Earlier this month, it was announced that Arkane Austin, among a number of other Bethesda-owned studios, was being shuttered by Xbox, meaning that the team responsible for vampire-themed loot shooter Redfall wouldn’t be able to continue supporting the game. The developers were reportedly working on a major update just before the news came down, leading many to believe that it’d never see the light of day. Fortunately, the team was able to wrap up what it had started and today, Redfall’s final update went live.
The update (cheekily dubbed 1.451.3.0 since 0451 is a significant number in the history of immersive sims) introduces an offline mode to Redfall, which was among the most requested features upon the game’s much-maligned launch last spring. There’s also now an option to pause the game in single-player in case you need to take a minute away from the game without fear.
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Redfall’s final update also revamps a few of the game’s major systems to be more rewarding and streamlined. The neighborhood system has been retooled and equipped with a new meter called Community Standing, which increases upon “unlocking a new Safehouse, completing Safehouse missions, rescuing civilians, or killing an Underboss.” The community standing meter has six ranks that players can blast through, and there are 39 rewards to be earned from completing all of them.
The updates also introduces elder nests to Redfall which, akin to the heart nests already in the game, are boss-focused arenas that “challenge you to destroy dangerously modified special Vampires.” Completing an elder nest will grant players rewards as well as a temporary buff called a heart shard, which scales in effectiveness to the difficulty of the game. The harder the elder nest encounter, the longer the buff lasts.
Though the patch notes available aren’t complete, the final update also brings new enemy encounters, improvements to enemy AI, a new weapon, accessibility options, and more. As the update’s been promoted, many Arkane Austin developers, including former creative director Harvey Smith, have begun spreading news of its arrival and bidding farewell to Redfall, its dedicated community of players, and fans of Arkane Austin.
Some outside developers, including Dinga Bakaba, director of sister studio Arkane Lyon, have also chimed in to congratulate the team on its hard work and pay respects to the studio as it closes.
Redfall’s final update is obviously a bittersweet one. Arkane Austin was clearly in the middle of addressing the concerns that players raised about the game when it launched last year. If the update is any indication, the team was fully ready to overhaul the game and its systems to improve the experience and make Redfall into the game that many hoped it would be. Now, as it pushes one last update out and closes its doors for good, Redfall will never get the shot to reach the height of its ambitions, and it’s nothing short of tragic.