Many Starfield factions live in the Settled Systems, all with wildly different ideologies, areas of expertise, and fashion senses. So while this upcoming space game will likely play into the fear of the unknown that’s synonymous with the inky black expanse of the cosmos, it’s still your fellow humans who pose the greatest threat to your survival.
When you begin your voyage across space, you are doing so on behalf of Constellation, one of at least seven different Starfield factions. As a new Constellation recruit, it’s your mission to seek out and expose the secrets of the known galaxy. As a result, you may come face-to-face with one of the other factions during your travels, and first impressions are vitally important.
Because we don’t want you to make a fool of yourself, we’ve pooled together every scrap of information we have about each of the Starfield factions, including details of what role they played during the bloody Colony War that happened 20 years before the events of Starfield take place. While some factions live in one of the many Starfield cities, others roam around the Settled Systems, and one is so secretive that we only know of them by name. One last word: we’re not sure if all of these factions will be joinable, so it might be that some are major players that you can join, while others are minor factions that you can’t truly align with.
The Starfield factions are:
- Constellation – the main faction of the campaign that you join in the city of New Atlantis on Jemison, one of the many Starfield planets. Their aim is to uncover any remaining mysteries in the Settled Systems after learning about people seeing visions and hearing voices when picking up specific artefacts.
- United Colonies – an alliance of different colonies which formed a space republic. Their capital city is New Atlantis, a melting pot of people of all races, ethnicities, and creeds. They fought with the Freestar Collective in the Colony War and are regarded as the most powerful, established military and political faction in the game, though these days they mostly repel pirates.
- Free Star Collective – a loose confederation of three star systems living in the walled Akila City, the Free Star Collective believe that people should have freedom and be allowed to live as individuals. They were previously at war with the United Colonies and now seek to protect themselves from harm.
- Ryujin Industries – a mega-corporation that controls neon-lit metropolises. It’s suggested in a developer commentary video that you can join Ryujin Industries by being hired by them – lead quest designer Will Shen refers to this as “one of the best starts of any of the factions”.
- Crimson Fleet – they’re essentially space pirates who plunder spaceships for parts. Bethesda has confirmed that you have the option to join this faction at some point in the campaign. Design director Emil Pagliarulo highlights that you’ll also still be able to play as a good character while playing with a bad faction, as you could use your access to report their deeds like an undercover cop. According to their leader though, the only way out is in death.
- Ecliptic Mercenaries – bounty hunters who travel across space carrying out dangerous missions for their clients.
- Spacers – not a lot is known about them aside from their violent nature.
- House of Va’ruun – a fanatical cult of religious zealots.
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And that’s all we know right now about the Starfield factions. There’s a long time to wait between now and the Starfield release date. Still, in the meantime, we’ve set out on our own journey to discover as much as we can about the upcoming RPG game, including when we’ll see Starfield on Xbox Game Pass. We also have details on the game’s mechanics we know so far, including Starfield base building, research laboratory projects, and how both your chosen background and traits are important during character creation.
