Bethesda director and executive producer Todd Howard notes, was the catalyst for the studio's creation of Broken Steel, one of the five DLC expansions that came out in 2009. Broken Steel significantly expands and continues Fallout 3's main story, raises the game's level cap to 30, and enables playing even after the narrative ends.

"The one thing that we did, we ended up changing in Fallout 3, we were like, 'Well, like the other Fallouts, it has to end,'" he explained. "You know, 'We’re having this type of character system, these other perks are going to work, and then when you finish it, it’s going to end. You’re going to get this video and then the game ends.' And we thought, 'This is Fallout! It’s great!'"

Unfortunately, the reverence Bethesda treated Fallout and its traditions with for Fallout 3 ironically backfired in this particular instance, as players were expecting to be able to continue playing after the ending like they could in The Elder Scrolls titles Morrowind and Oblivion.

"People hated it! They expected, like, 'Why would the game end?!' You know, 'The other games don’t end!' And so we were like, 'Well, that was our commitment to that.' And we were sitting around talking about it as we got into DLC, we’re like, 'What if it didn’t end? How would we do that?'" Howard continued. "And so, we kind of went back to the drawing board and figured out a way, as gracefully as we could. I’ll give us an average grade on that to make the story continue."

It's pretty interesting to hear that the decision to give Fallout 3 a hard end point came from Bethesda's aim to stick to Fallout norms, though like most, I'm glad it ended up reversing that call with Broken Steel. Personally, I've always felt that content-rich open-world games should have free play after their endings, even if that just means sending you back into the world the way it was before your final quest.

In the end, Fallout 3 ended up doing something even more interesting by showing you the effects of the big choice you make — one I won't spoil here — in the main story's ending sequence. I appreciated that reactivity to your actions a lot, and I'm glad it was present in the 2015 sequel Fallout 4, too.

Are you a fan of Fallout 3? Did you hate how the ending locked you out of exploring the open world before Broken Steel came out, or did it not really bug you? Let me know in the comments.

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Xbox and Bethesda's zany post-apocalyptic, post-nuclear RPG franchise Fallout may be a legendary series now — with multiple top-selling games and a blockbuster Fallout TV show — but once upon a time, it was a "B-tier side project" for its original developers at Interplay Entertainment back when the first game was still being made. It's hard to fathom how such a massive property could have such humble beginnings, but it's true.

That revelation comes from a new Game Informer interview with Interplay co-founder and former CEO Brian Fargo (now CEO of InXile Entertainment and working on Xbox's Clockwork Revolution) and Fallout co-creators Tim Cain and Leonard Boyarsky. While the rest of Interplay was taking advantage of its Dungeons & Dragons license, Cain and Boyarsky says they were "off in the corner."

"It was very insular. It was very much like, here’s our team off in the corner, and there’s the rest of Interplay ... once they saw what we were doing — and they appreciated what we were doing — they’re just like, 'Well, we have these much more important games! The Dungeons and Dragons games are licensed to print money. Just don’t bother anybody. Just go over there and do your thing and it’ll be great,'" Boyarsky explained.

"We were a B-tier side project at Interplay. They got the D&D license about six months to a year after we started, and they’re like, 'Okay, that’s the A-tier. Those are the money teams.' And we’re off in the corner," added Cain.

Others at Interplay eventually came to realize just how much potential Fallout had, and began to allocate significantly more manpower and resources to the project ahead of its 1997 release date. But initially being relegated to the sidelines wasn't the only challenge the RPG's creators had to contend with; another was the fact that two big licensing deals for the title fell through.

You see, Fallout was originally going to be a sequel to Interplay's 1988 RPG Wasteland that was published by Electronic Arts (EA), but its creators "ended up having to pivot because EA said, 'No, not going to happen,'" Fargo revealed. "We were being hopeful for a while, but ironically, that pivot ended up being wonderful because we ended up with Fallout, which obviously ended up being a good thing."

Interplay also planned to use Steve Jackson's Generic Universal Role-Playing System (GURPS) for Fallout, but Jackson declined to license the system to the studio after seeing the game's over-the-top violence juxtaposed with the cheerful Vault Boy character, ultimately feeling that it trivialized its subject matter. This led to the team developing the SPECIAL system, which ended up being an even better fit for its vision.

In the end, Fallout's creators say they're glad for these hurdles they had to overcome, as while they presented obstacles for Interplay's development of the game, the process of working through them is ultimately what gave us the beloved RPG franchise we've come to know and love.

"It was such the definition of 'lightning in a bottle,'" said Boyarsky. "Every time something went wrong, something great came out of it. ... A lot of this stuff was dictated by our constraints — the things we didn’t have money or time to do, things that went horribly wrong at the time."

"So many negatives turned out to be positives — losing GURPS and not getting the Wasteland license — but I’m going to point out that sprite engine I wrote had limitations we had to work around, and those workarounds ended up making the game really cool," Cain chimed in.

"But even being called a B-tier product ... turned out to be a great thing because we were pretty much ignored for years. No one really cared about what we were doing because there wasn’t anything huge tied to it, and that just let us kind of do our thing."

Are you a big fan of the Fallout series, or is it not really your thing? Are you ultimately glad that Interplay ended up making Fallout, or do you wish it would have been a Wasteland sequel after all? Let me know in the comments.

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Bethesda's bold and experimental multiplayer take on Fallout, Fallout 76, launched in 2018 to extremely negative reviews, with many taking the game to task over its severe technical bugs and lack of engaging gameplay content, among other issues. Both of these pain points were addressed over time with performance-focused patches and big updates like the Wastelanders expansion, though notably, one feature fans have been asking for since the game's release still hasn't been added.

That feature is crossplay — the ability to play and party up with players on platforms other than your own. Though Fallout 76 supports crossplay between players that share a console family (Xbox Series X|S and Xbox One, for example), Xbox and PlayStation players can't explore the Wasteland together, and folks on Steam can't play with console users, either.

Games like Fallout 76 with a strong co-op focus benefit hugely from crossplay since it reduces the impact of low player counts on any one platform in particular, helping to make sure that servers feel populated. It's also simply a great quality-of-life feature to have, as it breaks down barriers between players and brings everyone together.

Because of that, it's a real shame that Bethesda's open-world Fallout MMO-lite hasn't gotten support for crossplay in the almost eight years it's been active. But the good news is that the studio is "looking into it," and hears fans clamoring for it loud and clear. The bad news, however, is that if it does come, it won't be anytime soon.

"We are looking into it, and we have plans to try to scope out what that work is going to entail for us," creative director Jon Rush told Polygon in a recent interview. "It's just not in the immediate plans for us. We know players want it."

But why is that, exactly? Well, according to production director Bill LaCoste, the foundation for crossplay is something that's typically established ahead of a game's launch. Because Bethesda didn't do that with Fallout 76, going back and adding it now would be an arduous and time-consuming task for the developer.

"It's just huge technical hurdles that are things that you tackle before release, during your actual development of the product," LaCoste noted. "So going back and retrofitting it to do that, when you have different places that players are pointing into, and now you're having to worry about entitlements and account purchases and currency."

It's important to establish that doesn't mean the studio won't add it, however. It just means that if Bethesda determines it's realistically possible and decides to commit to bringing crossplay to Fallout 76, it will be a while before it's implemented, as doing so won't be a quick or easy process.

"What we can promise players is that we will continue to investigate, we will continue to try to establish plans to make that a thing in the future, just not in the short term," LaCoste added.

Ultimately, it's unfortunate that the game still doesn't have crossplay — especially since with Season 2 of the Fallout TV show fresh in everyone's mind and the Fallout games enjoying boosted player counts as a result, it would be great if fans of the post-apocalyptic RPG franchise across all platforms could enjoy the series' renaissance together. With that said, at least Bethesda has promised it's looking into it, and will bring the feature to Fallout 76 if it can.

How do you feel about Fallout 76? Would you be excited to see crossplay finally come to Bethesda's multiplayer take on Fallout, or do you not really care? Hit me with your thoughts down below in the comments.

Starfield, Bethesda’s newest IP, launched in 2023 as an Xbox and PC exclusive. Since release, it has been widely rumored to be heading to PS5, especially since the shift in strategy at Xbox.

Now, popular insider Shinobi602, who has a strong track record with industry information, has suggested on Resetera that a PS5 reveal could happen soon. According to the insider, the announcement may also include details about the game’s next expansion.

That expansion has been rumored for some time. Reports suggest it could introduce major improvements, potentially addressing some of the quirks and issues players have raised since launch.

A second chance to win players back?

Starfield, Bethesda’s space-set RPG, includes much of what players have come to expect from the studio. Despite that, it has been a point of contention among fans, with some feeling it did not fully meet expectations.

Here at Windows Central, however, it reviewed strongly. Jez Corden scored the game a 4.5 out of 5, praising its scope and ambition.

It has become popular online to highlight the so-called “jank” often associated with Bethesda titles. Even so, Starfield is not a bad game by any reasonable measure. A PS5 release alongside a substantial update could help shift the conversation and give it renewed attention.

This also is not the first time we have heard rumors of a PS5 port or a major update. Back in December, we reported on similar claims, but without a concrete timeline on when it would release along with an expected Nintendo Switch 2 version being in the works. Though Shinobi also believes that release has been pushed out or might not even come at all.

Now, according to Shinobi602, there is a clearer timeline. The insider suggests Bethesda could reveal more as soon as next month, potentially placing the announcement of the PS5 version and the next update in March 2026, with reports pointing to an April 2026 release for PS5.

Xbox is no stranger to porting their games to PlayStation and it’s very much expected as part of its strategy going forward, with Avowed being the latest to make the move. However, despite releasing games across multiple platforms, some titles are struggling to sell, with The Outer Worlds 2 being a recent example of this, despite reviewing well.

Do you think a PS5 release and major update could change the conversation around Starfield? Let us know your thoughts in the comments and make sure to take part in our poll below:

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With Xbox and Bethesda's latest RPG, Starfield, now out, many are turning their eyes to the horizon. Far, far out there lies the studio's next projects, including the long-awaited, highly anticipated The Elder Scrolls 6 and Fallout 5, the next entry in the developer's post-apocalyptic sci-fi franchise. If we're lucky, they might even come out one day.

Bethesda says The Elder Scrolls 6 is "progressing really well," even if it's still "a long ways off;" undoubtedly, Fallout 5 is even more so. Regardless, something a lot of folks are wondering about is how the two games might shake up the studio's open-world design so that they feel distinct compared to the developer's other projects, such as Skyrim and Fallout 4.

PressBoxPR asked Skyrim design lead and former Bethesda dev Bruce Nesmith how he'd change things up in a recent interview, and he says if he was calling the shots, he'd make The Elder Scrolls 6 and Fallout 5 more dynamic and "fluid."

"I would probably look at having the world be more dynamic," he began. "Bethesda games in the last decade have become less dynamic in order to meet the needs of what the games needed and audience expectations, but to be able to have the world be more fluid, I think that would be very cool."

Nesmith is most likely referring to game elements that change or evolve over time as you explore and progress through the open world, with factions and NPCs that react to everything around them, including random events, quest outcomes, and player choices.

That ties directly into his second suggestion, which is that Bethesda should strive to make choices in The Elder Scrolls 6 and Fallout 5 "meaningful." Larian Studios' Game of the Year-winning 2023 RPG Baldur's Gate 3, he says, is a shining example of a game that does this well, and was lauded for it.

"I also think, to look at Baldur's Gate 3 and draw lessons from that mash hit, that part of what made it so popular is that it felt like all choices were meaningful because you made a choice and it made a big difference in your play," he suggested.

"Bethesda games have maybe pulled back from doing that a little bit. The focus is on putting your toys away [keeping different parts of the game separate and without consequences that carry over] but in these games you do something in the Thieves' Guild quest line that completely changes what becomes of the Mages' Guild, for example," he continued. "The world and the game is changed because of your choices. Have it make a real impact."

Ultimately, Nesmith believes that "the gaming community has spoken," and that fans are hungry for RPGs with deeper levels of reactivity and consequence. And given the success of games like Baldur's Gate 3 and Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2, it's hard to argue against that notion.

One caveat to going in that direction is that certain pieces of content won't be playable in every single playthrough, which Nesmith says Bethesda actively tried to avoid with Skyrim. However, perhaps it's time for the studio to trade some of that open-endedness for a richer, more reactive world.

"That was actually an intentional thing in Skyrim. The thinking was that we spent time and effort making this content. We want to make sure the player can experience it all," he said. "That was done intentionally and I think those are good decisions. But as we're pointing out, every formula can get stale after a while, so maybe it's time to shake it up and do it a little bit differently and say all the content is available but you may need to do another playthrough to experience all of it."

Do you agree with Nesmith that The Elder Scrolls 6 and Fallout 5 should have more dynamism and reactivity to your choices? Or are you hoping that Bethesda will stick to more of its traditional open-ended formula? Share your thoughts in the comments.

Xbox and Bethesda's beloved post-apocalyptic RPG franchise Fallout is all the rage right now, with Season 2 of the TV show doubling its player counts on Steam, several free DLC add-ons hitting Fallout 4 recently, and more. Indeed, the last few months have been a great time to be a fan of the series — and in the days leading up to Season 2's finale episode, Bethesda has a treat for those who may not have played one of its biggest games.

From now until February 4 — one day after the finale of Season 2 of the Fallout TV show — you can play Fallout 76 for free across all of its platforms, including Xbox Series X|S, Xbox One, Windows PC (Steam, Xbox on PC), PS5, and PS4. Any characters and progress you make in the game will carry forward if you choose to purchase it after the free-to-play period ends (it's only $7.99 right now; it's usually $39.99).

Fallout 76 is one of the largest modern Fallout titles you can play right now, both in terms of available content and in terms of player count. As recent SteamDB data shows, the game has had, on average, around 20K-30K players on Valve's PC gaming platform at any given time.

That's not quite as large as Fallout 4's 30K-50K average, but it's above Fallout 3 and Fallout: New Vegas. Ultimately, these are healthy, respectable numbers — and they're in addition to all the players on Xbox and PlayStation consoles that can't be tracked due to the lack of publicly available metrics.

As the first multiplayer RPG in the series with live-service patches and MMO-like elements, Fallout 76 was (and for some, still is) quite controversial, and got off to an extremely rocky start in late 2018. Bethesda stuck with it and has routinely improved it with major content updates, though, transforming it into a game that many love and play regularly. Burning Springs, its latest expansion, is its largest in years, and features The Ghoul from the TV show.

Fallout 76 becoming free to play for a week is pretty awesome, though the way Bethesda chose to announce and advertise that is a little...odd. The studio revealed the news alongside a new commercial for its Fallout games that stars Michael Grzesiek, AKA Shroud, one of the biggest streamers on Twitch and a competitive FPS player that used to compete in Counter-Strike: Global Offensive (now Counter-Strike 2).

Getting a former pro player that specializes in PvP games to advertise your mostly singleplayer RPG franchise is certainly a choice, but I suppose he's still a very recognizable figure in gaming and may drive some PvP players to give Fallout a shot. Plus, Shroud says he's a huge fan of the series.

"Honestly still shocked I got to be apart of this commercial," he wrote in a post on social media. "As you all know fallout is one of my favorite video game franchises and to see myself in this video is incredibly heartwarming!!"

The commercial itself features Shroud clad in an up-armored Vault suit as he and several "Dogmeat" friends — referencing the canine companions you can find in most of the Fallout games — investigate a gas station for treasure, with a few amusing references to Fallout 4 thrown in. "Have any of you guys seen my son?" he asks the dogs.

Note that while Fallout 76 is the only game that's free to play for a limited time, all of the Fallout games are available to play across Xbox and PC with Xbox Game Pass. They're accessible through Xbox Cloud Gaming as well, with Fallout 4 also supporting Xbox Play Anywhere cross-save.

Do you plan on checking out Fallout 76 while it's free to play? If you've already played it, how do you like it compared to the mainstream singleplayer Fallout titles? Hit me with your take in the comments.

Bethesda's legendary post-apocalyptic sci-fi RPG franchise Fallout was propelled into the spotlight when the Fallout TV show debuted in Spring 2024, kicking off a renaissance for the fan-favorite games. Now, two years later, Season 2 of the show is sparking further renewed interest in the series — and if you're playing Fallout 4, Bethesda has released several pieces of free DLC content you can enjoy now.

These come in the form of community-made Creations mods paid for and curated by the developer. Typically, these cost money, but four that Bethesda has released for Fallout 4 recently are completely free to download and play across the Xbox, Windows PC, and PlayStation versions of the RPG shooter. None of them got any real marketing; that's a shame, because they're quite substantial and add many hours of content.

They include the following: The Varmint Rifle by Neeher, The Tale of the Beast Hunter by Hobgoblin Studios, Brotherhood of Steel T60 Pistol by Volodymyr Bondarchuk (Painter2099) and Armando Neto (NetoElite), and Revenge of the Van Graffs by the same creators. You'll find all of them in the Creations Store within Fallout 4.

Notably, the Varmint Rifle is a returning weapon from Fallout: New Vegas, and both The Tale of the Beast Hunter and Revenge of the Van Graffs feature or reference factions and gear that's either from or inspired by Obsidian's beloved entry in the franchise. The T60 Pistol add-on, meanwhile, brings the faction's powerful hand cannon from the TV show into Fallout 4.

That makes all four of these Creations especially worth checking out if you're a big fan of New Vegas and/or Amazon's TV series, which I'd wager most Fallout fans are. After all, the TV show is a record-breaking success, and New Vegas is widely regarded by many as the best Fallout game.

The Varmint Rifle features a bespoke, rather unique dungeon found by traveling west from Cambridge Polymer Labs along the nearby river, where you'll find a raider trying to enter a sewer through a manhole. Inside you'll find a variety of quest-markerless puzzles to work your way through, with the Varmint Rifle itself serving as your reward.

Tale of the Beast Hunter, meanwhile, sees you go through a "7-part holotape adventure" to "uncover the legend of the Beast Hunter." The Creation includes a unique outfit with two styles inspired by the iconic NCR Veteran Rangers and New Vegas' Lucky 38, along with a new Revolver Shotgun weapon called "Judge" and a "The Bar" player home fashioned after the look of The Strip in New Vegas.

The T60 Pistol is a smaller DLC that adds the weapon to Brotherhood of Steel inventories and to a few select locations like the Cambridge Police Station and Elder Maxson's room in the Prydwen. Revenge of the Van Graffs, though, is similar to Tale of the Beast Hunter in terms of scope.

Once you hit Level 15, you'll pick up an SOS signal on the radio that ropes you into a questline about mercenaries in dark black armor running amok in the Commonwealth, who New Vegas fans will recognize as the infamous gang of arms dealers in Freeside. By the end of it, you'll find yourself with both the Laser RCW and the Plasma Defender from New Vegas, with these weapons added to leveled lists as well.

I haven't played through these add-ons myself yet, but I have watched a few different walkthroughs and showcases, and overall, all the included quests and gear is great, with impressive voice acting, quality writing, and excellent visuals and animations. Thus, you should definitely check these free Creations out; after the disaster of the Fallout 4 Anniversary Edition, they're a nice win for the 2015 RPG.

Note that Fallout 4, along with every other Fallout game, is available to play on Xbox and PC through Xbox Game Pass.

What do you think of the four new Creations that Bethesda has given Fallout 4 players for free? Are you going to jump into the RPG to check them out soon? Let me know in the comments.

With Season 2 of the Fallout TV series now here, many players are likely wondering how (or even if) the events of the uber-popular show will tie into developer Bethesda Game Studios' next entry in the universe of Fallout role-playing games (RPGs).

"In short, yes," says Todd Howard, executive producer and director at Bethesda Game Studios, speaking with BBC on all things Fallout in the wake of the season's debut.

"Fallout 5 will be existing in a world where the stories and events of the show happened or are happening," Howard says. "We are taking that into account."

This makes sense, as it's worth noting for those who haven't yet watched it that the Fallout TV series isn't a direct adaptation of the events of one of the games. Instead, it's treated as another entry in the universe altogether, and is in fact the latest sequence of events in the Fallout timeline.

With that in mind, of course, the team at Bethesda Game Studios would take care to note and possibly reference the events of the series in Fallout 5.

Of course, the elephant in the room here is that Fallout 5 isn't close. Bethesda Game Studios has grown since its parent company, ZeniMax Media, was acquired by Microsoft, but the developer is divided into multiple teams, with some continuing to work on updates and a new expansion for the 2023 science-fiction RPG Starfield, while others continue to work on Fallout 76.

By far the largest team at Bethesda Game Studios is the one working on The Elder Scrolls 6, which is the studio's next mainline game. It's still a ways away, but production is underway.

In the meantime, the second season of the Fallout TV series has premiered, and is currently exclusively available through Prime Video.

As I write this, Season 2 of Amazon's Fallout TV show is just a few short hours away from its official premiere — and with the new episodes featuring the iconic city of New Vegas as their prominent, primary setting, a lot of attention has naturally fallen on Obsidian Entertainment's acclaimed 2010 RPG Fallout: New Vegas.

Like Fallout Season 2, New Vegas takes place in and around post-nuclear Las Vegas, and is notable for arguably being the most popular of all the Fallout games in terms of player reception. Many applaud its deep RPG systems, complex faction narratives, branching questlines, and emphasis on total player freedom, and consider it a cut above titles like Fallout 3 and Fallout 4 that were made by Fallout's primary studio, Bethesda.

Because there weren't many references to New Vegas, its events, or what it added to the series' lore in the developer's games, some in the Fallout community believe that Bethesda hates or resents Obsidian's RPG for being generally more well-liked by fans. There's never been any proof of this, mind, but the idea still took root as fans debated which Fallout games are better, and it's persisted over time.

Speaking with PC Gamer, though, Bethesda director and executive producer Todd Howard has now addressed this infamous misconception that the studio keeps New Vegas "at arm's length," making it clear that the two developers are on good terms and that there's no truth to the whispers.

"Huge respect to the folks at Obsidian. Had them out to the set to see [Fallout Season 2]. And they've had an incredible year, if you look at the year they've had," Howard said, referencing Xbox and Obsidian's release of Avowed, Grounded 2, and The Outer Worlds 2 throughout 2025.

"But again, this is something we asked them to do, right? And so, they just did an incredible, incredible job on the game," he added.

A few moments earlier in the interview, Howard discussed how New Vegas ultimately came to be, and seemed to speculate that the source of this misconception were "factions" of fans engaging in discourse about which Fallout games are better.

"Well, look, when we went to do that game [New Vegas], we were coming off of Fallout 3. We knew we were going to do Skyrim. We know the folks at Obsidian well, love their work. And so, you know, reached out to them and said 'Hey, would you like to do this? We see something else coming off of Fallout 3,'" he explained.

"So I just find it — I think fans debate what their favorite one is, which is understandable. I think it's great that you can have, we'll call it factions in the fans," Howard continued. "'Oh, I like 1 or 2 or 3 or 4 or Vegas or 76 now.' And so, I think that's really healthy for a franchise where people can say which one is their favorite."

Frankly, I've always found this idea that Bethesda shuns New Vegas to be ridiculous, and it's unfortunate that negative disinformation like that tends to spread like wildfire — resulting in misconceptions like this one that ultimately have no actual proof behind them.

It's good, then, that Howard has addressed it directly, and hopefully this will be the end of it (though there will inevitably be some that vehemently believe he lied for the camera, because of course there will). I mean, Bethesda is heavily involved with the TV show that just made New Vegas Season 2's main location. I think it's safe to say this assumption is unfounded.

Note that every Fallout game — including New Vegas — is available to play through Xbox Game Pass, either on Xbox consoles or on PC.

Fans of Bethesda's (and now, Xbox's) massively popular fantasy open-world RPG franchise The Elder Scrolls have been starved of a new entry to play, with the latest being a little 2011 game called Skyrim that you might have heard about. And while Oblivion Remastered was certainly a nice appetizer, but the main course everyone's hungry for is The Elder Scrolls 6.

It's been in the oven for a long time; it was announced over seven years ago during E3 2018 with a short teaser trailer, and we've heard very little about it since then, as much of Bethesda's development efforts were focused on Starfield for many years. Now, though, we actually have a new update from game director and executive producer Todd Howard, as well as a few other Bethesda devs.

"It’s progressing really well. The majority of the studio’s on VI, but I’ll say this: We always overlap. So, we’re very used to overlapping development," Howard told Game Informer when asked about the upcoming title.

"And we have long pre-productions on things so that we feel good about them. And it’s a process," he added. "We all wish it went a little bit faster — or a lot faster — but it’s a process that we want to get right."

Howard's mention of "overlapping development" no doubt alludes to the fact that Bethesda is also developing more Starfield DLC (it teased the "Terran Armada" on social media earlier this year) alongside The Elder Scrolls 6, and has begun early work on Fallout 5 as well. That game is ages away, I'm sure, but it has been confirmed.

Studio director Angela Browder and studio design director Emil Pagliarulo shared their own thoughts about the development of The Elder Scrolls 6 as well, expressing excitement about its gameplay advancements and possibilities with how far the gaming industry has come in the last 15 years. They also maintained that Bethesda is making the right choice by taking their time with the game, and not rushing.

“It’s wonderful to be back in this Elder Scrolls universe. As the internet likes to tell us, it’s been a while," commented Browder. "And the industry and the hardware and all of this have made such huge leaps and bounds since the last time we made one of these, like, I’m actively excited about what’s in front of us, because the opportunities, the hardware, the rendering, all of this stuff has just…the possibilities are crazy!"

She went on to say that The Elder Scrolls 6 "is this endless set of possibilities" that's exciting for someone working on the game, and also for those admiring the way the industry has progressed. "It’s gonna be dope. It’s dope!"

"I can say that it’s going! It’s funny, because the time pressure that players put on us, we don’t put on ourselves. And I know that can be frustrating for players who are dying to play a game," noted Pagliarulo, before highlighting GTA 6's recent delay and applauding Rockstar's decision.

"And so, what do fans really want? Do they want a game that comes out before it should and doesn’t meet their expectations? Or do they want the turkey that is in the oven for long enough to be delicious when it finally comes out of the oven, you know? That’s what I think people are going to want," he continued. "So, we’re going to take our time and as long as it needs to be to be great."

Indeed, as Howard indicated last month, The Elder Scrolls 6 is still "a long ways off." With that said, it's still reassuring to hear that development of the game is going well, and that the team working on it is excited to share it with the world once it's ready in a few years. It's expected on Xbox, PC, and PlayStation, and will be available on Xbox Game Pass as a Microsoft first-party title.

FAQ

The big premiere of Season 2 of the Fallout TV series is now under two weeks away, and with fans excitedly looking forward to its arrival on December 17 and the weekly episodic releases to follow, there's one big question on many a mind: how will the TV show handle the ending of Fallout: New Vegas?

It's something folks have been wondering about since the end of Season 1 strongly teased a focus on the post-apocalyptic city from which Obsidian Entertainment's acclaimed and fan-favorite 2010 game gets its namesake. The Season 2 trailer from Gamescom confirmed this — and along with other marketing materials, it's shown factions and characters from the RPG like the Kings, Caesar's Legion, and New Vegas' founder Robert House (Mr. House).

With the TV show set in 2296 — nine years after Fallout 4 and 15 after the events of New Vegas — this begs the question of what exactly happened. After all, through gameplay and story choices in New Vegas, you can help the New California Republic (NCR), Caesar's Legion, or Mr. House control the city and the wider Mojave Wasteland area, or alternatively, you can take it over yourself.

Ahead of Season 2's release, the showrunners of Fallout have finally addressed this, noting that they took a "fog of war approach" in regards to New Vegas' four different endings, and doesn't make any one of them canon in the TV series' narrative.

But what does that mean, exactly? Well, speaking with IGN, executive producers Geneva Robertson-Dworet and Jonathan Nolan noted that co-showrunner Graham Wagner (along with Robertson-Dworet) opted to make what happened in and after the events of New Vegas ambiguous, with each faction potentially having an argument that they "won."

“We had the delicious idea that at the end of a conflict, 15 years down the line, every faction might think they won, which I think has a bit of a poetic quality to it,” Nolan said. “It's like, the story of history depends on who you ask. That was the idea," Robertson-Dworet added.

Nolan also went on to say that New Vegas' different factions are all in "rebuilding mode" in the aftermath of the climactic events of the game, leading to some deterioration in the setting. The Elvis-worshipping street gang the Kings, for example, have all become ghouls, while the high-class "sanctity of Vegas" has been "violated."

“One of the fun ideas is that, with all the factions, whether it's the Legion, or the NCR, or the Kings, is that in any version of the ending, there'd be some rebuilding to be done, right?" He explained. "Whoever won, whoever lost, all these factions would be in rebuilding mode, and the sort of sanctity of Vegas, this place that House very carefully protected, has been, for reasons we'll come to understand in the season, has been removed or violated, which means that the folks who were in the game, safe and sound, have had some hard times.”

Still, locations like The Strip and Freeside will all be instantly recognizable to fans of New Vegas, so it's not like the city is a smoking crater or anything. The Strip in particular was described as “a very sacred kind of location" by Robertson-Dworet, so I don't expect it to look too different from the way it appears in Obsidian's game.

The Fallout TV show is doing right by New Vegas players

Robertson-Dworet explained that the reason for this "fog of war approach" is ultimately that "we wanted to try, as much as possible in our show, to honor all gamers' experiences and all the choices they might make as they play the game. So we always wanted to avoid trying to make one canonical ending the ending that led to the events of the show.”

This made me very happy to read, because I do think this is an important thing to keep in mind when you're adapting an RPG franchise in which the choices players make are very meaningful to them and their experience. The decision to go with a more obscure canon leaves room for the imagination to fill in blanks, and avoids invalidating anyone's chosen path in New Vegas. That consideration is much appreciated.

We can only speculate about the events that led to the state New Vegas is in now. I'm sure we'll learn plenty more details in Fallout Season 2, which premieres December 17.

Note that Fallout: New Vegas and every other Fallout game is on Xbox Game Pass, including the Xbox Game Pass Premium, PC Game Pass, and Xbox Game Pass Ultimate tiers.

FAQ

It's nearly the most wonderful time of the year, almost to that month when we get to watch a new season of the Fallout TV series.

As it inches ever-closer, a new trailer for Season 2 of Bethesda Game Studios and Prime Video's stellar video game adaptation was shared on Thursday, giving another look at what's in store with this return to the Wasteland. You can check out the new trailer below:

There is a lot to take in, with action, explosions, and even a couple of new actors. Macauley Culkin (Home Alone) and Kumail Nanjiani (Eternals) are both present here, with the former involved as some sort of leading figure in Caesar's Legion, while the latter is part of the Brotherhood of Steel.

One of the most interesting aspects of this trailer for me is not just what was shown, but what was heard. Around the 1:10 mark, when the screen goes black, we hear an extremely deep voice, and it sure sounds like a Super Mutant to me.

If so, then I'm extra-excited to see just what group (if any) this particular mutant may belong to and what their role could be. Outside of a brief glimpse of a dead Nightkin, we haven't seen Super Mutants in the Fallout TV series yet, and this season is already introducing several other series mainstays, including the iconic Deathclaw.

This season seems to be extremely focused on New Vegas, so I'm also quite curious about how the series will thread the needle of not picking particular routes and choices, considering how open-ended the fan-favorite Fallout: New Vegas is.

Season 2 of the Fallout TV series arrives on December 17, and I'll definitely be checking it out after how good the first season was. If you haven't watched it yet, you can catch up on Prime Video or snag a 4K Blu-ray copy.

As we wait for one of the best video game adaptations to return, more are coming

Outside of the Fallout TV series (which has already been renewed for a third season), there are a few other video game adaptations percolating right now, including several other Xbox properties.

Many of the same team behind the Fallout TV series are reportedly teaming up with Amazon MGM Studios once again for another Bethesda Softworks property with MachineGames' Wolfenstein.

A Call of Duty movie is on the way from Activision and Paramount, and the companies have signed a deal for Hollywood duo Taylor Sheridan and Peter Berg to helm the film.

Meanwhile, writing for a Gears of War movie at Netflix is underway, and a sequel to A Minecraft Movie (which earned nearly a billion dollars at the box office earlier this year) is already dated for 2027.

FAQ

Any fans of The Elder Scrolls that are wondering when it'll finally be time for the sixth mainline entry in Bethesda Game Studios fantasy role-playing series will be waiting a while longer.

The Elder Scrolls 6 is "still a long ways off," according to executive producer Todd Howard, who shared that small update in an interview with GQ.

“I’m preaching patience,” he says. “I don’t want fans to feel anxious.”

While The Elder Scrolls 6 was first announced with a small teaser all the way back at E3 2018, Bethesda Game Studios hasn't shared anything since, with the team focused on the release of its science-fiction title Starfield in 2023.

Howard goes on to add that while the studio now has "hundreds" of people working on the Fallout franchise "with 76 and some other things we're doing," The Elder Scrolls 6 is currently the studio's main focus.

He also notes that he considers it a good thing for Bethesda to have breaks in betwee its different games instead of just doing direct sequels, though he admits that the gap for The Elder Scrolls has been "too long."

"I think Fallout 3 has the best opening," Howard says, when asked what the best game he's worked on is. "I think Starfield has by far the best gunplay and gameplay in areas. I think the varied landscape of Fallout 76 is really good. Tonally and player agency-wise, I think Skyrim is really good."

Interestingly, when asked about how The Elder Scrolls 4: Oblivion Remastered was shadow-dropped back in April and if The Elder Scrolls 6 could follow a similar pattern, Howard doesn't say no.

"You might say that was a test run," he says. "It worked out well."

As the wait continues, more Starfield DLC is on the way

While I would truly admire the audacity of suddenly sharing a bunch of trailers and saying "Hey, The Elder Scrolls 6 is out today!" I truly do not think this will happen. That game is utterly massive, and will easily be one of the biggest single-player games from the Xbox first-party division to release whatever decade it arrives.

Keeping things shrouded until the year it's finally ready to launch, then having a blitz over the course of a few months? Now that, I can buy.

Learning that the game isn't close may be disappointing, but it's not surprising. I've maintained for a long while that The Elder Scrolls 6 will arrive in 2028, and I'm sticking to that timeline.

For Fallout players, the wait for Fallout 5 will be even longer, though at least players can look forward to Season 2 of the Fallout TV series arriving on December 17, as well as reports of a Fallout 3 remaster in development.

As we continue waiting, hopefully we'll learn more about what is next for Starfield soon. Bethesda confirmed back in August that a second expansion was on the way, alongside free updates that include changes to how space exploration gameplay works.

Little is known about the next story expansion, but Bethesda has teased the "Terran Armada" is on the way, which could have serious implications for the universe of Starfield and what's happening in its story.

FAQ

Developer Bethesda Game Studios celebrated the 10-year anniversary of one of its biggest and most beloved RPGs, Skyrim, in 2021 with The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim Anniversary Edition — a version of the game that included all its DLC as well as hundreds of curated community-made Creation Club add-ons. Now, four years later, it's done the same with its popular 2015 shooter RPG Fallout 4.

A full decade after Fallout 4's initial release, Bethesda has released Fallout 4: Anniversary Edition across Xbox, PlayStation, and PC. First revealed late last month on Fallout Day, this $59.99 version of the title is similar to the aforementioned Skyrim re-release in that it includes all of Fallout 4's DLC as well as over 150 pieces of Creation Club content including quests, weapons, armors, and more.

There's also an Anniversary Edition Upgrade available for those that already own Fallout 4, and want to expand their copy of the RPG with its expansions and a suite of player-made, developer-curated mods from the Creation Club.

However, the Anniversary Edition — its upgrade, in particular — is a bit confusing at a glance, and if existing Fallout 4 owners aren't careful, they might accidentally purchase content they already have by buying it. If that's you, though, don't worry; I've explained everything you need to know below, including all of the content it features, whether or not you should get it based on what parts of Fallout 4 you currently own, and what you should buy instead if you want all of its content without overspending.

Fallout 4: Anniversary Edition Upgrade, explained

Ultimately, whether or not you should buy the Anniversary Edition Upgrade is dependent on what parts of Fallout 4 you have already. The upgrade is $39.99 — though thanks to a deal, it's just $34.29 at Loaded (CDKeys) for the Steam version of Fallout 4 — and includes all six of the game's expansions as well as 150 Creations, but not the base game as the full Anniversary Edition does.

Therefore, if you own the base $19.99 version of Fallout 4, getting the Anniversary Edition Upgrade is a good idea, as it will give you everything you don't yet own. Note that on PC, this basic edition is just $5.79 with this discount, so you can save big by buying it and then the upgrade instead of buying the full $59.99 Anniversary Edition if you don't already own the game.

However, if you have the $39.99 Fallout 4: Game of the Year Edition that includes all the DLC, you should not get the Anniversary Edition Upgrade, as you'll be unnecessarily buying all the expansions if you do. Sadly, the upgrade's price doesn't get reduced if you already have Fallout 4's DLC, so it's entirely possible to accidentally spend $20 you don't have to here.

Instead, Fallout 4: Game of the Year Edition owners should buy the $19.99 Fallout 4 Creations Bundle that only includes the suite of 150 Creation Club items. By doing so, you'll get the content from the Anniversary Edition that you don't have, without wasting money on DLCs you already own. Notably, it's also on sale for $17.79 at Loaded, so if you play on Steam, take advantage of that deal to save a few dollars.

FAQ

It'll soon be time to explore the Wasteland yet again. During Fallout Day 2025, Bethesda Game Studios shared the news that Fallout 4: Anniversary Edition is on the way, and is slated to launch across Xbox, PC, and PlayStation on Nov. 10, 2025, a decade after the game's original release.

This new version of the game naturally includes all the DLC and expansions that were released years ago, but also over 150 pieces of Creation Club content and, for the first time, a Creations menu like in Bethesda's Starfield and The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim. This is meant to make it easier for players to find and install new community-crafted content.

While 2025 brings this re-release package to existing platforms, it's also headed to an entirely-new console.

Fallout 4: Anniversary Edition is coming to Nintendo Switch 2, meaning players with Nintendo's latest console will be able to take their adventures on the go. There is no exact release date at this time, but Bethesda says this version will launch at some point in 2026.

This marks the second Bethesda Softworks-published game to be slated for arrival on Nintendo Switch 2, with MachineGames' Indiana Jones and the Great Circle also planned for a 2026 launch on Nintendo's platform.

I'm curious if we'll see any others in the future. Another obvious choice would be id Software's DOOM: The Dark Ages, but we'll have to wait and see.

The developers recently optimized the game so that it runs better on gaming handhelds like the Steam Deck and Xbox Ally, so I have faith the team could get it working in decent shape on Nintendo Switch 2 as well.

Fallout is capping off 2025 in a big way

Fallout 4: Anniversary Edition may be launching next month, but it's hardly the only big Fallout news of the year.

The Fallout TV series is set to return with a December 17 premiere on Prime Video, and new episodes launching weekly. Season 2 has Lucy and The Ghoul drawn into the city of New Vegas, while clips from the teaser trailer indicate we'll see Caesar's Legion, Mr. House, and of course, a Deathclaw.

The first season was a smash hit, so much so that it rapidly became one of Amazon's biggest-ever series and was renewed for a third season well in advance of the second season's premiere.

For anyone that wants more to play, The Ghoul isn't bound to the TV series and will be arriving in Fallout 76 with the upcoming Burning Springs expansion in December. Actor Walton Goggins is reprising his role, so you can look forward to hearing the same seasoned tones when the expansion arrives.

This expansion has The Ghoul handing out bounty targets, with players able to complete contracts and turn them in for some hard-earned Caps.

FAQ

One of the year's biggest games is finally getting a physical edition, with Bethesda and Xbox's Oblivion Remastered coming to discs.

The official Bethesda Game Studios Bluesky account shared the news on Monday, announcing the physical edition of The Elder Scrolls 4: Oblivion Remastered through a fun mock-up, showing it as an item in a player's in-game inventory.

When you've cleared two goblin caves, an underwater shipwreck, and the entire town of Hackdirt, and you still can't remember where you picked this item up. 🤔

— @elderscrolls.bethesdastudios.com (@elderscrolls.bethesdastudios.com.bsky.social) 2025-09-30T09:45:32.826Z

The physical deluxe edition of The Elder Scrolls 4: Oblivion Remastered is set to launch on Oct. 13, 2025. Preorder listings are now available on Amazon, and you can buy it for Xbox Series X or PlayStation 5. Bear in mind that you'll obviously need a console with a disc drive.

Developed by Virtuos with oversight from Bethesda Game Studios, Oblivion Remastered brings back Bethesda's 2006 role-playing game, The Elder Scrolls 4: Oblivion, with new visuals rendered in Unreal Engine 5, sitting on top of the original game. The game launched digitally back in April across Xbox Series X|S, Windows PC, and PlayStation 5.

The remaster also includes a number of other improvements, with better-feeling combat, accessibility options, and more. It's been extremely popular, reaching over 9 million players and becoming the second best-selling game of the year in the U.S, as of July 2025, per analytics firm Circana.

In my review of The Elder Scrolls 4: Oblivion Remastered, I wrote that "I appreciate this game's authenticity to what Oblivion is at its core, keeping everything that mattered (including a fair number of shenanigans) while updating it to be more palatable and accessible on modern hardware."

I hope this physical version includes the game on the disc

While it's great to see this game getting a dedicated physical release for those players who still prefer to buy physical games, I do hope this is a proper release, with the game actually on the disc.

An increasing number of physical game launches in recent years don't actually have much of the game data on the disc, effectively making it a decorative coaster used for a license check to download and play the rest of the game.

This is more understandable in some cases than others, but it's particularly irksome and inexcusable with single-player titles. I'm crossing my fingers that Oblivion Remastered is actually going to include the full game on the disc, especially since it's coming months after the game's digital launch.

I'm not personally much of a physical collector, and I'm sympathetic to developers when it comes to how games change over time. Patches, updates, downloadable content; if these come after a game's initial physical launch, they can't possibly be included on the disc.

It's why I've argued for some time that in most cases, a physical edition coming after the digital release makes more sense. Players who do still want a physical game deserve to get a proper version with everything possible included.

As an aside, if you haven't bought Oblivion Remastered yet, this is a great deal, as it's $20 less than the price of the Deluxe Edition when it first launched back in April.

The Elder Scrolls 4: Oblivion Remastered is currently available on Xbox Series X|S, Windows PC, and PlayStation 5. As an Xbox first-party title, it's also available on Xbox Game Pass Ultimate and PC Game Pass.

On Sept. 5, 2025, the official Starfield Bluesky account posted a message for players, celebrating two years since Bethesda Game Studios' science-fiction role-playing game first launched.

"Celebrating two incredible years in the #Starfield." the post reads. "Thank you to everyone who has explored the Settled Systems with us. We look forward to the adventures yet to come."

Accompanying this is a short video that initially shows the Starfield logo with the text "Happy Anniversary," but this text suddenly begins glitching out, with flashes of other words before the video ends.

Going frame-by-frame, it's pretty clear that there are two barely-hidden words in the message: Terran Armada.

Is the next Starfield DLC Terran Armada?

Right now, it's unclear exactly what this means, but there are some obvious takeaways.

Bethesda Game Studios parent company, ZeniMax Media, previously filed a trademark for the term "Starborn" which many (myself included) speculated could be the title of a new expansion following the release of 2024's Shattered Space.

I'll hold off on spoilers for now, but Starborn refers to a group of people in the main story of Starfield, including the player character.

It's possible that plans could've changed, however, or even that Starborn isn't the next planned DLC. I'm inclined to believe that Terran Armada is the name of the next expansion, as otherwise it would be a bit weird to prominently display text in a teaser like this.

No matter what, we know Bethesda Game Studios is developing the next expansion, with producer Tim Lamb recently confirming that work is continuing, with other parts of the team also working on free updates, including improvements to space gameplay.

When I previously covered this news, I speculated that some of the other free improvements that could be offered could include Space Station construction, letting players build bases in the deep of space or in orbit around moons and planets. This could even lead to further random quests, such as having to defend a station against attacking pirates.

What could this next expansion bring?

It's important to note that in order to really examine just what this next DLC could bring, there will be some spoilers for Starfield's main story.

Still here? Okay, good.

Starborn characters hail from different universes, with the player character also becoming Starborn and able to visit new versions of reality after going through the Unity, which functions as an explanation for Starfield's New Game Plus mode.

After going through the Unity, players can see different timelines, with some radically varying changes in regard to characters and factions.

There are some major constants however, as no matter what, you'll always see Earth has been long-abandoned in favor of the Settled Systems.

In Starfield, there is no currently-known faction called the Terran Armada. The name certainly implies Earth-based forces (Terra means Earth or Land in Latin), which doesn't seem possible given the timeline of events in Starfield.

To speculate, what if this faction is so new because it hails from a completely different dimension, perhaps a world where Earth wasn't abandoned after its atmosphere was destroyed? If that's the case, we could see something akin to Star Trek's Mirror Dimension, an alternate universe where instead of minor changes, things are radically different.

From there, we could possibly have to rally the factions of the Settled Systems to defend against extradimensional invaders. The possibilities have me excited.

No matter what, I'm curious to see when this next DLC could be launched. I'm not expecting it to arrive this year, but maybe early in 2026, to coincide with the aforementioned major free updates?

Starfield is currently available on Xbox Series X|S and Windows PC (Steam and Xbox PC). Like all Xbox first-party games, it's also available in Xbox Game Pass.

Details are still vague, but we've got at least a small idea for what's coming next to Bethesda Game Studios' science-fiction role-playing game, Starfield, and it includes upgrades that players have wanted.

In a "developer spotlight" video, producer Tim Lamb talks about his work at Bethesda Game Studios, having contributed to titles like The Elder Scrolls 4: Oblivion, Fallout 3, The Elder Scrolls 5: Skyrim, Fallout 4, Fallout 76, and, most recently, Starfield.

After discussing a bit of what made working on Starfield different compared to other Bethesda Game Studios titles, Lamb continues by teasing a bit of what is coming next, saying that "I'm really excited for players to see what the team's been working on."

"We have some cool stuff coming, including free updates and features that players have been asking for, as well as a new DLC story," he says.

"I can't go into all the details just yet, but I will say, part of the team has been focused on space gameplay to make the travels there more rewarding. We're also adding some new game systems and a few other smaller delights."

It's not too surprising that a second DLC expansion is in development — executive producer Todd Howard previously indicated the plan was for more than one expansion — but it's still nice to have confirmation this DLC is still underway.

That said, it does seem fairly clear to me that there have been some internal delays. Starfield has received a couple of updates this year, with improvements for Creations made by modders and new "Very Low" settings that are ideal for gaming handhelds.

Still, that comes up short compared to what the team was saying at the start of 2025, when they communicated that there were a lot of exciting things planned for the year.

The year isn't over yet, and it's certainly possible we could see some of these updates Lamb was teasing arrive before 2025 is up, but I wouldn't be surprised if the expansion and the lion's share of the updates are waiting until sometime in early 2026.

Here's what I want to see in these Starfield updates

So, just what will we get?

Straight away, the fact that Lamb teases updates regarding space gameplay is tantalizing. I really enjoyed my time with Starfield like many other people, but there's no question that jumping from spot to spot can get old, with limited activities outside of dogfights with enemy ships.

If Bethesda can implement new kinds of random encounters and new ways of interacting in space using our ships, then I (and a lot of others) will be quite happy.

Outside of that, I really hope to see two features added. The first is the ability to build and customize our own space stations. This feels like a fairly natural extension of the ship-building and base construction that's already in the game.

Being able to set up a station that can keep a few vessels docked and benefit resource extraction in a base on the planet or moon below would be great. We could even have random encounters that incorporate the stations, possibly having to defend them from attackers.

The second feature I'd like to see is some form of underwater exploration. Adding underwater biomes would make many planets more interesting to explore, especially if there are underwater alien creatures to study that could also pose new aquatic threats.

As for the story DLC, I can only speculate, but I hope with the rumored "Starborn" title that it ties into the game's ending. I won't spoil you if you haven't reached the "end" of the game, but there are a lot of fun possibilities the developers could explore there.

More to come for other Bethesda projects

Outside of Starfield, players of Bethesda Game Studios titles can look forward to the return of the Fallout TV series this year, with Season 2 promising more adventures across and around the infamous city of New Vegas.

The second season is set to premiere on December 17, with new episodes dropping weekly.

The first teaser trailer for the Fallout TV series Season 2 debuted during Opening Night Live at Gamescom 2025, and there is a lot to take in.

The trailer for Prime Video's critically acclaimed adaptation of the Bethesda Game Studios role-playing games shies away from sharing too much on the story front, instead focusing on the cast of characters and some gory action.

Still, I'm here to do some business (scroll frame-by-frame over and over again) with a big iron on my hip (a mouse, keyboard, and access to the Windows Central CMS), which means I've spent some time figuring out just where this season could be headed based on what little has been shown so far.

If you haven't watch the trailer carefully, you may have missed these details, and the implications they hold for the next chapter of Fallout.

1. The Brotherhood of Steel controls Area 51

First up, a brief shot establishes some fascinating news, as a Brotherhood of Steel airship is shown hovering over some hangar bays. Look carefully, and you'll see the words "Area 51" on the silos.

This gives the faction an anchor point to establish a base near the West Coast, but there's more.

With control of Area 51, who knows what pre-war secrets the Brotherhood now has access to? As a reminder, aliens canonically exist in Fallout (yes, the Mothership Zeta DLC in Fallout 3, the random encounters in Fallout 4, and the Fallout 76 update are all canon), so it's possible, if unlikely, that the zealots will find otherworldly technology in addition to whatever the U.S. government was developing there.

I'm not expecting the show to go too hard on this aspect, but I'm not ruling it out either.

2. Caesar's Legion...and a new Caesar?

It's impossible to miss that Lucy has made her way into a camp of Caesar's Legion. I've seen suggestions that this clip means Caesar's Legion must've canonically won the Second Battle of Hoover Dam, but I don't think that's likely. This could easily be a remnant, a group of stragglers banding together. So, who is leading them?

Whoever they are, they have a laurel reminiscent of the historic Civil Crown, as well as the pointed armor pauldrons of Lanius, the second-in-command of Caesar's Legion during the events of Fallout: New Vegas. So, is this Lanius, or merely someone who scavenged his corpse?

3. We're getting a flashback of the Battle of Anchorage

Part of the conflict between the U.S. and China in the Fallout timeline saw fighting in Alaska, where U.S. soldiers eventually pushed the Chinese out in the months before the atomic bombs fell.

Cooper previously mentioned in the show's first season that he used to wear a suit of armor, and indeed, we get a quick look at him wearing what appears to be T-51 power armor as snow falls in a forest.

I'm betting this is a flashback to his days fighting, which would've partially taken place in Anchorage, Alaska.

4. The Brotherhood of Steel has a fleet of airships

Another quick clip in the trailer shows Maximus and an unknown member of the Brotherhood of Steel as they run away across the desert. The kicker? In the sky, we can clearly see THREE airships, with a fourth crashing into the dunes.

In Fallout 4, the Brotherhood commanded only a single airship, the Prydwen, which they are capable of using to great effect. That same airship shows up briefly in the first season of the TV series.

This one clip raises the most questions for me. How has the Brotherhood got this many ships up and running? Have they called in reinforcements from the Eastern division, or is this "merely" the strength of the western group? And what managed to bring an airship down?

5. The power is still on in parts of New Vegas

This is a smaller thing, but it's still worth noting: During a firefight as an explosion goes off near The Ghoul, you can clearly see that some of the neon signs in New Vegas are still powered on.

While the city looks abandoned in earlier shots in the trailer, this has to imply there's still some level of functionality, and raises further questions regarding exactly what happened here.

6. Yeah...that's a Radscorpion

Another quick clip that you could easily be forgiven for missing, but careful examination shows multiple eyes and distinctive pincers in this close-up shot of a creature, meaning that's clearly a Radscorpion.

We did see some mutated wildlife in the first season, with Radroaches, a new breed of Gulpers, and even a Yao Guai, but the Mojave Wasteland has plenty of threats that have remained hidden. Until now, at least.

7. The Kings now seem to be Ghouls

Finally, I want to point out that there's something strange about the ghouls Lucy is seen gunning down in the trailer. Specifically, they are former members of the Kings.

The Kings were a gang in Fallout: New Vegas that styled their hair and clothes after Elvis Presley. If they've all become feral ghouls, it raises serious questions about how and continues to add to the mysteries of what has happened to this city.

A few months until the premiere

What do you think? Is there something else you've noticed in the trailer that has you theorizing? If so, please let me know!

Fallout Season 2 is set to premiere on Prime Video on Dec. 17, 2025. From there, episodes will drop weekly, eschewing the model used for the first season, which dropped all eight episodes at once.

As previously promised, the first trailer for the Fallout TV series Season 2 showed up during Opening Night Live at Gamescom 2025.

Executive producer Jonah Nolan took to the stage to introduce the trailer for the second season of the massive Prime Video show set in the world of Bethesda Game Studios' role-playing titles.

Nolan was accompanied by showrunner Geneva Robertson-Dworet, as well as actors Ella Purnell and Aaron Moten. You can see the teaser trailer for Fallout Season 2 below:

Across the teaser trailer, we see Lucy MacLean and The Ghoul in pursuit of Lucy's father Hank, who has fled to New Vegas.

"The question is what she's gonna do when she finds her dad," says actress Purnell.

The Mojave Wasteland is a dangerous place however, and the duo are accosted by numerous threats, including what appears to be Caesar's Legion and what is definitely a Deathclaw, one of the apex predators of the nuclear world.

Meanwhile, Maximus is further ingratiated with the Brotherhood of Steel than ever before, and a quick shot shows multiple airships, a sign that the faction's strength seems to be growing more than ever in its pursuit of dominance over the old world's technology.

We've also got some more glimpses of the world before the bombs fell, including what I'm fairly certain is a glimpse of fighting in Alaska, as well as the Mr. House himself (who was already seen briefly in the show's first season).

While we already knew that the second season was set to premiere in December 2025, we now have an exact release date. The Fallout TV series Season 2 is set to begin on December 17, with new episodes dropping weekly.

This is notably a departure from the launch strategy of the first season, which saw all eight episodes made available at once when the series debuted on April 11, 2024.

Fallout Season 2 looks set for a repeat of the first season's success

While we'll have to wait until December 17 to see exactly how things go, the excitement is palpable, and I'm personally expecting this second season to continue the success the show has found so far.

Players of the games and casual newcomers alike didn't really know what to expect when the Fallout TV series was first announced. After all, video game adaptations are extremely hit-or-miss, even if there have been several great shows over the past few years.

Fallout's arrival immediately put concerns to bed, with praise of the dark humor juxtaposed against the serious story, as well as the focus on physical sets and props crafted in loving detail

Fallout quickly became one of Prime Video's biggest shows ever, and as of October 2024, it's reached over 100 million viewers.

If you haven't seen it yet, you can catch up on the first season by watching all eight episodes on Prime Video, or you can snag a 4K Blu-Ray copy. Personally, I really enjoyed the first season, giving it high marks in my review.

I will admit I'm somewhat torn on the decision to release episodes weekly instead of all at once. It's not surprising (with the show's success, Amazon and Bethesda almost certainly want it to be in the social media conversation longer) but I do wish I could watch more than one episode a week.

Personally, my favorite model is the "batch" release, where a handful of episodes are released weekly, like with Netflix's Arcane and Disney's Star Wars: Andor.

Elsewhere during Opening Night Live at Gamescom 2025, we saw a first look at gameplay for Activision's Call of Duty: Black Ops 7, Bethesda Softworks and Machine Games' Indiana Jones and the Great Circle DLC that is launching in September, and much more.