What’s Going On With Fallout 4 DLC?

VG247 has published an editorial on Fallout 4’s DLC and update strategy penned by Matt Martin, who seems to have mixed thoughts on the plans outlined by Bethesda for the future of the wildly successful fourth mainline Fallout game. While I agree with some of Martin’s concerns and thoughts, I find this passage on DLC highly dubious:

I actually like the fact we have no real idea about what’s in the DLC. As one of millions of fans of Fallout 4, I much prefer my content to be a surprise as close to release as possible. There’s speculation that there may be underwater content after the discovery of the harpoon gun, and concepts for creatures such as the Centaur that appeared in the official artbook are conspicuous by their absence in the game. But speculating on content is something we’ll leave for another day.

The concept of DLC has changed since Fallout 3 and Fallout New Vegas came out on last gen consoles. Now we expect more regular updates or else solid chunks of extra game. Take a look at the consistently free drops from The Witcher 3 or Dying Light, and the meaty add-ons of Bloodborne: The Old Hunters and Assassin’s Creed Syndicate’s Jack the Ripper gameplay.

Will Fallout 4’s DLC meet the new high standards being set by games such as those? It’s fair to say we shouldn’t expect the same amount of technical polish in Bethesda’s game. Fallout 4’s open world achievements are fantastic, but it’s visual and technical prowess is a throwback to the last generation of consoles. That’s not to say the content of each DLC won’t be up to the narrative and gameplay standards of the original game.

I’m not sure where the idea that the standards for DLC have changed a lot in the last few years comes from. It’s true that we’ve had a few impressive releases recently, but we’ve also had just as many expensive content-light add-ons as we had back when the PlayStation 3 and the Xbox 360 were still the consoles of choice for a large part of the gaming population.