Bethesda-Interplay settlement official, Bethesda gains full Fallout MMO rights

The bombs have dropped, the dust has settled, and Fallout Online, sadly, is no more. After an ugly legal scuffle that lasted nearly two years, Bethesda and Interplay have cased trading blows and started trading cash. More specifically, $2 million - for which Bethesda receives all Fallout MMO-related rights, according to VG247 . Interplay, meanwhile, can continue to peddle its own post-apocalyptic wares in the form of Fallout, Fallout 2, and Fallout Tactics - but only until December 2013.

For the time being, Bethesda's merely happy to be "able to develop future Fallout titles for our fans without third party involvement or the overhang of others' legal claims," but could a Bethesda-born attempt at some irradiated online action be headed our way? At this point, it's a toss up. But given Skyrim's all-consuming success with an allegedly draconian single-player-only approach, I'm not counting on it.