Starfield Early Access is officially live, but if you’re one of the unfortunate players to have found your Early Access isn’t working then you may be less excited.
As with any launch, there have been a few bumps blocking entry for Starfield players, including a bug that says “you are too early to play this game” even when you’ve bought early access. While this is frustrating, there are several steps you can try to fix Starfield not working errors.
Step 1) Have you bought Starfield Early Access?
I know this may sound straightforward, but it’s worth remembering that right now Starfield is only accessible to those who have purchased the Premium Edition of the game or, if you have Xbox Game Pass or the standard version, upgraded to the Premium Edition of Starfield.
You can still upgrade to the Premium Edition of Starfield now, if you haven’t already, allowing you early access. But if you would rather wait until the main launch day on Sept. 6 then you can check out our Starfield countdown to see exactly how long you have to wait until you can get your hands on it.
Step 2) Turn your console off and on again
Again, I know this may sound a bit basic, but turning your Xbox or PC completely off, unplugging it for 10 seconds, and then plugging it back in again could prove to be a savior. I know it’s saved my ass on one or two occasions. Once you’ve turned your console or PC back on again, open Starfield again to check if it’s working. If not, move on to the next step.
Step 3) Check for updates
Now it’s time to check if your Starfield install is actually up to date, especially as there was a large update applied after preload started but before early access began. Here’s how to do this:
Xbox Series X|S
If you haven’t got automatic updates enabled on your Xbox, follow these steps:
- On your home screen, hover over the Starfield tile and select the ‘Menu’ button on your controller
- Choose ‘Manage Games and Add-Ons’ from the drop-down menu
- Select ‘Updates’ from the screen that comes up
- If there are any updates available, download them now
Steam
On Steam, games that can be updated will have their names highlighted in light blue. Steam is usually set to automatically download any available updates when the client is open but you can also set updates to be manual, where they only download when you launch a game.
If you’ve launched Starfield on Steam then it should have automatically updated when you try to launch it if automatic downloads aren’t enabled
Xbox App for PC
Like Steam and Xbox consoles, you can set the Xbox PC app to automatically download updates. If you haven’t got this set, however, you can check if Starfield requires an update by following these steps:
- Open the Xbox app on your PC and go to ‘My Library’
- Navigate to Starfield and click on it
- If there’s an update available then it should show on your Starfield page
Step 4) Uninstall and reinstall Starfield
You probably want to avoid this option, but sometimes desperate times call for desperate measures. Starfield has a large file size, so this option likely takes a bit longer than the previous ones, but if it gets you into the game then it’s worth it.
If this doesn’t work, it’s worth getting in contact with the relevant support team.
