Photo: Bethesda
Starfield is shaping up to be one of the biggest video game releases in 2023, alongside Forza Motorsport. They're both Xbox 1st party "exclusives," although they're also on PC. Forza had no scandals in the press, but Starfield was a "paparazzi" favorite with delays, a 30 fps lock on Xbox, Walmart order cancels for the $300 Constellation Edition, and many more bumps in the road. Both are coming to Gamescom on August 23.
Gamescom is a video game trade fair held yearly (when no pandemics exist) in Cologne, Germany. There are showcases where big publishers like Xbox come to strut their stuff for notoriety, fan meetings, and showfloor demos.
If you're attending Gamescom this year, you'll have the chance to try out bangers like Armored Core 6: Fires of Rubicon from FromSoftware, S.T.A.L.K.E.R 2 from GSC Game World, Payday 3 made by Overkill Software with Starbreeze Studios, CD PROJEKT RED's Cyberpunk 2077: Phantom Liberty, Sega Atlus' Persona 5 Tactica, or Under the Waves published by Quantic Dream.
You can find the Xbox booths at Hall 8 of the Koelnmesse, North entrance between Thursday, August 24, and Sunday, August 27. They're there between 10 AM and 8 PM the first couple of days, and on the last two, they are open from 9 AM until 8 PM. Theoretically, you have plenty of time to try out new games, but keep in mind that there will be lines. Keep an eye out for those pesky elbow bumps.
Unfortunately, you won't get to play their flagship games like Starfield and Forza Motorsport. This could be for many reasons.
One of the most doom and gloomy ones would be that they're not in shipshape (pun intended). Forza Motorsport comes out on October 10, so it would make sense for the studio to be all hands on deck with no time to develop a demo for the public.
Starfield, however, comes out in a month on September 6, which theoretically should mean that it's nearing the coveted "gold" status. In gaming, when a game has "gone gold," it means the 1.0 version is ready to be copied and shipped.
Sadly, there are exceptions where studios publicly celebrate they have "gone gold," but the game ends up a complete mess. Yes, I am talking about Cyberpunk 2077.
With Starfield being this close to the shipping date, you'd think it would have a playable demo on the show floor, but it seems all power has been diverted to the main development engines.
It's a Bethesda game at the end of the day, which typically means many bugs will 100% be there on day 1. In a perfect world, this wouldn't be the case, but seeing that Starfield already went through delays, we could be looking at a massive day-1 patch to fix a lot of problems.
If you're attending Gamescom this year, you'll have the chance to try out bangers like Armored Core 6: Fires of Rubicon from FromSoftware, S.T.A.L.K.E.R 2 from GSC Game World, Payday 3 made by Overkill Software with Starbreeze Studios, CD PROJEKT RED's Cyberpunk 2077: Phantom Liberty, Sega Atlus' Persona 5 Tactica, or Under the Waves published by Quantic Dream.
You can find the Xbox booths at Hall 8 of the Koelnmesse, North entrance between Thursday, August 24, and Sunday, August 27. They're there between 10 AM and 8 PM the first couple of days, and on the last two, they are open from 9 AM until 8 PM. Theoretically, you have plenty of time to try out new games, but keep in mind that there will be lines. Keep an eye out for those pesky elbow bumps.
Unfortunately, you won't get to play their flagship games like Starfield and Forza Motorsport. This could be for many reasons.
One of the most doom and gloomy ones would be that they're not in shipshape (pun intended). Forza Motorsport comes out on October 10, so it would make sense for the studio to be all hands on deck with no time to develop a demo for the public.
Starfield, however, comes out in a month on September 6, which theoretically should mean that it's nearing the coveted "gold" status. In gaming, when a game has "gone gold," it means the 1.0 version is ready to be copied and shipped.
Sadly, there are exceptions where studios publicly celebrate they have "gone gold," but the game ends up a complete mess. Yes, I am talking about Cyberpunk 2077.
With Starfield being this close to the shipping date, you'd think it would have a playable demo on the show floor, but it seems all power has been diverted to the main development engines.
It's a Bethesda game at the end of the day, which typically means many bugs will 100% be there on day 1. In a perfect world, this wouldn't be the case, but seeing that Starfield already went through delays, we could be looking at a massive day-1 patch to fix a lot of problems.
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