Bethesda Quietly Donates $10,000 to Family of Cancer Patient Who Played ‘Fallout 76’ Early

Bethesda Softworks appears to have donated $10,000 to the family of a young cancer patient who got the opportunity to play Fallout 76 early.

The donation from Bethesda was spotted by people within the Fallout 76 community who noticed the GoFundMe page for a 12-year-old cancer patient named Wes had been updated with a sizeable donation and a comment from the studio. By either scrolling through the donations on shown on the right of the page or sorting the donations by the highest amounts given, Bethesda Softworks shows up as a donor of $10,000.

The GoFundMe for Wes was set up to raise money in the hopes of covering living expenses and costs associated with treating Wes, a child who battled stage 4 neuroblastoma for most of his life after being diagnosed at 5 years old. Wes, a Fallout fan from Virginia, passed away earlier in the month, and Bethesda Softworks left a comment on his GoFundMe page alongside the donation that called the boy “an inspiration to the Fallout community and everyone at Bethesda.”

“You have been an inspiration to the Fallout community and everyone at Bethesda,” the studio’s comment said. “We will miss you, Wes. #WesStrong forever!”

Prior to the boy’s death, Wes was given the opportunity to play Fallout 76 ahead of the game’s launch. Before anyone else was ever able to even try out the game’s beta, Bethesda made sure Wes could experience the game. Bethesda’s Matt Grandstaff traveled drove to Virginia with the Power Armor Edition of the game in tow to let Wes experience the game. We had pre-ordered the Power Armor Edition of the game when it was announced and was worried he’d never get to play the game after his family ended his treatment, so Bethesda gave him his very own power armor helmet that was signed by Bethesda’s Todd Howard.

“Bethesda’s (the company that makes the game) very own Matt Grandstaff drove 4 hours from Maryland to our home to hand deliver this surprise,” a post from a Facebook account tracking Wes’ story said back in September. “He spent the day at our house watching Wes play, making him the first person in the world outside of the video game industry employees to play. He also received the first prototype of the power armor helmet that will be included in the new release, only his was signed by Todd Howard of Bethesda himself.”

Wes didn’t get to keep the game since it was nearly 2 months before the game was to be released, that date coming on November 14th, but he did get to play it for several hours and got to keep the helmet.