Bethesda Explains Why Modders Are Patching Starfield Faster Than Itself
Bethesda's community manager revealed in a Reddit thread why modders are faster than developers when it comes to patching Starfield.
It's already five months since the premiere of Starfield, and despite evident bugs, the game received only a few meagre updates. And although a few days ago the release of the largest patch to date was announced (currently, its beta version can be downloaded on Steam), which is set to introduce many long-awaited improvements to the game, the community is still disappointed with how long it takes to release even the smallest fixes.
Internet users point out to Bethesda that the updates, which take developers many months to release, are made in a much shorter time by the modding community.
Interestingly, the Bethesda community manager Robert O'Neill addressed the accusations. In one of the Reddit threads dedicated to the future update to Starfield, he pointed out that the long time needed for releases of patches mainly comes from the fact that they have to undergo a "lengthy process of certification and localization, especially when it comes to consoles".
O'Neill also mentioned that the hotfixes brought by modders, the development team fuses into larger bundles, which "allows better build testing when the new code is altogether" All of this makes the game work correctly even with the introduction of many new "interlocking" elements at the same time.
On the one hand, this explaining makes sense because the developers of Starfield deliver fixes in large patches, without releasing daily "hotfixes" which would be required if the game had small updates released regularly. Mods, on the other hand, may take the form of minipatches with individual elements fixed, which may often require constant updates e.g. for every new released official version of the game.
Finally, if we look at the development of Baldur's Gate III in terms of released updates, we can see clearly that criticism from Starfield players is not unfounded, and the game from Bethesda has relatively poor post-release support.
Despite everything, this year's developers' plans for this space RPG remain ambitious. In the near future, the game is set to receive extended support for mods, a large expansion, as well as the mysteriously sounding "new ways of traveling".
