Ever since it announced Starfield's release date at E3 2021, Bethesda has been pretty generous with teasers about the spacefaring game. Much to the delight of Bethesda fans, the official Bethesda Softworks YouTube channel has released a handful of videos giving fans a better sense of Starfield through concept art and developer commentary. That kind of insight is fairly rare in game development, so it's great to see Bethesda part the curtain for fans for once. Bethesda has stressed a few times that Starfield is its first new game universe in decades, which makes its openness about Starfield's development process very special.
The Starfield concept art shared in these trailers gives a lot of great insight into the kinds of planets and cities that players will visit. This new spacefaring world looks as complex and inviting as one could hope for from RPG titan Bethesda. However, they might imply something a little disappointing too. As far as fans can tell, humans are pretty much the sole focus of Starfield. There's room for uncertainty, but none of the concept art revealed so far clearly indicates that Starfield players can be aliens rather than humans. While that would be understandable given Starfield's themes, it'd be a major loss for character customization and roleplay.
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Starfield's Concept Art Speaks Volumes
Starfield fans suddenly know far more about the game's world than ever thanks to Bethesda. For instance, the studio recently released a couple of short videos spotlighting several major cities that Starfield players might come across. Each of these cities has a unique backstory that results in a completely unique type of community. One of the cities is New Atlantis, capital of the United Colonies faction; developers say that New Atlantis prides itself on its diversity, welcoming humans of every background. Notably, the trailer doesn't clearly establish if sentient aliens coexist with humans in New Atlantis, or if there are sentient aliens to be found in Starfield at all.
The concept art does clearly establish that Starfield's galaxy isn't just filled with lifeless hunks of rock. On the contrary, the art indicates that players will visit lush jungles, dark caverns, and other biomes, and in the process, they'll run into remarkable creatures native to these planets. Starfield's galaxy is clearly alive with more than humanity, and yet it seems that the story is told through human eyes alone. In all of these images, there appear to be humans populating and exploring the teased settings, but there's no clear indication of sentient aliens interacting with humans.
When Bethesda first started teasing Starfield, it wasn't completely clear that the game would even feature any aliens. Its self-described 'NASA punk' aesthetic hinted that it was more about humanity's relationship with space exploration than humanity's relationship with theoretical aliens. The concept art confirms that Starfield features some amount of alien life. However, the absence of explicit depictions of intelligent aliens in Starfield's art suggests that they may not be in the game at all. If that's the case, then there's no hope of playing as aliens in Starfield, which fans really ought to be able to do.
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Why Starfield Should Have Playable Aliens
If Starfield allowed players to customize and play as aliens, it'd go a long way in setting Starfield apart from the crowd. It's surprisingly rare that sci-fi RPG players actually get to play as a non-human. For instance, the original Mass Effect trilogy famously focuses on the human Commander Shepard and their interactions with aliens. The Outer Worlds, a more recent sci-fi RPG star, also focused specifically on human spacefarers and colonists, rather than integrating aliens into the plot. Even many Star Wars games tend to lock players into human characters, even though the Star Wars galaxy is famously stocked with dozens upon dozens of interesting alien types.
Starfield seems significantly more like a serious Outer Worlds if it doesn't have intelligent aliens, especially in the player space. As far as fans can tell for now, both Starfield and The Outer Worlds are human-centric stories about early space colonization that have a few types of alien flora and fauna thrown into their planets to confirm that there's life beyond Earth. The Outer Worlds is a great game to be compared to, but Bethesda probably doesn't want Starfield to be boiled down to a comparison to another game. Focusing on very early stage relationships between humans and aliens would put Starfield in an interesting place between Outer Worlds and Mass Effect that could also enable playable aliens.
There's plenty of player benefits to alien protagonists. Character customization in The Elder Scrolls gives players special perks based on the race they choose, but Starfield could build on that, giving players physical perks based on their species which they can blend with cultural and social perks of their choosing. Such depth in character design would have a huge impact on roleplay. It'd be fascinating to experience Starfield through the eyes of various alien species, seeing humanity's journey from an outside perspective while still feeling the impact of human industry and colonization.
Starfield May Not Avoid Aliens Entirely
Admittedly, Starfield's seeming avoidance of playable aliens may serve a narrative purpose. A lot of Starfield publicity mentions how the question is about answering humanity's biggest question, without actually saying what that question is. One could guess that the question is whether or not humans are alone in the universe. While there's clearly alien life in Starfield, there may not be sentient life as far as humans are aware. Starfield's central narrative could involve trying to track down an alien civilization, proving its existence, and making contact. If that's a storyline that Starfield has in mind, then naturally player characters could only be humans.
A game focused broadly on humanity's early adaptation to space and alien neighbors might have been better off than a game specifically focused on the question of alien life, since it'd be a more unique angle. Starfield's implied latter plan sounds like a major setback for its character customization and RP aspects. Starfield really would stand out from the rest of the sci-fi RPG market by introducing some new alien ideas and integrating them into the gameplay. Maybe Bethesda will surprise fans with a major alien showcase sometime in the coming months, but for now, it looks like humans are the star of the show. At the very least, Bethesda's rising openness about Starfield inspires hope for clarification soon.
Starfield releases November 11, 2022 for PC and Xbox Series X/S.