Bethesda Game Studios staff reportedly fear Xbox's latest layoffs will damage development on The Elder Scrolls 6, with more than 50 people said to have been cut from the studio behind Skyrim, Fallout 4 and Starfield.
IGN reports that current and former Bethesda staff, speaking anonymously, expect the cuts to hurt the long-awaited RPG through lost experience, lower morale, higher crunch risk and possible delays. The Elder Scrolls 6 still has no public release date, so this is not a formal delay announcement from Bethesda or Microsoft.
The concern lands at a brutal moment for Xbox's Bethesda operation. Microsoft is already pushing ZeniMax toward Fallout, The Elder Scrolls, Doom, Quake and Wolfenstein after its wider Xbox reset, making The Elder Scrolls 6 one of the projects that should be most protected by the new strategy. Staff quoted in the report argue the cuts could make that harder, not easier.
Staff warn of lost experience on The Elder Scrolls 6
One Bethesda staff member told IGN the layoffs removed people across several development disciplines.
"Their loss will have a substantial and cascading effect on the game and morale of this studio."
Another staffer said the cuts included "a mix of every discipline: programmers, artists, and designers," adding that one person who had been at Bethesda since Morrowind was among those let go.
That detail matters for a studio like Bethesda Game Studios, whose RPGs run on proprietary tools and long internal production habits. One developer told IGN there was fear that lost staff could be replaced with cheaper contract labor or new hires who would need time to learn those tools, creating more delay pressure and crunch.
"We've all been very excited and hyped for TES 6 and this has had a crushing effect on morale," another staff member said. "We were already running a tight ship and are worried about this delaying the game (though a final release date was not yet chosen as far as we know)."
The report also says staff have shared photos of makeshift "Celebrations of Service" memorials in Bethesda offices in Dallas and Rockville, with framed photos of laid-off workers and flowers. At least one display was later dismantled under HR orders, according to IGN.
A flagship Xbox RPG is still years away
The Elder Scrolls 6 was announced in 2018 with a short teaser and has barely been shown since. Recent reporting already suggested The Elder Scrolls 6 may still be at least two to three years away, which keeps the next mainline Elder Scrolls game in 2028 territory or later if that estimate holds.
The new staff concerns do not give the game a new release window. They do add another caveat around a project carrying huge weight for Bethesda and Xbox. Skyrim launched in 2011, and the next mainline game now has to follow more than a decade of expectations while Bethesda also supports Fallout 76, watches Starfield's future become less certain and navigates Microsoft's restructuring of ZeniMax.
Bethesda Game Studios Union has also pushed back publicly on the cuts. In a Bluesky post quoted by Windows Central, the union said the layoffs were not a removal of "14 layers of management" and said Bethesda lost "dozens of programmers, artists, designers, and testers." The union directed fans to Microsoft's Xbox Player Voice feedback platform if they were worried about future games such as The Elder Scrolls 6.
Microsoft has not announced any cancellation or date change for The Elder Scrolls 6. The public status remains simpler than the internal picture described by staff: Bethesda's next RPG is still in development, still undated and now reportedly being built by a team dealing with the aftermath of major Xbox cuts.