Sameed Khan·

Players Call Fallout 1st Subscription A Mess And Bethesda Partially Agrees

In the two days following its release, Bethesda’s new Fallout 1st subscription service for Fallout 76 has come under heavy fire from fans and critics alike, and not just for what many feel is an unreasonably high price of admission. As it turns out, taking cues from the online RPG’s rocky beginnings, the features on offer as part of the subscription don’t even work as advertised.

At $12.99 a month or $99.99 a year, the subscription promises private sessions for you and up to seven friends, a scrap box with unlimited storage, a new “Survival Tent” portable outpost, 1,650 free Atoms per month for the game’s store, and a selection of unique cosmetics. Those who were brave enough to plump up for a membership soon realized, however, that the so-called “Private Worlds” weren’t all that private, with friends able to join without an invitation and the world itself, in some cases, appearing “looted.”

The consensus is that Bethesda may be serving recycled sessions from other servers instead of creating fresh ones, though Bethesda denies this outright. As for the session not being truly private, the studio has admitted that it may have dropped the ball on that one, confirming in a statement to Polygon that a solution is now on the agenda. “We are looking to provide an option in an upcoming patch that will allow Fallout 1st members to restrict access to their servers more completely,” says Bethesda.

This isn’t where the subscription’s problems end, though, with members reporting a bug that causes scrap placed in the bottomless scrap box to disappear without a trace. Bethesda admits that while the issue does exist, it is rare, and that for most players, the scrap box merely appears empty, with the scrap remaining accessible from the Workbench.

The Survival Tent too isn’t free of issues, it seems, with one Reddit post citing “multiple reports by reliable sources” when claiming that placing the tent causes the game to crash to desktop. The studio is yet to address this issue, though a ticket has been submitted to the developer.

Issues aside, Fallout 1st has been pelted with negative feedback based simply on what was advertised. Given the game’s problem-ridden launch and generally poor reception, it isn’t surprising that players weren’t happy seeing a highly requested feature such as private sessions locked behind a pricey monthly subscription. Some fans went as far as to buy the falloutfirst.com domain and adorn it with a defiled replica of the subscription’s official web page.

It is safe to say that this is one of the biggest gaming industry faux pas in recent history.

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