Bethesda’s forthcoming title, Starfield, has reportedly received major engine upgrades that will allow the game to look and run better than what was last seen of it during the Xbox and Bethesda showcase.
According to Youtuber and podcaster colteastwood, major upgrades have been made to the engine, pipeline, AI, physics, and visuals in Creation Engine 2.0, and its integral new add-on software packs for the Xbox Series X/S and PC.
Creation Engine 2.0
Much of the development for Starfield took place during the Xbox One console generation, without the full knowledge of the hardware specs available on the Xbox Series consoles. With this massive game, the studio has to strike a balance between scale and detail. The Creation Engine is around 10 years old, and after being built off the Gamebryo engine using a portion of the source code, creating a distinct and separate new game engine that has been overhauled and updated to become Creation Engine 2.0 for Starfield. An upgraded version of the engine is said to bring major improvements to both performance and visuals.
Animation And Physics In Starfield
Creation Engine 2.0 supports Havok in order to deliver life-like physics-based animations for realistic and fluid character movement. Upgrades have made it made it possible to add even more detail, natural shape and realism to character faces and reactions. Bethesda is using fully 3D modeled custom hand animated character faces, with procedural lip syncing, so that players can interact with a huge amount of NPCs, meeting the needs of the Starfield’s massive scale. None of the NPCs seen in the game use performance capture using actual actors.
AI Upgrades In Starfield
Starfield has fleshed out outposts, cities and faction-filled space ports with civilians and pirates to fill out its universe, with voice captured dialogue, story, motivations, and quests that follow the Bethesda formula of multi-tiered questlines and choice-driven RPG mechanics.
Radiant AI Software is Bethesda’s proprietary AI system that gives all NPCs a purpose, schedule, and task to complete, regardless of whether you’re following their patterns. All of this helps in making the world of Starfield feel lived in, with NPCs not just being there for the show. The addition of Radiant AI in Creation Engine 2.0 will allow the RPG mechanics a cut above what’s been seen before in Bethesda’s titles.
Radiant Software integrated into Starfield’s Creation Engine 2.0 brings the game to life beyond what was seen in Fallout 4. An upgraded version of Radiant AI allows NPCs to dynamically react and interact with the world around them. Similarly, Radiant Story, another integral part of Creation Engine 2.0, allows NPCs to dynamically create new quests for players in unexplored places. They’ll be more dynamic and volatile, as players can choose to stay on their good or bad side. Radiant AI also makes it possible for procedurally generated quests to feel more natural.
