Some Expeditions: Rome devs escaped NFT hell and Embracer layoffs to make a new patch for the game

Not all hope is lost

THQ Nordic

Update 1.6 for Expeditions: Rome, the turn-based tactical RPG, has been released this week – a piece of news that wouldn’t be all too remarkable, were it not for the fact that there is currently no known development studio attached to the game.

Expeditions: Rome was originally made by Logic Artists, the creators of the Expeditions series. However, Logic Artists was later acquired by a NFT company and renamed to Dynasty Studios, which led to the creative director and other key employees leaving the company to form a new studio called Campfire Cabal under THQ Nordic. Campfire Cabal was supposed to take over the Expeditions series, supporting Rome and eventually working on new games.

Unfortunately, the studio’s history was cut short – Embracer closed Campfire Cabal in August 2023 as part of its cost-cutting initiative, which cast significant doubt over the future of the IP.

However, this surprise update from November 20, 2024, is reason for fans to gather some hope about the future of the series. As was revealed by posts on Steam, some of the former Logic Artists and Campfire Cabal developers seem to have survived both the transition and the studio’s shutdown and remained at THQ Nordic, where they were able to work on the latest patch.

One of them even explicitly clarified that “The Expeditions IP is owned by THQ Nordic which is still very much alive. Currently we cannot reveal any information about plans for the series.”

That cautiously sounds like good news. After all, why make the effort to revive the game if you're not planning to do something with the IP, right? We’ll likely have to be very patient for details, of course. For now, you can find the Expeditions: Rome update 1.6 patch notes below.

Expeditions: Rome update 1.6 patch notes

Gameplay improvements:

• No unique items drop randomly anymore. The handful of unique items that formerly did so are now spread across Act 1 and the first half of Act 2. Additionally, some predetermined Linen drops have been added as well to increase the availability of that resource.
• Changed the flow of Pacification missions so you no longer have to run your world map avatar to a level entrance point: When you retrieve a Pacification mission, you now get to assign the Companion and Praetorians directly from the conversation with the Primus, which will start a timeline event. You can then proceed as normal, and when the timeline event triggers, the selected party will enter the pacification level.
• New Game Option: Disable Pacifications. This option disables turn-based pacification missions (except the first tutorial pacification), forcing all pacifications to be of the Legion mission type.
• New Game Option: Auto Praetorian Management. This option disables the need to manually equip gear and select skills on non-companion praetorians and automatically handles this for the player. You will still need to manage your own character and main companions.
• Adjusted Rural Village pacification “Burn Lumber” to only require you to burn 9 of the 12 stacks of lumber.
• Adjusted the Rural Village pacification “Save Legionarii” to be slightly easier.
• Adjust the Forest Caravan pacification “Protect Official” to be slightly easier.

Customisation unlocks:

• All themes, emblems, and trophies from Twitch drop campaigns are now available by default for everyone.
• Added one additional colour theme unlock for players who also own Expeditions: Viking.
• Added one additional colour theme unlock for players who also own Expeditions: Conquistador.
• Added one new colour theme unlock to each of the two primary Act 4 paths.
• Added the THQN theme and emblem as a default unlock.

Fixes:

• Fixed a bug that could cause the game to freeze after starting Act 4 on the Die is Cast path (previously, this freeze could be resolved by pressing escape twice and waiting 10 seconds).
• Fixed a mistake that caused the unique item Spectacle to drop as only a schematic instead of the actual item. This fix is retroactive: When loading an existing save, if you have the schematic, you will now receive the actual item.
• Changed the piercing damage affix of Tutankhamon’s Dagger from a % modifier (that didn’t do anything on this weapon) to a corresponding flat addition modifier. Note: in existing save-games you will need to dismantle and recraft the weapon for this to take effect.
• Fixed a bug that caused the Gracing Shot skill to receive its accuracy penalty twice.
• Fixed a bug where a specific sequence could cause you to get stuck in the Golden Wolf quest during the step where you must talk to Lunja. Existing saves stuck in this state should also now resolve themselves upon re-loading in the new version.
• Fixed an issue where in most cases you were unable to craft Tier 2 and 3 version of the Cocles unique armour.
• Fixed a bug where observatories could sometimes spawn unreachable loot.
• Minor tweak to the navigation mesh in the Africa world map.
• Added missing male snoring sounds to ambient sleeping animations.