Bethesda's grand RPG Starfield has just launched into the hands of special edition version owners as part of their five days of early access benefit. However, one missing aspect has been a major thorn in some players' sides: having no built-in option to change the game's field of view (FOV).
We have confirmed this to be the case ourselves, with none of the settings menus (Display, Interface, Accessibility, etc.) having any mention of changing FOV across all versions of the game.
Being a Bethesda title though, PC players have already taken it upon themselves to add the functionality to their games. As a Nexus mod page by creator Hellstorm102 shows (comparison shots below), creating a fresh config file in My Documents and adding a couple of lines will allow players to set any custom FOV. Other than for those looking to have a wider view as a benefit, this can also help those who suffer from motion sickness when playing games.
To change the field of view, follow the directions below. However, keep in mind that extremely high FOV numbers can present issues like the camera clipping into clothing or objects nearby. Moreover, considering this expands the amount of real estate the game has to show the player at all times, a performance hit is to the expected.
- Head to Windows' Documents folder, then My Games, and locate Starfield folder inside it. If this folder is not there, you probably haven't launched the game yet for it to be created.
- While inside the \Documents\My Games\Starfield folder, create a new text file and name it StarfieldCustom.ini
- Inside this file, add the following lines of text and save:
[Camera]
fFPWorldFOV=90.0000
fTPWorldFOV=90.0000
Change the numbers following the "=" sign to set the desired FOV. The given text above will set the FOV to 90. This should work across Steam and Microsoft Store (PC Game Pass) versions of the title.
The lack of FOV sliders mostly affects PC players due to how close they are usually to the display, with many developers nowadays including the handy feature in their ports. While not as commonplace as on PC, even some console games now have FOV sliders in settings menus to accommodate players. What's interesting is that Bethesda Game Studios' previous game, Fallout 76, currently has an FOV slider built into its menu, which makes its absence from Starfield a baffling one.
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