Starfield, the highly-anticipated RPG from Bethesda Game Studios, recently changed its Steam release date from "2023" to "coming soon." This news follows other games like Forspoken, Redfall, Ark 2, and Robocop: Rogue City that have also adjusted their launch dates. However, there is no cause for concern as this change is simply a result of a new system that Valve will be rolling out in October 2022, which we've already reported on.
For More clarity
Valve has made a change to the way it lists release dates for upcoming games on its Steam platform. Up until October 2022, release dates on Steam store pages were inconsistent, with some games listing an exact date while others had a more general release window. Valve acknowledged that this "hodge-podge of coming soon displays" left a lot to be desired and that the custom text field they were using didn't have localization support, resulting in a confusing and inconsistent experience for players worldwide.
To address these issues, Valve has introduced five options for developers to choose from when listing release dates on Steam. These include an exact date, month and year, calendar quarter of the year, year, and no date at all. The selected option will be displayed in a "localized and regionally familiar presentation" for each game.
To manage how these dates appear in lists of upcoming games, non-specific release targets will be listed on the last date in their timeframe. This means that if a game is planned for a release date in Q1 2023, it will be sorted as if the release date was March 31st and if it's simply listed as "2023," Steam will treat it as if the release date was December 31st. Essentially, it's an automated placeholder date. And if there is no date at all, it will appear after all other games that have a specific date or release target.
In summary, the recent release date change of Starfield to "coming soon" on Steam should not be cause for concern as it is simply a
