Talk:Fallout (video game)

3 recruitable NPCs from The Brotherhood

It's possible to recieve a powerful support of 3 warriors from The Brotherhood of Steel, however they appear only at one place - The Military Base. To get them, the character have to visit the area of base, come back to The Brotherhood, and convince The Elders of attacing The Base and giving him a support. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Nepireus (talk • contribs) 10:58:26, August 19, 2007 (UTC).

Sources

• https://web.archive.org/web/19970101093722/http://www.cdmag.com/news/oldnews2.html
• https://web.archive.org/web/20000306201313/http://headline.gamespot.com/news/98_02/11_timcain/index.html
• https://web.archive.org/web/20000307144150/http://headline.gamespot.com/news/98_01/27_fallout/index.html
• https://web.archive.org/web/20190706221433/http://publicaciones.retromuseo.com:8123/Revistasv1/Retro%20Gamer%20%5Ben-UK%5D/retro%20gamer%20%5Ben-uk%5D%20072.pdf
• https://archive.org/details/pclife012/page/n115
• https://archive.org/details/retrogamerenuk186
• https://archive.org/details/MicromanaTerceraEpocaSpanishIssue26/page/n37
• https://web.archive.org/web/20010805052618/http://www.gamasutra.com/features/artist_gallery/tramell_isaac/index.htm
• https://web.archive.org/web/20031205233317/http://www.gamesdomain.com/gdreview/adventure/falloutback.html
• https://web.archive.org/web/19971023142653/http://www.interplay.com:80/fallout/log.html
• https://web.archive.org/web/19971012045213/http://www.pcgamer.com:80/news/news02-24-97.html#9
• https://web.archive.org/web/19971012045200/http://www.pcgamer.com:80/news/news0310.html#8
• https://web.archive.org/web/19971012044818/http://www.pcgamer.com:80/news/news092997.html
• https://web.archive.org/web/19980208014851/http://ogr.com:80/specials/fallout/fallout_interview1.shtml
• https://archive.org/stream/Computer_Gaming_World_Issue_143#page/n101/mode/2up
• https://web.archive.org/web/19970101093722/http://www.cdmag.com:80/news/oldnews2.html
• https://web.archive.org/web/19970606030427/http://www.next-generation.com:80/news/022797i.chtml
• https://web.archive.org/web/19970605165904/http://www.next-generation.com:80/demos/fallout.chtml
• https://web.archive.org/web/19980204073023/http://www.next-generation.com:80/news/013098f.chtml
• https://web.archive.org/web/20160322202706/http://scans.roushimsx.com/PCGamer_1998_04_pg188.jpg
• https://web.archive.org/web/20160322185349/http://scans.roushimsx.com/CGSP_1997_04_pg040.jpg
• https://web.archive.org/web/20160322191135/http://scans.roushimsx.com/CGSP_1998_01_pg128.jpg, https://web.archive.org/web/20160322185453/http://scans.roushimsx.com/CGSP_1998_01_pg129.jpg
• https://web.archive.org/web/20160322185400/http://scans.roushimsx.com/PCGamer_1997_05_pg174.jpg

Did you know nomination

The following is an archived discussion of the DYK nomination of the article below. Please do not modify this page. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as this nomination's talk page, the article's talk page or Wikipedia talk:Did you know), unless there is consensus to re-open the discussion at this page. No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was: promoted by Cwmhiraeth (talk) 09:39, 2 August 2021 (UTC)

(

• Comment or view
• Article history

)

• ... that Fallout is one of the games credited for reviving consumer interest in role-playing video games? Source: [1][2][3][4][5]

• Reviewed: Michita Sakata

Improved to Good Article status by Lazman321 (talk). Self-nominated at 13:34, 20 July 2021 (UTC).

• General eligibility:

• New enough:
• Long enough:
• Other problems:

Policy: Article is sourced, neutral, and free of copyright problems
Adequate sourcing: Neutral: Free of copyright violations, plagiarism, and close paraphrasing:

Hook: Hook has been verified by provided inline citation
Cited: Interesting:

QPQ: Done.

Overall: Article reached GA status within the past week, is necessarily well sourced, neutrally written and free of copyvios. All in all it is a shoe-in nomination except I think isn't quite hooky enough, so I'm going to suggest some alts from the article. BuySomeApples (talk) 20:00, 20 July 2021 (UTC)

• ALT1:... that the developers of the video game Fallout originally meant for it to be a sequel to Wasteland, but were unable to get the licensing rights from EA? Source:[6]
• ALT2:... that Fallout developer Tim Cain wrote the game's prologue about the bleakness of war while watching an episode of the Simpsons? Source:same as ALT1

@Lazman321: what are your thoughts on these hooks?BuySomeApples (talk) 00:38, 21 July 2021 (UTC)

I don't honestly know. I was already going to propose hooks of my own. It seems to me we have an agreement over the hook saying that Fallout was originally going to be a sequel to Wasteland; though then again, one of my proposals could of something you hadn't thought of. Here are my proposals. Lazman321 (talk) 02:28, 21 July 2021 (UTC)

• ALT 3: ... that Fallout was considered a risky project by developer Interplay Entertainment and was threatened with cancelation three times? [7]
• ALT 4: ... that when designing Fallout, Chris Taylor wrote a statement that inspired the team to continue working on the game? [8][9]
• ALT 5: ... that Fallout was initially designed to be a sequel to Wasteland, but the developer couldn't secure the license? [10]
• ALT 6: ... that Fallout is considered one of the best video games of all time? [11][12][13]

I like ALT3 and ALT5 . ALT6 might be a little subjective even though Fallout is widely considered a good game (I personally enjoy it). ALT4 I think might also be a little underwhelming. Do you have a preference between those two @Lazman321: or do you want me to leave it up to the promoter?

• Approving ALT3 and ALT5. BuySomeApples (talk) 22:36, 21 July 2021 (UTC)

Copyediting comments

@Lazman321: I'll put my clarifying questions here as I go through. Ovinus (talk) 05:42, 19 May 2022 (UTC)

• "works from the Atomic Age" – what does this mean; the Atomic Age is a rather long long time period. Perhaps link to Atomic_Age#Influence_on_popular_culture Ovinus (talk) 05:42, 19 May 2022 (UTC)

•  Done along with a few edits for accuracy. Lazman321 (talk) 12:50, 19 May 2022 (UTC)

• I added "various (helpful and harmful) events", but wanted to check that for accuracy Ovinus (talk) 16:31, 19 May 2022 (UTC)

•  Comment: That is accurate. However, I am not fond of the placement of the parenthesis. I have replaced it with "various events and whether they are helpful or harmful." Lazman321 (talk) 12:53, 20 May 2022 (UTC)
  • Agreed, thanks Ovinus (talk) 03:52, 21 May 2022 (UTC)

• "The initial value of each skill is determined by the primary statistics" – Value... in what sense? Ovinus (talk) 16:31, 19 May 2022 (UTC)

•  Done: The effectiveness of each skill is determined by a percentage. I have clarified this in the article. Lazman321 (talk) 12:53, 20 May 2022 (UTC)

• "exploring the game world, visiting locations" – visiting locations is an implication of exploration. Do you mean that the player is directed to visit certain locations? Ovinus (talk) 16:31, 19 May 2022 (UTC)

•  Comment: No, not really. I mean some quests including the three required to beat the game do require the player to visit different locations than where the quest was given, but the player is mostly free to explore the game world and do whatever they want. I have removed ", visiting locations". Lazman321 (talk) 12:53, 20 May 2022 (UTC)

• In general, I've replaced "Vault Dweller" with "player". It's less clunky and more direct. If you disagree we can discuss. Ovinus (talk) 16:31, 19 May 2022 (UTC)

•  Comment: Generally, I prefer to refer to the player character themself when discussing a game. However, I do agree that "player" is more direct and less clunky, so we can use that instead. Just don't replace "Vault Dweller" with "player" in the plot section. Lazman321 (talk) 12:53, 20 May 2022 (UTC)
  • Will follow that guideline, thanks. However, I replaced it with "player" in one instance where the plot is chosen by the player (e.g., "called Shady Sands, which the Vault Dweller can visit". Undo if you disagree. I'm not sure about preferred style in video game articles Ovinus (talk) 19:57, 20 May 2022 (UTC)

• "buying them using caps" What are caps?

•  Done: Bottle caps are used as currency in Fallout. I have clarified this in the article. Lazman321 (talk) 12:53, 20 May 2022 (UTC)

• "China invading Alaska from the United States" – Do you mean "invade" or "annex"? Ovinus (talk) 19:57, 20 May 2022 (UTC)

•  Comment: I mean "invade". It says "China would invade Alaska" in the listed source's quote. Lazman321 (talk) 03:45, 21 May 2022 (UTC)

• "pre-War Soviet consulate in Los Angeles" – Being super picky here... which "War" is this? World War II? Cold War? Or the fictional war? If the last then it should be lowercase Ovinus (talk) 19:57, 20 May 2022 (UTC)

•  Comment: The fictional war. This information isn't important anyway, so I just removed it. Lazman321 (talk) 03:45, 21 May 2022 (UTC)

• It should be clarified in Characters that the non-chosen characters still inhabit the vault with the player Ovinus (talk) 19:57, 20 May 2022 (UTC)

•  Not done: No, it shouldn't. The Vault Dweller does not meet any of the pre-built characters in-game, nor does the game ever state that these characters actually exist in-game canonically. Lazman321 (talk) 03:45, 21 May 2022 (UTC)
  • Well, there's my confusion :P thanks for correcting me. Ovinus (talk) 03:51, 21 May 2022 (UTC)

• "Official canon states that the Vault Dweller was male, but his name is unspecified." I am confused. The character you choose is the Vault Dweller, right? But shouldn't their standard name also be preserved?

•  Comment: Technically, the player can choose to give the Vault Dweller an actual name during character creation. I have clarified this in the article. Lazman321 (talk) 03:45, 21 May 2022 (UTC)

• Also, replaced "them" with "him" in Plot. Certainly undo if you disagree
• Who is "Urquhart" Ovinus (talk) 19:57, 20 May 2022 (UTC)

•  Comment: That clause isn't even that important anyway, as Urquhart is not mentioned anywhere else, so I just removed it. Feargus Urquhart was the founder of Black Isle Studios, a subdivision of Interplay Productions that developed Fallout 2. There was originally a statement in the development section about Fallout being outsourced to Urquhart's division before it was named Black Isle Studios, but it was removed by Indrian for apparently being inaccurate. Lazman321 (talk) 03:45, 21 May 2022 (UTC)

• "Afterwards, before releasing the game, the team fixed some of the bugs present in Fallout" Relevant? (Doesn't this just mean they tested the game...) Ovinus (talk) 19:57, 20 May 2022 (UTC)

•  Done: Removed for irrelevance and insignificance. Lazman321 (talk) 03:45, 21 May 2022 (UTC)

• (edit conflict) In "Legacy", it states that most RPGs at the time had a Tolkien-inspired setting, and a D&D one. Which one? Or both? Ovinus (talk) 03:51, 21 May 2022 (UTC)

•  Comment: The article doesn't say (or said) that most RPGs had settings inspired by Dungeons & Dragons. It said that the gameplay of RPGs were often inspired by Dungeons & Dragons. Lazman321 (talk) 23:55, 22 May 2022 (UTC)

• Maybe abbreviation role-playing games to RPG early on, and then use that acronym for most of the article? (Not sure of guidelines on this one) Ovinus (talk) 03:51, 21 May 2022 (UTC)
• "there was reportedly much discussion about its "pausable real-time gameplay" thanks to its similarity with Fallout" There needs to be a bit more context on this one; why would real-time gameplay be a logical consequence of a non-real-time game? Ovinus (talk) 03:51, 21 May 2022 (UTC)

•  Comment: The source isn't clear on that. I have removed the sentence; it isn't that important anyway as I doubt Baldur's Gate was influenced by Fallout due to being developed by Interplay about the same time as Fallout. Lazman321 (talk) 23:55, 22 May 2022 (UTC)

• "and development started after Cain convinced Fargo to allow development for a role-playing game based on GURPS" – seems redundant with the previous clause, so I removed it, but lmk if you disagree Ovinus (talk) 00:05, 22 May 2022 (UTC)
• "Because of the lack of resources, early development was rough and difficult" – What does Cain mean by lack of resources? Ovinus (talk) 00:05, 22 May 2022 (UTC)

•  Comment: I have replaced "Because of the lack of resources," with "Cain considered the". This is because the "lack of resources" sentence originated from different part of the presentation, and Cain did not directly attribute the "rough development" to a "lack of resources". By "lack of resources", he probably meant a scarce team given the context. Lazman321 (talk) 23:55, 22 May 2022 (UTC)

• "He believed that the player should experience the game along with the player character" – I do not understand this sentence Ovinus (talk) 00:05, 22 May 2022 (UTC)

•  Done: Rewrote the statement for clarity. What the sentence was supposed to mean was that the player and player character's knowledge of the world would correlate. Lazman321 (talk) 23:55, 22 May 2022 (UTC)

• "The vault concept was influenced by the 1975 science fiction movie A Boy and His Dog" – Perhaps you could be a bit more specific on what the movie contained that inspired the vaults. Ovinus (talk) 00:05, 22 May 2022 (UTC)

•  Done: An underground base in the movie was what inspired the vaults. Lazman321 (talk) 23:55, 22 May 2022 (UTC)

• "The characters were purposely made morally ambiguous, with no clear right or wrong choice during each event. This was done so the player could take whatever choice suited them best" – This is rather confusing. How does the moral ambiguity of characters lead to moral ambiguity in choices for "events"? (Indeed, what is an event) Ovinus (talk) 00:05, 22 May 2022 (UTC)

•  Done: I have rewritten the sentence to be more accurate to the sources and clear. Lazman321 (talk) 23:55, 22 May 2022 (UTC)

• Continuing that point: "An example of which would be the endgame encounter with the antagonist, the Master, which featured multiple solutions" This sentence is nearly meaningless unless the reader has actually played the game Ovinus (talk) 00:05, 22 May 2022 (UTC)

•  Done: I have expanded upon this statement to make it more useful for readers who haven't played the game.

• "At one point in development, in Junktown, if the player ... a more palatable ending" Relevant? Ovinus (talk) 00:05, 22 May 2022 (UTC)

•  Done: Removed. Lazman321 (talk) 23:55, 22 May 2022 (UTC)

• Vault Boy's parody/origins should be described a bit more; what exactly makes him a parody vs. just inspired? Ovinus (talk) 00:05, 22 May 2022 (UTC)

•  Done: Added more details to the Vault Boy's satirical nature. Lazman321 (talk) 23:55, 22 May 2022 (UTC)

• "although there was at least one unofficial advertisement of the game that was released in magazines" Relevant? Ovinus (talk) 00:05, 22 May 2022 (UTC)

•  Done: Removed. Lazman321 (talk) 23:55, 22 May 2022 (UTC)

• "According to Taylor, there was discussion among the development team about creating a demo for Fallout. The reason the demo was created and released was because "[they] just wanted people to play [their] game!" " Relevant? (What does this tell the reader, just that the team was excited? If the team hated the game and didn't want a demo, perhaps that'd be worth mentioning, but I'd hope they were excited! :P) Ovinus (talk) 00:05, 22 May 2022 (UTC)

•  Done: Removed. Lazman321 (talk) 23:55, 22 May 2022 (UTC)

• "greatly extending the 500-day time limit" – To how many days? Ovinus (talk) 00:05, 22 May 2022 (UTC)

•  Comment: Actually, the FAQ source states that the 500-day time limit was removed in patch 1.1, so I have edited accordingly. Lazman321 (talk) 23:55, 22 May 2022 (UTC)

• "totaled just over 50,000 combined lifetime sales in the region" Date? Ovinus (talk) 00:05, 22 May 2022 (UTC)

•  Done: The statistic was by 2008. Lazman321 (talk) 23:55, 22 May 2022 (UTC)

• "According to Fargo, sales of Fallout ultimately reached 600,000 copies" Date? Ovinus (talk) 00:05, 22 May 2022 (UTC)

•  Done: The statistic was by 2017. Lazman321 (talk) 23:55, 22 May 2022 (UTC)

• "orth returning to despite being outdated" Is this criticism of the game being "outdated" found in any other sources? Ovinus (talk) 00:05, 22 May 2022 (UTC)

•  Comment: Even if it was, it's just an opinion anyway. I have replaced "being" with "perceiving the game as". Lazman321 (talk) 23:55, 22 May 2022 (UTC)

• I suggest simply moving the references for "Fallout has also been ranked as one of the best PC games of all time by PC Gamer" and the rest of that paragraph to the greatest games of all time sentence, since they express very similar concepts. Ovinus (talk) 00:05, 22 May 2022 (UTC)

•  Not done: Being among the greatest of all time and being among the greatest of PC are two different things. Lazman321 (talk) 23:55, 22 May 2022 (UTC)

I think I'm mostly done. Hope this has been helpful, and sorry for the wall of comments! Ovinus (talk) 00:05, 22 May 2022 (UTC)

Thank you for your copyedit and notes. This has been quite helpful to the improvement of this article. Lazman321 (talk) 23:55, 22 May 2022 (UTC)

Reviews

• Backstab #8

207.229.139.154 (talk) 01:22, 18 May 2023 (UTC)

References

Description of the setting incomplete/inaccurate

I think there should be a more detailed overview of the setting. Currently the "Setting" section states that "Survivors on the surface live off the salvage of the old world", which is a somewhat incomplete/inaccurate and could lead the reader to believe that this is an average/tropey post-apocalypse setting where everyone lives in squalor and has forgotten how to build/maintain architecture, keep their living spaces clean, how to grow crops, etc. (which is pretty much how the Fallout universe is depicted in the Bethesda games).

Settlements in Fallout are shown to practice agriculture (Shady Sands and The Hub cultivate crops and raise livestock), having somewhat functional societies, and trading with other settlements. And while many of the game's buildings predate the war, not all of them can be described as ruins, and Shady Sands is an entirely post-war settlement that seems to use adobe construction.

The stereotypical post-apocalypse depiction of a humanity that lives in dirty, rubble-filled ruins and mostly subsists on scavenged pre-war food items only started with Fallout 3 I believe. That game's setting is very exaggerated and one-dimensional, whereas the earlier games were more though-out and realistic.

I'm not familiar with the article's sources, so I'm not sure if any of them describe these aspects of the setting. But for a game as well-known as this, there must be at least one or two sources out there that mentions these things. --Veikk0.ma 21:05, 16 September 2023 (UTC)

"Fallout 1" as common name

I restored a simple note that I added long ago and was removed at some point when this article was revamped. I believe it subtly fits nicely in the nested notelist without being an eyesore, and is useful to some extent (e.g. someone may somehow think Fallout Tactics was first). I see the game called Fallout 1 by the community and gaming outlets all the time. Is this not fitting?~Sıgehelmus♗_(Tøk) 07:33, 19 January 2024 (UTC)

@Sigehelmus: I don't really see the use of this footnote. Honestly, it's not something I've ever seen discussed in sources of this game probably because it's so typical of creative works like this one. Referring to the first work in a popular series by its title + "1" as a retronym is very common and trivial to call attention to. Furthermore, I've never seen anyone confuse Fallout Tactics for the first game in the series. I've removed the footnote. Lazman321 (talk) 23:11, 19 January 2024 (UTC)

Agree with Lazman. -- ferret (talk) 23:52, 19 January 2024 (UTC)

Yeah, it's too obvious to say. NinjaRobotPirate (talk) 03:20, 20 January 2024 (UTC)

So be it, it's alright. I think that then (and I can't find it it does exist) there should be something in the MoS for games articles about retronyms. ~Sıgehelmus♗_(Tøk) 03:27, 20 January 2024 (UTC)