Nate Purkeypile is one of the Bethesda developers who left the studio when Starfield was in the middle of development. He was one of the designers involved in creating the city of Neon, but he was out the door before the game was ready for shipping and release.
Now, YouTube channel NoClip caught up with Nate in a video discussing the Bethesda approach in development and Nate’s self-funded and self-directed project called Axis Unseen, which is due to release this year.
When asked to compare his workflow as a solo developer with his time at Bethesda, Nate noted that the Unreal Engine allows him to replicate assets and make improvements upon them so he doesn’t have to recreate each version of a creature, for instance.
He said that was impossible to do with Bethesda, since they don’t have shared properties and each asset has to be designed, together with its attributes, by hand. Nate noted that he had to take note of each attribute to make sure he doesn’t mess it up by hand.
Nate also made note of the need for meetings in Bethesda due to the studios’ large size, which necessitated tiers of teams for decision-making. Someone has to represent each of these teams, and the management has to sign off on every decision these units make, making constant team meetings necessary.
He also revealed that, when developing Skyrim, they considerably had more freedom as compared to developing Starfield, when the team grew to 500 where meetings and marketing were the norm.
When asked to discuss about his game, Nate said that, so far, he has done all the designs and organizing himself. The former Fallout 76 lead said that the game is nearly complete, with the full open world map done in October 2022.
What can he reveal about Axis Unseen? Well, Nate said that this full open-world map is five times the size of The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim!
This game is something to look forward to. If you’re a fan of open-world hunting AND of heavy metal music, Nate’s future offering is definitely the one for you. Add to your Steam wishlist if you want to support Nate in pre-release.
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