Todd Howard Confirms Fallout 76 Cross-Play Hopes Deleted by Market-Leading Sony PS4

Maybe one day we'll all be able to play together. 

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No one is pleased with Sony right now and its divisive approach when it comes to cross-play, but so far the company hasn't budged on easing up on the regulations it has in place when it comes to letting folks play together. That's why it's not surprising that, according to Bethesda Game Studios' Todd Howard, there will be no cross-play in the upcoming online title Fallout 76.

During an interview with German publication GameStar, Howard was asked about the eventual possibility of cross-play multiplayer in Bethesda's online-only RPG. He stated that the team would "love" to do that, but that "right now" it's not possible. After a brief pause, he adds that "Sony isn't being as helpful as we want them to be." That's the quote, verbatim, straight from Howard himself.

This isn't a shocking answer, nor should it come as a surprise that Sony isn't exactly being cooperative, especially with the issues surrounding Switch players being unable to access Fortnite with their Epic Games accounts that previously were used on PlayStation 4 and the like. While Sony has made statements that it could be making strides and working on resolving these problems in the future, it certainly hasn't made any advancements toward fixing the issue just yet. We'll just have to wait and see what happens. 

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Fueled by horror, rainbow-sugar-pixel-rushes, and video games, Brittany is a Senior Editor at Shacknews who thrives on surrealism and ultraviolence. Follow her on Twitter @MolotovCupcake and check out her portfolio for more. Like a fabulous shooter once said, get psyched!

From The Chatty
    • reply
      July 2, 2018 12:36 PM

      Wow, this is twice now that Bethesda has thrown Sony under the bus for imposing arbitrary limitations on games. (The first, that I'm aware of, was when Bethesda was bringing mods to consoles.)

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        July 2, 2018 12:42 PM

        Bethesda is totally willing to play dirty. If they were EA big I'm sure it would make more of a difference :/

    • Zek legacy 10 years legacy 20 years
      reply
      July 2, 2018 1:21 PM

      I'm glad they're willing to speak up about it, the only thing that will push Sony to change their policy on this is lots of bad press.

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      July 2, 2018 2:24 PM

      I'm really surprised that he's willing to just up and call Sony on it.

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        July 2, 2018 2:35 PM

        As they should. I love Sony but fuck their bullshit draconian stance on cross play. Like, who gives a fuck? It's 2018, there's no more Sega vs. Nintendo bullshit. There's no downside to this.

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          July 2, 2018 2:38 PM

          Yeah. I don't love Sony (have a PS4 Pro but it only gets play for the big exclusives. It's a Netflix machine otherwise) and I agree. Tear down the walls! Stop trying to cling to every possible penny even if it's at a detriment to your players.

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          July 2, 2018 2:44 PM

          There's absolutely downside for Sony. It's the same reason there was no Xbox cross play when XBL was the dominant console online network. The network effects of having players on PSN or XBL increases the relative value of those platforms. Each company has invested significantly in those networks to make them attractive to players for this reason. Sony has enough share with PSN that they can credibly expect people to choose the Playstation version of a game in order to play with their friends. What's unusual is to see all the smaller players band together to increase their bargaining power with consumers.

          • Zek legacy 10 years legacy 20 years
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            July 2, 2018 3:01 PM

            Yeah the split ecosystems we've always had are just a result of everyone involved working in their own best interest. There isn't really any incentive at all for the market leader to play ball here, except that maybe the tables could turn some day and they'll be glad they set the precedent. Or maybe as soon as MS is in the lead again they'll take away crossplatform, who knows.

            At the end of the day it's the consumers that want this, and they're the ones who need to hold companies accountable to make it happen.

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            July 2, 2018 3:07 PM

            ^ Hit the nail on the head. I don't understand the argument that this is bad for Sony - they're essentially playing corporate game of thrones. The company would have a hard time justifying cross-play when that functionality takes away from their financial bottom line.

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        July 2, 2018 2:40 PM

        I'm not, he called them on the mod issue too.

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          July 2, 2018 2:42 PM

          The mod issue probably a bit more personal to Bethesda though. Good on him for calling them out though, maybe see some action from it

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