[Update:] Bethesda is issuing out 500 in-game Atoms to compensate for the falsely advertised duffel bag that was not included in the Power Armor Edition of Fallout 76. They suggest gamers contact customer support with their receipt to get the situation resolved.
We understand and respect that there is disappointment with the bag in the Power Armor Edition. We are sorry. Please contact Bethesda Support to provide proof of your CE purchase. They will assist in granting your account 500 Atoms.
Please visit: https://t.co/TJBMjYaph0
— Fallout (@Fallout) November 29, 2018
[Original article:] Leading up to its release in November, Bethesda advertised that there would be a $200 Fallout 76: Power Armor Edition featuring some physical items within the box, including a Power Armor helmet, 24 Fallout figurines, a glow in the dark map, and a West Tek Canvas duffel bag. Except… it doesn’t come with a canvas duffel bag.
According to Spiel Times, gamers noticed that when their Fallout 76: Power Armor Edition arrived, it did so without the advertised canvas duffel bag.
As pointed out in the article, the duffel bag was advertised prior to release at Walmart, Target, Amazon, and Best Buy to name a few.
When gamers reached out to Bethesda to ask them about the duffel bag being replaced with a cheap nylon bag, they received the following response via e-mail…
“Thank you for contacting Bethesda Customer Support. My name is Nicholas and I’d be happy to help you today!
“Due to unavailability of materials, we had to switch to a nylon case in the Fallout 76: Power Armor Edition. We hope this doesn’t prevent anyone from enjoying what we feel is one of our best collector’s editions.”
Some gamers attempted to get additional help from Bethesda’s Gear Helpdesk after they ran into a dead end with the customer support. However, the response was the same, as indicated in the e-mail below that one person shared on social media.
If you can’t read the message, the Gear Helpdesk representative states…
“We are sorry that you aren’t happy with the bag. The bag shown in the media was a prototype and was too expensive to make.
“We aren’t planning on doing anything about it.”
Actually, the Helpdesk rep is wrong.
Bethesda did do something about it…
They changed the description on their official store page.
If you check the cache of the store page you’ll find that the snapshot from November 20th, 2018, six days after the game released, the store page still featured the West Tek Canvas Carrying Bag in the description.
So ahead of the release of Fallout 76: Power Armor Edition and after the release of the game, Bethesda advertised a duffel bag that was not going to be shipped with the $200 product that people paid for.
The company made no announcement about the change, nor did they inform those who pre-ordered the collector’s edition that the change would be taking place.
Worse yet is that the online shops still advertise the old duffel bag, even to this day. Here’s Target’s store page, as of November 29th, 2018:
Here’s Amazon’s store page, as of November 29th, 2018:
And here is Best Buy’s store page, as of November 29th, 2018:
While Bethesda may have sneakily changed the description on their own store page, the store pages for every other vendor selling the Fallout 76: Power Armor Edition have yet to update their store pages, and it could spell bad news for Bethesda if the FTC caught wind of this.
(Thanks for the news tip Red)
