Housemarque has been doing its best to release consistent updates for Returnal, as the studio’s first AAA game has been dealing with some issues. While these problems have been both minor and major, Returnal fans should be pleased to see that many of the biggest issues have been solved.
Housemarque had detailed the fixes in Returnal’s new update prior to its release, and the patch itself has delivered on al the promised changes. It is now available to download, though some gamers may need to start the process manually. If Returnal fans took Housemarque’s advice, they may have turned off auto-updates. With the feature ruining in-progress runs that are stopped in place using rest mode, it is best to keep off for those looking to “save” their progress. If auto-update is still on, however, the game should be ready to go as soon as players start it up.
Arguably the biggest change in the patch was a fix for Returnal’s dreaded corrupted save issue. Caused by a recent update, some gamers were losing their entire saves just for downloading the faulty patch. While Housemarque was quick to pull the update and revert the game to an older state, the damage was already done, and many fans were forced to start from scratch. Fortunately, the new patch should prevent any further save corruption issues — though gamers may want to make sure they are backing up their saves just in case.
Another big fix sees Returnal’s door bug addressed. Tied to the game’s pre-order suits, players that changed into the alternate outfits were blocked from progression. As a result, only Selene’s default outfit could be used, with gamers punished for wearing one of the ASTRA Scout’s alternate attires. This bug has now been fixed, however, and gamers should be free to use whatever costume they want for Selene. Alongside the fixes for the troublesome suits, controller mapping issues and crashes were also fixed.
The final big bug squashed by this update could prove to be a bit controversial with Returnal players, as the healing exploit in Selene’s ship no longer works. An unintended trick used by many fans of the game, the exploit saw players heading back to Helios to instantly heal themselves. Sleeping in Helios’ bed saw Selene’s health restored to the maximum amount, with integrity upgrades also possible thanks to the bug. From there, they could backtrack to where they left off in a biome, not needing to fight any enemies on the way. While Housemarque reverting back to version 1.3.1 of the game saw this exploit return for a brief time, it has once again been taken out of Returnal.
Though fans have debated whether Returnal’s Helios healing is fair, Housemarque’s stance on the trick seems clear. While there are other ways to heal inside the roguelike, update 1.3.6 has ensured that this popular strategy is no longer viable.
Returnal is available now on PS5.
Source: Housemarque
