The Outer Worlds is about to get one of its most obvious missing features: grenades. Obsidian Entertainment announced the addition in a Steam post, marking the studio's first major communication about the original game in nearly a year. The explosive throwables will arrive later this month as part of a larger update that also includes performance improvements, lighting adjustments, and a wave of bug fixes.
The timing is striking. The game launched in 2019 to solid commercial success, but grenades have been a staple of The Outer Worlds 2 since that sequel arrived less than six months ago. Players of the newer title have long had access to these weapons, making their absence from the original game increasingly conspicuous as the franchise evolved.
Before the grenade patch rolls out, Obsidian is deploying a smaller update this month designed to test its update pipeline and address various lingering bugs. The heavier lift comes next, when the studio will push out the performance work and additional gameplay refinements alongside the new weaponry.
The timing of these updates coincides with a significant shift in how The Outer Worlds is sold. Starting May 27, Obsidian will delist the base edition of the game from digital storefronts, leaving only the Spacer's Choice Edition available for new purchases. Existing owners of the original version will keep their copy, but anyone buying on current-generation consoles or PC after that date will receive the newer edition instead.
Current players on modern systems have a limited window to upgrade for free. Those with the vanilla game on PC (across Steam, GOG, or Epic Games Store), PlayStation 5, or Xbox Series X/S can transition to Spacer's Choice Edition at no cost through May 27. The offer is more complicated for last-generation console owners. To upgrade from base to Spacer's Choice on PS4 or Xbox One, players must own both the original game and all its DLC packs. Obsidian is also adjusting prices for those legacy platforms, dropping the base game to $24.99 and DLC content to $14.99 each.
The Outer Worlds 2 underperformed commercially when it released last year, and Obsidian has already confirmed it has no plans for a third entry in the franchise. The news stung particularly because it arrived alongside word that Avowed, the studio's other major 2024 RPG release, also fell short of sales expectations. Both titles required over six years of development, a heavy investment that failed to pay off at retail.
The brighter spot in Obsidian's recent portfolio is Grounded 2, which launched in early access in 2025 and found an audience. That survival game reached the market in just over two years, a fraction of the time spent on either Avowed or The Outer Worlds 2. The disparity in development cycles and commercial returns has not gone unnoticed in the industry.
The patch notes for update 2.5.7.0 read like a studio working through years of accumulated technical debt. Fixes range from minor UI improvements, where companion status effects no longer hide health bars, to more serious framerate issues that plagued certain encounters. A repeated use of the Storm Cannon at close range no longer causes severe FPS drops. The heat effect from the Unreliable ship has stopped stacking infinitely. Performance has been boosted across multiple locations including Fallbrook, Roseway, and the initial Marauder encounter zone.
Quest-related fixes address broken dialogue sequences, stuck geometry, and progression blockers. Characters now spawn in the correct locations, objectives update properly after key story moments, and players can no longer become trapped between environmental objects. The patch also corrects longstanding cosmetic bugs, such as Felix's book finally appearing in his room at Roseway and Frey's Bar Cart no longer vanishing from the Unreliable after certain travel sequences.
The workbench now correctly displays item ownership during inventory management, and the hacking and lockpicking tutorials trigger properly regardless of player skill level. Weapon sight positioning has been fixed for the modded Hunting Rifle Hyper, and companion armor now displays accurately when modified during gameplay.
Obsidian's decision to add grenades and push out these fixes suggests the studio has not entirely abandoned support for the original game, despite the franchise's commercial struggles. Whether these updates will draw lapsed players back remains to be seen, but the studio appears committed to at least patching the most glaring omissions and technical problems before shifting resources elsewhere.
Author Emily Chen: "After seven years and a sequel that proved the concept, grenades should have been here from day one. At least Obsidian is finally getting it right."
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