Bethesda Accidentally Uses Fan-made Fallout Art, Finds Quick Solution

There’s a high chance if you’re part of the Fallout 76 community you know Zack Finfrock by name, and an even higher chance that you’ve seen some of his Fallout fan content online even if you don’t recognize him by name alone. Behind the fan film Fallout: Nuka Break which has developed quite a few fans of its own over the years, Finfrock also uses his talents to provide artwork featuring Vault Boy, his social feeds often featuring an iconic meme reworked to feature one of the undisputed icons of the franchise. 

The artwork Finfrock creates and shares is so good that an error with an external vendor led to Fallout 76 featuring one of the pieces in the Atom Shop representing the Fourth of July-themed Flag Waving Bundle. As was reported by PC Gamer, while it’s exciting for any artist with love for the franchise to see their work in the game it has to be in an official capacity, and in this case Bethesda didn’t approach Finfrock to get consent to using the art first. “Look, I love Fallout76, and it seems someone on the art team loves my Fallout memes,” the post from Finfrock begins. “So [Jon Rush], who do I talk to about this? I get that I don’t own the Vault Boy and whatnot, but you could have reached out so I could draw a newer, better version for your Atom Shop image.”

Finfrock directly tagged and direct messaged Fallout 76‘s creative director Jonathan Rush to ask about the situation and received a quick response in which Rush explained it was a “Mix up with an external vendor” and thanking Finfrock for bringing it up. As promised by Rush in the message, the Atom Shop was shortly updated to replace the image, and Rush continued on to apologize and extend an invitation to Finfrock that he’s likely been waiting a long time to receive. “I would like to contract you for some artwork for our message of the day and bundles assets for a future patch, if you’d be open to it,” accompanied Rush’s apology, which Finfrock of course accepted. 

Since, Finfrock has noted he’s already received a non-disclosure agreement and signed it, joking that he’s now an “official shill,” as people have called him in the past for having personal preferences and opinions toward the franchise that differ from theirs. Now that Finfrock has a foot in the door, here’s to some extra hoping that we’ll finally see the Nuka Breaker from Fallout: Nuka Break in the Atom Shop at some point.