More than 300 Fallout streamers, content creators, and fans are rallying together to stream throughout the week to raise funds for children’s charity for St. Jude. They’ve been going for a few days now, and have already raised over $20,000.
The entire effort comes under the Fallout for Hope banner and involves players streaming PvP events, in-game karaoke, and live cooking shows. People from Bethesda are also getting involved. Last night Bethesda vice president Pete Hines popped up for an apocalyptic version of trivia show Hollywood Squares, and Fallout 76 Wastelanders lead designer Ferret Baudoin is doing a lore dive later today.
One of the organisers behind the charity drive tells us that the inspiration for the event came from earlier this year after the community rallied around one of their own who fell on hard times. “Earlier this year a prominent roleplayer in the Fallout 76 community, Doc C. J. Martin, was injured in real life getting his family to safety when their home caught fire,” one of the producers of the CHAD Fallout 76 podcast tells us. “What started as a modest GoFundMe ended up going global with donations pouring in from as far away as Japan. We ended up raising over $12,000 for him in a matter of a week and a half.
“That singular amazing event stuck with me. With COVID-19 and everything else this year, it has been a year that we’ll likely remember for how awful it has been.
“I wondered if we could do that for one person, what if we, as one big global community of Fallout streamers, content creators, community leaders and players, all got together to help an entire cause? So Fallout For Hope was born from that idea, and I figured we’d get maybe 20 or 30 people on board. We’re now looking at over 300 worldwide taking part in the charity drive. As surprising as it is that this concept blew up, it just goes to show how caring and interconnected this community is.”
Fallout for Hope is rumbling on for another four days, and if you’d like to donate, you can do here. You can also find an events schedule on the organiser’s website.