PlayStation owners will soon be able to embark on interplanetary travel with Starfield when it launches in a few weeks alongside new content. After roughly three years of rumors and speculation, Bethesda’s spacefaring adventure game is finally making its way to Sony’s consoles on April 7. Bethesda is also releasing both free and DLC on the same day. Meanwhile, the PlayStation edition will support the adaptive triggers of the DualSense controller, providing an additional immersive experience when using different types of weapons, including those of your starship, along with other controller-related features.
The PlayStation 5 version includes every major update released to date. New explorers will benefit from meaningful quality-of-life improvements like clearer, more functional surface maps and the REV-8 land vehicle that make planetary exploration smoother, as well as substantial feature additions introduced through free updates, like Creations.”
-Bethesda
Free lanes, as the name implies, are free new content that will be included in the PlayStation 5 edition. Free Lanes will add a long-awaited interplanetary travel option called Cruise Mode, which will also allow players to perform tasks previously limited to being in space. The autopilot function has also been updated, and new points of interest have been added, which will pop up in Cruise Mode. On top of that, there will be new encounters and a new resource called X-Tech, new game+, outposts, and much more, details for which can be found here.
- Anchorpoint Station: Anchorpoint is a new starstation with vendors and quests.
- New Ship Modules: New ship modules have been added to upgrade different ship specs and even add some unique new abilities to your ship, like a new stealth module that cloaks your ship while boosting. These modules will drop in ship combat as schematics and can be installed at any ship services technician.
- Upgrade Module Slot: You’ll notice as you’re customizing your gear that there’s a new Upgrade Module slot. This slot lets you upgrade a specific stat like range, rate of fire, etc. on your gear.
- Colony War Action Heroes: There are 27 Colony War Action Hero collectibles for you to track down. Each one gives a stat buff (with different buffs for opened and unopened versions) and will look great decorating your outpost in the new outpost display cases.
- Many more planetary POIs: You’ll notice an increased variety in the types of planetary POIs as you explore.
- New Elite Crew: Fan-favorite NPC Muria Siarkiewicz can now be added as an Elite Crewmember. Find her at her normal spot near Galbank in New Atlantis.
- New side quests: There’s a number of people on Anchorpoint that could use your help. Talk to everyone.
- New land vehicle: Bounce your way across the surface in style with the new Moon Jumper land vehicle. With its impressive boost capabilities, the Moon Jumper is built for verticality, allowing you to reach high up places much easier while in a vehicle.
- Asteroid base home: For those with a lot of credits to burn, you can now purchase a very ritzy asteroid base to call home. Explore Anchorpoint to learn how to purchase it.
- New enemy modifiers: Add some extra challenge to combat with new enemy modifiers like Tank (3x more health), Tricky (chance to avoid damage), Martyr (dying puts nearby allies into a rage), and more. These modifiers can be tuned in the Gameplay Options menu. All new modifiers will be identified with new icons near enemy health bars and full descriptions can be found in scanner mode.
- New weapon skins: New Constellation and Neon skins for select weapons
- Photomode poses with the REV-8
- New camera features: A toggle to always play a landing camera has been added to Accessibility settings. Additionally, a more distant ship POV level has also been added to camera options.
Terran Armada is a paid DLC for $9.99, or freely included for those who purchased the Premium Edition. This new story introduces a new companion robot with questionable, ambiguous ethical programming. The settled systems are experiencing a new threat from the Terran Armada, a group that believes itself to be the “true” children of Earth, who are largely made up of military factions, but not all are out for conquest.
“Not all Terrans have it out for the Settled System. Along the way, you’ll meet your new companion Delta, a reprogrammed Terran Armada robot. “He’s not evil,” says Pagliarulo in the deep dive. “But he’s definitely not good.”
– Bethesda
The Terran Armada content will add a new incursion system, which will be integrated throughout the game. Players will need to examine their starmaps carefully to plan their travels to systems where an incursion is taking place or face the possibility of jumping into a major battle unprepared. Other additions include new ships, parts, gear, elite crew, pre-built outposts, decorations, and more.
Folks have already been wondering if all of these updates constitute calling this Stardate 2.0, but lead creative producer Timothy Lamb has said this isn’t the case. While he does state these represent perhaps the biggest amount of changes, updates, and added content to date, they don’t add up to a 2.0 moment. He essentially just says that this is the best version of the game so far, but there will be more updates to come.