Had it been up to him, the game might have taken a very different direction. Who knows how long we would have had to wait for it?

Kurt Kuhlmann worked as a designer at Bethesda Game Studios (BGS) for two decades. During that time, he was the co-lead designer of The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim, a game that could go down as the studio’s greatest success. Known as the “Loremaster” of the series, Kuhlmann claims in an interview with PC Gamer that he was the lead designer for The Elder Scrolls VI. If it had been up to him, the long-awaited latest installment of the Elder Scrolls series would have been a Star Wars-inspired game. Although he was never officially offered the position, Kuhlmann believes that BGS head Todd Howard verbally offered him the role after Skyrim‘s completion. According to Kuhlmann, if it weren’t for Fallout 76 and Starfield, we would have gotten The Elder Scrolls VI much sooner.

Not getting the top job made Kuhlmann realize that he and BGS had different ideas when the studio finally decided to focus on The Elder Scrolls VI. This, along with the fact that Bethesda had evolved to a level no longer compatible with his working methods, contributed to his departure from the company in 2023. But what if he had been given the leadership position and things had gone according to his vision? The story we would have gotten would have been The Elder Scrolls: The Empire Strikes Back.

“Of course, after Fallout 4, we didn’t work on The Elder Scrolls VI. We made Fallout 76, and then we made Starfield instead of TES6. Starfield became an extremely long project compared to others. So, from my point of view, I’ve been waiting 11 years to lead The Elder Scrolls VI. I was one of the old-timers and had a lot of experience. Bruce Nesmith and I were the co-leads on Skyrim. Most people would call it a successful project, so I thought it was reasonable to expect that I could be a successful lead on TES6. It wasn’t just my expectation; I had been told it would happen. But then they made the decision: No, you’re not going to be the lead.

I envisioned The Elder Scrolls VI being like The Empire Strikes Back. By the end, the Thalmor – the elven supremacists on the fringes of Skyrim‘s story – would seem to have won. However, the player would do something at the very end to create a hopeful cliffhanger ending that would lead into The Elder Scrolls VII. So, you’ve preserved hope for the future, but overall, it looks like the Thalmor are on the march,” said Kuhlmann.

He admitted that he doesn’t think the rest of the team would have liked his idea. Making a game is not like making a movie. After waiting more than a decade for The Elder Scrolls VI, players might not have appreciated it as much if the game had ended with the victory of evil and the good guys might succeed in the next game, which could take another decade to arrive. He thinks this would be a poor way to end a game and says we may have to wait 10-15 years.

While Kuhlmann may be right that players would not have liked his approach, the reality is that whatever BGS does, it will not meet expectations. Former Bethesda artist Nate Purkeypile correctly calls the game a losing proposition.

Source: WCCFTech, PCGamer