A Brief History of the World: Fallout Style

80 years have passed since the Vault Dweller was cast out into the wastes. It is revealed that the Vault Dweller ended up setting up a small tribal village far to the north of Vault 13, called Arroyo. In the world of Fallout 2, you play the Vault Dweller’s descendant. In a nod to the first game, your initial quest first involves retrieving a precious item for your home, then dealing with a global-scale menace. The item in question is the “Garden of Eden Creation Kit,” a piece of Vault technology that will help your home prosper in the midst of widespread famine.

Once again, our hero ventures forth into the Wasteland, having adventures, meeting friends, making enemies, saving people, hunting things. At long last, he encounters his ancestral home of Vault 13. Now populated with sentient super-monsters called “Deathclaws,” our hero ends up befriending them and, as thanks for restoring a missing computer part (it is revealed that The Overseer of Fallout 1 was overthrown and replaced by a computer), the Deathclaws give him the very G.E.C.K. he so desperately needs. Our young warrior heads home only to find his village burned to the ground and his people kidnapped or killed. The stage is set for the introduction of The Enclave: the last surviving remnants of the pre-war United States government, controlled by the psychopathic, genocidal President Richardson and his right-hand man, the genetically-altered Frank Horrigan.

Through various means, the player activates an ancient oil tanker and is able to land at the off-shore base of The Enclave. He soon discovers that both his Arroyo villagers and the descendants of Vault 13 are imprisoned at the base and being used as test subjects for a mutant airborne strain of the Forced Evolutionary Virus. This new strain of FEV is being designed to wipe out all life, which will allow The Enclave (who are shielded in massively-powerful pre-war suits of armor) to easily take over. Our hero ends up destroying the Enclave’s base, killing most of the villains, and escaping with his Arroyo brethren and the men and women from his ancestral home. Together they create yet another community, this time lush and prosperous, using the help of the G.E.C.K.

And there you have it, folks. Fallout 3, hitting shelves October 28 in the United States for the PS3, 360, and PC, takes place thirty years after Fallout 2 and in a completely different area: Washington, DC as opposed to California. While Fallout 3 will build on the history of its past brethren (the return of The Enclave is already confirmed, for example), it will mostly be geared towards attracting as many people as possible to play it. So, even if you didn’t know a single thing about the history of the Fallout universe, Fallout 3 will still be ready and waiting to consume your time in large amounts.

That doesn’t make the impressive history of the Fallout universe any less awesome, however. With a clever sense of wit and an expansive history, the Fallout universe is easily one of the most engaging gaming universes of all time. To this day, with both games over a decade old, Fallout 1 and 2 still hold up as two of the greatest RPGs of all time. And that, above all else, has me most excited for Fallout 3: it’s the return of a world that I can’t get enough of, and the restarting of a legacy that sorely needs to be remembered.

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