I'll start off by saying that I have been a huge Fallout fan ever since I played Fallout 3 on the Xbox 360. I've poured countless hours into Fallout 3, New Vegas (my favorite), and Fallout 4. I've put in about 70 hours so far on Fallout 76 for the Xbox One, just hoping and praying it would get better, but it just doesn't. I am by no means a marketing expert and I certainly don't speak for everyone, but I feel like what players really loved about Fallout, is the immersion. I could get lost for hours in the older games; exploring new places on every playthrough, joining different factions to see alternate endings or different gear. I have beaten Fallout New Vegas at least twenty times and something I always loved, was that on every playthrough, I saw several things I had never seen before. Your decisions had real consequences. YOU chose which factions rose or fell. Fallout 76 just feels... lazy.
WARNING: Some spoilers may lie ahead!
The game starts you off in Vault 76. No one else is around and your character creation screen is exactly the same as it was in Fallout 4. You're basically given a few items and kicked out the door with almost no direction whatsoever. You are given a quest, but the game just has you going around picking up and listening to holo tapes. As many of you know, Fallout 76 has NO NPCs. Zero. This makes the games just feel... empty. Quests are acquired by either interacting with a robot or finding a note somewhere. Knowing there are no NPCs somewhat spoils the story; if you want to call it a story. I'll be straight-forward, there really isn't a story. If you start a quest that has you trying to find someone, it is absolutely 100% guaranteed that person is either dead, or a robot.
Moving on to the multiplayer aspect. Your mobile C.A.M.P. has a budget limit and it doesn't take much before it's maxed out. For example, I have a 3x3 single-story wooden building with one crafting station of each type in the buildable zone. I have 2 missile turrets, a water purifier, and about 20 crops. That's it. My budget is maxed out. So yes, you can build in Fallout 76, but it is nowhere near what you could build in Fallout 4. You are also given a "stash box," which is similar to the workbench stash from Fallout 4. However, the stash box is limited to 400lbs. In the end, you never seem to have enough junk for what your trying to build, repair, or improve with the 400lb limit. Just for reference, a missile launcher weighs 20lbs, a large rifle is about 14lbs, one piece of power armor is about 14lbs... You can see how this could add up very fast.
On a lighter note, other players are mostly friendly and Bethesda has a pretty good system in place for preventing higher level player from bullying and looting lower level players. If a player damages your property, they are given a bounty of caps for a period of time. All other players would be hidden on their maps until the bounty is cleared and the bounty can add up pretty quick. If another player tried to hurt you in any way, their attacks will do almost no damage until you to something in retaliation, initiating the PvP combat. Only then will players do full damage to each other and level balancing makes it entirely possible for a level 99 to be killed by a level 10. I actually really liked this aspect of the game. Playing with friends makes things more fun, but it the game has a problem giving multiple people credit for completing certain quest steps at the same time. Your friend may be able to tag along and help you kill enemies, but it's 50/50 on whether or not they'll get the rewards for completing the quest by your side.
Key gameplay styles have been altered as well, making Fallout 76 a bit jarring for seasoned Fallout players. the V.A.T.S. system obviously can no longer slow/stop time and as a result, this is more of a real-time targeting system. S.P.E.C.I.A.L. stats are similar to previous games, but the perks system is different. What Fallout 76 doesn't tell you is that once you reach level 50, you can no longer add points to your SPECIAL attributes. So, if you're anything like me who put a whole bunch of points in strength or intelligence, you'll be unable to balance those builds later in the game. At the present time, there is no way to reallocate attribute points.
Selling unwanted items at stores was always a great way to accumulate caps (currency) in previous games. Most of us can probably remember selling thousands of rounds of ammunition at stores and leaving with a load of caps and better gear. Don't expect that in Fallout 76. In-game vendors are robots (shocker), they only hold 200 caps, and many of the vendors/shops have a linked cap count. If you sell 200 caps worth of items, leaving the vendor with zero... most of the vendors in the game will also have zero... for 24hrs. Prices at the vendors are outrageous. You need some .45cal ammo? You're in luck. The vendor will have maybe 20 rounds of that ammo in stock for the low price of 2-4 caps PER ROUND! It should be noted that this is the price with a fully maxed perk which improves buying and selling prices. Caps are very, very hard to get in this game. As I said earlier, I'm 70hrs in and I only have 2500 caps. If you buy an item with caps, only a small fraction of what you paid will go into the vendor's caps. Say you spend 400 caps on an item; maybe 70-100 caps will go into the vendor's stash, allowing you to sell a few more items. The buying and selling will not help you like it has in previous games.
Game glitches are to be expected as well, but this game needs some serious work with the framerate a server stability. I play on an Xbox One X and there is a very noticeable framerate dip any time I am combating are more than a couple enemies. There are several experience glitches, carry weight glitches, and cap stash exploits that just shouldn't exist in a product made by such a well-funded company.
In conclusion, the game needs work and is far from a finished product. This game should not have been released in its current state. I have had some fun moments, but they're few and far between. I feel that this would have been a much more enjoyable game if it weren't fully multiplayer. We've all wanted to bring a friend or two into our Fallout work to explore with, fight enemies, and show of each others building prowess. However, I think the game would have been better off keeping the NPCs for that great feel of a story and allowing maybe a max a four man team in one game.