Summary
- Fallout 4’s next-gen update impacted the fan-made mod Fallout London, prompting delays and frustration among players and developers alike.
- Team Folon postponed Fallout London indefinitely to adjust to Bethesda’s update, prioritizing the majority of gamers benefitting from the enhancements.
- Bethesda’s lack of communication with Team Folon highlights the importance of transparency in collaborations to avoid unexpected setbacks.
Betheda’s official next-gen update for Fallout 4 may have come at a cost to players by impacting a far more exciting, highly anticipated project. To coincide with the release of the Fallout TV show on Amazon Prime, Bethesda announced its free update for PS4 and Xbox One owners would be launching on April 25, alongside native digital applications for PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X/S on the same day. These next-gen enhancements will bring new Performance mode and Quality mode settings across all platforms, as well as stability improvements and fixes to allow the game.
Unfortunately, this has impacted Team Folon’s highly anticipated, extremely ambitious, DLC-sized mod for the game, Fallout London. In an interview with BBC News, the project lead on Fallout London, Dean Carter, explained how Bethesda’s upcoming Fallout 4 update impacted the project, saying the team felt “blindsided” by the move.
While it was highly publicized, Fallout London is an unofficial mod, so despite brief communication with Bethesda’s community manager around the time of the mod’s reveal trailer, Carter pointed out that there has been “zero correspondence” with the studio, but agrees that there should have been more, and that Team Folon would have signed an NDA (non-disclosure agreement) regarding official releases as it has done with big companies in the past to ensure a smoother development process.
Fallout London Mod Gameplay Trailer: 10 Biggest Takeaways
For the first time, the Fallout series is moving outside the United States via an impressive, sprawling Fallout 4 mod called Fallout London.
Fallout London Was Originally Scheduled To Release This Week
But Fallout 4’s Next-Gen Update Would Launch Two Days After
Bethesda previously announced Fallout 4‘s next-gen update in 2023, but didn’t establish a release date. Team Folon had also planned to release Fallout London that same year, but had to postpone to 2024, opting to pick a day after the show had released, but also the in-game start date, which was St George’s Day, April 23rd. Unfortunately, Bethesda also delayed its update to just two days later, causing Team Folon to delay Fallout London indefinitely until the team got to see what the new updates changed in the game, and what fixes would need to be implemented to get Fallout London working with the new version of the game.
On Fallout London‘s official Discord server, Carter addressed fan frustration, pointing out that “it’s important to understand that this mod is for everyone, not just a select few” when asked why Team Folon didn’t just release the mod for the original version of Fallout 4, and as the majority of gamers will benefit from the Fallout 4 next-gen update, Team Folon decided “cutting off a significant portion of [its] player base isn’t a viable option.” and that from a technical standpoint, maintaining two separate builds moving forward would be impractical.
With no new Fallout game in sight, and Fallout London already securing talent such as Baldur’s Gate 3‘s Asterion actor, Neil Newbon, and Final Fantasy 16‘s Anna Demetriou, many considered this to be the next major release for the franchise in gaming. Therefore, further delays, while understandable under the circumstances, are disappointing for both Team Folon and the players, especially considering how better communication from Bethesda surrounding Fallout 4 potentially could have avoided them.
Source: BBC News/YouTube, Fallout London/Discord, Fallout London/YouTube
