Fallout 4 blasts another free trial weekend

Going anywhere nice this weekend? Have you considered the irradiated ruins of post-apocalyptic Boston? You might fancy a crack at Fallout 4, as this weekend Bethesda will hold yet another days-long free trial of the full game. The speedrun record is under one hour so you certainly could 'complete it' in one weekend, but myself I like the sound of wandering aimlessly. While I find Bethesda's open-world RPGs quite flat and have never finished the main quest of a single one, I do always enjoy spending a while pottering and seeing sights. That's my weekend sorted.

The trial weekend lets everyone play the full version of Fallout 4 (minus its paid DLC) for free through Steam. It started just now, at 6pm UK time on Thursday, and will run until 9pm on Sunday the 4th (1pm Pacific, if that's your thing). Head on over to Steam to download it. It's about 25GB to download, or a whole lot more if you also want the big ol' official high-resolution texture pack.

If you want Fallout 4 for keepsies, it is on sale until 6pm on Monday too. The regular edition is £9.99 on Steam, while the GotY Edition including the DLC is down to £23.99. Most of the DLC is a bit bum but, even with individual DLC packs on sale separately as well, it doesn't cost much more to get the lot than to just get Far Harbor, the one which Jack de Quidt told us is quite good.

Saves will carry over from the trial to the full version too.

This is regular Fallout 4, to be clear, not the gogged-up new Fallout 4 VR which is somehow sold as a separate game. If you are curious about that, hey, our Alec called it "technically impressive" but "gimmicky" so no great loss.

I know I've said before that I wanted to explore Fallout 4 during a free trial weekend, but I really mean it this time.