Starfield’s music will be your companion in Bethesda’s new space RPG

Bethesda Softworks’ newest look at its space-exploration role-playing game StarfieldIt is intended primarily to be heard, but Inon Zu and Mark Lampert have begun a conversation that could also benefit the eyes. The discussion includes concept art and images of unexplored worlds as well as enticing space imagery.

In a new episode released Tuesday from Bethesda’s Into the Starfield series — previous episodes have highlighted the game’s visual design and its companions and conversations — Zur and Lampert wax on “the emotional dimension of Starfield.” That’s music, of course, and the latest look at/listen to StarfieldThere is plenty. Zur talks about the difficulties of creating signatures and themes and breaks down the ways that elements of an orchestra represent all aspects of space, from particles to return to faraway reaches.

Starfield will have its share of interactive and hopefully memorable companions as players embark on their adventure, but Lampert hopes that the game’s music and sound design will serve as a different sort of ever-present companion.

“We don’t have control over how the player chooses to experience the game,” Lampert said. “The music has a funny way of playing the right chord change at the right time, and a lot of that just happens at random. You look over the valley at just the right moment, and that just happens to be when this one chord change happens, and there are times like that that feel scripted — and they’re not. And I like that each player has that experience for themselves, personally.”

StarfieldNovember 11th on Windows PCs and Xbox Series X. It will also be available through Xbox Game Pass.