Once Human’s latest patch overhauled progression, and players aren’t happy about it

Once Human rolled out a major update this week that reworked its tech tree and folded the old specialization system into that new progression setup. According to the patch notes, players now unlock more tech nodes through cultural artifacts, synthesis bench crafting, and points earned from things like leveling, killing elite enemies, and repeat research.

The new tree is split into Survival, Production, Combat, and Building. At the same time, the separate specialization system has been removed, with many of those bonuses moved into tech unlocks instead. That also changed crafting in a few ways, including the removal of some mid-tier benches and letting players craft items directly from raw materials in some cases.

A lot of the pushback seems to be about progression resets and the broader crafting changes. Player reaction on social media and Reddit has been pretty negative, with complaints centered on having tech trees reset and on the update making systems more cumbersome rather than simpler.

The patch also caused another problem for some players: bases were reportedly moved into out-of-bounds parts of the map, leaving people unable to reach them. The developers later reversed that issue in a follow-up official post, though some bases may still need to be relocated if they now clash with terrain.

There were a few other additions in the update, including a new free lockbox reward on the battle pass, terraforming in Eternaland, and changes for RaidZone, Visional Wheel, and custom servers. But the progression overhaul is clearly the part players are focused on, and right now it’s landing badly.