Bethesda’s official next-gen update for Fallout 4 may have hindered the launch of a much more exciting project that fans have been waiting for.
To coincide with the premiere of the Fallout TV series on Amazon Prime, Bethesda announced that its free update for PS4 and Xbox One owners would arrive on 25 April, along with native digital versions for PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X/S on the same day. These next-generation enhancements will bring new performance and quality modes to all platforms, as well as stability improvements and fixes for the game.
Unfortunately, this has impacted Fallout London, an ambitious, DLC-sized mod eagerly awaited by the Team Folon team. In an interview with BBC News, Fallout London project leader Dean Carter explained how Bethesda’s upcoming Fallout 4 update affected development, saying that the team felt “taken by surprise” by the decision.
Although widely publicised, Fallout London is an unofficial mod. Although there was brief communication with Bethesda’s community manager at the time of the mod’s reveal trailer, Carter emphasises that there was “no contact” with the studio. He agrees that there should have been more communication, and that Team Folon would have signed an NDA (non-disclosure agreement) regarding official releases, as it has done with large companies in the past, to ensure a smoother development process.
Fallout London was originally scheduled to be released this week
Although previously announced for 2023, Bethesda’s next-gen update of Fallout 4 had no set release date. Team Folon had planned to release Fallout London in the same year, but had to postpone it to 2024, choosing 23 April, the day after the series’ debut and also the initial in-game date, St George’s Day. Unfortunately, Bethesda delayed its update until just two days later, forcing Team Folon to postpone Fallout London indefinitely. The postponement was necessary so that the team could analyse the changes introduced by the update and implement fixes to ensure the mod’s compatibility with the new version of the game.
On the official Fallout London Discord server, Carter responded to the fans’ frustration. When asked why he wasn’t releasing the mod for the original version of Fallout 4, he pointed out: “it’s important to realise that this mod is for everyone, not just a few”. As the next-gen update will benefit the majority of players, Team Folon considers that “cutting off a significant portion of our player base is not a viable option”. In addition, maintaining two separate versions of the mod would be unfeasible from a technical point of view.
With no new official Fallout game on the horizon and Fallout London already boasting talents such as Neil Newbon (actor of Asterion in Baldur’s Gate 3) and Anna Demetriou (Final Fantasy 16), many considered the mod to be the next big release in the franchise. So, while understandable, the delays are disappointing for Team Folon and the players, especially considering that better communication from Bethesda about the Fallout 4 update could have avoided this scenario.
