Starfield was launched back in September last year after a delay from its initially planned launch in November 2022. The game has received generally favorable reviews from both fans and critics but has also seen growing criticism for several reasons months after the launch.
The game has over a thousand planets and allows players unmatched freedom of exploration. It also has several main and side quests for players, and the lengthy endgame quest is one of them, but the fun mission wouldn’t have been possible if not for senior-level designer Steve Cornett.
The Main Quest Ending in Starfield Was a Last-Minute Creation
The final mission in Starfield sees players reach Masada 3, where they battle the Starborn ships in orbit and fight several enemies on the surface, traveling to different dimensions and locations that they have first visited in the game. This is one of the longest quests in the game, and its ending was created at the very last minute.
Speaking at the Game Developer Conference in San Francisco, the game’s former lead quest designer, Will Shen, and former Fallout 76 lead level designer, Daryl Brigner, had a conversation about the final quest of the game and revealed what it was missing and how it all came together.
Will Shen stated that while the game was wholly playable, it was “missing the large final location that was going to tie the story together and have a satisfying action-filled payoff.” He further revealed that he was working on “both implementing the main quest and leading the quest design team” and had no time to work on the missing set piece.
That’s when the team decided to turn to senior-level designer Steve Cornett, with Shen saying that “he was definitely our panic button.” He said that Steve Cornett had the idea of dimension hopping, which allowed players to revisit locations and helped save time in creating new locations for the final mission.
The Massive Team Working on Starfield Was the Main Issue for the Game
Will Shen and Daryl Brigner said that the main reason behind not having the time to work on the final quest’s set piece was the massive team that was working on Starfield. It was revealed that more than 500 people were working on Starfield from across Bethesda Game Studios’ departments, as well as developers from Machine Games, Nobody Studios, Snowed In, Arkane, and The Forge Interactive.
The developers added that a large number of people from different studios working on one game could have issues. Shen said that “it’s more difficult than ever to know who does what, who you’re supposed to report to,” while Brigner added that “every department is scrambling for resources and saying ‘no’ to collaboration requests,” which could cause problems for the game and its needs.
However, the team was able to create the missing final part of the quest with the help of level designer Steve Cornett, who put together things to form the lengthy mission. What are your thoughts about this? Let us know in the comments.
