Bethesda After a feverish 24 hours of speculation (will it be a remaster? Will Obsidian be returning? Will it be Fallout 5? ), Bethesda have finally confirmed what the next instalment in the Fallout franchise will be. Debuting a teaser trailer, the company announced Fallout 76 (yeah, get your "how have I missed 72 sequels?!" jokes in now) in the most trollish way possible. Though, if anything, the official reveal has only left fans even more confused. Thankfully, although the teaser trailer kept things purposefully vague by promising a major blowout at E3, details have trickled out detailing what the spinoff is actually going to be, how it's going to play, and even what the general plot is going to be. Courtesy of a few reports from anonymous developers currently working on the game, as well as a couple who have worked on the project over the past four years or so, gameplay and plot details have finally been revealed, and they certainly point towards 76 going in a radical new direction for the franchise. The old Fallout adage is that "war never changes", but that doesn't seem to be the case with Bethesda's latest.<doc-sep>The next entry in the famous retro-futuristic post-apocalyptic series is almost here. Bethesda has shared a lot of details about the next Fallout game in the reveal and at E3 2018, with gameplay following soon after. The next Fallout will revolve around the titular Vault 76, a vault that already exists within the Fallout Universe and stands apart in that it was set to open much, much earlier than most of the other Vault-Tec shelters. In the meantime however, we have a plenty of trailers and interviews to crawl through for details, and reams of background information from other games in the series to pore over for all the gameplay, setting, and story details we can find. Join us as we dig through all the facts about the Fallout 76 release date, beta, multiplayer, and more to find out how it connects to the other games in the Fallout series. We also have details on how Bethesda aim to stop griefing and whether we’re getting microtransactions this time around. Here’s everything we know about Fallout 76. Fallout 76 release date Bethesda has provided a Fallout 76 release date: November 14, 2018. This was announced at Bethesda’s E3 2018 showcase, debunking a previously leaked July release date. FaLLOUT 76 beta The Fallout 76 beta start date for PC is October 30, 2018. Xbox One players will get access to it first on October 23 and it will be available a week later on PS4 and PC. According to an FAQ on Bethesda’s website, the beta will be used to “stress test the game” and with servers online being online in “targeted time frames.” Fallout 76 gameplay For a good idea of what this unique take on the Fallout formula means in practice, check out Game Informer’s gameplay of the first hour above. Where once you had the wasteland all to yourself, you’re going to have to share the Fallout 76 setting with real life vault-dwellers. Fallout 76 is entirely online, and although you can play on your lonesome, there’s no ‘I’ in nuclear wasteland. Or in Virgini… actually, never mind. Every human you encounter in this West Virginian prequel will be another player, and they might not necessarily be friendly. So teaming up with friends is probably the best way to secure a patch of the wasteland for yourself. That’s also a good idea from a progression perspective. When you level up you choose which of the seven S.P.E.C.I.A.L attributes you want to increase, and then you pick from a selection of Fallout 76 perk cards that can be shared across your merry band. Speaking of progression, nobody wants to be languishing on the lowly levels for long. For that reason we’ve helped you our by putting together a Fallout 76 levelling guide and our top tips for success in the Appalachian wastes. Part of that is taking part in Fallout 76 public events, or special repeatable tasks that can reward crucial loot. There will be many more to collect after launch, too, as Fallout 76 themed card packs could tie in to seasonal times such as Christmas, Thanksgiving, and more. Likewise, if you’re one to constantly change your mind about the kind of character you want to play then not to worry: the Fallout 76 character creator can be accessed at any time. The wasteland will be far from overrun with real-life players, however: Fallout 76’s server size will allow for between 24 and 32 players at a time. Given the size of the map, this is hardly going to be the most bustling of online games. Friends that build together, stay together: unlike the specific settlement spots in Fallout 4, you can build anywhere in Fallout 76 and move your progress wherever you like with the Construction and Assembly Mobile Platform, or the humble Fallout 76 C.A.M.P. Teams of players can muck in on their own property in their bid to settle this recently ravaged slice of the US. It’s also useful to look out for claimable bases across the wasteland; Fallout 76 Public Workshops are great C.A.M.P. fodder as they offer resources. But remember that you can’t hold on to them forever. Of course, you’ll also have a bevy of bespoke Fallout 76 emotes so you can communicate with your team even if you don’t have voice chat, and make a fool of yourself in photo mode. As well as teaming up to build, there will also be a Fallout 76 trading system so you can share resources and buy and sell wares to other players. There are also treasure maps. In this YouTube video from JuiceHead we can see a map being looted that gives us a clue as to where to travel to in the massive map for some loot. Given the size of the world, we imagine we’ll be scratching our heads for a few of these. Another concern is how Fallout 76 quests will work in a game without any NPCs. You will start quests through terminals, holotapes, and notes rather than chatting to townsfolk. In addition, an interview between GameStar and Todd Howard has revealed that there will be Fallout 76 radiant quests – those are the never-ending quest lines from you would get from NPCs like Preston Garvey in Fallout 4, often telling you that another settlement is in danger and needs your help. Don’t fear, though, there will be a Fallout 76 main quest with a narrative that guides you through to the higher levels, and it culminates with the launching of Fallout 76 nukes. Yeah, remember when we said other players might not be so hospitable? They might well be armed with massive nuclear missiles. After a nuclear fallout, these missiles are a dime a dozen, and you can roam the wastes with friends to the bunkers dotted across the wastes to destroy everything all over again. Once you have collected enough bits of code you can unleash hell on other player’s bases, and then greedily collect up the spoils – if the radiation doesn’t get you. It’s going to be like that infamous Megaton moment but on real-life players this time. Delightful. Another question that occurred to us once we heard that we have an online Fallout game is V.A.T.S. That’s the targeting system from previous games in which you can pause time and aim for specific body parts on an enemy. For unavoidable temporal reasons, that’s a problem in a multiplayer game, so the solution is a Fallout 76 V.A.T.S. that works in real time. Another fitting addition to this online survival game is hunger and thirst meters. There will always be those players who just want to watch the world burn, but how will Bethesda tackle the inevitable Fallout 76 griefers who just want to wade into servers, raise hell, and ruin everybody’s game on purpose? Well, they will become a wanted murderer as part of an interesting bounty system that ties into some of Fallout 76’s anti-griefing PvP innovations. If you attack another player they’ll only take a very small fraction of the damage your attack would normally do, if they fight back, both players will then do normal damage – whoever wins gets caps and whatever junk/crafting materials their enemy was carrying. There’s also a Fallout 76 debt system, so if you’re killed in PvP but don’t have enough caps to pay off your bounty then your PvP damage will be reduced by up to 50% for a significant duration. However, if you keep attacking a player who doesn’t fight back and eventually kill them, not only do you not get any rewards, you also get marked for all players to see, a bounty is placed on your head, and – worst of all – you’ll have to pay the caps out of your own pocket. And, if you don’t have any caps to your name and you have a massive bounty to pay off, you’ll get a massive damage debuff. Bethesda shed more light on Fallout 76 PvP at QuakeCon 2018, explaining that player stats and gear will be balanced when it comes to PvP so new players still stand a chance when they come up against other players in power armor. Private servers and Fallout 76 mods should also be coming to the game so this new wasteland can be a little more familiar. A lot of fans are also anxious that Fallout 76 stealth will not work with the new online systems, but Bethesda has said that stealth will be useful for taking down tough creatures as well as hiding your location from other players on the world map. Then again, just as the national governments that got you into this mess in the first place, everything is going to descend into chaos again anyway. As with any other online game, we’re going to need a Fallout 76 endgame, and this will the take the shape of “cyclical nuclear war.” According to the Noclip documentary, it is intended that players partner up to track down missiles from the nuclear bunkers dotted across West Virginia and blow the world up all over again. The newly-nuked zone will then become a higher level with more precious loot drops. To further keep us going, Fallout 76 12v12 deathmatches could be on the way, too. Fallout 76 microtransactions It’s been confirmed many times that Fallout 76 will feature cosmetic-only microtransactions in order to support its online features and future DLC. However it is possible to earn the in-game currency used for microtransactions simply by playing the game and completing Fallout 76 Atoms challenges, although be prepared to put a lot of hours in. Todd Howard told Gamestar that the aim for Fallout 76 microtransactions is to avoid being pay-to-win, but also that all items should be available to earn in-game. Fallout 76 cross-play An important topic for the first time in the series: will there be Fallout 76 cross-play? Apparently not, which is a big problem for any of you with friends who only game on consoles. According to an interview with GameStar, Bethesda’s game director Todd Howard said that they had wanted to allow cross-platform play, but Sony were unhelpful in the process and as a result, Fallout 76 cross-play is unlikely. Fallout 76 trailer So far there has been a Fallout 76 reveal trailer, an extended E3 2018 version, a live action trailer, a cinematic in-game cinematic intro teaser, and a host of gameplay trailers. The extended Fallout 76 E3 2018 trailer above gives us a much better look at the post-apocalyptic West Virginia setting and some hints at what the Fallout 76 gameplay will be like. The extended Fallout 76 trailer above confirms much of what we expected following the teases of the reveal. First is the setting: John Denver’s Take Me Home, Country Roads song plays once again but, this time, we get to see the country roads of West Virginia. We can also see some of the new monsters we will be fighting – including a huge winded beast – which take inspiration from local folklore. A lot might be changing for Fallout 76, but this live action trailer above featuring guns and nukes reassures us that this is still Fallout, just with your mates. The gameplay teaser trailer above give us an idea of the beginning of the game, starting in Vault 76. After what appears to have been a big party ahead of ‘Reclamation Day’ our character has overslept after ‘overindulging’. Before we head out, we’ve got our new (or, well, old) Pip-Boy to pick up, first. This next Fallout 76 trailer illuminates how online gameplay will work. Our kind and informative voiceover man tells us that other human inhabitants might not necessarily be as “neighbourly” as you. One of these nasty souls is PGarvey, who is clearly no longer in the business of honourably rescuing settlements. The player appears to gain points for successfully protecting their base from this highly memeable miscreant. Since there are friendly folk out there, we also get to see co-op combat with friends the player has found – and we get Fallout 76 emotes with which to say hello, too.<doc-sep>
Barely a day after Fallout 76 was revealed and reported to have survival gameplay mechanics similar to Rust and DayZ, a new leak has suggested that the next entry in the post-apocalyptic franchise may have less in common with these games than initially suggested. According to a Reddit post that’s now been deleted but archived on the Space Battles forums, there seems to be a lot more to Fallout 76 than meets the eye. Apparently, Fallout 76 is an open-world role-playing game with an emphasis on improvised weaponry and base building. It will feature a scavenger from the surface as an important character which would explain why the vault seen in the trailer is empty aside from the protagonist. It has a cooperative mode but the source claimed it’s “not an MMO or Rust-like”. The game will also come with a phone app and have a voiced protagonist like Fallout 4. Six factions will be present. Three of these are “notables” that were in past games. It could also have “numerous retcons” to the events of Fallout 4 and past games with the likes of Maxson and Harold making an appearance. And to no one’s surprise, Fallout 76 is “laying the groundwork for Fallout 5 which is already in the works.” Interestingly, the source stated that Bethesda will not allow fan-made modifications to Fallout 76 that don’t go through the company’s Creation Club, effectively killing off the likes of Nexus Mods. “No external modes outside of Creation Club, they’re going to try and cut that off at the pass and sell it as a security thing citing stolen content and adult mods,” the post reads. Furthermore, it may seem that Bethesda is in “panic mode” following rumours and wants to release more information soon to cut it off. In what form this takes place is yet tone known. Are you looking to Fallout 76 or is the drama surrounding the game’s final shape and form entertainment enough? Let us know in the comments. If you're a fan of video games, check out Transition, Gadgets 360's gaming podcast. You can listen to it via Apple Podcasts or RSS, or just listen to this week's episode by hitting the play button below.