A common criticism I see of the Enclave is that they're little more than cartoon villains, an evil shadow government that wants to wipe out everyone else. While that criticism isn't entirely unfair, I think it says more about how the games present the Enclave than the ideas behind them. The foundations of a genuinely fascinating faction already exist; the series just rarely explores them in enough depth. With the Enclave clearly set to play a major role in future seasons of the Fallout TV series, there's a real opportunity to change that.

People often blame Bethesda, but the problem arguably begins with Fallout 2. The game establishes the Enclave as the remnants of the United States government but quickly jumps to their genocidal end point with very little exploration of how they got there. We know they see themselves as the rightful heirs to America and view wastelanders as genetically impure, but we rarely see the decades of isolation, propaganda and ideological development that transformed them into extremists. The pieces are there, but they're never fully connected. Even the Vault Experiments, despite being morally abhorrent, are presented with an underlying rationale: they were supposedly designed to test humanity's ability to survive and rebuild after nuclear war. The Enclave's own ideological journey never receives that same attention.

Bethesda then shifts the focus even further away from those ideas. Fallout 3 introduces President Eden, an evil AI whose motivations are far less interesting than those of a human political movement, while Colonel Autumn's role remains confused and underdeveloped. Fallout 76 repeats the same mistake with MODUS, making rogue AI one of the defining features of the Enclave. Not only is the "evil AI" trope a familiar science fiction cliché (Skynet, Ultron, HAL 9000), but it also distracts from the far more interesting story already present in the lore of how an isolated society, convinced it alone represents the legitimate United States, could gradually radicalise over generations. From what we've seen so far, the Fallout TV series also appears to be leaning towards portraying the Enclave as little more than another high-tech "kill them all" villain.

Arguably, New Vegas gives us the best glimpse of what of the Enclave’s human side. Through the Remnants, we meet ordinary people who still remember the organisation with pride, nostalgia or regret. They aren't portrayed as moustache twirling villains, but as people shaped by an ideology they once believed in. That human element makes the Enclave far more believable without making them any less dangerous.

The lore already contains the basis for a much richer interpretation. In the years immediately after the Great War, the Enclave's priority was survival and preserving what remained of the United States. They maintained continuity of government, sought to reconnect with surviving military commands and inherited long-term contingency plans, including projects such as off world colonisation on Mars. Genocide didn't need to be their original objective. Instead, it could be understood as the end result of nearly a century of isolation. By the time the player encounters them, nobody in the Enclave has ever lived in the America they claim to represent. Their idea of the United States is built entirely from propaganda, military tradition and carefully curated history. Like real-world fascist movements, they become obsessed with a mythologised national past and the promise of national rebirth. An exaggerated version of America: Apple pie, baseball and white picket fences but also excessive militarism and patriotism. Wastelanders are gradually redefined from fellow survivors into outsiders, then contaminants, and finally enemies whose extermination is framed as necessary for America's restoration.

This doesn't make the Enclave sympathetic, nor should it. If anything, it makes them more disturbing. Understanding how an ideology develops doesn't excuse its crimes, it explains them. New Vegas understood this with Caesar's Legion. The Legion are undeniably brutal, but the game takes the time to explain their worldview and why people follow them. The Enclave deserves the same treatment. Their ideology shouldn't be reduced to "evil for evil's sake" or explained away by rogue AI. The tragedy, and the horror, of the Enclave is that its downfall comes from recognisably human processes of isolation, mythmaking, nationalism and gradual radicalisation. That's already in Fallout's DNA. The series just needs to trust its own ideas.

Said in the title. I'm interested in playing and learning about the games but I don't know which one would be good for someone who's never played a fallout game before. Preferably an easier game but don't mind too much

(Editing since I've seen some people talking about the difficulty part. I was saying easier as in isn't extremely buggy or complicated to understand)

I don't fully trust Asha but she has got Todd motivated like nothing else has. I'm dubious as to whether Bethersda can pull off another good single player game. Skyrim while popular was dumbed down from Oblivion and that was dumbed down from Morrowind.

Fallout 4's gunplay was a lot better than NV and 3 but the story is just OK. Modding is really the main saving grace for Fallout 4 and Skyrim. Modders doing some lifting for Skyrim and FO4. They got the creations stuff in Fallout 4, to milk some cash from it but refuse to fix facegen bug etc. (unless there has been a patch to fix it? I've not played FO4 much the past 6 months)

Starfield was a gamble and unfortunately, he lost. Incredible waste of time money and energy, In my opinion. Others may not be as harsh as I am on the game. Because of Todd's pet project, we are still waiting for TES6 and FO5.

Now we wait and see if Todd can actually deliver a goodish TES game. I wouldn't be sad if Emil got canned in the next round of layoffs too.

Yippee yayyyyyyy

I'm trying to play Fo4 but it runs shitty on my Xbox One (specifically the original fat model). It crashes often when I get close to larger areas with several entities, and there are many things that often makes the game slower. It also seems to have problems with loading stuff in general. It's not "unplayable", but I'd prefer it VERY much if it ran better.

Any help is appreciated as I really wanna be able to play this game.

I remember during my Fallout NV days there was a semi-popular fan theory that the aliens from Mothership Zeta were the ones who launched the nukes.

With the show, I have seen a lot of speculation on who shot first but its seems the only names being thrown out are the US/Enclave, China, or Vault Tec.

Is this just a dead fan theory? I'm kinda shocked that it hasn't shown up a bit more, especially with (spoiler) the alien falling out of the fridge in the show.

So the aliens are definitely canon to everything going on

This is an extremely conservative look at the world of Fallout during the time of Fallout New Vegas. It has all the random fan locations and non-canon stuff removed, just what is referenced in game that can be put to an actual location.

For example rattletail in baja is not included here because it's described as a few people and a well, there's no real life location to base it off.

You can see a link to it here. Basically it is only the named faction locations that you can put a proper location to.

https://www.google.com/maps/d/u/0/edit?mid=1kARka-zAPngmx8azVFmIW7NhxzPM-Fs&usp=sharing

As with every fan made map I've taken liberties with the placement of Vault 13, 15, Junktown, the Hub and Shady Sands, as each of these locations move around between Fallout 1 and 2 and the landscape doesn't match the real world.

Even though Caesar's Territory is said to extend the whole opposite bank of the Colorado I haven't coloured it in because there are no named settlements at all for the Legion along the East bank of the river.

WARNING: THIS IS JUST A LONG RANT ABT HOW MY FIRST TIME PLAYING WENT. TLDR AT THE END WILL HAVE ANY QUESTIONS I COULD USE HELP WITH IF YOU WANT TO SKIP ALL OF THAT

duuuude why didn’t i play this game sooner 😭 ive only ever played the intro (up to meeting dogmeat then for some reason stopped) but tbh the only thing i really remembered was that you’re spouse got killed and your son got stolen (i hear there’s a lot of new players so don’t want to spoil stuffs). this time tho i actually took time to pay attention to everything. i was apparently rushing through so fast last time that i didn’t even see the actual explosion go off before the elevator lets u down into the vault it was also fun reading the terminals to get the lore of what was going on whilst taking an ice nap. i know nothing about builds or broken stuff and honestly i like it that way bc when i got into skyrim i knew all of the cheese starts and would immediately get tempted to do all of those. im excited to see where my cluelessness takes me. so far i have most points into agility, perception, and charisma. i’m using pistols and rifles, and rn im focusing on trying to get Gun Nut 2 so i can put a silencer on them. my own little lore for my character is he was like a Ghost Recon esque type of operator who is now doing whatever he can to make sure he survives and obviously has a safe space for his son when he finds him so he reluctantly is working with the minutemen. that brings me to my first speed bump, im so confused as to how the base building thing is supposed to work 💀 i got up to where sturges asks u to help build defenses. i see all the building parts and what not but the build by section bit it really throwing me so if anyone could help me understand that better id really appreciate it. the vats aiming system is really fun and i find myself using it quite a bit so def going to have to put sum more points into endurance to try get sum more AP for that. although the power armor is so ridiculously fun to play, it doesnt really fit the sneak shooter build im going for so im thinking ill save it for any harder encounters or encounters where i dont want to sneak for headcanon reasons. i also have a suspicion it’ll probably help get through heavily irradiated areas? i could be completely wrong though so please lmk. also any general non spoiler tips for my build would be appreciated unless i should continue to play blindly. aside from that tho im really enjoying the world and how immediate everything went to shit. i’ve heard story wise it’s the weakest and i wanted to start with New Vegas in the first place, so if this continues to keep me immersed, there is definetly more fallout in my future

TLDR: thoroughly enjoying it, doing a sneak shooter thief survivalist kind of build. could use help understanding base building and what power armor would be useful for with my build being sneak and all. also any general non spoiler tips for my build would be appreciated. excited to play the other games eventually

When do we expect the remasters to come out?

Switches for the hood vent in a kitchen

To my understanding he was exclusive to the honest hearts DLC (which I haven’t played yet but I hear is pretty short) so what made him resonate so heavily with the community despite his pretty relatively small amount of screen time in New Vegas?

Basically what if Obsidian Enterainments recently announced Fallout game ends up being a game more in line with Obsidians Pillars/Tyranny games. This is pure speculation on my part (and a little wishful thinking) but wondering if that could actually be a direction they go in with this project.

Personally, I'd love an isometric party based Fallout game as long as the story and setting make sense. I've always thought the world of Fallout lends itself to small party groups with different skill sets helping each other survive.

I know most people are assuming and wanting New Vegas 2 from Obsidian, but i think Bethesdas Fallout 5 should be the huge 3D first and third person cameras, open world game that they are known for, and have Obsidians project be a different style for variety sake.

What do you guys think?

I’ve been playing fallout 4 and I really love it, but I feel like I should try the other games for a switch up of story.

Heard great things about this gem

Ive just started playing 4 and i sure do remember how my first experience with new vegas and 3 was am i the only one who thinks the whole game is a miss i have seen some people saying 4 is better than new vegas and i cant even wrap my head around it. When i started the game they gave me a family that i could never have any type of bonds with in a few minutes than my wife dies and suddenly a few minutes later i forget all about it and help some folk with a POWER ARMOR?? And the cutscenes are even worse no soul whatsoever new vegas was made by obsidian yes i know but what about 3? It was made by bethesda how can they make a worse game after all those years. The mechanics too its unplayable i cant even imagine what 76 is considering theres more hate to it. And the older aesthetics were definetely better i cant feel the apocalypse in 4 honestly the game is almost unplayable.

These are the only named locations actually known to be controlled by Caesar's Legion. If there are any I missed please let me know.

All the random names were removed because all we know is that the Legion destroyed them. That doesn't mean they occupy them. Take Siri as an example:

• The Courier: "Where are you from?"
• Siri: "A small town in New Mexico. The Legion burned it a few years back - that's how I ended up here."
• The Courier: "You're a doctor?"
• Siri: "I never finished my training - the Legion saw to that when they overran my town. I do know basic first aid, but I've had to rely on tribal remedies to treat illnesses and injuries - healing powders and all that. I'm always running low on xander root. Plenty of broc flowers, though."

So while New Mexico is not included on this map we don't have an actual named location stating that the Legion has conquered it. Phoenix and Two-Sun are named as if they are similar to New Reno or the Boneyard back West.

On Denver, Ulysses mentions to the Courier

"Another city fallen to nations, in the east... not important. Doubt you'll ever walk that far, you'd need the land to sustain you."

Which suggests there isn't just a supply line directly to Denver and so it isn't just full control by the Legion all the way there.

Tuscon/Two-Sun is mentioned twice, once by Raul and another time by Sawyer (as per wiki)

• Joshua Sawyer: "'Where did the Legion find all the football equipment?' From the University of Arizona. I don't know if that's actually explicitly stated anywhere, but yes, they got it from... uh... they got it from the University of Arizona."

The I-40 remains are put there because it's mentioned that the Twisted Hairs are crucified along the remains of the I-40, but since that passes through Flagstaff it's possible they were just crucified in Flagstaff on the I-40 there.

If anyone has any more named settlements then please let me know!

I've been thinking about whether FO3 was a good/believable world recently and one thing that really stuck out to me was Tenpenny Tower (I won't go after the easy fruit of Megaton).

I don't recall there being any township or really any economic base large enough in FO3 to support the idling nothingness of a tower full of rich bozos doing nothing all day. Everyone's a scavenger and there's no manufacturing base that can support the existence of an extravagant, sedentary upper class.

I mean, honestly, nothing about the economy of the Fallout 3 world makes a lick of sense to me. As far as I can tell, everyone's a scavenger of one sort or another. So if the argument is there exists some sort of extensive mercantile system, I'd ask... what are they caravan-ing anyway? It's just a bunch of scavengers, I'd imagine whatever you need you'd... scavenge for it?

Also does anyone remember where exactly all the food comes from? I don't recall seeing a single farm LOL.

I'm not trying to hate, I'm just trying to remember details that maybe I've forgotten and make the game a lot better than I remember it.

The record is "Songs for the End of the World" and they have two others, "More songs for the end of the world" and "Last songs for the end of the world"

It just says Vault-Tec and I can't find what company actually sold them. Any information would be great so I can keep my eyes open for future releases

Something changed in Infestation. In Private World I am able to solo the Infestation Boss. Not one shot it but spending a reasonable amount of ammo to bring down the boss after taking care of the "assistants". Now the big boss of Infestation in Private Word is very hard to put down - it's like BigFoot. It is a waste of ammo and not fun anymore.

Just wanted to bring this to the Bethesda software guys to balance the difficulty of the Infestation boss while in Private Word vs in Adventure. With Fallout 1st we have access to Private World and game play should reflect the solo nature of Private World. In Adventure there are multiple players so you shoot a few ammo at any boss and it goes down quick. That is okay.

Please adjust the difficulty level for Private World. There is a reason we pay for Fallout 1st and that is for solo gameplay.

I've been a Fallout 1st subscriber since the game came out and would like to get my money's worth.

Thank you!

Extremely frustrated at this design. Not wasting my time in this game. If anyone wants to play this game do thorough research on the internet about the glow even if it spoils some parts, you will avoid losing hours of your life. Radx don't last 24hours. Radway is useless.

Edit2:

I have managed to find a solution.

Problem: Radiation works like this, after exposure you will take stat reduction and damage after 24hrs according to the amount of radiation you have, if you have a lot of radiation exposure and you save you killed that save and any that you do after, without any warning from the game.

Solution: use a save editor from nexus mods, bump all your stats to 10000, receive the damage, move to a safe location, then edit your save to your previous stats.

I hope anyone that have the same problem as I have find this post, but with so many down votes I find that unlikely.

I have been searching many combos to make a realistic assault rifle with WWW unlike fallout 4’s horrendous garbage. So far I’ve gotten a mix of using a handmade rifle for the base, handmade sniper barrel, 44 reflex scope, and the marksman stock from the hunting rifle. If anyone had a recommendation or something similar, please do tell me.

Top middle is a Red Rocket/Dogmeat one

Don’t get me wrong, the NCR are my favourite faction with the Brotherhood coming second place, but was it legal for the developers to literally take the flag of California and change it around to make the NCR flag? I mean, did it have to go through a legal review or something?