What is Fallout 76? Bethesda’s pre-E3 tease has few answers

Another Fallout game needs your help. I'll mark it on your map.

Since yesterday morning, Bethesda has been drawing over 100,000 Twitch viewers to a static "Please Stand By" screen with a Fallout Pip-Boy in the foreground. Today, those patient fans were rewarded with a rather cryptic, gameplay-free trailer for Fallout 76, the next game from Bethesda Game Studios.

Opening with a cover of John Denver's "Take Me Home, Country Roads," the teaser slowly leads us through the interior of Vault 76, which we know from past games was built in the Virginia area. According to the in-game lore, Vault 76 is one of Vault-Tec's "control vaults," designed to be one of the first to open up to the outside world 20 years after the 2077 apocalypse. Judging by the dates in the trailer, that opening might have been delayed—there's a Pip-Boy in a few shots that displays a date of "27 Oct 2102," five years behind "schedule."

Pip-Boys, Solo cups, and party hats. Must have been a wild night. (credit: Bethesda)

Still, the teaser appears to show the someone gearing up for a red-letter day. The vault—which appears pristine and functional—is littered with the remains of a huge party, and the character appears to have set his or her alarm in order to get up early for "Reclamation Day," which we assume is when the doors open and the vault's inhabitants emerge to take back a world cleansed of Commies and rich with oil.

Read 3 remaining paragraphs | Comments