Fallout's Alt-History Timeline

[mandru]

Here's a link to the best historical timeline for the Fallout world I've encountered: https://imgur.com/a/YNhbP  *Sorry I do not have the original source for this material*
**Edit - Source found http://www.mixedmartialarts.com/forums/OtherGround/Fallout-World-History:2462692

From looking at the Pre-War 2077 design and decor of the Fallout series it's clear that was an alternate reality that spun off from one similar to ours somewhere in the 1950's.  Instead of the development of transistors which led to our micro circuitry and semiconductor technology the Fallout universe excelled in clever vacuum tube design and harnessing the power of the atom to the extent that the automotive industry and every home was filled with nuclear powered appliances.

Think about it.  All those radios throughout the game have been playing away for 200 plus years with no external power supply. 

I've seen OWG members comment on the incessant smoking by game characters and I can see how that might be strange or annoying if they don't remember life in the 50's which as I said above was the point in time where that world/universe splits off from ours.

I remember commercials on TV where a doctor (finishing up filling out the patient's records) after completing a physical exam offers the freshly examined patient a cigarette and then extols the health virtues of the filter on the various brands that used that approach to sell their products.

Just from tobacco ads alone we should have learned our lessons agains ever listening to celebrities opinions when making life choices. 

[Art Blade]

 

Interesting, and amusing

Now that you mentioned the 1950s commercials and how people were completely innocent regarding cigarette smoking, I wasn't born yet to remember that but I once in a while I came across material from back then. Be it old magazines in a second hand store or movies from that time, I do recall something like "doctors recommend smoking" or pictures of them smoking in their practices and the likes. It was more like, "oh, what's that?" "That's a filter cigarette, try one." Today it's more like, "oh, what's that?" "That's an e-cigarette (vaporiser)."

[PZ]

Even in the 60's - remember the Marlboro Man?  How about "Paging Phillip Morris!"

[Dweller_Benthos]

Yeah, that is definitely the reason there's smoking in the game, and that you find cigarettes practically everywhere, but the characters smoking is a different thing. They should have a set of animations to run through when they are doing nothing else, smoking being one of them, but something happened in an update and now they all just do the smoking one.

[mandru]

 

The access to near unlimited power in the Fallout through harnessing the atom is mind boggling and yet confusing when that timeline and clues in game play indicate that the war was over resources.  Primarily the resource of oil.

Something which I don't know if you've noticed about cars and trucks in the Fallout universe but the Red Rocket service stations aren't selling fuel.  It's coolant for the nuclear powered vehicles that's being sold.

Maybe it's because of the 200 years that have passed since the vehicles were last serviced (during which their coolant has slowly cooked off) that has made all of them so unstable.  I've had multiple times where bumping into a car while wearing a power suit has caused it blow up in my face.

I find it hard to believe that any of the prewar owners would have put up with their cars exploding over mere fender benders. 

[mandru]

Source found for the link to the timeline and edited in thread's first post.

[Art Blade]

 

No, I wasn't aware of the coolant albeit I've kept finding coolant canisters. Interesting Those cars being so unstable, I love the explosions. I think that's what caused my first otherwise unexplained 9 murders in my criminal statistics.. I used to shoot those cars whenever I found them. And I never felt above using mini nukes to kick off a proper explosion, either

[Dweller_Benthos]

Yes, I wondered that myself, when I first started playing the game. If everything is nuclear powered, why were they fighting over oil?

And yes, the filling stations are selling coolant.. at $299.99 a gallon. Look at the price sign.

[BinnZ]

Interesting story Mandru, good find!

[mandru]

This is another timeline for Fallout that was written in response to the one I linked to at the beginning of this thread to cover many points that were not touched on in the first timeline.

This deals (almost) entirely with the details leading up to the start of the First Fallout game and it's huge  :

www.imgur.com/gallery/6SphH

It helped me that the illustration for each section of information gives a clue as to the subject matter being described.

I need to credit Imgur member nman10000 as this was a lot of info to assemble while maintaining a cohesive narrative covering so many data points.

While it's quite massive I found it to be an interesting read filling in a lot of the details I've missed by beginning my Fallout exploration by jumping into that world starting with FO4 (adding only Far Harbor DLC) and then stepping backwards into FO3 with all DLC content.

[Art Blade]

Thank you for digging up so much info about Fallout, mandru +1