10 January 2026

Fallout 76 Has Randomly Ended Fallout 1st Subscriptions for Some Players

By newsgame

Fallout 1st is the premium membership subscription to Fallout 76, giving players access to private adventures, custom worlds, the scrap box, monthly Fallout 76 atoms, season passes, and various other features, so you’d think Bethesda would want everyone to have access to that paid feature. However, despite only being reliably available in Japan since April 2024, Fallout 76 players are no longer able to sign up or renew the service on the Xbox/Microsoft Store version of the game.

What’s weird about this situation with Fallout 1st’s subscriptions is that it only applies to the Xbox/Microsoft Store version of Fallout 76. Japanese players on PC (via Steam), PlayStation 4, or PlayStation 5 have not been impacted by this issue. In other words, a first-party service for a first-party game on a first-party console is not working properly, but it is for that party’s competitors. Sure, that doesn’t fully account for Bethesda, but optics-wise, that’s exactly what it’s like: it works for competitors. Unfortunately, given the history of the service in Japan, it doesn’t seem likely to return anytime soon.

Fallout 76 Ends Some Fallout 1st Subscriptions for Japan After Making It “Mistakenly Available”

Fallout 1st was not reliably available on the Japanese Xbox Store until April 2024. Before then, it was plagued with issues consisting of instable access, the service not appearing on the Xbox Store at all, or subscriptions being randomly canceled or incapable of being renewed. That changed in April 2024, with many Japanese users believing this was a “possible normalization of the service,” according to Redditor freezedmouse, a Japanese Fallout 76 player. The service has worked, as intended, from April 2024 to the end of 2025/start of 2026.

At that time, Fallout 1st was once again removed from the Japanese Xbox Store without prior notice or announcement—not long after Fallout 76 dropped its populars Burning Spring update. Redditor freezedmouse reports that players who reached out to Bethesda were told that it is not “officially offered for Xbox in Japan,” saying it was “mistakenly available” during the period players could access it. If nothing else, it’s clear that communication has been lackluster for Japanese players opening their wallets and purchasing or wanting to renew their subscriptions. The end result, as described by Redditor freezedmouse, is “prolonged uncertainty among users.”

More than anything, it’s unclear why Fallout 1st is not available for Japanese Xbox players but remains accessible on the Steam and PlayStation stores. There’s been no official statement explaining the instability before April 2024, as well as why this period was a “mistake,” leaving it all to speculation. Some believe it is some matter of international law or business, while others point out how flaky the Microsoft Store is in Japan as a whole, but again, that is mere speculation. And for the time being, that doesn’t alleviate the concerns of Japanese players who want to enjoy the convenience Fallout 1st offers in Fallout 76.

Phil Spencer Says Japan is Important to Team Xbox

Xbox Game Pass launched in Japan back in 2020, with Microsoft’s Phil Spencer saying the following:

“The gaming market in Japan, fans in Japan, gamers in Japan, are incredibly important to me and team Xbox. Some of the most amazing experiences we’ve all played on games have come from Japan, and we work really hard to make Xbox a part of the experience for customers in Japan.”

Indeed, Spencer has called Japan and its market important to Xbox and Microsoft for years. Spencer and others at Xbox have worked hard at bringing more Japan-created games to Xbox, developing new games alongside Japan-based developers, and supporting Xbox-driven games in Japan (like Kojima Productions’ OD).

Hideo Kojima and Phil Spencer collage — Hideo Kojima (left) and Phil Spencer (right).

The entire situation with the Fallout 1st subscription’s availability in Japan is so strange, with comments such as these not outright aligning with Xbox Store support for Japanese players. It would stand to reason that there are some kind of extenuating circumstances, but it’s hard to say with any confidence what that is or could be. Again, for the umpteenth time, it bears repeating just how odd it is that it only affects the Microsoft Store, not Steam or PlayStation. Still, all these players can do is raise awareness of the ongoing issue.

Source: Medium