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Bethesda’s Fallout 76 did not launch in a good state. While the MMO is now a great Fallout experience with friends, former project lead Jeff Gardiner remembers the intense hatred from fans the team received on release.
Fallout 76 lead was harassed in real life
Speaking to PC Gamer, Gardiner explains that he will “never forget” the reactions from fans on launch as they ended up breaching the virtual world and impacting his real life. With 15 years of experience creating Bethesda games, he never expected to be harassed outside.
“I got yelled at in an Apple Store, I’ll never forget,” the veteran Fallout developer explained.
For Gardiner, the stress of Fallout 76’s reception didn’t end at launch. As the project lead, it was Gardiner’s role to improve the game and bring it closer to what we now know today, and that stress was constant.
“Working on a live service game comes with a lot of stress, because it just doesn’t go away,” Gardiner explained. “When you put a game out that’s that maligned, especially on a team that has had such success, the morale is doubly bad internally. So it was my job to make the people who are making the game like the game.”
Despite the horrendous reactions on launch, Gardiner reveals that Fallout 76 is his favourite game he’s worked on. After the huge overhaul that came with Wastelanders and beyond, the MMO has become the Fallout spin-off it was meant to be, and that has been incredibly rewarding, despite the horrid start.
“It’s a very unique game. It still is,” he told the outlet. “People always ask, ‘What’s your favorite game you’ve worked on?’ Because 76 was such a difficult game and then it turned around to a successful game, it’s actually probably my favourite.”
Nowadays, Fallout 76 is still ongoing with thousands of players exploring the wasteland, completing quests and setting off nukes. It’s a game that’s built on strong foundations, but foundations that didn’t have the meat they needed to stand strong.
For more Fallout coverage, read about the cancellation of awesome New Vegas mod Neuvo Mexico, or read about Fallout designer’s claims that the games industry is unsustainable in its current form.
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