Fallout 76 is an interesting experiment, if nothing else. It takes Bethesda, a company known for its immersive single player experiences, their formula, and transplants it into a shared world survival shooter mould. What’s more, all of this is being done on the now almost two decades old engine Bethesda has been using since Morrowind, which has been stretched and patched beyond belief to facilitate something like this.
Given that, as well as the general bugginess of Bethesda games, you would expect there to be a lot of errors and glitches in the upcoming online title too—which is more problematic than if they were in a single player title. And indeed, a thread posted on Reddit claims that no server checks for file or model integrity means that “hacking” the game on the PC version is inordinately easy.
Multiple problems were pointed out in that thread, including being able to change the size and appearance of objects, turning off collision, and being able to grief players with no checks. This would, naturally, spell disaster for the game, and potentially give some players a lot of advantages over the others.
Bethesda, however, has responded to these claims in a statement made to IGN, claiming that they are largely inaccurate and foolish. While legitimate problems have been discovered and are being addressed by Bethesda, the thread in question seems to be sensationalist, according to Bethesda.
“Many of the claims in the thread are either inaccurate or based on incorrect assumptions. The community has however called to attention several issues that our teams are already actively tracking and planning to roll out fixes for. Our goal is always to deliver a great experience for all our players. Cheating or hacking will not be tolerated. We know our fan base is passionate about modding and customizing their experience in our worlds, and it’s something we intend to support down the road,” they said in their statement.
So, for now, it seems like Bethesda is not acknowledging these claims as accurate. If they are, then we will know once the game launches on November 14 for PS4, Xbox One, and PC. Nevertheless, given Bethesda’s recent statement that their commitment to Fallout 76 is “never ending”, hopefully a troubled launch will still be righted over time, if nothing else.
