Starfield's reviews are here, and the internet is full of takes, impressions, and everything in between. If you are curious how Bethesda's latest single-player RPG fares on the Xbox Series S, you should be happy to know the console can run the game just fine.
In our Performance Review for Starfield, we tested all three versions of Starfield. Like the Xbox Series X version, the Series S version of Starfield is locked at 30 frames per second, and for the most part, it holds that framerate consistently.
"The Series S delivers almost identical performance rate and shows the team worked hard to ensure the console did not suffer over its bigger brother," Michael Thompson said in the video.
However, there are some issues with the Series S version, but nothing major. We note in the video that both console versions do encounter some issues with stuttering, such as in combat and when exploring bigger cities. Nevertheless, our reviewer noted that it is brief and drops the FPS to mid-20s "at worst." He did point out that the streaming and loading stutter was "slightly" worse in Series S than Series X, but nothing that would make it unplayable.
Since the Series S was released in 2020, there has always been a conversation on the compatibility of the Series S and whether this console would hold back developers making games on Series X. While the lower visual quality is the big difference between the two.
Last year, Microsoft noted that the Xbox Series S was getting a performance boost to help free up additional megabytes of memory after it was previously pointed out that developers had issues with the memory limitations, which made it harder to optimize games on Series S.
Some players will be able to play Starfield as early as tomorrow. For more information, check out our full performance review, or read our full written review. If you are starting your journey tomorrow, be sure to check out our guides.
Taylor is a Reporter at IGN. You can follow her on Twitter @TayNixster.
