Starfield "was the best-selling video game of the week" in US for first time in nearly 3 years, reports analyst, despite Bethesda's rough PS5 port of the RPG

Starfield has suffered a rough couple of weeks following its so-called "unplayable" PS5 port and subsequent disappointing fixes from Bethesda Game Studios, but it's not all doom and gloom for the space RPG – in fact, things might be a lot better than they seem.

Veteran analyst and Circana games lead Mat Piscatella reveals as much in a new online post, explaining that Starfield was actually "the best-selling video game of the week in tracked physical and digital US full game dollar sales during the week ending April 11th" – the same week Bethesda launched its divisive space game on PlayStation 5 and released its Free Lanes update, as well as the Terran Armada DLC.

Starfield was the best-selling video game of the week in tracked physical & digital US full game dollar sales during the week ending April 11th. It's the first time Starfield has led the weekly US best-selling titles chart since week ending Sept 2, 2023. Source: Circana Retail Tracking Service

— @matpiscatella.bsky.social (@matpiscatella.bsky.social.bsky.social) 2026-04-20T16:32:49.248Z

Furthermore, though, this is apparently the first time this has happened since September of 2023 – nearly three years. As Piscatella writes, "It's the first time Starfield has led the weekly US best-selling titles chart since week ending Sept 2, 2023."

That's no small feat, especially when we've got other analysts saying Crimson Desert is "on track to overtake Starfield's total lifetime copies sold by the end of the year" thanks to the "not fantastic" PS5 port.

Rhys Elliott, head of market analysis at Alinea Analytics, for example, stated, "In the context of a Bethesda budget and a decade-long development cycle, Starfield has likely barely broken even."

It's hard to take a stance here, but I do personally wonder how things will continue to change – particularly now that it appears Starfield is coming to Switch 2 at some point. I'm not sure it'll go smoothly after the PS5 port, but its sales might similarly prove otherwise.

Only time will tell, I suppose. For now, at least, it's good to see that Bethesda managed to hit some sort of high the week ending April 11, considering everything that preceded the stellar sales numbers Piscatella reports.

Todd Howard says that Starfield's New Game Plus was "us asking you this weird, deep question that I actually think got lost on a lot of people."