Will Starfield have multiplayer? This is the question on many people’s lips at the moment following the news that Starfield will have “over 1,000” 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.
This huge open world designed by Bethesda is going to take hundreds – maybe even thousands – of hours to experience in full, making it the company’s biggest game to date. And given there are countless of other multiplayer space games out there that Starfield has undoubtedly taken inspiration from, like No Man’s Sky and Elite Dangerous, the concept of Starfield multiplayer is a good one.
But will it actually happen? It’s worth remembering that while Bethesda’s RPGs don’t usually include multiplayer or co-op systems, Todd Howard and his team of talented developers have created fully online experiences before with the likes of Fallout 76 and and Elder Scrolls Online in the past so it does have precedent for these types of things.
But will Starfield have that same treatment? Here’s everything we know so far about Starfield multiplayer, including whether the game will have it and in what capacity.
Will Starfield have multiplayer?
Unfortunately, it seems like Starfield won’t have multiplayer. 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.
While Howard hasn’t commented on this since 2020, it’s unlikely that Bethesda’s stance has changed on this. Starfield has – and always will be – a game that’s focused around storytelling.
We’ve also not heard a peep about Starfield multiplayer in any of the subsequent reveals, suggesting the game will ship without multiplayer capabilities.
However, even if the Starfield release date rolls around and the game launches without multiplayer, that’s not to say it won’t happen. Bethesda has, in the past, added multiplayer functionality into its games – so who knows what the future might hold.
For now though, you might as well sink your teeth into the best Xbox open world games currently available. Some of them even have multiplayer functionality to stave off your exploration thirst.
