Summary

• Starfield's lack of graphic violence was an intentional choice, largely due to technical issues and to maintain the game's tone.
• Dennis Mejillones, a character artist who worked at Bethesda on Starfield and Fallout 4, explained these reasons in a recent interview.

Starfield was initially planned to feature much more violent elements, as revealed by a former Bethesda artist. While Bethesda's first-person shooters are known for their gore, the level of violence seen in Fallout did not carry over to their latest sci-fi RPG, Starfield. The decision to limit graphic violence was a deliberate one, though it wasn't always the intended direction.

Despite this, violence remains a key component of Starfield, with gunplay and melee combat being central to the gameplay experience. Many players have noted that Starfield's combat is a significant improvement over Fallout 4, with enhanced attention to shooting and melee mechanics. The game almost increased its violence level but ultimately chose to scale back the more graphic elements.

Dennis Mejillones, a character artist who worked on both Starfield and Fallout 4, provided insights into the game's violence in an interview with the Kiwi Talkz podcast on YouTube. He confirmed that Starfield was initially going to include decapitations and other kill animations, but technical challenges prevented this. The diverse range of suits and helmets in the game made it difficult to animate such violent actions realistically without causing visual glitches. Given Starfield's ongoing technical issues, even after multiple updates, the decision to avoid further graphical complications seems justified.

Starfield Cut Decapitations for Technical and Tonal Reasons

The decision to remove graphic violence from Starfield was not solely based on technical difficulties. Mejillones highlighted that the gore in Fallout contributes to its humorous tone, which does not align as well with Starfield's more serious and realistic sci-fi atmosphere. Although Starfield occasionally nods to Bethesda's more light-hearted and violent games, such as the recent addition of Doom-inspired content, it generally aims for a more subdued and grounded experience. Over-the-top executions might have disrupted the game's immersion.

Fans have expressed a desire for more realism in Starfield, particularly critiquing the game's nightclubs as feeling tame compared to other gritty sci-fi titles like Cyberpunk 2077 and Mass Effect. Adding humorous violence could have exacerbated these criticisms by making the game seem even less authentic. In the end, Bethesda's choice to reduce the level of gore in Starfield appears to be the right one, despite deviating from the trend seen in their previous shooters.