The Free Lanes update is now live in Starfield, Bethesda's biggest yet in the spacefaring RPG. But besides the namesake ability to fly between planets in a star system and some other features, it brings a load of quality-of-life changes the community has been waiting for.
An immediate highlight in the patch notes is the Always Show Landing Camera option, for people who want to be able to see their ship land each and every time it does. This might seem small, but it makes for greater immersion as it makes it seem like you're legitimately planet-hopping.
Then there's a new method of placing objects in outposts, to complement the existing rotation mode, and made workbenches for weapons easier to place. You should now find better loot for Expert and Master level locked chests, helping to justify the effort needed to seek them out.
A few missions have been fixed, including Refurbished Goods, where all the weapons needed can definitely be found, and Guilty Parties not starting if you'd done Background Checks. These aren't all built for your convenience: Legendary enemies now have some new, unspecified modifiers, to make them a little tougher, and a toggle for their activation.
There's a lot to go through; it's a substantial list, but it certainly gives the impression that Bethesda's paying attention to the community, and in particular, what people have been fixing themselves using mods. "One less mod in the LO!," exclaims one commenter on Reddit. "One less bug fix mod to keep!" another says, on the Refurbished Goods changes.
People are still using hundreds of mods to make Starfield play just how they'd like, so Bethesda definitely isn't going to follow those trends for every change. But this shows positive alterations are happening, and the amount of mods you use overall may continue to decrease in the months ahead if updates like this continue.
