Baldur’s Gate 3 smooches update now live

The latest, and very timely, update for Baldur’s Gate 3 is now live across PC, PlayStation 5, and Xbox Series X/S.

Patch 6 has been teased by Larian Studios since last week, when we learned it would include more kissing animations and easier party management, but we didn’t know when it would be rolling out – or everything else it would contain.

Well, the update is now live, and with it comes the usual delight of patch notes a la Larian, which are too lengthy to be contained in Steam’s character limit (of course).

Each companion now has “unique kisses that reflect their personality”, which are randomised and vary from “incredibly romantic” to “a little more intense”. Kisses are also “improved for shorter and taller body types”.

Some companions now have new idle animations while in camp. You might find Halsin sat on the floor whittling away the time with literal whittling, or Lae’zel studying a githyanki disc.

The full patch notes are chock full of spoilers, as lots of bugs and balance issues throughout all acts of the game have been addressed. Here are some of the highlights Larian has pulled out from Patch 6:

• You can now dismiss a recruited companion from your party while speaking to the companion you want to replace them with.
• When a dialogue triggers automatically, the game will now try to prioritise your avatar character as the main speaker.
• Your partner now has a few different kisses! They’re brand new, unique, and randomised – and we’ve also made improvements to how kisses look across the board, particularly for taller and shorter body types.
• If you sit on the stool in Shadowheart’s camp corner, she will now react to you with a line based on your relation with her.
• Added new idle animations for some companions at camp, including Lae’zel (studying a githyanki disc), Minthara (contemplating a skull, tending to mushrooms, expressing violence, adjusting her armour, plotting her future, and being bothered by the sun), Jaheira (sitting, kneeling and whispering to a rat messenger, and whittling), Minsc (cooking and shaving his head – These are two separate animations. Although we wouldn’t put it past him, he’s not, in fact, cooking his head), Shadowheart (polishing the Spear of Night), Halsin (whittling).
• If you started your game on a set difficulty, you can now switch to Custom Mode (except when already playing Honour Mode).
• Fixed an issue that would prevent travel between acts.
• Fixed an issue causing quicksaves to fail to upload to cross-saves.
• Fixed the Shield Bash and Rebuke of the Mighty passives not triggering Saving Throws.
• Added light bar colours for the DualSense controller on PC.
• If you romanced Lae’zel, grab a red dragon and saddle up – you can now join her in the rebellion against Vlaakith, even if you are not gith yourself.
• Fixed graphic settings not being applied for some 4k monitors.
• Fixed a crash on Xbox that would sometimes occur when starting or ending a game.

As previously stated, players on PC and Steam Deck will need about 150GB of free space to install. If you’re short on storage, Larian recommends uninstalling and reinstalling the game. The studio is working on bringing this update to Mac, and asked Mac players to wait “a little longer” for the patch.

Larian boss Swen Vincke went on the record earlier this month to dispel rumours Tencent was buying the Dungeons & Dragons IP from Hasbro with Larian acting as an intermediary.