In an interview on the Kinda Funny podcast, Todd Howard spoke at length about how Bethesda Game Studios created the 1000 planets featured in Starfield, which is launching later this year on September 6th (or the 1st for those with a special edition). He confirmed that out of those 1000 planets, only around 10% of them will feature some kind of life.
It was almost to be expected, and Howard did stress that having too many locations, abandoned bases, and settlements on planets scattered all around the galaxy eventually feels far too ‘gamey’ or unrealistic – which is a fair defence.
Prepare for Desolation
While talking about how the vast majority of locations are procedurally generated, Todd Howard mentioned that specific locations have been hand-crafted and specifically placed, but for the most part, the planets in Starfield are desolate, empty, and lifeless.
Spoiler alert: That’s kind of how space works.
Todd Howard said:
It is that moment when you land on some of these barren planets – and again, we will generate certain things for you to find on them – but when you look at a planet, you see the resources, it has things you want… I love the Buzz Aldrin quote – ‘the magnificent desolation.’ I think there’s a certain beauty to landing on those and feeling like ‘I’m one of the only people or the only person to ever visit this planet.’
Mostly, the planets littered around the gargantuan map in Starfield will be good for resource collecting only, but given that easter eggs and secrets could be hidden absolutely anywhere, it’ll likely be years before players fully exhaust the map – if ever.
In the Kinda Funny podcast, Todd Howard also covered the actual exploration aspect of every individual planet, going in-depth on the biomes and environments to be uncovered. He highlighted that almost every planet is more or less unique – Bethesda has worked with temperature, radiation levels, weather effects, gravity, and impacts on a player when constructing these planets.
Do you think it makes sense that ‘only’ 10% of Starfield’s planets have life on them?
For more Insider Gaming news, check out our coverage of the projected price of Sony’s Project Q
