Ferret Beaudoin, a senior designer at Bethesda Softworks who served as lead designer on "Fallout 76," has died; according to a Facebook memorial page (opens in new tab), he died suddenly on October 15 "surrounded by family and friends."

Beaudoin's obituary was shared on Twitter by Jeff Gardiner, former lead of the "Fallout 76" project, who described Beaudoin as "an eternal optimist and dear friend" and a deeply devoted RPG fan.

"We had lunch together several times after I left Bethesda. He will be sincerely missed," Gardiner tweeted. 'I emailed him about any RPG I was playing. He is the only person I know who has played more RPGs than Dezinuh (Emil Pagliarulo, design director at Bethesda Game Studios) and I." He completed four of the latest Pathfinder OwlcatGames RPGs by himself.

Pagliarulo paid tribute to Baudoin on his Twitter thread, saying he was "unstoppably creative, always inspired and worked hard. He loved making games.

Baudoin's real name was Eric, but the game's credits (opens in new tab) list him as Ferret, and a comment in the Reddit (opens in new tab) thread announcing his death states that it was his preferred name. One Redditor claimed to have met Beaudoin in 1989, when he was a freshman in college, and said he had used the nickname since that time and was very secretive about its origins.

"I lived in the dorm room next to his for three years and he was best man at my wedding. I know he enjoyed it when he visited Ireland." At the time, it was popular in that country to shove a ferret down your pants, and he used it as a pick-up line!"

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In a Reddit (opens in new tab) post published earlier today, Kenneth Wieg, who worked with Beaudoin at the Fallout For Hope (opens in new tab) charity, shared that his death was due to complications arising from cancer surgery He clarified that the death was due to complications arising from his cancer surgery. Some fans have left memorials to Beaudoin in "Fallout 76," and the "Fallout" 25th Anniversary Cosplay Gathering on October 22 (opens in new tab) will include a charity walk in four cities to raise money for St. Jude Children's Research Hospital and and will offer direct condolences. The family is also accepting donations to support Beaudoin's College Fund for Children and is soliciting donations in his name to the American Cancer Society.

Beaudoin spent 10 years at Bethesda Softworks, where he was a quest designer and writer for "Fallout 4" before becoming the lead designer for "Fallout 76" and the expansion "Wastelanders" after its launch.LinkedIn (open in new tab ), he was also a senior designer for the upcoming Starfield.

Prior to joining Bethesda, he spent six years as a lead designer at BioWare, where he worked on Dragon Age: From 2003 to 2006, he was the lead designer for Neverwinter Nights 2 at Obsidian Entertainment. From 2003 to 2006, he was the lead designer for Neverwinter Nights 2 at Obsidian Entertainment. He also had a brief stint at Black Isle Studios, where he was the designer for two famously failed RPGs, the first "Baldur's Gate 3", codenamed "Jefferson", and the first "Fallout 3", codenamed "Van Buren".

Bethesda paid tribute to Bourdain on Twitter, calling him "a kind man we all miss and will never forget."