Fallout 76 Developers Surprised by Players’ Combat Skills

“We have not lived up to our expectations.”

That’s a line you might expect from a struggling entrepreneur, or more recently, a member of the San Antonio Spurs.

At Summer Game Fest last week, while chatting with Fallout 76 creative director Jon Rush and production director Bill LaCoste, I heard those very words—but they were delivered with a positive spin. The team believed they had set a challenging stage with the latest update, Infestations, which launched on June 2, but players quickly proved them wrong.

“We were playtesting [Infestations] extensively, and we thought, ‘we’re pretty good, these seem pretty tough, I bet our players are going to struggle with this,’” LaCoste shared. “But sure enough, we underestimated our players and their knack for taking down enemies; they’re breezing through these challenges.”

Infestations marks the 27th major update in Fallout 76’s nearly ten-year journey, introducing random spawns of formidable foes across the map from a selection of about 40 specific locations. Players must venture to these sites to hunt down and eliminate the threats. Super Mutants, Scorched, Mole Miners, Ghouls, and more are among the menacing creatures now occupying these once-deserted areas. The stakes are high, as players can earn powerful legendary items for their bravery.

Bosses and their minions will adapt to their environments, presenting unique challenges based on their chosen locations. “You could find yourself at Top Of The World, where a Mole Miner boss has taken refuge inside a bus with a rocket launcher—good luck getting in there to take him out,” Rush explained. “Or you might be at the golf course, where a Scorched is hiding in the basement, forcing you to navigate long hallways while under fire just to reach him.”

Initially, the team had a much broader list of potential spawn areas for infestations, but they ultimately narrowed it down to the 40 featured in the update. These locations were chosen for their potential to deliver the “best gameplay,” as noted by Rush and LaCoste, while also considering factors that would encourage exploration rather than turning the update into a “fast travel game.”

“We wanted to see what kind of gameplay we could extract,” Rush said. “You’ll encounter spots where enemies are holed up, or wide-open areas. For instance, at the Palace of the Winding Path, it’s wide open, and there’s the boss, but you’ve got nowhere to hide, and he’s surrounded by 20 minions. It’s all about employing different strategies for different locations.”

What excites Rush and LaCoste about Infestations is the “knob under the hood,” or the ability to dynamically adjust the gameplay across the Fallout 76 map in real time. “The team can decide they want more infestations, and poof, it happens,” LaCoste said. “They can choose to have only super mutants infesting for the next few hours, and suddenly, it’s a super mutant invasion. We can even create overlapping infestations to unleash chaos if we want. That’s the advantage of being a live service; we can leverage the ‘live’ aspect whenever we choose.”

This capacity to respond to player progress in real time, only for players to tackle those challenges and for developers to realize they need further adjustments, creates a thrilling competition between the two sides. “We have players who find these current infestations pretty tough,” Rush noted, “while others can take them down in just two shots. The challenge lies in finding a solution that works for everyone, but if it were easy, everyone would do it. That’s what makes it enjoyable.”

Rush and LaCoste are part of that player base themselves, each boasting over 1,000 hours in the game outside of work. “We’ve spent countless hours in the game,” LaCoste said, “which gives us valuable insight from a player’s perspective. When our community raises issues, we’re already well aware of them.”

As Infestations is still in its early days, I asked what might be on the horizon for the game. Currently, these infestations only occur in abandoned or low-populated areas; could it be possible for mutants, scorchers, and robots to target more active locations on the map? “That might be next on the agenda,” Rush replied, “but it’s not where they’re starting.”