After leaving their fans to speculate for several years, Bethesda have finally decided to address the situation with “The Elder Scrolls 6”, although the news might not sound very exciting (or even positive) to some fans of the franchise. According to the studio, while they do have concrete plans for the game and it’s definitely going to become reality one day, they don’t plan on teasing it a significant time in advance.
In other words, fans should expect the big reveal to be something similar to the one for “Fallout 4”, close to the launch date of the game, but still early enough that fans have a lot of time to build up a lot of hype. The announcement for “Fallout 4” actually worked quite well for the game and fans were pleased with the way Bethesda handled its release, so the company is right to want to repeat the same pattern.
Plus, it’s the same way they have been making their revelations for a while now anyway. Many fans likely remember “The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim”, and how that game’s first teaser was basically just a picture of its release date. Bethesda didn’t really need to show more, because fans already knew what “The Elder Scrolls” is, and the implications behind a sequel to that franchise.
According to some commenters, that’s one of the main benefits the studio has at their disposal. They don’t have to rely on generating a lot of attention through announcements that they are working on a sequel, because their IPs are already hugely popular, and they are expected to be developing new entries anyway.
This not only gives them a lot more creative freedom in the announcements themselves, but it must have a positive impact on their finances, considering they don’t have to invest that much into the marketing of their games. Franchises like “Fallout” and “The Elder Scrolls” practically market themselves, all Bethesda have to do is keep working on them.
With all that in mind, Bethesda were adamant that they don’t plan on revealing any details about “The Elder Scrolls 6” years before the game is actually ready to be shown. Some of their more optimistic fans seem to be treating this as a hint that they could make the announcement tomorrow for all we know, and the game will be out before the end of this year, but there is realistically pretty much no chance of this happening.
Bethesda are, after all, preoccupied with their work on “Fallout 4” at the moment, as they are still bringing out new content for it and polishing the gameplay. After that, they might dedicate their resources to “The Elder Scrolls 6”, but even then we likely won’t hear about the game for quite some time.
It’s of course always possible that the project has been active in some form but they just haven’t been investing a significant amount of resources into it. We’ve been hearing various rumors about the game, including its possible setting and location, ideas about its gameplay, and various other bits. While the most likely explanation for those rumors is that they were started by excited fans, there’s always the possibility that something could have leaked from the developers and into the public. But we would never know until the game was actually finished, and even then a lot could change by the time it’s ready to be shown to the world.