Fallout 76 players will be able to turn themselves into Ghouls in early 2025, Bethesda announced during the Xbox Games Showcase this evening. It’s a series first for the Fallout universe, and a move that’s sure to make the millions of new players who have started playing the Fallout games in the wake of the Fallout TV show jump with irradiated joy.
You’ll need to reach Level 50 before you can become your own version of Walton Goggins’ gun-slinging Ghoul in Fallout 76, and there will be a specific questline to complete that kicks off the path toward your eventual transformation.
Bethesda’s keeping the exact details of this quest close to its chest for now, but in a press briefing ahead of tonight’s reveal, creative director Jonathan Rush told Eurogamer that turning into a Ghoul will have a significant impact on how you play the game going forward.
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For example, your new appearance “could land [players] in trouble” with some of Appalachia’s various faction groups, and NPCs will react to you differently than before. However, there will also be plenty of benefits to becoming a Ghoul. In addition to the existing Perk Cards you had as a human (which is how Fallout 76 handles its stat points and special abilities), Rush said there will also be “dozens of Ghoul-specific Perk Cards to use” on top of what you’ve already unlocked, which could end up making them quite versatile allies around the wasteland. Likewise, Ghouls will also have unique environmental benefits, such as being more resistant to radiation.
Rush hinted there will be more incentives to tempt players into becoming a Ghoul, though he wasn’t ready to reveal what those are just yet. Instead, we’ll have to wait until later in the year before we can find out more, he said, though curiously, the transformation won’t be permanent. How one goes from human to Ghoul and back again, however, is another mystery that will be revealed later this year.
Until then, players will have plenty to sink their teeth into with Fallout 76, as there’s another big update coming next week on June 12th.
The Skyline Valley update will expand the map of Appalachia for the first time since the game launched in 2018, adding the Shenandoah Valley region to the southern edge of the map’s central Savage Divide region. It will also be home to several new story quests and activities, and I’ll have more to share on this next week.
