Bethesda games certainly aren't lacking in launch issues—the presence of charming bugs and funny physics glitches are sort of the studio's maker's mark at this point, although with the lukewarm reception of Starfield, that reputation's also begun to tip over into subpar features, too.
That's not to say the devs aren't aware of the state these games launch in, though. In an interview with Dennis Mejillones from last year that's currently making the rounds (thanks, GamesRadar+), the retired artist, who worked on Skyrim, Fallout, and Starfield, explains:
"I have a ton of valid criticism of myself for Skyrim, Fallout, Fallout 76, Starfield—I have my own strong criticism, we all do … I can almost guarantee you that like, 95% of the stuff that players have brought up after a game was launched? Every single developer, just about, has brought [them] up as a concern in the meetings.
"We're gamers, we're going to play the game, we play and see the same things that the gamers do." That's all fair enough, honestly. I've never respected the idea that videogame developers are somehow 'lazy'—most are trying very hard to make a good game. Most issues stem from production, management, and the simple fact that videogames need to make money and have to come out, like, at some point.
Mejillones shares that Todd Howard expressed a very similar rub to him in those same meetings: "Todd used to say in meetings all the time: We can do anything, but we can't do everything."
That doesn't mean you've gotta give up, though—Mejillones uses Fallout 76 as an example which, to Bethesda's credit, is basically good nowadays: "They could've dropped the game, they could've just let it go—but they didn't, they kept pushing it and improving it … Starfield, same thing, they keep pushing it and trying to update it."
This is where my skepticism creeps in—admittedly with the unfair advantage of a year of hindsight, and statements that Howard himself has made in the interim. But when the head of your studio says that Starfield probably won't be getting a 2.0 overhaul, it's hard to imagine a 76-style revival.
