It has recently been revealed that the Fallout 76 servers will be online forever. The enior vice president of marketing at Bethesda, Pete Hines himself, confirmed the news when he was asked about the longevity of Bethesda’s upcoming title.
GameSpot has reported that although there was initially some concern in relation to the future of the game given its online-only build, Pete Hines has announced that Bethesda plans to maintain the servers indefinitely. According to Hines:
How long is [the game] going to be up? Forever. I don’t know how to give an answer other than that. It’s not like anybody makes a game and goes, ‘Well this is going to make it for 10 years if we’re lucky.’ Nobody thinks that way. How long has [World of Warcraft] been up now? Is that gaming planning to sunset in a year? I seriously doubt it.
Blizzard’s World of Warcraft has endured the test of time and seems to have only gotten bigger over the years, so if Bethesda is using that as its model for Fallout 76, players could be in for a lot more than they initially anticipated.
However, Bethesda’s plans for support don’t guarantee the game’s success. Considering that all human characters in Fallout 76 will be controlled by real players, the support provided by Bethesda won’t matter unless people are playing the game. Therefore, Fallout 76 will need to grip players early on if it’s to be the long-term project Bethesda is hoping for.
Fans of Bethesda won’t be getting another game until the next generation, so it’s likely that players will flock to Fallout 76 despite the controversy tied to the fact that it’s multiplayer-only. Therefore, if Bethesda manages to impress players early on, Fallout 76 could very well be the next long-term online game, in which case it will be maintained forever – or thereabouts.
