Game: John Carpenter’s Toxic Commando
Developer: Saber Interactive
Publisher: Focus Entertainment
Update: Retrieval — second major update
Cost: Free for all players
Out: Now
Platforms: PS5 · Xbox Series X|S · Steam · Epic
Base Game: Released March 12, 2026
Sale: 30% off base · 35% off Blood Edition
⚠️ Content note: Toxic Commando is age-gated on Steam and built around heavy gore. This is a grindhouse zombie shooter in the most literal sense — worth knowing if you’re buying it during the sale for someone else.
🧟 The Retrieval update is live now and it’s free for everyone. Saber Interactive and Focus Entertainment’s second major drop for John Carpenter’s Toxic Commando adds a new extraction-style mode, a new enemy type, four new weapons, a dash button, and Trials Season 2 — across PS5, Xbox Series X|S, Steam and the Epic Games Store.
⚖️ Grab the Relics. Get Out. Don’t Be Loud.Retrieval Mode is the headline addition, and it’s a clean structural change rather than another mission.
Pick a map, collect relics, and reach an extraction point before the hordes catch you. The complication is the one that matters: move too slowly and you draw the attention of the Sludge, who wants you dead.
That’s an extraction loop with a soft timer enforced by escalating threat rather than a countdown clock — which suits a game built on an engine that can throw thousands of enemies at you at once.
It’s live on four maps at launch: Church of the Damned, High Octane, Impasse and Demon Bait.
Move fast, or he notices
Saber describe Retrieval as being for the most seasoned soldiers. What they mean is that the mode has no patience for anybody who wants to clear the map first.
John Carpenter’s Toxic Commando has its second major post-launch update, and like the first one it’s free for everyone who owns the game. The Retrieval update went live today across all four storefronts, headlined by a new extraction-style mode and backed by a decent spread of new content and fixes.
Saber Interactive and Focus Entertainment have also lined up a sale alongside it — 30% off the base game and 35% off the Blood Edition on Steam — plus a Fortnite crossover landing later this week, with one significant catch we’ll get to.
Meet the Goblins
👹 A Threat That Has to Be Cleared Properly
The new enemy type is the Goblins, and their design is smarter than “small zombie, comes in packs.”
They arrive in groups of three, they all attack the same target, and — the important part — they can revive each other as long as one of the three is still standing.
That turns a trash-mob clear into an actual priority problem. Drop two and walk away and you’ll be dealing with three again shortly. In a co-op shooter where the default answer is spray in the general direction of the noise, an enemy that punishes incomplete clears is a genuinely useful addition — particularly in a mode where standing still gets the Sludge’s attention.
Four New Ways to Deal With It
🔫 Le Clairon
A new assault rifle. The conventional option in a lineup that mostly isn’t.
🔥 Flamethrower
Overdue for a horde shooter, and the obvious answer to enemies that revive each other.
⚡ Thunderstick
New tool in the arsenal. Saber haven’t detailed the function beyond the name.
🪚 Saw Trap
A placeable that tears the infected apart. Deployable rather than carried.
🔧 And a Batch of Fixes That Matter More Than They Sound
The quality-of-life half of the update is quietly the more significant one for anyone already playing:
• You can now dash. Adding a core movement option five months post-launch is a notable change to how the game feels moment to moment
• Trials Season 2 — the next rotation of the challenge system introduced in the last update
• PC local servers, which should help latency and private-group play
• Vehicle improvements, in a game where vehicular combat is a headline feature
• Bot improvements — arguably the most important item on this list, since bots fill your squad whenever you’re short of three friends
Saber haven’t itemised what changed in the vehicle and bot passes, so we’d point you at the in-game patch notes for specifics.
This Update Is Answering Its Own Reviews
Worth putting this in context. When Toxic Commando launched in March it reviewed reasonably well — mostly in the 7 to 8.5 range — and it sits at Very Positive on Steam, with around 80% of nearly 2,900 reviews positive. The gunplay and the sheer scale of the hordes were consistently praised.
The two criticisms that came up again and again were limited enemy variety and repetitive mission design. Look at what the last two updates have actually shipped:
🏙️ Urban Blight — June
A new mission set a year after the campaign, the Hornet flying enemy, the Thrasher APC, and a daily/weekly/seasonal challenge system. Mission variety and a new enemy archetype.
🧟 Retrieval — Now
An entirely new mode structure across four maps, the Goblins, four weapons, and a movement option. Structural variety and another new enemy archetype.
That’s a studio working through its review feedback in order. Neither update is enormous on its own, but the pattern is coherent — new enemy archetypes to address variety, new structures to address repetition — and it’s being delivered free rather than sold as a season of content.
Worth an honest note alongside it: Steam’s recent review trend sits at Mostly Positive, around 74%, below the lifetime figure. Post-launch drift is normal for co-op shooters as the launch crowd moves on, but it does suggest the updates are working harder to hold an audience than to grow one.
Walter Irons Is Going to Fortnite
🎁 Free — If You Bought It in the Right PlaceWalter Irons, one of Toxic Commando’s playable commandos, drops into Fortnite on September 5 at 8:00 PM EDT (5:00 PM PDT / 2:00 AM CEST on the 6th).
Here’s the catch, stated plainly because the announcement rather glides past it: the skin is free for owners of John Carpenter’s Toxic Commando on the Epic Games Store.
If you bought the game on Steam, PlayStation or Xbox, that appears not to include you. Given the update itself is free across every platform, singling out one storefront for the crossover reward is a slightly sour note — and it’s the kind of detail that generates a lot of confused forum posts on Saturday morning.
Focus haven’t said whether the skin will be purchasable in the Fortnite item shop separately.
Cosmetic Pack 2
Launching alongside the free update is the paid Cosmetic Pack 2 DLC, which is included in the Bloody Season Pass if you already own it. It adds unique skins and headgear for each character, plus weapon and vehicle skins, all themed around the Sludge God — along with new profile titles and icons.
Standard split for this kind of drop: the gameplay content is free, the cosmetics are the monetisation. Given the mode, enemy, weapons and fixes all cost nothing, that’s a reasonable line to draw.
Where and How Much
🎮 Out Now on Four Storefronts
The Retrieval update is live on PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S, and PC via Steam and the Epic Games Store, free for all existing players with no additional purchase required.
If you don’t own it yet, there’s a limited-time discount of 30% on the base game and 35% on the Blood Edition on Steam. Focus haven’t given an end date for the sale, so if you’re interested, don’t sit on it.
The Blood Edition bundles additional cosmetics and DLC over the standard release — worth checking what’s already in your library before upgrading, since the Bloody Season Pass overlaps with today’s Cosmetic Pack 2.
🧟 Zombies
🔫 Co-Op FPS
🚙 Vehicular Combat
📼 1980s
🎃 Horror
👥 4-Player PvE
Who’s Behind It
🛠️ Saber Interactive
The studio behind 2019’s World War Z, and the makers of the Swarm Engine that lets Toxic Commando put thousands of zombies on screen at once. That tech is the game’s single biggest differentiator, and it’s why an extraction mode with escalating pressure makes sense here specifically.
🎬 John Carpenter
More involved than a name on the box. Carpenter worked on the game’s story and composed its musical score — a reasonable use of a director who has scored most of his own films for fifty years. There’s also a Dark Horse prequel comic, Rise of the Sludge God, written by Michael Moreci.
🏢 Focus Entertainment
Publisher, and the party running the ongoing free content cadence — two major updates in under six months since the March launch.
The Retrieval update is available now on all platforms.
Hi there! I’m Marie, also known as CtrlQueen. I’m passionate about keeping up with the latest in gaming news and sharing my insights. RPGs steal my heart with their rich narratives and immersive worlds, but I also love unwinding with fun, casual games. Whether you’re here for deep dives into game mechanics or just to chat about your favorite casual game, you’ve found the right place! Let’s game and explore together.
