Evidence that a new VR game published by Bethesda Softworks, the studio behind The Elder Scrolls and Fallout series, has appeared in an online listing by the Australian government’s media classification board.
According to the listing, the game is codenamed ‘Project 2021A’, and will be developed by Bethesda subsidiary studio id Software. It’s unclear what to make of it since there’s no name attached to the game itself, although the listing does hold a few scraps of info.
The game, which is is solely listed as supporting VR, carries an ‘R 18+’ rating for “high-impact violence, [and] online interactivity,” which could point to any number of id Software regulars, including franchises such as Doom, Wolfenstein and Quake.
Notably, id Software’s DOOM VFR (2017) was also rated ‘R 18+’ by the Australian government, which restricts the game to users 18 years and over; that was for the game’s “high impact violence, blood and gore.”
Bethesda’s Wolfenstein: Cyberpilot (2019) was rated ‘MA 15+’, which restricts it to 15 years and above for its “strong violence, [and] online interactivity.” Whatever it is, it’s probably going to be more intense than killing Nazis from the relative safety of a giant mech.
Could we be looking at a wholly new VR-only game in the vein of Doom VFR, or possibly a retread of an older, non-VR game from the studio? It’s difficult to say with so little information, although the codename and preemptive media classification would suggest we’ll be hearing about it sometime this year.
The next likely announce windows are E3 2021 in June and GDC 2021 in July. Both events are still being held in-person, albeit with heavy emphasis on a “digital-first” component.