Bethesda's Unannounced 2017 Game: 5 Things It Could Be
3. A New Mobile Game
Since Bethesda's unannounced 2017 title would require an extremely short amount of time to prepare for a wide scale release, perhaps we should look to the mobile genre, in which Bethesda announced and released Fallout Shelter on the same night during E3 2015.
The mobile game capitalized off Fallout 4's hype, collecting over 100 million downloads so far, and generating millions of dollars in revenue for Bethesda.
Bethesda Game Studios expanded shortly after, establishing a branch in Montreal. This new team based in Canada is believed to have a focus on mobile games, meaning Bethesda has likely had a mobile title in development for quite some time. If they are ready for release, Hines' comments seem to match the timeframe perfectly.
A mobile release has the additional benefit of requiring no case nor disc, which would mean Bethesda would have no reason to worry over a rush to quickly stock retail shelves, which would be a major issue if their 2017 release was a major triple A title.
With Bethesda's track record and the short amount of time left in 2017 for a major release, a mobile game seems to be the most likely suspect of Pete Hines' tease, but we can only speculate at this point in time.