Bethesda Game Studios’ upcoming Starfield Free Lanes update aims to change the game with the addition of free movement throughout the game’s massive galaxy. With every quest reformatted to exist within this new open universe, as well as the addition of new content, Bethesda explains that the update is designed to give players more control over their role-playing experience.
In the launch version of Starfield, travelling the universe was largely a series of fast travels between star systems. While players can still traverse that way if they want, this new update allows players to freely travel the universe in “Cruise Mode”, a faster-than-light form of travel that allows you to zip past planets.
In an interview around the announcement of Free Lanes, Starfield lead producer Tim Lamb explained that the game’s new Cruise Mode is designed to give you more control over your ship. While players can autopilot their way towards new planets and even walk around the ship while doing so, giving players more control was the main goal behind the update.
“I think that was one of the big things about working with Free Lanes was that the ship had to feel like it was under your control,” Lamb said. “We added the boost in there, it does serve as a mechanic of getting you to your top speed as fast as possible, but it had to feel like, ‘I’m flying this ship around’”.
With that said, Starfield’s new faster-than-light travel does have “some assistance” that will gently guide you towards a spontaneous POI in space, but it won’t force you towards it, unless its an event designed to pull you out of Free Lanes like the new Terran Armada DLC’s incursions.
“As you look at a space encounter or things that pop up, or planets, there’s a slight amount of magnetism to sort of guide you that way, so you can arrive easily, but the ship’s completely under your control,” Lamb said. “I think the addition of the autopilot was more, ‘I want to arrive somewhere, I want to guarantee that I’m going to arrive, but I still wanna go cook dinner for my crew or put some X-Tech this weapon’. That you’ll know that you’ll be there.”
Lamb explained that, if you leave the cockpit up without engaging autopilot, you will likely shoot way past your target as a result, chucking you God-knows-where within the game’s massive universe. “We wanted to give players the ability to determine how they got there with as much agency as possible,” Lamb continued, “so Cruise Mode will let you fly right around the planet and, if you lock in with the autopilot, you will actually arrive”.
For many, Starfield Free Lanes is exactly what they wanted out of Bethesda’s RPG at launch, and it’s better late than never. Additionally, for the hardcore fans of the sci-fi adventure, Bethesda is not abandoning the game, even as the bulk of the studio works on The Elder Scrolls 6.
Lamb confirmed that there are plans for “years” of additional Starfield updates, although the producer did not explain what fans can expect from those content drops. While the game likely won’t see gigantic No Man’s Sky style updates, there is more coming for fans at some point in the future.
