It is worth noting that it is going to be a test version, so players should be ready to expect bugs and other technical issues. Bethesda aims to wrap up testing and will release the full versions for current-gen consoles later this summer.

Among the improvements for the PS5 and Xbox Series X/S versions of Fallout 76 are a frame rate of 60 FPS across all current-gen consoles, improved draw distances, improved shadows, 4K resolution on Xbox Series X, Xbox One X, and PS5 Pro, support for variable refresh rate displays on Xbox Series X/S and PS5, and support for 1440p displays on the base PS5 and PS4 Pro consoles. Versions for Xbox One and PS4 will continue to run at 1080p.

This announcement comes after Bethesda had first confirmed that PS5 and Xbox Series X/S versions of Fallout 76 were in the works back in October 2025. At the time, the company had noted that it was aiming for a 2026 launch window for the current-gen versions.

In the meantime, it is still unknown whether or not the company is working on cross-platform multiplayer for Fallout 76. Back in February, creative director Jon Rush and production director Bill LaCoste had acknowledged that it was a much-requested feature, and that it was still on the table for future development. However, they noted that the studio was facing “technical hurdles” that date all the way back to when Fallout 76 first began development.

“We are looking into it, and we have plans to try to scope out what that work is going to entail for us,” said Rush in an interview. “It’s just not in the immediate plans for us. We know players want it.”

LaCoste went into more technical detail, noting that it was difficult to retrofit in new features like crossplay into the Creation Engine, which was used for the development of Fallout 76.

“It’s just huge technical hurdles that are things that you tackle before release, during your actual development of the product,” he explained. “So going back and retrofitting it to do that, when you have different places that players are pointing into, and now you’re having to worry about entitlements and account purchases and currency.”

“What we can promise players is that we will continue to investigate, we will continue to try to establish plans to make that a thing in the future, just not in the short term,” he continued.

In the meantime, you can check out the new content brought into Fallout 76 by the Infestation update, which gives players a new source of 4-Star Legendary items.

On The Xbox Two podcast with Rand al Thor, the duo discussed newly appointed XBOX chief strategy officer Matthew Ball and his statement about reviving “storied” franchises. When the former said this might mean Fallout, Corden responded, “I’ve heard that like, I don’t know how true this is, but one thing I heard is Fallout remasters are probably a little bit further off than people think, and The Elder Scrolls 6 is still quite far away. I suppose that getting some of those games out more quickly is probably something they’re probably very thinking is top of mind for them.”

Both believe that the alleged Fallout remasters could arrive starting next year, if not “at least one of them.” Corden went a step further, theorizing that perhaps The Elder Scrolls 6 could launch in 2028 or even 2029. At this point, launching any time before the decade is up would be a miracle.

Bethesda’s Todd Howard has said on more than one occasion that multiple Fallout projects are in the works, and that Fallout 5 would eventually have its time. Whether that includes Fallout 3 Remastered remains unknown, but rumors claim it’s aiming for the same level of polish as The Elder Scrolls 4: Oblivion Remastered (hopefully with better post-launch support).

As for The Elder Scrolls 6, Howard said last March that the “majority of this building” (referring to Bethesda) was working on the title. It’s developed on Creation Engine 3, and the team is “happy where it’s headed”, but sit tight because the team is taking its sweet time with it.

Following up Tomodachi Life: Living the Dream is Capcom’s Pragmata at the number 2 spot. Third place is taken up by Crimson Desert, followed by MLB: The Show 26 in fourth place. Rounding up the top 5 is the indie pirate-themed survival crafting game Windrose. The only other new releases in the top 10 listing are Saros at ninth place, and the PS5 release of Bethesda’s sci-fi RPG Starfield.

When it comes to the entire year so far, the period from January 4th to May 2nd has seen Resident Evil Requiem taking up the top spot in terms of sales in the US. Interestingly, Tomodachi Life: Living the Dream was the only recent release to make its way into the rankings at ninth place. The rest of the list is taken up by titles you’d expect, like Crimson Desert in second place, MLB The Show 26 in third place, Pokémon Pokopia in fourth place, and WWE 2K26 in fifth place.

April saw hardware sales rise, with spending going up by 34 percent year-on-year. Interestingly, much of this spending is attributed to the Nintendo Switch 2, since the original Switch, Xbox Series X/S, and PS5 have all seen year-on-year spending declines of 69 percent, 43 percent, and 30 percent, respectively.

This has made the Nintendo Switch 2 the best-selling hardware platform in terms of both number of units sold, as well as dollars of revenue generated for both the month of April itself, as well as the entire year so far. The PS5 is in second place.

Interestingly, when taking US lifetime sales into account, the PS5 is tracking 2 percent ahead of the PS4 in the same 66-month time frame. Similarly, the Nintendo Switch 2 has already taken a lead over the original Switch in the pace of its hardware sales, overtaking the 2017 console by 11 percent for the same 11-month period since their respective launches.

Tomodachi Life: Living the Dream topping sales charts shouldn’t really come as a surprise since the title has been a hit across social media platforms thanks to its absurdist comedy and emphasis on player freedom. The title was released on the Nintendo Switch on April 16th, and since then, has seen quite a bit of critical and commercial acclaim. Leading up to its release, Nintendo had also released a free demo for it, giving players a taste of its core gameplay that largely revolves around managing a quiet island town and its crazy denizens.

The other new title to have topped the charts this month—Pragmata—was released on PC, PS5, Xbox Series X/S, and Nintendo Switch 2 on April 17th, and since then, has been praised for its unique combat gameplay that melds shooting, dodging, and puzzle solving.

April 2026 U.S. Projected Top 10 Best-Selling Games Ranked on Physical & Full Game Digital Dollar Sales (Excludes Mobile and Digital Add-On Content)

— Mat Piscatella (@matpiscatella.bsky.social) 2026-05-20T13:00:19.106Z

YTD 2026 U.S. Projected Top 10 Best-Selling Games Ranked on Physical & Full Game Digital Dollar Sales (Excludes Mobile and Digital Add-On Content)

— Mat Piscatella (@matpiscatella.bsky.social) 2026-05-20T13:00:19.107Z

Hardware – April hardware spending increased by 34% when compared to a year ago, to $261M. Spending on Nintendo Switch 2 hardware offset declines seen across Switch (-69% versus April 2025), Xbox Series (-43%) and PlayStation 5 (-30%).

— Mat Piscatella (@matpiscatella.bsky.social) 2026-05-20T13:00:19.108Z

Lo and behold, it was more than a gorgeous facelift. The leveling was fixed, and it actually felt worthwhile to improve the skills you wanted. Combat felt more responsive, and animations were updated. But more importantly, it felt like the original updated for the modern age, retaining all the bizarre charm and imaginative world-building that made Cyrodiil and the Hero of Kvatch’s story so compelling.

Truly a blast from the past, when Bethesda delivered a compelling narrative that you wanted to dive further into alongside interesting and varied side content. The addition of the Shivering Isles – widely considered one of the finest expansions ever – made it an even sweeter deal at $50, despite the admittedly annoying Digital Deluxe Edition with its armor sets, weapons and not one but two horse armor sets.

To no one’s surprise, Oblivion Remastered was a massive hit. Despite launching on day one for Game Pass, it was one of the best-selling games of 2025 in the United States. To say that its sales outpaced the original in a fraction of the time would be an understatement. Bethesda had seemingly found a new winning formula to print money: simply revisit its glory days.

There was just one problem: The bugs. And no, not those left intentionally, which contributed to some of the quirkiness. We’re talking about other, serious, game-breaking bugs and some performance hiccups. Many players reported many other issues – who knew that taking a dual-engine approach could create so many problems? Surely, Virtuos would address them in short order. Right?

Well, after two months and no real response, players began to grow antsy. The studio eventually released update 1.1 in July to address numerous crashes and then update 1.2 a few days later with even more fixes. The latter even added more difficulty options and settings to separately adjust player and enemy damage.

And then it abandoned the game. That’s not an exaggeration. No other updates have been released ever since. In terms of post-launch support, even Redfall lasted longer, despite a pitiful critical reception and minimal sales (per Phil Spencer himself). Ponder on that for a moment.

One year on, Oblivion Remastered still suffers from performance stutters, crashes, and an altogether uncharming level of jank. Perhaps the most egregious issue is that performance actually degrades with more playtime. That’s right – the more time you spend exploring Cyrodiil and really taking in the atmosphere, the more likely it is that performance will nosedive.

Many argue that those two updates actually made everything worse. Others believe they barely made a difference. Very few are happy with the game’s state, regardless.

You could argue that Bethesda earned whatever revenue it could and peaced out, but this is a game that continues to attract players on Game Pass. Within three months, it reached nine million overall – surely it and parent company Microsoft would want to continue support, ensuring the remaster remained the definitive way to experience Oblivion in today’s age. But no. Not even close. Recent reviews on Steam are “Mixed” with only 51 percent of the 523 users recommending it. Even Starfield has fared better, regardless of how players may feel about the game’s overall state.

Of course, there are other potential reasons why Oblivion Remastered was left to fester. Virtuos suffered several layoffs in the months after launch and may not have had the resources to continue supporting it. Maybe getting the game up and running also required significant support from Bethesda, which is plenty busy with other projects. It may also have been a matter of Microsoft not wanting to foot the bill.

But hey, don’t worry. Xbox still clearly sees the money in more remasters, hence why it’s allegedly remastering Fallout 3 (gotta give those fans of the show what they want, after all). So, to add insult to injury and rub salt in the wound further, another beloved classic may be ruined by this dual-engine approach. Nothing is confirmed, naturally, but hearing that it’s reportedly getting the Oblivion Remastered treatment doesn’t fill my heart with hope. Will the rumored remaster of Fallout: New Vegas also suffer the same fate? Is Microsoft doomed to repeat the cycle forever, wiping those tears away with fat stacks of cash?

If all that wasn’t enough, Halo: Campaign Evolved could offer another look at a potential dual-engine disaster, since it’s running on the original Halo’s legacy code while overhauling the visuals on Unreal Engine 5. Judging by the criticism from the reveal and the fact that we’ve not seen any gameplay ever since, not to mention an alleged launch in July, you have to wonder what’s going on.

Of course, all of that is still to come. Maybe we won’t witness the same problems at launch or shortly after. Benefit of the doubt, fingers crossed, and whatnot.

It’s still a shame right now because Oblivion Remastered is genuinely good. The visuals are simply incredible, and for a time, it seemed like the perfect argument against Bethesda remaining on the Creation Engine. Look what a different developer could accomplish on Unreal Engine 5 while still retaining all the classic gameplay fundamentals! And it sadly wasn’t to be.

I’ll still have the memories of venturing into deep dark caves and slaughtering all and sundry while waking up to a mysterious assassin from the Dark Brotherhood who recruits me. I’ll still remember that feeling of watching the king suddenly slain, and setting forth into this vast and beautiful world to find his heir. From battling the horrors emerging from the gates of Oblivion to wandering onto an inn that happens to be a pirate ship and fighting my way through to escape this impromptu kidnapping. From hearing the adoring fan’s annoying pestering to breaking the spell system to an absurd degree. That’s the Oblivion Remastered that I have the benefit of remembering.

Too bad that newer players will have that experience marred by a litany of technical issues that Microsoft and Bethesda couldn’t bother to fix. Maybe when Bethesda announces its next remaster, it will have an epiphany and realize, like 343 Industries did with Halo: The Master Chief Collection, that it should address this mess first. If for nothing else than a show of good faith to customers.

Then again, this is Bethesda we’re talking about. Even after the mixed reactions surrounding Fallout 4 and its DLC, it went on to release a massive disaster in Fallout 76 at launch. And yet, it still managed to get millions on board for Starfield. You can bet that it’ll have even more people ready to put down their money when The Elder Scrolls 6 is imminent or when Fallout 5 pre-orders are live. Maybe it’s just the nature of the machine and those sworn to it.

Note: The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of, and should not be attributed to, GamingBolt as an organization.

Aaron Paul, whom you might know from Breaking Bad and Westworld, is going to be the new face joining the show’s next season, although details about his character and role in the narrative are yet to be disclosed. Deadline has also reported on a couple of Annabel O’Hagan, whose take on Steph was an absolute treat, and Dave Register, who brought the childlike Chet to life, becoming regulars in the new season. They’ll definitely be welcome additions, especially considering everything thus far.

It remains to be seen if Paul’s presence in the third season is going to produce any interesting effects like the second potentially has. Regardless, we’re definitely eager to see where the writers take us after all the shenanigans we’ve already been privy to.

Of course, this is far from the end for the successful TV show, especially with actor Aaron Morten (Maximus) claiming it would last for five to six seasons.

He said that TKs-Mantis was “partially right,” going on to note that “there are certain things that were gonna take place in Van Buren that do happen during the time of New Vegas.” Despite this, however, “not a ton of” things from Van Buren affected the story of Fallout: New Vegas aside from “a little bit” of a planned plot point involving conflicts between the New California Republic and a “merchant mafia.”

“That’s why all those nukes go off, cause I’m like, ‘well, I need to destabilize some regions,” Avellone explained. “Like, not wipe out factions, but I need to shake up both the Brotherhood, I need to shake up the NCR, I need to have them even more at each other’s throats in California.’ And so that was the reason for some of the precursor decisions for some of the DLC stuff and some of the stuff in core New Vegas … When we still thought we’d be able to do a New Vegas 2, or whatever the title would be, but that quickly evaporated.”

As for the evaporated idea of a New Vegas 2, Avellone has said that it “will not happen in the next six years at least, if ever.”

In the same interview, Avellone had also said that a remaster of Fallout: New Vegas in the vein of last year’s The Elder Scrolls 4: Oblivion Remastered is unlikely due to Bethesda’s lack of engineering know-how to make it.

“I don’t think Bethesda has the engineering know-how to make a remaster of New Vegas at all,” he said. This lack of know-how was reflected in the fact that, when New Vegas was still in development at Obsidian Entertainment, Bethesda had offered the studio a $10,000 bonus if it could “deliver all the source code and the ability to make the build.” This bonus was skipped by studio lead Feargus Urquhart.“What that milestone really meant was if all those assets are given to Bethesda, that means they can recreate the game at any time,” he explained.

While a collaboration of this scope between Bethesda and Obsidian seemed unlikely in the years following the 2010 release of Fallout: New Vegas, both companies now fall under the Xbox Game Studios banner following a series of acquisitions by Microsoft. This means that there is potential for the two to work together to remaster the critically acclaimed cult classic open-world RPG.

March also saw a report indicating that Iron Galaxy Studios might be involved in the development of a Fallout: New Vegas remaster. However, the studio quickly dispelled the notion by revealing that any hints towards the remaster were merely a “behind-the-scenes” look at its preparations for team meetings, and that it wasn’t involved in any project related to the Fallout franchise.

“I don’t think Bethesda has the engineering know-how to make a remaster of New Vegas at all,” said Avellone when asked about a potential remaster. This comes down to Bethesda offering Obsidian Entertainment a $10,000 bonus if they could “deliver all the source code and the ability to make the build”. The bonus was eventually skipped by studio head Feargus Urquhart at the time.

“What that milestone really meant was if all those assets are given to Bethesda, that means they can recreate the game at any time,” he explained.

It is worth noting that, since then, both Bethesda and Obsidian Entertainment have been acquired by Microsoft. With both studios working under the same banner, the chances for collaboration to make Fallout: New Vegas for modern platforms certainly exist. If it does happen, Avellone has noted that it would be better if Bethesda were to “try out that process with Fallout 3” to better equip itself to deal with potential engine issues.

Last month saw rumors about Fallout: New Vegas getting remastered heating up, thanks to a social media post by Iron Galaxy Studios. The post featured the iconic “PLEASE STAND BY” screen from the Fallout franchise, with its color scheme matching that of New Vegas.

“Today’s our February company meeting,” wrote Iron Galaxy Studios at the time. “It’s time to catch up with what the company’s been up to and what’s coming up next for IG.” This post was followed up by Josh Sawyer—the director for the original Fallout: New Vegas—with his own social media post about how “the time for posting has ended,” and “the time of making games is upon me.”

Eventually, however, the studio had to once more take to social media to clear the air and confirm that it was not involved in a Fallout-based project.

“Nope! There is nothing to see here. Sorry to disturb the volcanoes, but that was just a BTS look at our company meeting. We use that slide every month and has nothing to do with anything Fallout being worked on. As you can imagine, we love Fallout, too. Now pardon us as we retreat back into our vault.”

Fallout: New Vegas was originally released back in 2010 on PC, PS3, and Xbox 360. Rather than picking things up where Fallout 3 left off, the title instead focused on the wasteland in and around the Nevada desert, which included the city of Las Vegas as one of its key locations. Despite suffering from many technical issues, Fallout: New Vegas was highly praised for its setting, characters, and writing.

Since launch, several players have complained about bugs, crashes, and save file problems that left the game “unplayable”. While we did find the visuals on the console port to be slightly outshone by their PC counterpart, we didn’t encounter any of these issues on PS5 Pro.

Our review was fairly positive of the port, too, and players who’ve been able to sink time into the game like we did have come away relatively happy. Although a cursory glance at the comments in the tweet shows some areas that Bethesda could focus on after the hotfix goes live.

Those include some of the biggest complaints already being discussed, alongside suggestions about tweaks to collectibles, and reports of strange NPC behavior leading to amusingly unintended consequences. There are also questions about Upgraded PlayStation Spectral Super Resolution support, although the studio has yet to comment on that.

For our part, we’re hoping that the hotfix gets here as soon as possible so that all players finally get to play a very enjoyable romp through space.

Major spoilers for Starfield‘s ending below.

As you get to the end of the main story of Starfield, the story mission One Giant Leap presents you with a choice of partaking in the Unity. Doing so turns the player’s character into a Starborn and puts you in an entirely new universe. Through this choice, the studio integrated the idea of New Game+ into the overall narrative of Starfield, since players got to carry over all of the progress they had made throughout the story, while also “resetting” the universe around them, allowing players to start from scratch with things like character relationships, mission progression, and map data, among other things.

“The Unity was our way of doing New Game+,” Howard explained. “It was us asking you this weird, deep question that I actually think got lost on a lot of people. It asks if you are just this power gamer who wants to get everything, or are you willing to leave this world behind? How do you feel about your own life choices – would you leave that all behind and start over? Some of that pain – having to give up all of your stuff, Sarah Morgan not loving you anymore, and so on – is supposed to make you feel all of that.”

On the subject of why the studio decided to go this route with its New Game+ system, Lamb explained that feedback from playtesters led to this, since they wanted to continue their journey. “The game just ended,” he said. “The feedback we got at the time was that fans were surprised – they wanted to keep going. So we put this system into Starfield; we wanted it to be a meaningful choice, but it wasn’t meant to be suffering.”

With the release of the free Free Lanes update, Bethesda has also brought in a major change to Starfield‘s Unity ending and the subsequent New Game+ mode; players can now build a machine that allows them to bring over up to 50 items into the new universe. “If you decide to enter the Unity now, you can do it in a way that you feel that you can still continue your character and have some of your stuff – it’s stuff that you earned, after all,” explained Howard.

Interestingly, the introduction of X-Tech as a way to further raise the power of players’ weapons and equipment may have played a role in allowing players to build this device. Since players would likely be unhappy about leaving behind powerful items that they may have worked hard for, the studio decided that there should be a way to carry these items forward.

“We are introducing X-Tech to further upgrade your weapons and your gear; well, we don’t want to ask the player to put in a lot of work for a reward they are searching for, only to say, ‘no, it’s gone now.’ So once these things started coming together, we knew we absolutely had to do something like this,” said Lamb.

Howard went on to explain how, through this change to the Unity ending, Bethesda wants to further refine the “elder loop” of Starfield. This “elder loop” is essentially the long-term gameplay loop offered by Starfield, which would often involve players hopping on and off between extended periods of time. To help with this, the Free Lanes update was meant to add more game content that would give players plenty more to do aside from just the new missions.

“Take something like the Trackers Alliance, or other quests. You do them and then you’re done,” said Howard. “That’s still rewarding, but for someone who jumps back in, they might play for a few hours – and then the update didn’t serve them beyond those two or three hours. We want to be trying to do more things that update the game where it’s going to change the next 100 hours. You can tell us if we’re done our job right.”

Starfield is out on PC, PS5, and Xbox Series X/S. For more details, take a look at our review of the PS5 release, as well as its Terran Armada expansion.

Players have also suggested that the PS5 Pro’s more powerful hardware doesn’t help much with running Starfield. This would indicate that the crashes and other issues don’t seem to be related to the console’s hardware. Rather, it seems to be a case of poor optimization for Sony’s platform.

“Yeah I’ve shelved it,” wrote a player. “I’ve called their tech support line and left a message and submitted a ticket. I have done every single troubleshooting step and it’s the only game I own that hard freezes like this constantly. Feel seriously ripped off. I want to play it because I like what I actually did get to play but this is actually bs.”

It is worth noting that, in our graphical analysis of the PS5 Pro version of Starfield, we found it to be a competent port, at least in terms of visual fidelity. We made a note of “slightly lower-resolution textures” being visible “only if you’re really looking for them.” When compared to a high-end PC, we found that, while PSSR was doing its best to upscale images, the console version still fell short when it came to raw visual fidelity.

Interestingly, not all players seem to be suffering from crashes. One player made a point of having spent 10 hours with Starfield on PS5 so far without having suffered even a single crash. Another mentioned having played for 60 hours without facing any problems.

Starfield‘s PS5 release was quite hotly anticipated, with the game essentially taking over the pre-order charts on PlayStation Store across various regions. While some saw it take first place, others saw it not too far behind, sitting in second or third. This was further compounded by the fact that the standard edition and the Premium edition were both listed separately.

Starfield was originally released on PC and Xbox Series X/S. Its PS5 version—check out our review—was accompanied by the release of the Terran Armada expansion, which introduced a new faction, complete with its own intricate lore and a host of story content. In our review, we gave the expansion a score of 7 out of 10 thanks to its compelling premise and breadth of content, while criticizing the repetitive nature of incursions.

For more on Starfield, take a look at our thoughts about why the sci-fi RPG happens to be so divisive. And while you’re at it, here is a broader look at whether, three years after its original release, Starfield has seen any major improvements.