Bethesda's Starfield Quest Designer Jumps Ship and Joins inXile Entertainment

Besthesda's former Starfield quest designer, Veronica Harbison, has jumped ship and has taken a new position at inXile Entertainment.

[IamTylerDurden1]

Probably bc the game is in polishing faze. Non news.

[phoenixwing]

It's interesting news to me. But for ppl invested in console wars its probably boring. Basically the quests for starfield will be very close in ideas to whatever inxile is working on now that she'll be there.

Edit: as long as it's the same genre. Also it tells me whatever inxile is working on involves quests which I'm happy about.

[IamTylerDurden1]

I said non news bc i imagined some would say it's a bad sign for Starfield. I play mostly xb now...

And InXile already has experience in the Fallout wing essentially. They currently make a Fallout spiritual successor as well. They are familiar with this style but rather in a top down form.

InXile always has quests..........

[RaidenBlack]

Maybe inXile's future Fallout spin-off ? 🤞🏻 (apart from the current steampunk RPG ofcourse)
(one can only hope, since inXile was originally consisted of ex-Interplay & Black Isle devs, who worked on the OG 1980s Wasteland and 1990s Fallout 1&2 games)

[shinoff2183]

Inxile has a steam punk rpg coming?

If true that's dope af. I always enjoyed their wasteland games I'm sure other stuff they've made to that I can't think of.

[Christopher]

It's a lateral move anyway (both under the same umbrella). But makes me wonder what InXile is doing more than anything.

[IamTylerDurden1]

Perhaps another Wasteland?

[Workshyskiver]

This site really is obsessed with individuals moving companies. Its an unfortunate truth in almost all industries that you can improve your terms and remuneration by moving rather than staying put.

[Bobertt]

Yeah but for game developers they usually get a big bonus once a game is released so one leaving this late in development could reflect that they don't think it will turn out well enough for the bonus to be worth sticking around for.

[rpvenom]

As an ex tech recruiter, that's not necessarily true. They can easily get a sign on bonus from the new company that would roughly match what they would've received should the game turn out successful.

[Zeref]

They're still at Xbox. Pretty good chance they'll still get a bonus since the salary is handled by Microsoft.

[XbladeTeddy]

Or they just wanted a change because change is good.

[dumahim]

Unfortunate? Seems pretty damn good for people to step back and try new things now and then. Maybe company B offered them more money for doing mostly what they were doing with company A.

[IamTylerDurden1]

That's why i said non news bc i knew ppl would view it as a negative. Starfield is done and InXile is a former Fallout dev and MS first party. This ain't really shit.

[XiNatsuDragnel]

Maybe inXile has a big goat project that's going to be hype

[phoenixwing]

That would be cool. I hope it's medieval fantasy or steam renaissance. Something set in olden days. Not that I wouldn't play something with advanced tech but I prefer the former.

[AgitUzumaki]

There are some rumors that they are developing a steampunk type of game.

[Obscure_Observer]

"I hope it's medieval fantasy or steam renaissance."

Possibly both. Rumors are that InXile is working on two RPGs. One is an established IP and the other is a new steampunk AAA RPG.

[shinoff2183]

I'd prefer almost a future steampunk kind of setting. I personally just feel the olden days especially medieval games are a dime a dozen there's so many. Not to say I wouldn't play it

[CrimsonWing69]

I don’t know if game journalists know this, but it’s quite normal for people in the industry to move between companies. Hell, some are only contracted for a single game and have to find another job after the project is finished.

Surprised you didn’t do an article about the Devil May Cry battle director jumping ship from Capcom to Square Enix

[dumahim]

"I don’t know if game journalists know this, but it’s quite normal for people in the industry to move between companies."

So they shouldn't report on it? I don't know if you know, but it's quite normal for a news article to just be news.

[CrimsonWing69]

The more you know, amirite?

[Thundercat77]

Another one leaving Xbox 😯.

In a few years Xbox's Bethesda is going to be a shadow of their former group just like Rare.

[gangsta_red]

"Another one leaving Xbox 😯."

Leaving Xbox to join Xbox? Not the flex I think you want here.

[Imalwaysright]

InXile is owned by MS.

[Workshyskiver]

Lol you do realise he is going to another Xbox Game Studios?

[Othegamer5]

you guys are embarrassing. just reaching

[Obscure_Observer]

"Another one leaving Xbox 😯."

Epic Facepalm*

[AmUnRa]

Another one.....

[Zeref]

They left Bethesda to join InXile.

Both are owned by Xbox.

Their work at Bethesda was probably done. This is a good thing.

[Zeref]

Pretty cool that talent between the many Xbox studios can now just seamlessly jump between them.

Activision Blizzard is also gonna be a huge benefit for this. I Imagine some talent from the Call of Duty studios will go to 343i to help with Halo. Or maybe one of the studios will start working on a new Halo Spinoff

[Tedakin]

They make the headline deliberately sound bad when the game is almost done and they probably just moved on to something else. inXile is also an Xbox owned company.

[shinoff2183]

I don't think the title is meant to sound bad I think its more on the readers end.

[--Onilink--]

Jumping ship isn’t necessarily what I would call a “positive term” though

[Psychotica]

If a company wants to offer me enough money I won't hesitate to leave my current employer. Just like they wouldn't hesitate to end my employment to save money.

[chobit_A5HL3Y]

tbh, it's not like the quest design in bethesda games is good anyways lol it's basically, "accept quest, walk to marker, kill/get something, talk to npc, return to quest-giver for reward", over and over again. if it was a writer then maybe it'd have more impact, but you esentially have the entire bethesda quest experience back in oblivion. it's unchanged. the guy's basically placing way-points on the map.

[phoenixwing]

I think you oversimplified it. Writers and quest designers work with the director for not only ideas but how to implement them into code. They do what is feasible in a set period of time. I remember watching it be discussed in a podcast or video about God of war and how they added removed the water in the game for exploration.

[hotnickles]

Nice. I hope a lot of this swapping and brainstorming happens more often. Especially with stuff like quest design

[mastershredder]

May as well as start posting positions listed online and gamasutra, like anything you think MIGHT be related to industry news…. love the constant use of “jumps ship” to describe individual movement. You guys are like superficial as f.