In brief: Bethesda is wrapping up its month-long 25th anniversary celebration of the Fallout series on a high note. On Monday, Bethesda announced a next-gen update for Fallout 4. Set to launch in 2023, the freebie will be available for Xbox Series and PlayStation 5 as well as on the PC. Details are sparse at this hour but we do know it’ll support 4K resolution and high frame rates, plus deliver bug fixes and bonus Creation Club content.
Bethesda is also offering active Prime Gaming subscribers the opportunity to claim the 25th anniversary bundle for Fallout 76. It’ll be available via Prime Gaming Rewards from November 2, 2022 until February 2, 2023, and includes a handful of in-game goodies.
Active Xbox Game Pass Ultimate members can also nab the bundle. The window for redemption opens October 27 and runs through December 27.
Bethesda additionally announced that from October 25 through November 8, Fallout 76 players can visit the Atomic Shop for a free daily item.
The first game in the series, Fallout: A Post Nuclear Role Playing Game, landed in 1997 from Interplay Productions on MS-DOS and Windows and later came to Mac. The game received critical acclaim and is considered by some to be responsible for renewing consumer interest in RPGs. Others consider it to be among the greatest games ever made.
Related reading: Grab Fallout 3 for free for a limited time
Fallout 2 arrived a year later, but it’d take a full decade before the third main series entry launched. It was notably the first game in the series developed by Bethesda and marked a major shift in the franchise. Fallout 4 hit in late 2015 for PlayStation 4, Xbox One and Windows and supported several add-ons including Automatron, Wasteland Workshop and Far Harbor.
The most recent game in the series, Fallout 76, was universally panned by critics when it dropped in 2018. Unlike Hello Games which was able to save No Man’s Sky (and turn it into a pretty great game), Bethesda hasn’t been able to replicate that with Fallout 76. As of writing, the game has a Metacritic score of 52 and a user score of just 2.8.
