New 'Starfield: Shattered Space' DLC explores House Va'ruun homeworld (video)

Starfield: Shattered Space - Deep Dive - YouTube Starfield: Shattered Space - Deep Dive - YouTube
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Bethesda Game Studios, creators and designers of "Starfield," the epic single-player exploratory space game, continue expanding the narrative and overall experience of this engaging sci-fi adventure, and now they're bringing out a new DLC pack titled "Shattered Space" that fleshes out secrets of the spooky homeworld of Va'ruun'kai.

"Starfield: Shattered Space" is a paid expansion pack that players can buy for $29.99 from Steam and Xbox store. This impressive expansion launches on Sept. 30 and represents the most ambitious addition to the open universe phenomenon since "Starfield" arrived for Xbox Series X/S and Windows PC in 2023. 

To help introduce some of the upcoming features baked into this major DLC booster, Bethesda has dropped the illuminating deep dive video above that explains all the bells and whistles for their expansion add-on primed to deliver 50 new locations.

Here's the official synopsis:

"The home planet of House Va'ruun remains a mystery to the vast majority of the citizens of the Settled Systems. The religious zealots that make up this clandestine faction are known only by their dangerous reputation. When a distress signal originating from a derelict star station leads you on a path to Va'ruun'kai, you'll begin to uncover the secrets surrounding the followers of the Great Serpent. Explore a new location, take on new enemies and experience the story of House Va'ruun when 'Shattered Space' launches later this year."

A scene from the new "Starfield: Shattered Space" DLC expansion pack (Image credit: Bethesda Game Studios)

Bethesda's Lovecraftian cosmic horror theme previewed in the explanatory sneak peek video teases a creepy, mysterious plot with plenty to explore, both on foot or inside your REV-8 all-terrain space vehicle. A significant amount of care and attention has obviously been applied to this story expansion and if what we see in this deep dive video is half as incredible as it looks, gamers are in for a perfect outer space escapade to usher in the Halloween season.

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"We love 'Starfield's' massive open galaxy, but from early on in our planning, we knew we wanted to introduce a more secluded and handcrafted location, similar to what you've seen from our past expansions," notes Bethesda Lead Producer Joe Mueller in the video. "There's so much mystery to House Va'ruun and because they've so thoroughly isolated themselves it made them the perfect faction to explore in a completely self-contained experience. 

"Everything you discover, every location you visit, every side mission you seek out, it all tells the story of what happened here, and how the Va'ruun people have survived, cut-off from the comforts of the Settled Systems and the rest of humanity."

"Starfield: Shattered Space" enters Earth orbit on Sept. 30, 2024.

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Jeff Spry
Contributing Writer

Jeff Spry is an award-winning screenwriter and veteran freelance journalist covering TV, movies, video games, books, and comics. His work has appeared at SYFY Wire, Inverse, Collider, Bleeding Cool and elsewhere. Jeff lives in beautiful Bend, Oregon amid the ponderosa pines, classic muscle cars, a crypt of collector horror comics, and two loyal English Setters.