The futures of both Microsoft's purchase of Bethesda expected to be approved soon, the gaming giant is making plans to publicly reveal its intentions for the studio. While Bethesda has maintained that both Starfield and The Elder Scrolls VI are its top priorities for the immediate future, not much is known regarding their availability on other consoles moving forward.
Microsoft will honor preexisting agreements for games like Deathloop and that service-based games The Elder Scrolls Online and Fallout 76 will continue to be ed.
Games industry insider Jeff Grubb confirmed on his podcast (via PushSquare) that Microsoft is indeed still planning some sort of event to outline its plans for Bethesda. Around the 27:45 mark when speaking about E3, Grubb stated, "Microsoft's E3 and Bethesda's E3 could actually still be separate, they're planning their stuff right now, and they're planning it as two separate companies." Later in the podcast, Grubb is asked if he thinks Microsoft will make some sort of Bethesda-related announcement following the finalization of the deal, to which he replied:
"Yeah, I think they're gonna have an event for this. Leading up to E3, I think this is one of the milestones for Microsoft. Once the deal closes they will talk about it in a in a big way. I don't know if it'll be like a full direct style event, but they will make note of it and they will talk about it extensively and explain what it means to everybody and kind of talk about the immediate future for both companies."
It is no secret that there is not a financial need for Microsoft to make cross-platform Bethesda games going forward.
Microsoft has been noticeably collaborative with both Sony and Nintendo when it comes to cross-platform titles and enabling cross-play between bigger games. Realistically, Bethesda games already in production like Starfield or The Elder Scrolls VI will probably see some sort of timed exclusivity, but titles further down the timeline may incorporate more features for Microsoft's hardware and/or come with Xbox Game on launch.
Source: Jeff Grubb, PushSquare
