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Hardcore Fallout 4 Fans Can Test Out Survival-Mode Beta On PC
Life in the Fallout universe can already be short and brutal. It is, after all, a world where feeding on the people you just killed with a sledgehammer is a completely legitimate way of restoring health. Still, there are those who want even more of a challenge from Fallout 4. For them, there's the upcoming Survival Mode, which is now available as a PC beta. Brace yourself, however, since it removes many of the quality-of-life features that you may have grown accustomed to.
Details on the mode were leaked late last month, but Bethesda has laid it all out today in an official blog post. As the development team sees it, this tough new difficulty option is designed to encourage cautious exploration of the world and careful management of the resources that you may have taken for granted during earlier playthroughs.
Some of the biggest changes to the game in Survival Mode include not being able to fast travel to known points of interest using the map; disabling manual saves and only allowing saving by sleeping in beds; and increasing both the damage dealt and taken in combat. Enemies no longer appear on the compass to provide an advanced heads-up, and you'll need to be significantly closer to that nearby ruin or landmark to have it show up on your compass as well. You'll also need to manage your hunger and hydration levels and make sure that you're getting enough rest.
There is a new perk, Adrenaline, to help counteract what's bound to be a tougher overall experience. Every time you kill five enemies, you increase your Adrenaline rank by one, to a max rank of 10. Each rank adds 5-percent bonus damage, providing an incentive for players who tend to end their confrontations with a corpse rather than a successful persuasion check.
Take a look at the breakdown here for more details on Survival Mode. There's a lot to soak in. It's currently in beta for PC, and it will eventually make its way to console. For more Fallout 4 info, take a look at Reiner's impressions from the game's first DLC, Automatron.
[Source: Bethesda]
Our Take
I'm all about dialing up the difficulty in Bethesda games, though one Survival Mode tweak in particular gives me pause. Putting a weight on ammo and stimpacks? As an avowed packrat, that goes against everything that's in my nature – especially when I can't fast travel my way back home after a great haul. Decisions, decisions...
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