On June 13, 2018 Todd Howard, head of Bethesda, announces a new game coming to all platforms; Fallout 76. This game was said to have 16 times the detail and a map 4 times the size of Fallout 4. The hype at E3 was unmatched.

The game was released on November 14, 2018 with a day-1 patch of 46.47 gigabytes, a patch larger than the actual game itself. Needless to say, this patch took a while to download, but with a little patience one is able to get into the game with no problems.

Once in the game, players began to feel their hype subside as the bugs take over their screens. Item duping, teleportation, infinite ammo, infinite invisibility, player speed exploits, player and NPC models stretching, the skybox turning different colors, bugs from Fallout 4, and a lot more. However, error code “CE-34878-0” would corrupt all your data and cause players to lose all progress made.

With the bugs in this game, it’s no surprise that Bethesda would start to lose players. This was the point in Fallout 76’s downfall where players decided this game was not as fun as they thought it would be and playing another game would be more fun.

Players were not happy with the turnout of the game they hyped up for a long time and felt that the time has come for refunds. It is important to note that Fallout 76 is not on Steam and is on Bethesda’s own launcher, this means Bethesda is in control of their refund policy. However, after receiving countless requests for refunds, Bethesda had enough and decided to change their policy a bit; no more refunds.

One of Fallout 76’s most important features is the Atomic Shop, there you can spend real money for in-game currency called “atoms,” which can be used to purchase materials and gear. However, fans agreed the prices are ridiculous, especially for a game they already had to pay for. Meanwhile, Bethesda refuses to lower the prices and instead chooses to reduce the amount of items found in the wild to encourage the shop’s use.

In case Fallout fans were not already disappointed, those who ordered the Fallout 76: Power Armor edition had a different story to tell. Fallout 76: Power Armor Edition was a $200.00 version of the game that came with a map, figurines, a steel case, power armor helmet, books, and a canvas bag. However, when the product arrived something felt a bit off.

The canvas bag players received was made out of nylon rather than canvas which players felt reduced the overall value of the entire product. When fans emailed Bethesda about it, they received this from the Bethesda team: “Hello, we are sorry that you aren’t happy with the bag. The bag shown in the media was a prototype and was too expensive to make. We aren’t planning on doing anything about it.”

The problem with Bethesda’s explanation on why they didn’t make the bag was that it just is not true. They definitely made the bags, but gave them all away to influencers of the game to boost sales.

Eventually, Bethesda felt that they should make up for their mishaps because they felt that they have let their fans down. So, to make things right, they decided to give 5 dollars of atoms to players that spent 200 dollars on the Power Armor Edition. Though fans appreciate Bethesda taking steps to properly make things right, 500 atoms did not make up for the bag as it can hardly get you anything on the Atomic Shop.

Later, Bethesda decided to finally manufacture the bags with the proper material and send them to those who already purchased the Power Armor Edition and filled out an order form on Bethesda’s website. However, their customer support pages lack security and anybody can open, close, and edit people’s order tickets. This means anybody can view other people’s full name, home address, phone number, and the type of card used to purchase the game. Not knowing how to immediately fix the problem, Bethesda temporarily shuts down the whole site.

Luckily, things didn’t too far down south for Bethesda, and the replacement bags began arriving to fans’ doorsteps on June of 2019, approximately 6 months after ordering.

While still on the topic of the Power Armor Edition, the power armor helmet had some problems of its own. The inside of the helmet began to grow dangerous levels of mold on the inside. Obviously, the helmet could then no longer be wearable so GameStop ordered a recall on all helmets.

One final piece of Fallout merch to discuss is Nuka Cola Dark, Bethesda’s first alcoholic drink available for purchase online for $80.00. However, after about 4 months since fans pre-ordered, Bethesda released a promotional video of the bottle being made. This sparked controversy because the bottle, which people thought would be made of glass, was actually made of plastic, even though none of the ads mentioned it being made of plastic.

Though Fallout 76 seemed to stir up a lot of controversy, it can definitely serve as an example of how not to treat customers as a game developer. Bethesda has the ability to make the game better. For example, a game called No Man’s Sky received very negative feedback at release but eventually became a huge success after a couple of years, so maybe the same can happen to Fallout 76.