Bethesda plans "years and years" of updates for Starfield, first hotfix out now

Bethesda launched Starfield out to Xbox and PC players last week, offering a sci-fi twist for its tried and true RPG formula. The release turned out to be hugely popular, quickly becoming the studio's biggest launch in its history even while being a Microsoft platform exclusive release. The studio is already looking towards the future, however, with years of updates already being planned.

"First, an enormous thank you to all of you playing Starfield and your support. We are absolutely blown away by the response and all you love about the game," said the company in a blog post today. "We’re also reading all your great feedback on what you’d like to see improved or added to the game."

Bethesda explains that even if some of the popular fan requests, such as the availability of city maps for instance, won't be fulfilled immediately, it plans to support the game with updates and features for "years and years".

"Our priority initially is making sure any top blocker bugs or stability issues are addressed, and adding quality-of-life features that many are asking for," adds the company. It confirmed today that upcoming patches will include things like built-in Brightness and Contrast controls, HDR Calibration, an FOV Slider (which can already be done via file tweaks), and ultra-wide monitor support.

While some fans already have hacked in Nvidia DLSS support for the title, Bethesda will also be implementing the upscaling tech in a future update. A quality of life feature that's requested by many, a button to simply eat the food players encounter in their travels instead of storing them is incoming too. The company is also working with AMD, Nvidia, and Intel for further driver optimizations.

Alongside all this, the studio has pushed out Starfield's first post-launch update today. Version 1.7.29 brings performance improvements and a few bug fixes:

PERFORMANCE AND STABILITY

• Xbox Series X|S Improved stability related to installations.

• Various stability and performance improvements to reduce crashes and improve framerate.

QUESTS

• All That Money Can Buy: Fixed an issue where player activity could result in a quest blocker.

• Into the Unknown: Fixed an issue that could prevent the quest from appearing after the game is completed.

• Shadows in Neon: Fixed an issue where player activity could result in a quest blocker.

Official modding support for PC and Xbox consoles was also announced as coming in early 2024, something which Bethesda head Todd Howard already confirmed recently.

Starfield is out now across PC, Xbox Series X|S, as well as across Xbox and PC Game Pass subscription services.

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