Warhammer 40K: Darktide’s latest update brings big changes to how players earn gear and modify gear, and looks to be a step in the right direction for a title that has been heavily criticized by fans for feeling incomplete.
Patch #4, Blessings of the Omnissiah, revamps numerous aspects of Darktide’s progression. For starters, players will always receive a new weapon or piece of gear upon completing a mission, something that curiously wasn’t the case until now. Completing missions on higher difficulties will increase the chances of receiving a higher-rarity item.
Players have complained since launch about being unable to obtain the gear they want, as doing so largely revolved around sitting at a vendor that stocked random weapons and waiting for the vendor to refresh its inventory. Developer Fatshark has largely addressed that issue with the update, as players can simply buy a base version of any weapon type they’ve unlocked at any time at the Armory Exchange.
Blessings, a key-part of Darktide’s endgame, can now be extracted and weapon blessings modified at the Shrine of the Omnissiah, giving players more control of their progression. Another much-maligned system, Sire Melk’s Requisitorium, has also been revamped. His challenges are generally easier now and the rewards he offers have improved.
More missions will be available at any given time via the mission board as of Patch #4, which addresses another common complaint fans have had. Emotes have also been added so players can interact with one another while in the game’s hub area.
The patch notes go on to include a lengthy list of weapon balance changes and bug fixes as well. Reception to the update, at least judging from the game’s subreddit, seems largely positive. However, positive reception to the update has not seen a major shift in the game’s user reviews on Steam, which are “Mixed” overall with “Mostly Negative” recent reviews.
Fans have complained about the game’s microtransactions, technical issues, disappointing progression, and almost total lack of story since launch, and while Blessings of the Omnissiah does at least address the progression aspect of Darktide, many players are still unhappy with the overall state of the game. Many of the recent negative reviews on Steam comment on how Darktide feels unfinished or like it’s still in early access, despite the game’s full release.
Fatshark recently made the decision to delay future content updates, as well as the console versions of Darktide, in order to address fan feedback.
“Over the next few months, our sole focus is to address the feedback that many of you have,” Fatshark CEO and co-founder Martin Wahlund wrote in a statement. “In particular, we will focus on delivering a complete crafting system, a more rewarding progression loop, and continue to work on game stability and performance optimization.”
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