Bethesda may be planning to release a number of remasters and remakes of its games. To do this, the company has opened a separate studio, according to one of the insiders. This would be a logical step for Bethesda, given the large number of classic IP at its disposal. However, this rumor should still be treated with caution.
The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind
The information was shared by blogger Skullzi, who specializes in content on Bethesda games. Before that, he also published screenshots from an early version of Starfield.
Skullzi heard about the opening of the studio from several sources associated with the company. However, he clarified several times that he could not fully confirm this information yet, so it should be taken skeptically.
Initially, the blogger wrote that the new studio would be called Artifact. Soon Skullzi noted that the team with this name is actually engaged in the production of a documentary in honor of the 10th anniversary of Skyrim.
Bethesda itself did not comment on the rumors about the opening of a studio to create remakes and remasters. However, such a step would be logical for the company from a business point of view.
Now Bethesda owns many famous brands. Among them are The Elder Scrolls, Fallout, Wolfenstein, Prey, Dishonored and DOOM. Now all these IP are at the disposal of Microsoft, which bought ZeniMax for $7.5 billion. Updated versions of classic games can also boost the number of Xbox Game Pass subscribers.
Today, there is a trend in the gaming industry to update classic IP, and Bethesda has not yet made any attempts to develop in this direction. The exception was Skyrim, which received many re-releases for different consoles.
The most successful examples of remakes in recent years have been the second and third parts of Resident Evil from Capcom. They partly inspired Electronic Arts to relaunch Dead Space, which was announced in July.
Other companies are returning to their classic franchises today. In February, BlizzConline showed a remaster of Diablo II, designed to rehabilitate Blizzard after the failure of Warcraft III: Reforged. It is being developed by the Vicarious Visions studio, which became part of the company specifically for this purpose. Other good examples include the remakes of Final Fantasy VII and Demon’s Souls. Bluepoint Games studio, which Sony was rumored to be planning to buy, was responsible for the development of the latter.