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Whether exploring the irradiated monuments of Washington D.C. in Fallout 3 or gambling away your last couple of Caps on The Strip in Fallout: New Vegas, the series' North American setting is an essential piece of the puzzle. And while players have previously been given tantalising glimpses of how the rest of Bethesda's bleak world might be faring, studio head Todd Howard says the plan is to keep the series set in the US.
The Fallout series retro-futuristic setting is littered with the remnants of US institutions, from The Enclave clinging onto some shreds of governmental authority to the cruel excesses of corporations like Vault-Tec. It's always been a savage satire of the concept of American exceptionalism, which just wouldn't feel right in other parts of the world.
In a new interview with Kinda Funny Games (thanks IGN), Howard explained: "My view is part of the Fallout schtick is on the Americana naivete and part of that. And so, for us right now, it's OK to acknowledge some of those other areas. But our plan is to predominantly keep it in the US."
Howard elaborates, explaining that this is something that Elder Scrolls fans have always wanted but that sometimes not knowing a thing can be more evocative: "It's OK to leave mystery or questions: what is happening here? I think those are good things. In the Elder Scrolls, everybody wants to go to these other mysterious lands. The worst thing you could do to mysterious lands is remove the mysteriousness. Keep mysterious lands mysterious!"
What do you think? Would Fallout without America make sense? Let us know in the comments section below.
[source youtube.com, via ign.com]
Comments 18
Great. Now how about doing something about the 10+ year wait between mainline entries.
This is the real reason the London Mod team was never told when the patch was dropping. 😅
@tangyzesty I just wish they'd give it to Obsidian again, or Larian ...
well i would watch the interview but its on kinda funny and cant stand Greg miller
@LikelySatan we all do. Fallout could do with spreading things out across genres as well, there’s no reason to keep it within Bethesda only, especially when they have a loose interpretation of their own lore anyway. There’s really no need it to not be passed to other studios.
@trev666 thought I was the only one, no harm meant to the guy but I find him incredibly annoying.
@ShadowofSparta Especially seeing as it’s not even Bethesda’s lore in the first place. In many ways Fallout would be more at home in Obsidian’s hands.
I have to say I sort of agree that the series is a satire of American 50s optimism. Setting a game elsewhere could introduce a mismatch with its atmosphere.
@VeldinX I mean, it WAS more at home in their hands. They built what is considered by many the BEST Fallout game in under 2 years!! That is absolutely insane to think about, especially nowadays.
@Olskeezy Indeed. What I meant is they should have it permanently. Leave Bethesda Game Studios to focus on TES.
this feels incredibly obvious and i've always wondered why people clamor to see the series go elsewhere in the world. it wouldn't be fallout if they did.
then again, a dangerously large swathe of the fallout fan community lack the media literacy to recognize satire, so....
@sanguinekhajiit I think that includes the Todd and the devs, as they seem to have forgotten the series was meant as dark satire and instead started making a realistic apocalypse simulator. While half of the fans really want Stalker or Metro instead of Fallout.
@NEStalgia i don't know if i'd call fallout 4 realistic haha but yeah, there's not nearly as much of the tongue in cheek commentary in 4 as there has been in fallout games past - which is super disappointing. it's still... there, but definitely very neutered.
@sanguinekhajiit 76 took that to a whole other level, too! The intro in the vault is over the top silly and satire, a bit too on the nose, and then it just jumps into apocalypse, zombie horror basically. Really killed what made fallout special and made it just another apocalypse sim. . Todd seemed to be hinting at future obsidian involvement and Bethesda is probably going to be tied up in TES6 for the next 20 or 30 years, so maybe fallout can be good again
@NEStalgia oh, right - i forgot about fallout 76. intentionally. because i haaaaaaaaaaaated it LOL. fair point!
yeah, would love to see those vague rumors come true and have obsidian take a crack at another game, but with bethesda's new commitment to fast turnaround... i'm expecting them to pump out a slightly more polished fallout 4 in a new location with the same old factions. probably in ten years.
edit: clarified a point
@sanguinekhajiit I was a day one pre-order player of that monstrosity. My hate runs deep. I got to that first town and just couldn't figure out where my fallout went in this zombie survival game. And then I saw ragdoll dead zombies floating through the door of the church and around the room after other players killed them. I think I only launched the game one other time 😂
While I do get sick of seeing many recreated US cities I am also not surprised either because it's what those devs can be familiar with and sometimes they just know the right way to put those places with a spin with satire, alternate history and more.
I do sometimes wonder what they'd do though as Ubisoft even if what they have done with game design is what it is their attempts at different locations/time periods has been nice.
Watch Dogs could have been more than the UK while AC has gone to many past histories.
Or GTA London was a thing. Or other examples to pull from that aren't coming to mind right now. Metro does well with European settings. Other series probably exist out there. The Disaster Report series does a fair job disaster situations with Japan. Disaster Day of Crisis is a great Wii game and is super silly but balances serious and silly well.
There is probably still a lot that can be done in different parts of the US or just a way to angle the Fallout themes in such a way I guess. There is so many differences in each state I wouldn't be surprised if they found some other way to approach the series while still being consistent.
The 1950s USA vibe with it's own quirks is what makes Fallout charming even though I have never played the games to me some worlds just have that right angle about them and right approach to the setting it just makes sense and changes per state/city to set each one in.
Resistance I think went a bunch of places and did a fair job, and Wolfenstein (like Fallout is consistent with it's themes/settings) have done what they have.
Fantasy/sci-fi in their own way can offer bits of things.
Sometimes you get the right humour and theming like Outer Worlds or Journey to the Savage Planet to put the capitalism/consumerism in a certain way that just works too besides their own silliness mixed in.
76 had it's issues but then again to me it was an apocalypse. I didn't care seeing NPCs there. Marketing was bad, was it multiplayer or was it typical, no multiplayer, survival elements....... didn't want to commit to that. What did it want to be. Something apparently of multiplayer/live service Fallout. But badly messaged that.
Same with the No Man's Sky multiplayer of old that was abandoned. While it didn't work well it would have been REALISTIC or an interesting spin on multiplayer. I agree fun matters more or co-op to play with people but sometimes a new spin (or an MMO kind of multiplayer in space) on things makes it more interesting then just sigh fine the same formulaic design but of multiplayer in this case, yay........
Fallout riffs on a specific aspect of Americana so yeah a Fallout set somewhere else wouldn’t work and would just tick off whatever the new locale is anyway. Because folks would complain that Bethesda doesn’t get their culture and would miss the satire narrative. If you want a local game, make one. Post apocalyptic stories aren’t unique and I am sure a team somewhere else could make a new IP that represents their culture. Could even go back to the isometric roots at this point.
@NEStalgia super late reply - but, hey, sounds like you found the fallout DNA in the game! LOL
i don't even remember playing it, to be totally honest. i know i did, at least through the intro... maybe played a whole hour. who knows. i don't remember it in the slightest. all i remember is thinking "okay, screw this, i'm going back to a real fallout game."
thought about trying again after the NPC update, but nah. too disappointing, generally.
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