Bethesda Lets Sick Child Play Fallout 76 First

Since the gaming industry seems to be chockfull of bad news lately, let’s focus on some good news, shall we?

And this bit of heartwarming news comes to us from Virginia, where a 12-year old boy named Wes is dying of a rare form of cancer called Neuroblastoma. Which, to be clear, is not the good news. Nor is the good news that his doctors have recently recommended stopping his cancer treatments, as they are likely doing more harm than good. No, the good news is that Wes will go down in history as the world’s first player of Fallout 76, as when Bethesda was told the boy was afraid he would never get to play the Power Armor Edition of the game he had pre-ordered, assistant director of Bethesda Matt Grandstaff drove four hours with a copy of the game so Wes could give it a play.

As his parents wrote on Facebook:

“He spent the day at our house watching Wes play, making him the first person in the world outside of the video game industry employees to play… While he doesn’t get to keep the game because it’s too early, just those hours of playtime made him happier than you know HUGE thank you to Martino and the team at Bethesda for jumping through hoops to make this happen for him ❤️ ❤️ ❤️ It means the world to us and him.”

It’s sad he couldn’t keep the game, but he could keep the Power Armor helmet he had also brought, which was signed by chief Todd Howard.

Bethesda has a strong history of treating their fans right, and I wouldn’t be surprised if they decided to honor Wes in the final game as an NPC or something like it. Here’s hoping everything turns out alright for Wes, but you can donate to his GoFundMe right here, if you’d like.