Does Starfield have multiplayer? This is the question on many people’s lips at the moment following the news that Starfield will have 1001 planets to explore across the galaxy. Exploring these vast open worlds is set to be an incredible experience, but we all know it’d be ten times more fun with a friend in Starfield multiplayer or Starfield co-op.
This huge open world designed by Bethesda is going to take hundreds of hours to experience in full, making it the company’s biggest game to date as we mention in our Starfield review. And given there are countless other multiplayer space games out there that Starfield has undoubtedly taken inspiration from, like No Man’s Sky and Elite Dangerous, it would be great to see it here so it can become one of the best Xbox co-op games.
Does Starfield have multiplayer?
There is no Starfield multiplayer or co-op mode. The feature is not in the game and it seems unlikely that the game will ever get co-op because Bethesda Games Studios mainline RPGs have never had it, outside of Fallout 76 (which was a spinoff).
In 2020, Todd Howard noted in a Develop: Brighton interview that Starfield would be a single-player game, even though the team had learned from its experiences with Fallout 76 and Elder Scrolls online in the past.
Have Bethesda Games Studios’ other games had multiplayer?
Only Fallout 76 has had multiplayer. Every other Bethesda Games Studios title for consoles or PC has been a purely single-player experience, including Fallout 4, and The Elder Scrolls 5 Skyrim. As such the studio hasn’t dabbled much in co-op modes. Fallout 76 was even primarily developed by a different studio, their Austin team, rather than their Maryland team.
Starfield is already incredibly ambitious. From the variety of Starfield planets to explore, the depth of Starfield ship customization, and the vast expansive Starfield cities to complete quests and meet people in Bethesda is already shooting for the moon here. Multiplayer likely would have made the game too ambitious and caused what is called ‘scope creep’.
This is when the scope and scale of the game slowly get bigger and bigger outpacing what is possible for the team developing it. It exists in other creative industries too. So, unless Bethesda Games Studios are keen to spend that time post-launch creating a multiplayer mode, it seems unlikely we will see it.
For now, though, you might as well sink your teeth into the best Xbox open-world games currently available that do have some co-op features. That way you can have some fun with your friends even though Starfield multiplayer co-op isn’t a feature in this RPG.