Fans would’ve been able to play the highly anticipated Starfield right now, but it has been delayed to provide developer support according to Phil Spencer.
It’s no secret Starfield, what fans refer to as ‘Skyrim in space,’ has been delayed out of 2022. But as game development goes, delays can lead to a good product, and time crunches put undue stress on developers, ultimately leading to huge mistakes down the line. A good example of this, is the latest statement made by Doom Eternal composer Mick Gordon on the botched soundtrack release, notably published by the same Bethesda.
While time crunches are stressful in any medium, CEO of Microsoft Gaming Phil Spencer, has doubled down on support of the delay of the latest AAA Bethesda published title, calling it “the right thing to do” in a recent interview posted by The Verge. On the delayed release, Spencer issued a lengthy statement saying:
In hindsight, when you look at a game like Starfield, it’s taken so long and so much investment in new IP from the team. The decision to give the team the time to build the game that they feel they should be building is just the right thing to do. There are financial implications to those decisions. Weighing what is going to happen, whether it’s platform growth, subscriber growth, or frankly, the revenue that you generate when a new game launches, those are business decisions. You definitely have to weigh the outcome of those decisions.
Phil Spencer, from The Verge
In retrospect, Phil Spencer outlined the problems with a game delay so close to the Holiday season. Instead of filling Microsoft’s coffers, the decision to support Todd Howard (Starfield Director), and the rest of the development staff instead of forcing the game out ‘as promised’ was a decision not made lightly, but was overall the best thing to do for the finalized product Spencer notes.
All in all, Starfield will inevitably hit consoles sometime next year hopefully, and while it is delayed, a more polished product is the overall goal instead of speed running development on a huge investment.
