In an ambitious, misguided attempt to resurrect Fallout 76 from the dead, Bethesda has announced a new premium subscription service  for the beleaguered multiplayer survival game.

Unsurprisingly, the news has proven perfect ammunition for a dressing down on social media.

Fallout 1st Aims to Fix Fallout 76 for $99 Per Year

Dubbed Fallout 1st, a 12-month subscription costs the princely sum of $99.99. You can also opt to pay $12.99 a month, which makes it more expensive than a monthly subscription to Google Stadia Pro (although you’re actually guaranteed to play Fallout 76).

We heard rumblings of things to come for Fallout 76 earlier this month when Bethesda pushed backed the long-awaited NPC-introducing Wasterlanders update. However, few would have expected such an audacious money-grubbing move.

Short of deconstructing what amounts to a pretty meager set of features packaged into the Fallout 76 membership, here’s the official blurb :

The Internet Reacts in Predictable Fashion

The reaction has unsurprisingly produced some real gems. Much of the backlash centers on subscription features that should have been in Fallout 76 at launch. Other critics are using the membership announcement to plug Obsidian’s recently released title, The Outer Worlds .

Here is a selection of some of the best.

https://twitter.com/TheGamesCage/status/1187019817833943040

What’s Bethesda Doing?

From where we stand, the new scheme is unlikely to be the panacea needed to reverse the fortunes of Fallout 76. Less than a few hours into letting the news loose into the wilds of the internet, it has already exacerbated longstanding ill sentiment towards the game.

It’s difficult to understand what’s driving Bethesda’s strategy at this point.