Fallout (video game)

Character creation Fallout is a role-playing video game. The player begins by selecting one of three characters, or one with player-customized attributes. There are 48 perks (plus two extra perks which can only be obtained by wearing certain types of armor) and each has prerequisites that must be met. For example, "Animal Friend", which prevents animals from attacking the player character, requires the player to be level nine, have an intelligence of five or higher, and have an outdoorsman skill of 25%. Exploration and combat In Fallout, the player explores the game world from a trimetric perspective and interacts with non-player characters (NPCs). Characters vary in their amount of dialogue; some say short messages, while others speak at length. Significant characters are illustrated with 3D models, known as "talking heads", during conversations. The player can barter with other characters or buy goods using bottle caps as currency. The game has companions that the player can recruit for exploration and combat, although they cannot be directly controlled. There are three main quests where completion is required, two of them given after completion of the first one. The first main quest has a time limit of 150 in-game days; the game ends if the player fails to complete it within the allotted time. Some characters give the player side quests; if the player solves them, they receive experience points and occasionally a reward in the form of money and/or goods. The player can utilize the PIP-Boy 2000, a portable wearable computer that tracks these quests. Many quests feature multiple solutions; they can often be completed through diplomacy, combat, or stealth, and some allow solutions that are unconventional or contrary to the original task. Based on how they completed quests, the player can earn or lose reputation points, which determine how others treat them. The player's actions dictate what future story or gameplay opportunities are available and the ending. Combat is turn based and uses an action-point system, the number of action points that are available depending on certain perks and the player's allocation in the agility statistic. During each turn, multiple actions may be performed by the player until they run out of action points. Different actions such as attacking, moving, reloading, interacting with objects mid-combat, and accessing the inventory consume different amounts of points. The player can rapidly switch between two equipped weapons, and may acquire a diverse range of weapons, many of which can target specific areas of enemies. All weapons have one or two types of attacks, for example: Melee (hand-to-hand) weapons typically have two attacks: swing or thrust, automatic firearms come with a burst mode. If the player has equipped no weapon, they can punch or kick. ==Plot==

Setting On October 23, 2077, a worldwide nuclear war between the United States and China following a global conflict caused by resource shortages devastated the world and destroyed modern civilization. The events of Fallout take place nearly a century later in 2161, and follow the Vault Dweller, a human born and raised within Vault 13, one of a number of high-tech underground fallout shelters built to protect survivors. The four companions the player can recruit are: Ian, a mercenary guard from Shady Sands; Tycho, a desert ranger; Dogmeat, a tireless loyal dog; and Katja, a member of an organization called the Followers of the Apocalypse. Other major characters include Vault Boy, the mascot of Vault-Tec, the creators of the Vaults; Killian Darkwater, the mayor, sheriff, and shopkeeper of Junktown; The Vault Dweller then explores the wasteland and locates a replacement chip in the destroyed Vault 12, underneath Necropolis. The Vault Dweller returns to Vault 13 with the chip and the water system is repaired. However, the Overseer becomes concerned about the mutants reported by the Vault Dweller. Believing the mutations are too widespread and extreme to be a natural occurrence, the Overseer assigns the Vault Dweller a new task: finding and stopping the source of the mutations. Information discovered throughout the wasteland reveals that humans are being captured and turned into Super Mutants by exposure to the Forced Evolutionary Virus (F.E.V.) at the Mariposa Military Base. A majority of the Super Mutants are led by the Lieutenant, an intelligent cybernetically enhanced Super Mutant stationed at the Mariposa Military Base who takes orders from the Master. The Master intends to transform every human into a Super Mutant and establish "unity" on Earth. The Children of the cathedral are a front created by the Master, who is using them to trick humans into peaceful submission. To stop the mutations, the Vault Dweller must destroy the vats containing the F.E.V. and kill the Master; the order of the tasks is chosen by the player. Additionally, there is an alternate ending if the player chooses to join the Master. This ending has the player character dunked into the F.E.V. at Mariposa and made into a super mutant, who then returns to Vault 13 with the Master's army and massacres its inhabitants as witnessed on security footage. ==Development==

Development on Fallout began in early 1994. and for the first six months, the programmer Tim Cain was the sole developer. Cain eventually enlisted the aid of Interplay employees during their spare time. The development concluded on October 1, 1997, after three and a half years and a total cost of approximately $3million (~$ in ). Engine and design render mimicking Fallouts oblique projection and hexagonal grid|upright=0.8|alt=A rendering of a red house on a trimetric hexagonal grid. Fallout started as a game engine that Cain was developing during his spare time, based on the tabletop role-playing game Generic Universal RolePlaying System (GURPS). It entered more coordinated development after Cain convinced Fargo of its potential, and Interplay announced it had acquired the GURPS license in 1994. The first Fallout prototype was finished that year. The team considered making the game first-person and 3D, but discarded the idea because the models would not have held the desired amount of detail. They instead selected an oblique projection, producing a trimetric perspective. Cain resisted pressure to convert Fallout into a real-time multiplayer game. In March 1997, Interplay dropped the license for GURPS due to creative differences with GURPS creator Steve Jackson Games. According to Interplay, Steve Jackson objected to the amount of violence and gore. Interplay was forced to change the GURPS system to the internally-developed SPECIAL system; Some NPCs feature 3D models during conversation called "talking heads", most of which were created by Scott Redenhizer. Each took eight weeks to create, and voice recording took a few months. The talking heads began as sculpted heads of clay, which the team studied to determine which parts should be most animated. The heads were digitized using a Faro Space Arm and VertiSketch, with LightWave 3D used for geometric corrections and the texture maps created in Adobe Photoshop. The development team conceived of a faction of mutants who grew their ranks by dipping people into virus vats. During the discussion, someone wondered what would happen if more than one person was dropped into the vat. The team conceptualized the leader of the faction as a synthesis of a man, a woman, and a computer terminal mutated together. Cain enjoyed modelling, animating, and writing the Master's dialog, particularly because the Master switched between three voices: male, female, and electronic. The development team became confident in their vision after the audio director reacted to the voice-switching concept, and every department believed the Master would be a great antagonist. Assistant designer Scott Bennie described the backstory of the Master, who views himself as a well-intentioned hero, as an example of their intention of "hit[ting] the player with an emotional sledgehammer as often as possible" with their story design. ==Release==

Boyarsky and lead artist Jason D. Anderson Fallout did not have a trailer, but a demo was released on April 26, 1997. Taylor felt the demo did not demonstrate Fallout well. The packaging was designed to resemble a lunch box, and the manual was designed to resemble a survival guide to reflect the game's style. in North America for MS-DOS and Windows. Version 1.1 was released on November 13, 1997, patching many bugs in the original release and removing the 500-day time limit. The patch was released for the Mac OS on December 11, 1997. Fallout was initially not released in Europe due to the player's ability to kill children in-game. Version 1.2 removed the children from Fallout and was released at an unspecified date in Europe. To mark its 20th anniversary, the game was made temporarily free on video game digital distribution service Steam on September 30, 2017. It was also included in Fallout Anthology in September and October 2015 and Fallout Legacy Collection in October 2019. ==Reception==

Fallout received critical acclaim, with critics considering it one of the best role-playing video games at the time. PC PowerPlay predicted that Fallout would revive the genre and thought that both casual gamers and fans of role-playing games would enjoy the game. and Todd Vaughn of PC Gamer found the system "easy and fun to use." Computer Games Strategy Plus said the system allowed for a variety of effective character builds, Just Adventure said that Fallout abandoned the traditional fantasy-based settings of many role-playing games. Butcher said the game's appearance, sound, and ambient music delivered a believable environment, The Electric Playground called it "the most haunting opening movie" he had seen. and GameSpot found the targeting system satisfying. It did not meet sales expectations, but developed a fan following CNET Gamecenter noted that the game was part of a trend of role-playing successes that month, alongside Ultima Online and Lands of Lore 2: Guardians of Destiny, and said, "If October's list is any indication, [role-playing games] are back." Worldwide, over 100,000 copies were shipped by December 1997, and Erik Bethke reported sales of over 120,000 copies after a year. By March 2000, 144,000 copies had been sold in the US alone. GameSpot called these "very good sales, especially since the overall [worldwide] figures are likely double those amounts". Fallout was unpopular in the United Kingdom, where sales for it and its sequel totaled just over 50,000 combined lifetime sales by 2008. In 2017, Fargo said in an interview that Fallout sold a total of 600,000 copies. After the release of the 2024 television adaptation, Fallout experienced renewed commercial success. According to data trackers Steam Charts and SteamDB respectively, Fallout player base experienced a 160% increase, peaking at 2,300 players. Awards and accolades The Academy of Interactive Arts & Sciences nominated Fallout for "Computer Entertainment Title of the Year", "PC Role-Playing Game of the Year", and "Outstanding Achievement in Sound and Music" at the inaugural Interactive Achievement Awards. Similarly, the Computer Game Developers Conference nominated Fallout for its "Best Adventure/RPG" Spotlight Award. Fallout received GameSpots "Best Role-Playing Game" and "Best Ending" prize; and was nominated for GameSpot "Game of the Year". It also won the "Role-Playing Game of the Year" award from both Computer Games Magazine and Computer Gaming World. ==Legacy==

Influence .|alt=caption The 1990s saw a decline in the popularity of the role-playing video game genre as a result of stale settings and ideas, competition with other genres, and poor quality assurance. Fallout has been credited as one of several innovative role-playing games that revived the genre's popularity. Rowan Kaiser, writing for Engadget, called Fallout the "first modern role-playing game". Fallout post-apocalyptic setting was novel, as contemporary role-playing games often featured Tolkien-inspired fantasy settings. Years later, working for Obsidian Entertainment, Cain and Boyarsky created The Outer Worlds (2019), a role-playing video game influenced by Fallout. After the Fallout series became popular, Wasteland 2 (2014) was pitched by Fargo and developed by inXile Entertainment, which Fargo founded, with a design team featuring Anderson and Fallout composer Mark Morgan. PC Gamer found Wasteland 2 to be more similar the first two Fallout games than the original Wasteland. Other personnel from the Fallout development team have worked on games that were influenced by Fallout such as Neverwinter Nights 2 (2006) and Alpha Protocol (2008). A feature similar to the perks in Fallout, called "feats", was added to the third edition of Dungeons & Dragons. Other games with similar features, according to Cain, include World of Warcraft (2004) and Oblivion (2006). Both Metro 2033 (2010) and Atom RPG (2018) are post-apocalyptic games that were influenced by Fallout. Other games influenced by Fallout include Deus Ex (2000), Dark Angel: Vampire Apocalypse (2001), and Weird West (2022). Retrospective reception Fallout continues to receive acclaim, and is considered one of the best role-playing games on PC. Retrospective critics have considered the game innovative and praised its setting, dark tone, gameplay mechanics, and character system. Several critics have also found the game outdated yet still enjoyable. Critical assessments of Fallout quality relative to its sequels differ. GamesRadar+ ranked it low among the series, and Kotaku and Paste Magazine ranked it high. Critics have particularly highlighted the Master, the game's villain. GameSpot singled out Jim Cummings's voice acting as the Master as "chilling" and considered him "one of the most memorable antagonists in computer-gaming history." Multiple journalists especially praised the option to convince the Master that he is wrong, with Kotaku describing it as "unforgettable", Praising the final confrontation, USGamer Mike Williams said, "Even at its end, Fallout is about player choice, and the choices available to you are pretty clever." GamesRadar+ called the player's encounter with the Master "one of the most striking storytelling devices of its era", and IGN called it one of the series' most memorable moments. Fallout has been inducted into the "Hall of Fame" (or similar award) of Computer Gaming World, GameSpot, GameSpy, and IGN. It has also been ranked as among the best PC games of all time by PC Gamer and IGN and among the greatest video games of all time by IGN, Game Informer, and Polygon. The 2002 MacPlay ports of Fallout and Fallout 2 were listed under "Best Games Rescued from Oblivion" in Macworld "2002 Game Hall of Fame". Fallout was included in the 2010 reference book 1001 Video Games You Must Play Before You Die and was exhibited in Smithsonian American Art Museum's "The Art of Video Games" under the category of adventure games in March 2011. Series Fallout was followed by a series of sequels and spin-offs, often different in genre and ambiance from the original game. Cain did not work on any sequels and spin-offs beyond brainstorming for Fallout 2, and left Interplay during its development. Vault Boy has been considered an iconic mascot of the franchise. the Brotherhood of Steel, the PIPBoy (known as the Pip-Boy in later games), and Power Armor. Three sequels have been released: Fallout 2 in 1998, Fallout 3 in 2008, All received positive reviews. Fallout: Brotherhood of Steel in 2004, Fallout: New Vegas in 2010, Fallout Shelter in 2015, and Fallout 76 in 2018. Fallout Tactics: Brotherhood of Steel and Fallout: New Vegas received positive reviews, Other media In 1998, Interplay wrote a script for a film adaptation of Fallout, to be produced by its Interplay Films studio. The adaptation was canceled following the dissolution of Interplay Films in 2000. Throughout 2002, Chris Avellone, a designer of Fallout 2, compiled research of Fallout world and released a series of issues known as the Fallout Bible. Following Bethesda's acquisition of the Fallout franchise, the Fallout Bible became non-canon. Morgan released a remastered soundtrack album for Fallout on May 10, 2010. A television adaptation of the video game series, announced in July 2020 with Lisa Joy and Jonathan Nolan as executive producers, premiered on Amazon Prime Video on April 10, 2024, to positive reception from critics and fans. In a YouTube video, Cain praised the adaptation for matching the mood of the series and for its easter eggs and characters. He also defended the adaptation from accusations of contradicting the Fallout canon. The adaptation's success on Amazon Prime Video has led to renewed commercial success of the Fallout video games, including the original game; according to Steam Charts, it experienced the highest percentage increase in player base at 160%. ==See also==