Alright. I've done my reading hither and yon, and can't come across a single other person who's experiencing my particular conditions here. Please help me out if you can, as I'm racking my brain and can't come up with any workaround.

I'm trying to start Dead Money on the Xbox 360. The download is complete. My level cap (and current player level) is 40 (I also have Honest Hearts downloaded). The quest is active on my Pip-Boy, and directing me to the correct location, but the Abandoned Brotherhood of Steel Bunker (NOT the BoS Safehouse, NOT the faction headquarters at Hidden Valley, but the location named precisely as written, lying just south of Camp Forlorn Hope) will not open, saying it requires a key.

I already understand that it was meant to be locked from the beginning but mistakenly left accessible. I also understand that is was then locked with the first patch and each thereafter, pending the release of the Dead Money DLC which would make full use of the location. I know it's meant to unlock as soon as Dead Money is downloaded, and I also am aware that this doesn't always happen correctly, as it hasn't for me. I know that many players have been able to successfully access the bunker by manually deleting both cache and Title Update #4 via the dashboard, taking the game back to its unintended glitch original status of the bunker being accessible without DLC installed.

Here is my problem.

I am level 40 already. I have played for over 100 hours, and saved the DLCs as my penultimate challenges. The Dean's Electronics Repair skillbook contained inside is also my very last skillbook to obtain.

Because I am level 40, if I remove the Title Update #4, the game will not load at all, because (I believe) it won't be able to recognize my character as being beyond the level cap of 30 (the game freezes identically on the load screen every time I try.) If I remove Dead Money, the game won't recognize me as level 40 and will not load. I cannot, therefore, circumvent the problem by using the initial bug of the manhole being unlocked without crashing my game because of my max level.

Please. Anyone. Someone. Tell me I haven't lost all of this play progress and become completely unable to use the DLC I downloaded and paid for with the character I've poured so much time, effort, and energy into.

Help.

Here's a short list of what I have tried thus far, and the specific result:

- Deleting the system cache (pressing Y on the HDD device under Memory, on the dashboard), then trying again. Game loaded normally, bunker still Required Key. Nothing changed.

- Deleting the Title Update #4. Game froze on load screen four times, at the exact same time. I believe one of the patches included necessary code for the game to recognize a character above level 30, and cannot load a game containing a character above that level without the update installed.

- Reapplied the Title Update #4. Game loaded normally, bunker still Required Key. Nothing changed.

- Deleting the Dead Money DLC. The game loaded (with a warning message that some content based on previously present DLC would be missing) normally. The bunker was still locked (as it's meant to be, I suppose, without the DLC).

- After freshly redownloading the Dead Money DLC. The game loaded normally, bunker still Required Key.

- Jumped online to read everything I could find. Couldn't find one single account of a character already at the enhanced level cap when trying these methods.

- Posted here, to mine the intellects at the source, who've made a truly fantastic game that just shouldn't have been pushed out of production before being fine-tuned.

I really, sincerely hope there's a way around this. I'm a huge fan of this game, and would rather not be the victim of it being irrevocably broken for me, after having spent $10 on the DLC.
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- Adrian out.