Obsidian released the Rot and Ruin update (version 0.6.0) for Grounded 2 on October 20, 2026, posting the full patch notes on Steam the same day it detailed the update on Xbox Wire. It adds a new area, the Woodpile, plus a Centipede boss, a second combat-ready Buggy and a way to upgrade gear to higher tiers.
The Details
- The Woodpile: a new adventure area where Termites return, including Workers, Soldiers, the Queen, the Termite King and new O.G.R.R. variants. Obsidian warns of “new attacks and some particularly strange behavior.”
- The Centipede: a new boss that Obsidian calls one of the community’s most requested creatures. The patch notes add a Centipede armor set, a Centipede Staff, a new mutation and a new trinket.
- Potato Beetle Buggy: bigger than the Ladybug Buggy and built for close range. It fires a spread of projectiles, has a charged shot and a Healing Roar, and can haul resources and feed materials into blueprints.
- Painting: craft paint and apply it with a paintball gun called the Splotcher to walls, floors, roofs, stairs and doors.
- Gear tiers: a new resource, Bismuth, upgrades weapons and armor at the new Yoking Press. The Abyss also gains Bismuth, diggable chests and warming geysers.
- Collectibles and combat: 8 SCA.B color schemes and 5 figurines to find, a Perfect Dodge that costs no stamina and leaves you free to counter, and quick-swap mutation loadouts in the Hotpouch radial menu.
- Tech: the PC install drops from 37GB to 18GB, and console installs shrink by 200 to 300MB. The game moves to Unreal Engine 5.7 with what Obsidian calls large performance improvements.
What This Means for Players
If your main story stalled, check again: the notes fix the “Retrieve BURG.L’s New Body” quest failing to trigger on some saves, which blocked players from finishing the story. Other fixes cover client rubber banding in multiplayer and a PS5 crash when joining an Xbox host’s Playground.
Gear tiers are the long-term change. Instead of retiring a favorite weapon or armor set, you can now push it further with Bismuth.
Grounded 2 is still in Early Access on Steam and Game Preview on Xbox. We rank it among the best PC co-op games of 2026 and the best PS5 co-op games of 2026, where we cover what that means before you buy. For another survival-crafting game in the middle of a big change, see what Enshrouded’s 1.0 release changes.
When and Where
- Rot and Ruin (0.6.0): out now. The patch notes include fixes for PC, Xbox and PlayStation 5.
- Where: Xbox Series X|S, Xbox on PC and Game Pass (Game Preview), Steam (Early Access) and PlayStation 5.
Source: Obsidian Entertainment, “Grounded 2: 100 Reasons to Run in the Rot and Ruin Update,” Grounded 2 on Steam and Xbox Wire, October 20, 2026.