Bethesda Says Xbox Layoffs Haven't Affected Elder Scrolls 6 Roadmap

Full text

Bethesda is promising that the development roadmap for The Elder Scrolls 6 hasn't been impacted by mass layoffs across Xbox's various subsidiaries, despite some current and former staff fearing the worst.

Earlier this month, Xbox began what it called a "reset" of its business. In plain words, that meant the console maker parted ways with four first-party studios and laid off 1,600 workers across Xbox Game Studios, Bethesda, and Activision Blizzard, with 1,600 more job cuts coming over the course of the next year.

Now, asked about whether the sweeping cuts have impacted The Elder Scrolls 6's development timeline at all, Bethesda tells YouTuber MrMattyPlays that production on its most-hyped upcoming game is going just fine, thank you very much: "No, the roadmap is unaffected."

The question was tossed toward Bethesda because the publisher was hit particularly hard by Xbox's layoffs and because several staffers are seemingly far more worried about the fantasy epic's development than their employer.

Citing anonymous sources, IGN reported that several The Elder Scrolls 6 developers are worried about potential delays, crunch culture, and an extra reliance on contractors who would be unfamiliar with the studio's proprietary game dev tech.

The Elder Scrolls Online is already struggling with "team bandwidth" after developer Zenimax Online Studios lost well over 100 team members, but we likely won't see how the worker reductions affect The Elder Scrolls 6 until the game finally, maybe, rears its head once again.

Bethesda Game Studios' mammoth RPG was first announced to the public in the summer of 2018 with a trailer that didn't reveal much. There was a logo, a non-descript landscape, and a promise that BGS would eventually start properly making the sequel once Starfield was in the wild.

Last we heard, the company said it was happy with its progress on The Elder Scrolls 6 . "The next chapter is on the way. We're where we planned to be, loving how it looks, and playing it every day," it wrote.

"Don't fall for it": Union says Fallout 5 and Elder Scrolls 6 news shouldn't distract you from huge Bethesda layoffs as Xbox CEO praises the series' "remarkable" achievements