• Hey, guest user. Hope you're enjoying NeoGAF! Have you considered registering for an account? Come join us and add your take to the daily discourse.

Starfield Steam update removes Russian language support

Topher

Gold Member
With the Starfield release date on the (event) horizon, the Bethesda RPG game seems to be undergoing some interesting changes. A new Starfield Steam update seemingly removes Russian language support from the space sim, despite fellow Bethesda open-world hits Skyrim and Fallout 4 previously allowing for Russian-language interfaces and subtitles.

On April 11, an alteration was made in the backend of the Starfield Steam listing, removing references to Russian subtitles and Russian language support from the game’s page. Checking archived versions of the Starfield Steam page, as recently as April 4, support for Russian subtitles and a Russian-language in-game interface were both listed, but as of this writing, these have both vanished.

Further updates in the Starfield Steam backend indicate that various store tags have been removed. Since you can search Steam to find games that include specific language options, it’s possible that this is connected to the removal of Russian language support – indeed, when conducting a Steam store search for games that include Russian language support, Starfield does not appear.

Other Bethesda titles including Fallout 4, The Elder Scrolls Skyrim, and the upcoming vampire game Redfall, which Bethesda will publish, are all listed on Steam as including various forms of Russian language support.

PCGamesN has contacted Bethesda with regards to the removal of Russian language support from Starfield and will update this story with any further information or comment. You can see the Starfield Steam update, removing Russian support, in the image below obtained from SteamDB:

Starfield Steam update removes Russian language support: An image from SteamDB showing an update to Bethesda RPG game Starfield




 

kraspkibble

Permabanned.
I almost felt sorry for the Russians. I am sure a lot of them are innocent, don't want a war, or are being lied to but the war needs to stop and if this is what it takes to get Russians to stand up to Putin then so be it. Obviously I don't mean to suggest that Steam removing the language in a game is going to get Russians up in arms to overthrow the government but enough little things like this will hopefully eventually force them to try change the direction their country is going in.
 

Guilty_AI

Member
I almost felt sorry for the Russians. I am sure a lot of them are innocent, don't want a war, or are being lied to but the war needs to stop and if this is what it takes to get Russians to stand up to Putin then so be it. Obviously I don't mean to suggest that Steam removing the language in a game is going to get Russians up in arms to overthrow the government but enough little things like this will hopefully eventually force them to try change the direction their country is going in.
Or it'll make them believe the west hates them as people and want them gone, leading them to support the war more and more.
 

westman

Member
I don't think it's good. Russian is spoken in many countries. Not only in Russia. Even in Ukraine, Russian is spoken a lot. And in most games there is no Ukrainian translation but a Russian one.
If you remove Russia, Belarus, and Russian-occupied parts of Ukraine, what's left of the user base might not warrant a Russian translation. It's not only about the total number of people speaking Russian, but how many of them would actually buy the game, and would do so only if a Russian translation was available.
 

Spyxos

Member
If you remove Russia, Belarus, and Russian-occupied parts of Ukraine, what's left of the user base might not warrant a Russian translation. It's not only about the total number of people speaking Russian, but how many of them would actually buy the game, and would do so only if a Russian translation was available.
I never said that purchasing power was ever great in those countries, but at least there was that option as a band-aid, and now that's gone, too.
 
Besides Russia itself, Russian is an official language in Belarus, Kazakhstan, and Kyrgyzstan, and is used widely as a lingua franca throughout Ukraine, the Caucasus, Central Asia, and to some extent in the Baltic states.

Corporations dont care about that. They ban whatever twitter warriors and woke culture dictates. 40 years from now, if you're not part of LGBT, you are banned from society for being a straight trash human.
 

ChoosableOne

ChoosableAll
this is what it takes to get Russians to stand up to Putin then so be it
Probably such little things contribute to Putin's propaganda. It's nothing more than a useless, unethical practice. They will probably crack the game and add russian subtitles to it in 1 month. So 1 win for Russians, 1 win for Putin.

I'm not sure it will be worth the effort though.
 

Emedan

Member
If it is for geo political reasons its so dumb. Russian is spoken widely in all old Soviet states, you think they'll add Kazakh or Kyrgyz?
 
I don't think it's good. Russian is spoken in many countries. Not only in Russia. Even in Ukraine, Russian is spoken a lot. And in most games there is no Ukrainian translation but a Russian one.
the biggest chunk of the language is Russia itself though, the rest might be too small markets to keep supporting it in the current trying to isolate Russia somehow climate (even if it hurts us, our compannies, more than their economy or even the fantasy this would start the revolt because of lack of McD, Gucci and Steam...). Russia was also well known for being a piracy haven and only slowly turned into legal customers, which probably reversed again now. So the effort to support it to begin with was possibly not that great of a deal and keeping or finalising what was already done is now not worth it for the other Russian speaking countries.
 

OmegaSupreme

advanced basic bitch
Besides Russia itself, Russian is an official language in Belarus, Kazakhstan, and Kyrgyzstan, and is used widely as a lingua franca throughout Ukraine, the Caucasus, Central Asia, and to some extent in the Baltic states.
I bet they speak other languages in those countries too. They'll be fine.
 

Cyberpunkd

Gold Member
It's also hard to learn and practice, with non-standard characters. It might be simply too expensive to support it at this point.
https://gamerant.com/starfield-removes-russian-language-support/
Starfield is easily one of the most anticipated RPGs of 2023 with millions of players looking forward to its September release and will support several languages such as German, French, Italian, and Japanese, some of which are to enjoy full audio support while others are only supported through subtitles and a translated interface.
Japanese: 3 000 characters
Russian: 33 letters

This is virtue signalling BS for no reason, did someone got angry at Bethesda for the Russian language?
 

artsi

Member
I'm from a country where we don't get either dubs or even subs (except for a small minority of games) since forever, so I don't think it's much of an issue.

Our language learning is much better because we consume a lot of media in English.
 

Cyberpunkd

Gold Member
If you remove Russia, Belarus, and Russian-occupied parts of Ukraine, what's left of the user base might not warrant a Russian translation. It's not only about the total number of people speaking Russian, but how many of them would actually buy the game, and would do so only if a Russian translation was available.
If this releases in September the translation is already done, probably with lines being recorded as well if there was audio support planned.
 

Flabagast

Member
I don't think it's good. Russian is spoken in many countries. Not only in Russia. Even in Ukraine, Russian is spoken a lot. And in most games there is no Ukrainian translation but a Russian one.
Yeah, I despise Russia and the passivity of Russian people but it remains a great culture & a language spoken in many places. I agree with you.
 

Teletraan1

Banned
I am still boycotting MS due to the US involvement in Iraq, Syria, Afghanistan, Yemen. Apparently it is also fine to hate the people of America as well. Hopefully my hate will cause them to overthrow their government and destroy the military industrial complex because actually overthrowing a government is so easy.
A few selfies and property damage in the Kremlin should put the final nails in Putin's coffin. Personally I thought it was game over for him when his Twitter account was restricted but it looks like it is back.
 

nemiroff

Gold Member
I don't think this has much to do with the war though, it's not logical, obviously language isn't constrained to specific country borders.

F.ex. both my two year old and my eight year old sons speak russian, and they ain't no russians by any stretch of the imagination..

Wouldn't it make sense to confirm an angle before running with it..? Of course, it wouldn't generate as many clicks that way, but still..


Edit: Forgot about localization services.. So it's of course not because they want to punish the russian speaking, but Bethesda might've been hit by sanction issues.
 
Last edited:
Top Bottom