Touching Starfield Memo From Todd Howard Leaks Online

Summary

Bethesda Executive Producer Todd Howard recounts the long-awaited development of Starfield in a leaked internal memo, expressing gratitude to the teams involved.
The memo reveals that Starfield has been in the works since 2013, with the founder of ZeniMax Media, Robert A. Altman, supporting the project until his passing in 2021.
Despite facing challenges such as the global pandemic and Microsoft's acquisition of Bethesda, Howard acknowledges the support of Xbox Head Phil Spencer and the rest of Xbox leadership in the memo.

Bethesda Executive Producer Todd Howard recapped the development of Starfield in a touching internal memo that leaked online mere days ahead of the RPG's much anticipated release. While the newly surfaced communication primarily serves as a thank you to everyone who made the upcoming game possible, it also underlines how Starfield has been a long time coming.

Howard often reiterated how Bethesda wanted to do a space-fairing RPG since the late 90s. And while the company already secured the trademark for its next game in 2013, Starfield only started development several years later, after the studio released Fallout 4 in 2015.

An internal memo obtained by Windows Central has now shed some more light on the circumstances leading up to Starfield getting a green light from Bethesda parent ZeniMax Media. The note—sent to numerous teams at Xbox, Microsoft, and Bethesda itself—opens with Howard recalling how he first pitched Starfield in 2013 to Robert A. Altman, the founder and then-CEO of ZeniMax. Although Altman "looked concerned" when he learned that the concept represented Bethesda's first new IP since the 1996 The Elder Scrolls: Arena, he was on board with the idea by the time Howard finished his pitch, the memo reads.

Bethesda's executive producer recalled how Altman continued supporting the project "no matter the situation" in the years that followed, although he never got to see the end result of Bethesda's development efforts. Namely, the ZeniMax Media founder passed away in early 2021, aged 73. Apart from Altman, Howard also thanked Bethesda's development, publishing, and quality assurance teams, as well as the company's HR department, for helping the studio endure the "most challenging years" in its 37-year history.

The final stretch of Starfield's development marked some exceedingly turbulent times for Bethesda, starting with the 2020 global pandemic that had a significant impact on its day-to-day operations. Altman's subsequent passing was then followed by Microsoft's acquisition of Bethesda and the rest of ZeniMax Media the following year. However, the tech giant employed a rather hands-off approach to managing its 2021 purchase, to the point that ZeniMax continued operating as a separate entity instead of being incorporated into Xbox Game Studios.

Howard remarked on the company's new ownership in the internal memo by thanking Xbox Head Phil Spencer for his continued support of Starfield and every other title under Microsoft's vast umbrella. "I cannot imagine a better place to create games," the industry veteran wrote, noting how the rest of Xbox leadership proved to be equally supportive of the project since the ZeniMax acquisition. Every staffer who received Howard's memo was also given a copy of Starfield's Premium Edition, allowing them to play the game as soon as it enters early access on September 1.

Starfield launches September 6 for PC and Xbox Series X/S.