Baldur’s Gate 3 Developer Larian Continues to Have Fun With its Patch Notes

Larian is closing out 2023 with yet another Baldur’s Gate 3 update, and as usual, it’s had loads of fun writing the patch notes.

Baldur’s Gate 3 Hotfix #15, now live, isn’t a game-changing update by any means, but it still makes a number of important improvements and fixes to the sprawling Dungeons & Dragons role-playing game. Chief among them are fixes for crashes, blockers, and gameplay issues.

“Have you found some characters’ faces turning into stretched eldritch horrors with pits of flesh in place of eyes?” Larian asks in the patch notes published to the Baldur’s Gate 3 Steam page. “That should not be a problem anymore!”

The patch notes are published in full below, but I want to draw your attention to the aforementioned fix. Here’s the relevant line:

“Fixed several cases of what we’ve dubbed the Pinocchio issue, where characters’ noses (and cheeks) get stretched in cinematics. They also happen to lose their eyeballs, turning the sockets into pits of flesh.”

That really paints a picture, doesn’t it? I haven’t had this particular bug during my ongoing playthrough, but I kind of wish I had now.

More seriously, the hotfix also addresses a bug I have encountered quite a bit: your followers not jumping after you. “Fixed companions not being able to jump when following the player character,” the patch notes read. Huzzah!

As Larian says, this hotfix also addresses an issue that was preventing players from loading a save if the mods used had changed. “Bear in mind some saves might still not load depending on the mods that have changed, but the menu should now let you continue,” Larian said.

Here are the Baldur’s Gate 3 Hotfix #15 patch notes in full:

CRASHES AND BLOCKERS

• Fixed a potential crash during autosave after moving to another level.
• Fixed a multiplayer crash that could occur for the client when the host loads a savegame after a Game Over screen.
• Fixed a crash related to deleted physics objects.
• Fixed a crash that would occur when you disarmed an NPC twice during combat and made them drop two different weapons (e.g. because they were dual-wielding), incapacitated them, and ended the combat without killing them, and then the incapacitating condition got removed.
• Fixed not being able to load a savegame that was started with a mod that’s now missing.
• Fixed a crash that could occur on Xbox when losing internet connection while editing a lobby name.
• Fixed a potential crash on Xbox related to the game checking whether you have the Deluxe Edition.
• Fixed a crash that could occur when swapping to Honour Mode.
• Fixed a crash that could occur when changing levels.

PERFORMANCE AND CODE

• Fixed potential performance issues at the end of the cinematic where Shadowheart in the Shadowfell.
• Fixed an issue related to lava bubbles near the Sentient Amulet in Grymforge causing savegames to become very large.
• Fixed a memory issue when closing containers on controller.
• Fixed the Low Model Quality option sometimes not working as expected.
• Fixed an issue that could make certain special items, like the Idol of Silvanus, enter the wrong state when decluttered to a Traveller’s Chest.
• Reduced memory usage related to animation skinning.

MULTIPLAYER

• Fixed the Traveller’s Chests sometimes disappearing when changing to or from Honour Mode in the Multiplayer Settings.
• Fixed a multiplayer issue where, if the host was controlling a companion and a split-screen client joined the game, the client would gain control of the host’s avatar.
• Fixed a multiplayer issue where a reconnecting player wouldn’t get their characters assigned back to them correctly.
• Fixed Player 2 not being able to prepare spells if Player 1 moves their focus during a split-screen game.

FLOW AND GAMEPLAY

• Addressed an issue that prevented you from talking to NPCs at camp when going to camp via the Long Rest button.
• Fixed some wrong character behaviours likely introduced in Patch 4.
• The ‘Deal with the Devil’ quest now accounts for different outcomes in the Epilogue.
• Karlach should now get her scene in , regardless of whether she’s an avatar or a companion.
• Fixed companions not being able to jump when following the player character.
• Fixed an issue where ending the tutorial with only Lae’zel alive prevented you from saving the game in Act I.
• Fixed Gale’s dialogue ending abruptly when you ask him what he wanted to show.
• Fixed player factions sometimes becoming hostile towards each other when they shouldn’t.
• Fixed Create or Destroy Water only casting Create Water at Level 2.

OTHER FIXES

• The Korean language pack is now enabled on Mac.
• Fixed some weapon textures.
• Fixed several cases of what we’ve dubbed the Pinocchio issue, where characters’ noses (and cheeks) get stretched in cinematics. They also happen to lose their eyeballs, turning the sockets into pits of flesh.
• Fixed equipment tooltips opened via the Inventory sometimes randomly closing on controller without player input.

Wesley is the UK News Editor for IGN. Find him on Twitter at @wyp100. You can reach Wesley at wesley_yinpoole@ign.com or confidentially at wyp100@proton.me.