Starfield Surpasses Baldur’s Gate in Playtime for 2023

baldurs gate 3

baldurs gate 3

Being launched roughly the same time - with only a month’s gap in between - comparing Bethesda Game Studios’ Starfield and Baldur’s Gate 3 by Larian Studios is inevitable.

BG3 has proven to be the stronger contender for awards, having won The Game Awards’ Game of the Year for 2023 last month. Regarding numbers, however, Starfield may have a slight edge against its critically acclaimed competitor.

According to the infographic released by Bethesda on its official X account, players have spent an average of 534,823,944 hours in its space exploration RPG. On the other hand, Baldur’s Gate 3 gamers have spent 452,556,984 hours on average.

For disclosure, Starfield data covers up to December 20, 2023, while Baldur’s Gate 3 statistics are only up to December 5, 2023.

baldurs gate 3 and starfield
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Credit: X/Larian/Bethesda

However, BG3 has a month of lead time versus Starfield since it was released on August 3, 2023. Bethesda launched early access for its latest RPG 28 days later on August 31 and officially rolled Starfield out on September 6, 2023.

Comparison and competition between the two games have been very close. Baldur’s Gate 3 was nominated for and bagged several awards during TGA 2023, while Starfield was only nominated for Best RPG and did not even win.

This competition was lampooned by the YouTube channel Unscripted - the one behind the Todd Howard “Honest Conference” video - in an episode where Starfield is the strongest contender for “Glitch of the Year” but ultimately lost still to Baldur’s Gate 3.

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