The new SciFi RPG Starfield from Bethesda is set to provide a campaign that will keep you engaged for about 40 hours. Even before the game celebrates its full release on September 6, speedrunners are already making good progress. The record stands at 2:51 hours.
Starfield is a game that requires you to take your time. There is much to do, the game’s pace is generally rather slow, and distractions such as loot boxes or interesting NPCs are everywhere.
Over 250,000 lines of recorded dialogue are designed to prevent us from rushing through the RPG.
However, this does not bother the speedrunning community. They see a lot of potential in Starfield and are already working on techniques to get through the campaign even faster.
Currently, the best speedrunner for Starfield is a user named “Micrologist”. In a video on YouTube, you can watch the entire run, which is, however, full of spoilers for the game. At least only the main campaign is completed:
The video is likely to develop into a sort of tutorial: Which parts of the story can be skipped, which conversation options are important, where you can possibly save more time.
As the US site VG247 reports, a whole community is already working on a Discord server to develop tricks and tactics to progress faster.
In certain circumstances, you can trigger a teleport glitch with your character, but it’s still unclear how that exactly works. Something with melee attacks (via youtube.com). The third-person camera also offers much potential for moving through unwanted barriers.
The 3-hour mark is unlikely to last long. Someone may have already broken the record, and it’s likely to happen in quick succession now.
Speedruns are an important part of the gaming community. Many players try their hand at such an endeavor over the course of their gaming careers, most fail within the first few hours. Some persist and find a hobby for life.
And even the big role-playing games are ruthlessly optimized until only a few minutes remain: World record: Speedrunner completes Baldur’s Gate 3 in 4 minutes by putting Shadowheart in a box
