Fallout Setting

The Fallout world is not quite our own. Somewhere along the way, it diverged. It's still recognizably our world, but with some changes. The Fallout world is historically divergent from ours and also is fundamentally different in terms of how science works. The base concept for the setting is the World of Tomorrow, as imagined in the Golden Age of Science Fiction, after the bomb. This means that before the war, the Fallout world was more or less what the people of the 1940s and 1950s thought things would be like in 2077. (see: Divergence for more details).

The most important event in the Fallout setting was the Great War which happened on October 23, 2077. It lasted a mere two hours, but was unbelievably destructive. More energy was released in the early moments of that war than all previous conflicts combined.

Fallout games take place many years after the apocalypse, as humanity struggles to pick up the pieces. Some groups have barely managed to survive above ground, either scavenging the scorched ruins of cities or surviving and adapting through mass mutation. Communities that were sealed in underground Vaults during the war are now emerging to re-populate the blasted landscape. Striving to organize and sustain the human race, these tattered remnants of civilization are threatened by psychotic mutants, rogue machines, raiders, and all manner of hostile creatures. The games take place mostly in the area known as the Core Region, where the main threats so far have been the Master and the Enclave.

History
Main article: Timeline

Before the War
Main article: World before the War

In the Fallout setting, twenty-first century America also descended into an era of paranoia and mania similar to the 1950s. The U.S. government became more and more militant and aggressive against real and imagined enemies. Other world powers were often just as bad. As the world’s fossil fuel supplies started to dry up and conversions to nuclear power lagged, people became desperate.

The United Nations failed in 2052 as the planet's natural resources dried up, causing many smaller nations to go financially bankrupt and fail. Europe and the Middle East were cast into a long, drawn-out war over the few remaining productive oil fields.

In late 2053, the United States closed its borders when a new super plague was discovered, and a terrorist nuclear weapon destroyed Tel Aviv. In early 2054, the U.S. responded by creating Project Safehouse. This project, financed by junk bonds, was responsible for creating large underground survival shelters, commonly known as Vaults.

In 2060, the Middle Eastern oil fields ran dry, ending the European war. The European Commonwealth soon dissolved into quarreling, bickering nation states bent on controlling the last remaining resources on Earth.

In the winter of 2066, China attacked Alaska over what were most likely the last drops of oil in the world. The U.S. responded with force, but it would be ten years before the conflict would end. In a desperate maneuver, both superpowers invaded neighboring countries in an effort to bolster their dwindling resources. The U.S. annexation of Canada was concluded by 2076. Canadian timber provided fuel for U.S. military needs, and Alaska was reclaimed by early 2077.

In the early morning hours of Saturday, October 23, 2077, the sky was filled with nuclear missiles. No one knows who started the war, but after two hours of nuclear devastation, no one cared.

Because of frequent false alarms, few made it to the Vaults when the final alarm sounded. Most people were trapped outside the closing Vault doors. The Enclave, the remains of the United States shadow government, retreated safely to an Oil Rig on the Pacific Ocean.

After the War
The Great War changed most of the planet into a radioactive wasteland. Those who did not die in the nuclear weapon exchanges lived in darkness or misery for decades. Living in subterranean vaults or frozen in cryogenic chambers, humanity persevered. Most people outside the Vaults were killed, and many of those who were lucky (or unlucky) enough to survive, mutated. The first effects of radiation were seen in the survivors around 2080. Widespread mutations occurred with animals and humans alike. Those that survive the effects of the mutations are permanently changed. New species are created almost overnight. Among them were the hideous ghouls.

Years after the bombs dropped, the first Vaults started to open and their inhabitants emerged to rebuild the destroyed civilization. The Core Region, corresponding to the American West Coast and Southwest was one of the first areas of the world in which significant interaction emerged, eighty years after the war. Though many regions of the formerly-civilized world are waking up, humanity has a long way to go if it is to ever stabilize.

Creatures
Main articles: Creatures, Mutations and their causes

The various types of mutant creatures that inhabit the wastelands were mostly caused by radiation. This is where mantises, geckos, spore plants, radscorpions, brahmin and the various mutant rodent species come from. Also, this is how ghouls, decrepit, ragged, almost rotting, zombie-like victims of massive radiation poisoning, are made. Generally, in the Fallout universe, massive exposure to radiation causes humans to transform into ghouls. Also, in this world, in accordance with the 1950's sci-fi physics, radiation makes most creatures bigger and meaner.

The other source of mutations in the Fallout world is FEV: the Forced Evolutionary Virus. The super mutants, floaters, centaurs and possibly wanamingos were products of FEV infection. It was initially called the Pan-Immunity Virion Project and was created to fight a disease called the New Plague. However, abnormal side effects were observed in test subjects: the test animals began to grow dramatically and their brain activity increased. The project was renamed FEV: Forced Evolutionary Virus and was tested by the Army on humans.

After a man known as Richard Grey discovered the base and was accidentally dipped in the FEV vats, he slowly mutated into an unrecognizable mass of living flesh. He developed psychic powers, which were enhanced by consuming living creatures and absorbing their minds to expand his own. Slowly, he started doing his own experiments with FEV, at first on animals and later turning other humans into his super mutant army. He decided that he would have to force humanity to evolve, and even continued injecting his own twisted body with more of the virus to continue his own evolution. Those who could not evolve would die. Eventually, the mutants turned out to be sterile and the Master himself was killed by the Vault Dweller.

Places
Main article: Places

The basic Core Region stretches from Los Angeles in the South to Klamath in the North. It covers most of California, as well as parts of Oregon and Nevada. It is a largely inhospitable region, which is why most people have chosen to seek refuge in the remains of old cities, where they have found (relative) safety in numbers. However, as resources grew more and more scarce, people and creatures came to consolidate into groups of their own kind, so locations are far more homogeneous than one might expect from a world ravaged by mutation.

The ghoul population of the wasteland was mostly clustered around old Bakersfield (Necropolis), but were scattered after an attack by the master's army. Most of the surviving ghouls eventually found a home in Gecko or Broken Hills along with humans and super mutants, both far to the north-east of their former home.

Super mutants were plentiful in the Mariposa area from 2102 to 2162, and they sent patrols as far as to Los Angeles. After the master's defeat, however, most of them retreated to the east.

Humans are the dominant species of the wasteland, and their main cities in the Core Region are The Hub, Los Angeles Boneyard, NCR, Vault City, New Reno and San Francisco.

Factions
There are very few factions in the Core Region that aren't limited to one or two towns. After the Master's defeat, the New California Republic became the most influential organization that unites several major towns, including Shady Sands (its capital, now known mostly simply as NCR), the Hub, Junktown, Maxson and Dayglow. The NCR is actively trying to unite the entire California under a single government.

In contrast, the Brotherhood of Steel is a mysterious techno-religious organization, with roots in the US military. While few in numbers, they make up for this with their arsenal of pre-war and post-war technology: They have laser weapons, Power Armors, surgical enhancements and combat implants. Unlike the NCR, the Brotherhood is not interested in conquests nor in saving the humanity, but instead in keeping their secrecy and preserving and developing technology.