It's safe to say that Fallout 76 has not had a good launch. From incorrect special edition bags to poor reviews to the state of the game itself, it's been a bad month for Bethesda PR. The only way it could be worse is if the studio was considering Fallout 76 loot boxes... and it looks like this just might happen.
Despite the fact that anyone who knows the gaming industry would be able to tell Bethesda that adding loot boxes to Fallout 76 would be a very bad idea, especially right now, dataminers have spotted Fallout 76 loot boxes in the game's code - so let's hope they don't get activated.
The possibility of Fallout 76 loot boxes was spotted by dataminers on Reddit, with the line "no current need to panic but might be worth keeping an eye on" - so take that to heart before you read on.
The offending article, though, is that code for "Lunchboxes" have started appearing in Fallout 76, presumably as of the last patch. Lunchboxes were the name for the Loot Boxes in mobile/PC title Fallout Shelter, which contained various random goodies. The Fallout 76 Lunchboxes all have the "ATX" code attached, which is the code for the Fallout 76 Atom Shop - so they can be bought using the game's premium currency.
Going by what the code suggests, the Lunchboxes can also seemingly be found in the game itself, where they may set off a celebratory alert similar to Call of Duty when a player opens one - along with confetti, balloons, and funny messages. They seem to also offer Damage increases, Carry bonuses, and XP Boosts. There's also the suggestion (again, entirely based on datamined code) that Perk Card Packs are either getting removed, or were meant to be sold for Atoms.
"ATX_Entitlement_Category_Store_TEST EDID changed to ATX_Entitlement_Category_Store_Lunchboxes
ATX_Entitlement_Category_Store_PerkCardPacks full name removed"
None of this is for sure, and there's certainly the possibility that it'll be all for free rather than costing Atoms - plus, it will almost certainly be cosmetic-only, like the rest of the Atom Shop, apart from the temporary boosts. However, nonetheless adding any sort of loot box system to Fallout 76 would be a costly move right about now. The backlash against the game is considerable, from fans and critics alike, so we'd hate to think what adding loot boxes would do. It worked out fine for Star Wars Battlefront II though, didn't it?
