Free ‘Fallout 4’ Copies Revoked By Microsoft And Replaced With $10 Credits ‘For Users’ Trouble’

Fallout 4 players who thought they landed a free copy of the game on the Xbox One got an unwelcome surprise a few days ago when Microsoft went out and revoked those free copies. It turns out the free versions of Fallout 4 were listed on the Xbox Live store by accident and should have never been allowed. This is why the free version was only online for a few hours but that time was enough to see thousands of copies get downloaded.

Because we now live in an era where companies can revoke the licensing for products, Microsoft was able to fix their problem as opposed to simply losing money on those copies of Fallout 4. The good news, according to Polygon, is Microsoft seems to understand they needed to make good, at least a little bit since they were the ones that made the mistake in the first place. While the company did take back their copies of Fallout 4, they are offering something in exchange to those who downloaded Fallout 4.

“Our pricing error on Fallout 4 has been fixed and your free download will no longer work. For the inconvenience we will deposit $10 by the end of June in your Microsoft Account. This expires one year from the time it was deposited.”

Microsoft put on a notice that went up in place of people’s copies of Fallout 4. It’s a safe bet there are still going to be some people who are a bit miffed that they lost out on both a copy of the popular game as well as all of the DLC that has landed. Not only was the original game listed as free on the Microsoft web store for a time, but users were also able to grab Automatron, Wasteland Workshop, Far Harbor, and the Season Pass for free as well.

It’s likely there were more than a few fans who felt as though they had lucked into a rather massive deal when they opened the Fallout 4 page. Microsoft is now attempting to make sure that anyone who does feel like they are the victim of Microsoft’s mistake will now at least take solace in knowing they might not own Fallout 4, but they can put that free $10 towards getting the game for real.

This isn’t the first time the Microsoft store has had some problems with listing the correct price. Just a few weeks ago, the company offered a weekly deal ahead of the launch of The Witcher 3: Blood and Wine official launch. The problem was that days after the sale was supposed to be lifted, the sale price was still showing both for the game and for the game’s season pass. The positive, from Microsoft’s Perspective, is that unlike Fallout 4, when users clicked on the sale price, the original, normal price was the one showing up in their carts.

In the Witcher 3 instance, it meant the company didn’t need to issue any sort of apology to those looking to purchase the game. Instead of dealing with it in the same way it has had to with Fallout 4, the firm just needed to answer a couple of questions explaining why the game wasn’t registering with the deeply discounted prices once it was clicked on. When the smoke clears on the revoked free copies of Fallout 4, it seems likely that at least a few people might shrug their shoulders and buy the game anyway.

In that regard, this mistake might have been a boon for both Microsoft and Bethesda. Considering how many people likely went ahead and downloaded the game, this situation was almost like a free advertisement for Fallout 4 and its DLC.

[Image Via Bethesda Softworks]