It's time for the third season of Fallout 76 to begin, and we have patch notes to mark the occasion.
This week on the official Fallout 76 blog, Bethesda laid down their plans for the "final update of the year," preceding the upcoming quality of life patch in early 2021, as well as the subsequent Brotherhood of Steel storyline content. While season three is the big thing in version 1.5.1.3, new "Core Vault" objects can help spruce up your C.A.M.P. through the completion of a very easy Home Expansion quest, and a bunch more bugs have been fixed. You can find the full patch notes below.
Having scanned over each and every patch, it's kind of crazy just how many bugs are still in the game, or are being added with subsequent updates. The biggest hit this week was regarding combat challenge fixes; as six enemy types were previously not counting toward challenge completion progress. I can't imagine how maddening it must be to not understand why any given aspect of the game doesn't work after all this time.
These are the sort of things a lot of people can brush off in a single-player game, but the "games as a service" approach has really put this one in a corner. Direct rewards are tied to mechanics like this, which can drive people to the Atomic Shop (in-game and real-money transactions). While Fallout 76 has markedly improved before my own eyes, I hope Bethesda learns from this experience and doesn't try to force this sort of model into a game that can't handle it again.
Update Notes [Bethesda.net]
