With the last major update for Fallout 76—Burning Springs—having come out back in December, Bethesda is now looking to the future. The studio has released a new Developer Preview video giving us a look at the next major free update for the multiplayer title, dubbed The Backwoods. Check out the video below.
The trailer features creative director Jon Rush providing details about The Backwoods. The update will serve as a reason for players to once again explore Appalachia to discover brand new secrets. Public events and regular events are seeing “big changes,” according to Rush, including being renamed to Activities.
“We’re not redoing them,” he explained. “Just ironing out some wrinkles, offering bigger challenges, bigger rewards, and lots of excitement.” The new rewards will include more experience, caps, legendaries, and rare resources. “We want to keep our adventurers adventuring,” he said.
After a public event has been completed, a bigger challenge will become available in the form of Party Crashers. Rush describes them as being “super challenging enemies” that have the chance to show up when a public event has been completed. Among the various creatures that can show up as Party Crashers is Bigfoot, who is mad at players for destroying forests. The creature is a 4-star legendary, with all the appropriate loot rewards you can expect.
There will also be new quality-of-life changes, like a performance update for the Pip Boy, making its UI smoother and easier to navigate. Armor sets are also getting balance changes to make more options viable for different activities.
The release of The Backwoods will also mark the arrival of the newest season of content for Fallout 76. As the presence of Bigfoot might indicate, cryptids are going to be the main focus. The Season itself is titled Rip Daring and the Cryptids from Beyond the Cosmos.
The studio has revealed the full roadmap of content for the season, which will start on March 3rd and will go on until June 1. Shortly after the season’s start, a variety of events are planned for Fallout 76 players, from Caps-A-Plenty and Mutated Public Events, to a Rip Daring mini season and a Scrip Surplus event.
Parts of the roadmap covering June 4th to July 7th refer to Season 25. Unfortunately, however, none of the listed events for the month provide any indication for what this next Season might be.
The Burning Springs update was released back in December, and brought with the eponymous new region for players to explore. It also introduced new types of activities, like bounty hunting. The core story of the update revolves around the Rust King, who rules over all of Burning Springs with an iron fist.
Fallout 76 is available on PC, PS4 and Xbox One. PS5 and Xbox Series X/S will have to make do with backwards compatibility to play the multiplayer title for now. However, Bethesda has confirmed that current-gen versions of the game are in the works, slated for release later this year. While you wait, check out the studio’s celebration of 2025’s major updates, and how it teased its plans for 2026.
