The Entertainment Software Ratings Board has passed judgment on Starfield, and like Bethesda Game Studios’ other games (Fallout 4, The Elder Scrolls 5: Skyrim) the spacefaring role-playing game will be an M for Mature-rated game. Expect violence, foul language, sex, and drug use in Starfield when the game launches later this summer.
When it comes to violence, players will use “futuristic guns, lasers, axes, and explosives to kill enemies,” according to the ESRB’s content description of the game. “Combat is fast-paced, with frequent gunfire, cries of pain, and explosions. Attacks on some enemies can result in blood-splatter effects; several environments depict blood stains on the ground around corpses.”
While the violence sounds graphic, the sex in Starfield sounds pretty tame. The game’s rating says players can expect “some suggestive material in the dialogue, and after sharing a bed with characters.” The best of those suggestive lines? “I’m all for getting a little wild, but next time let’s try it without the jetpacks,” as noted by the ESRB. My Starfield character, whom I will role-play as having nothing but jetpack-equipped coitus, better not say that and break my immersion.
Finally, the rating also reminds us that Starfield will let you get high on that primo stuff: space fish juice. Starfield’s drug of choice is called Aurora, and as noted by Bethesda way back in 2021, players will get some when they visit a destination called Neon, a “pleasure city” built on a massive fishing facility. That facility processes a breed of psychotropic fish that creates the naturally occurring drug, and, according to the ESRB, players can even work there at some point in the game.
Starfield is slated to hit Windows PC and Xbox Series X on Sept. 6. The game will launch day one on Game Pass. In June, Bethesda and Microsoft promise a deep dive into Starfield in a livestream titled Starfield Direct.