Jon Rush Welcomes You To Fallout 76’s Milepost Zero – gamescom 2024

After a calamitous launch in late 2018, Bethesda Game Studios has been hard at work on improving its first ever multiplayer title, Fallout 76 , through a series of major updates. Nowadays, as the game is on the verge of its twentieth such update, named Milepost Zero , public sentiment about it seems to be at an all time high .

Preceded by Skyline Valley , an update which my colleague Matt Keith got to preview earlier this summer and which brought a whole new region to the game, Milepost Zero will introduce content focused on a merchant group called Blue Ridge Caravan Company, a system for upgrading and decorating your very own outpost, changes to legendary crafting and more.

At gamescom 2024, I sat down with the creative director of Fallout 76 , Jon Rush , to talk all things Skyline Valley , Milepost Zero , Gleaming Depths , the major update currently planned for December, and what else is to come in the future:

Hello and thank you for having me today! To get things started, I’d like to know: what is your favorite thing about the Fallout universe?

Jon Rush : My favourite thing about the Fallout universe, I think, is how all the games have maintained this balance between the darkness of the story and the levity of the humour. That’s something I’ve always enjoyed.

It’s been about six years since Fallout 76 released originally — what is it about the game that keeps players coming back for more?

Jon Rush : You know, the Bethesda fan community is the best community and that’s certainly represented in the folks that play Fallout 76 . A large part of what brings people back is the really friendly community and the friends they make along the way.

That’s true! And even just at gamescom, every year, there are a lot of Fallout 76 and Elder Scrolls Online fans.

Jon Rush : Yeah, I have seen a lot of Fallout t-shirts! That’s awesome!

So, moving on, the release of the Fallout series brought with it a significant number of newcomers to 76 . How are you ensuring that the game is accessible to first-time players?

Jon Rush : Good question. So, that’s something that we’ve talked about for a while. We have a pretty good number of future plans for it, but more recently, we revisited the experience for new players leaving the Vault. Now, when a player leaves the Vault, they can choose to either leave as a fresh dweller at level two, or they can choose from a selection of five presets and leave as a level 20 — which arms them a bit better for the Wasteland. In addition to this, we’ve also placed a lot of points of interest around the Vault that weren’t there before.

The purpose of these points is to introduce new players to a lot of the factions and different types of characters that they’re going to face as they venture even further into the Wasteland. And, there’s even a small little dungeon kind of right by the Vault, too, which is fun as it gives them a first taste at some of the combat.

Would you recommend that players start at level two or just jump ahead to level 20? What would you say is the ideal experience for a newcomer?

Jon Rush : If you’re brand new to Fallout , if you’ve never played 3 or 4 before, I would recommend jumping to level 20. And then, as you become more familiar with the game, rolling a new character and starting with that one as a level two is a really good option.

The release of Skyline Valley , the latest update, brought with it a new region, which is a first for Fallout 76 . What makes Skyline Valley, the region, different from the rest of 76 ’s map?

Jon Rush : When I look at our Fallout 76 map, I see a theme park. You have these different areas that are very distinct from one another but which still make you feel like you’re in the same park. So, if our park is Appalachia and I’m looking at our different regions in that way, we needed to find something that, tonally, was different from the other regions but also felt like it fit within Appalachia.

We were exploring the idea of Vault 63 and the whole backstory being kind of dark and mysterious, right? And so, we wanted to reflect that dark and mysterious tone in the new region. So, as we were going through different pre-visualizations, after I saw a storm in one of them I knew that, yes, that’s what we’re going to do!

Moving on, the next update, Fallout 76: Milepost Zero , will bring with it the option to run missions for the Blue Ridge Caravan Company and help defend their Brahmin caravans. How do you expect these missions to shake up the gameplay loop?

Jon Rush : I think these missions are going to give the player something to do in between going from event to event to event. When I log into the game, I’ll do all my stuff at my camp and get myself all ready, and then I’ll jump from event to event to event. And I know that other people are doing that, too, because I see the same people showing up. But, there’s that period in-between where, you know, maybe some people go to a train station and sell their stuff or go to Purveyor Murmrgh, the legendary vendor, and scrap their weapons and whatnot.

But, since running a caravan will take about maybe 10 minutes, we hope that caravans will give you something that you can still progress towards in between those events. Or, if you want just to do caravan after caravan after caravan, you can do that too! That’s perfectly fine! Long story short, I think it rounds out the experience for the investment of time that players are putting in.

Milepost Zero will also introduce the feature to decorate, customize and upgrade outposts. How will 76 ’s outposts differ from what we’ve seen previously with Fallout 4 ’s settlements?

Jon Rush : The outpost will serve more like a house in Skyrim . What’s different with the outpost, though, is that you can earn different vendors from faraway lands that you can only access in your outpost. These vendors will sell you things or provide services that you can only get from them. You also have the option to earn a brand new weapon through these vendors, too, which is cool.

I want to ask now about perhaps the most exciting addition to Fallout 76 0 — the ability to mutate into ghouls. Do you expect a lot of players to undergo the mutation process, especially considering that being a ghoul will make them unfavourable with at least some of the factions in the game?

Jon Rush : With anything new, I always expect most players to try it out. So, I’m sure that people will be curious to see what it’s like to be a ghoul. And, if they hop in there and they decide they don’t like it, they can revert their character back, that’s totally fine. They won’t lose any progress. If they want to stick with being a ghoul…great! I’m looking forward to seeing how people explore their newfound powers and perk cards and whatnot.

Are there any plans to add more mutation processes like ghoulification? Will there ever be an option for players to play as a Super Mutant, for example?

Jon Rush : So, we had talked about letting players play as ghouls for years. But we wanted it to represent more than just a visual change. We wanted it to be really impactful to how players play the game. What playable ghouls really represent is a means for our experienced players to have alternate ways to play the game.

If another character race, like Super Mutants, for example, would fit this hole that we’re missing, then we would certainly be discussing that. I can say that other races have been discussed, but I don’t think that they’ve been seriously considered. Player-ghouls fill a hole that we were kind of missing with the in-game players so it’s definitely serving a specific purpose. And it’s fun!

Given, then, that you’ve considered adding playable ghouls for a number of years, why is now the perfect time to do so?

Jon Rush : I know where you’re going with this question: you’re thinking of The Ghoul from the Amazon series ! I promise, though, that the fact we’re about to allow players to play as ghouls is pure coincidence! [laughs] But it’s awesome to see the reaction to that character on the show! In any case, with regards to 76 , looking at player feedback on Reddit, on Discord and on YouTube, what we’ve noticed is that our in-game players, meaning people who are at level 50+…they’re looking for something else, right?

Players are looking for their next jump in power or the next big challenge. So, that’s where our Gleaming Depths update comes in, which releases in December. The Ghouls will serve as an alternate way to play through the challenging content that will be added there, so now seemed like a great time to add playable ghouls.

You briefly touched on the fact that you’re paying attention to player feedback in developing updates for Fallout 76 . How do you know what feedback to take to heart?

Jon Rush : That’s a great question! I wish there was some kind of formula where we could plug in the feedback and see all the boxes which it would check. But, really, the best way — as far as we found — to listen to player feedback is to approach it really organically. So, we all love the game, we all play the game…speaking on behalf of myself, I’ve got multiple high-level characters, but I will also go try different things and roll new characters.

Going through the feedback on Discord, Reddit and YouTube…read and watch it all, and we sort of use our playing experience as a lens to view the feedback through. And, when we look at the feedback, it’s not for super specific things, but, rather, we’re looking at the broader strokes: what are a lot of people saying about a big part of the game? So, yeah, we look at that through the lens of our playing experience and take decisions from there.

Now that you’ve mentioned Gleaming Depths , the update that will drop in December, can you please expound on what it will entail? The teaser at QuakeCon was really short!

Jon Rush : Sure! So, Gleaming Depths is a new look at a raid feature for us. As such, the update will present a series of challenging encounters for our players that require teamwork, precise timing and really good gear. The story of Gleaming Depths takes place in an abandoned Enclave facility, where people were researching a phenomenon called “ultragenesis”. So, players will get to discover how, when left ungoverned, how that ultragenesis affects things around it. The facility itself consists of several really challenging encounters…players are going to have a tough time, but once they figure out how to clear them, it’ll become a really lucrative loop to continue to go through.

After each encounter, players will be presented with a whole bunch of rewards and, when they finally beat the end boss, they are going to get a chance to get some of the really cool, big stuff which factors into legendary crafting.

Can you speak more about what you have planned in regard to the legendary crafting?

Jon Rush : So, up until the release of this next patch, legendary crafting has been kind of random. Thanks to the new legendary crafting system, players will be able to scrap legendary weapons, armour and power armour. When they do so, they have a really small chance of learning how to craft one of the legendary mods associated with it. What they can now do with those mods is place them into their weapons.

Say, if they have a three-star weapon and they don’t like the third-star legendary attribute on it, they can grab a mod and plop it in there for a crafting cost. The system, then, gives players more control and a bit more agency over the gear that they have, and the hope with that is that, in the end, players will be emboldened to try different playstyles…I’m really excited to see how players engage with it. I’d also like to mention that this is the first step to our expansion of player power, which is coming out very, very soon: there’s a direct correlation there.

Looking past the Fallout 76: Gleaming Depths update for a moment, I’m wondering about how you and your team tackle the roadmap(s) for Fallout 76 . With the wealth of updates across the past few years, it’s become clearer and clearer that 76 is here to stay and will continue to expand in the years to come. How do you envision the future of the title?

Jon Rush : Skyline Valley really touched on what the majority of players are looking for in updates. For example, when we’re coming up with a new big feature like adding the region of Skyline Valley, we’re looking for opportunities to continue to tell Appalachia’s story and for ways to enable our players to continue to tell their own stories. So, an update like Skyline Valley , which has a big quest arc a nd has a lot of space for you to build your camps and lots of places to explore, is a perfect example of that mindset.

For the future of the project, I would say that updates of that calibre are certainly on the table and even being scheduled. And, being able to play as a ghoul, the legendary crafting, the Gleaming Depths raid, and other raids like it are definitely the future of the game.

Staying on the topic, is there an endpoint in mind for Fallout 76 ? Will all of these updates culminate with something?

Jon Rush : Never an end point…if i started thinking about an end point, I’d get depressed! [laughs] When planning the road map, we think about every update, like the next chapter in the story. If I look at 76 from day one, the very first chapter tells the story of people leaving the Vault, the empty Wasteland and the people who used to live there. All of this set the stage for the next chapter, which is when characters started to move in.

So, when we’re looking at future updates, we’re really thinking of it as a continuation of that larger story…not in an arc, but kind of like a straight line or a trajectory upward. What I see for the future of 76 is more opportunities to explore, more opportunities for camp buildings, more tools for builders to show off what they build, more challenging experiences and more ways to level up your character.

Fallout 76: Milepost Zero is set to release on September 3, 2024 on PlayStation 4 and 5, Xbox One and X | S and PC.