Bethesda rolled out version 1.6 of Fallout 4 today, which delivers a few nice changes, but one in particular. After its introduction in beta, it's now live: the addition of exit saves. If you exit to the main menu while playing, a save file will be created. Upon loading that save, the file will be deleted. The key benefit is for those players using Survival mode, as prior to the update they would have had to find a bed to sleep in before being able to save and quit their game.

While I respect the idea of making Survival mode a more challenging experience, I've never liked that sleep-to-save requirement. It's just not practical. Having no choice but to find an in-game bed can be a real inconvenience if you need to quit playing at a particular moment, or even if you simply want to quit. With the patch, you can now quit the game without losing all the progress from the last bed you visited. And you can't use it as a crutch, either: once you load it, the save vanishes, so you won't be able to continually reload from that point. It's more practical but doesn't allow you to simply reload repeatedly if you die. It feels like a somewhat decent compromise.

Other changes include new icons for the Workshop mode that indicate where you can find items that are part of the add-on DLC. Though the Workshop menu is still poorly arranged, at least now you can find new items more quickly. Also, Codsworth has learned 300 more player names, so if you've been disappointed he never addressed you as "Sir Humplebutt" you might have another try.

The full patch notes are below, and include my favorite item: "Dead settlers can no longer be commanded or assigned to supply lines." Lazy dead settlers.

New features

  • ExitSave - Exiting to the Main Menu will create an ExitSave. During next play session, the ExitSave will delete itself after you load it. The Existsave works in all difficulty levels including Survival.
  • New Add On specific icons in Workshop mode
  • More than 300 new player names added to Codsworth's vocabulary
  • Support for upcoming Add Ons

Fixes

  • General stability and performance improvements 
  • Fixed a crash related to targeting an enemy weapon while in VATS
  • Fixed an issue where a Companion would become stuck walking and unable to run
  • Fixed issue in "Mankind Redefined" to prevent the player from getting stuck in elevators while in Mass Fusion Building
  • In "Boston After Dark" quest now completes properly when waiting for Old Man Stockton
  • Fixed occasional issue where player would become permanently invisible
  • Dead settlers can no longer be commanded or assigned to supply lines
  • Fixed issue where deleting saved games would cause other saves to disappear
  • Fixed occasional issues with activating mods that did not come from Bethesda.net
  • Minor bug fixes and optimizations to Mods load order and browsing