It’s apparently still too early to tell whether The Elder Scrolls 6 will be an exclusive because it won’t launch for at least five years.
It has been over five years since and, in that time, the only thing the studio’s really said about it is that it isn’t launching any time soon.
Obviously, ’s main priority is at the moment, but it’s only become more apparent that The Elder Scrolls 6’s announcement came far, far too early.
During the legal battle between (FTC) over the former’s Activision Blizzard buyout, Xbox boss Phil Spencer admitted The Elder Scrolls 6 is still over five years away, meaning it won’t be out until 2028 at the earliest.
This came about when Spencer was asked for testimony regarding Microsoft’s acquisition of Bethesda and the way it has handled exclusivity for the studio’s games.
As a reminder, one of the FTC’s arguments against the Activision deal is that Microsoft will have the power to lock games like Call Of Duty to its platform, and it believes Microsoft has demonstrated a willingness to do that with Bethesda’s games.
Microsoft has now said it has plans to but failed to given any examples of doing so.
In fact, when Spencer was grilled about , he said it’s too soon to tell.
‘It’s so far out it’s hard to understand what the platforms will even be… We’re talking about a game that’s five-plus years away,’ said Spencer.
As reported by Axios’ Stephen Totilo, Spencer seems to have conveniently forgotten whether he’d previously said The Elder Scrolls 6 would be Xbox exclusive.
Admittedly, there’s never been a concrete answer regarding The Elder Scrolls 6’s release since the Bethesda buyout. At one point, Bethesda’s Todd Howard said it was ‘’ it’d be an Xbox exclusive, suggesting it would come to PlayStation 5 too.
A year later, though, Spencer appeared to imply that The Elder Scrolls 6 would follow Starfield’s example and be exclusive after all. Annoyingly, his exact quote was never recorded, with the interview only stating that ‘’ when discussing Starfield’s exclusivity.
2028 is also when Microsoft predicted that the PlayStation 6 and next gen Xbox , which doesn’t seem like it’s a coincidence. Although Spencer never drew a direct connection between those two comments.
A lot of interesting behind the scenes details about Microsoft’s Bethesda buyout have come to light thanks to this court case. For instance, fans now know for certain will be Xbox only, but it was meant to be multiplatform before the buyout.
It’s too soon to tell whether Microsoft’s actions with Bethesda will hamper its chances at buying Activision. What can be said for certain is that by the time The Elder Scrolls 6 comes out, it’ll have been over 10 years since its announcement.
This also means is even further away than initially expected and likely won’t launch until perhaps midway through the 2030s.
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