The Complete Fallout Timeline EXPLAINED'
The “Fallout” series is rich with intricate lore and an expansive alternate history that captivates players. Here's a deep dive into the timeline and some of the most fascinating aspects of its lore:
### **Timeline Overview**
#### **Pre-War Era (Before 2077)**
- **1945:** End of World War II, leading to a timeline divergence from our own history.
- **1969:** The United States wins the Space Race, but unlike our timeline, technological advancements lead to the widespread use of nuclear energy and fusion power.
- **2052-2077:** The Resource Wars begin due to dwindling fossil fuels, causing global tension and conflict.
- **2077:** The Great War occurs on October 23, 2077, a catastrophic nuclear exchange that lasts only two hours but devastates the planet.
#### **Post-War Era (After 2077)**
- **2077-2161:** The survivors emerge from Vaults and begin to rebuild society amidst the ruins.
- **2161:** The events of "Fallout" (the first game) take place, focusing on the Vault Dweller's quest to save their vault.
- **2241:** "Fallout 2" occurs, following the Chosen One, a descendant of the Vault Dweller, on a mission to find a Garden of Eden Creation Kit (GECK).
- **2277:** "Fallout 3" takes place in the Capital Wasteland, with the Lone Wanderer searching for their father and encountering the Enclave and Brotherhood of Steel.
- **2281:** "Fallout: New Vegas" focuses on the Courier's journey in the Mojave Wasteland, involving the conflict between the New California Republic, Caesar's Legion, and Mr. House.
- **2287:** "Fallout 4" follows the Sole Survivor from Vault 111 as they search for their kidnapped son in the Commonwealth.
- **2102:** "Fallout 76" is set in Appalachia, focusing on the Reclamation Day, where Vault 76 opens and survivors begin to rebuild after the Great War.
### **Fascinating Aspects of Fallout Lore**
1. **The Great War and Its Aftermath:**
- The brief but devastating nuclear exchange of the Great War left a profound impact on the world, shaping the post-apocalyptic setting of the series. The fallout (pun intended) of this war is evident in every game, showcasing the resilience and adaptability of humanity.
2. **Vault-Tec Experiments:**
- The Vaults, ostensibly designed to protect people, were actually social experiments conducted by the Vault-Tec Corporation. Each vault had a unique, often sinister experiment, like Vault 101's perpetual isolation or Vault 22's plant-human hybrid research.
3. **Factions and Power Struggles:**
- The various factions, such as the Brotherhood of Steel, the Enclave, the New California Republic, and Caesar's Legion, each have distinct ideologies and goals, creating complex power dynamics and moral dilemmas for players to navigate.
4. **Technological Retro-Futurism:**
- The "Fallout" series features a unique blend of 1950s aesthetics with advanced, yet decayed technology. This retro-futuristic vision, filled with robots, power armor, and laser weapons, contrasts sharply with the desolate '
### **Timeline Overview**
#### **Pre-War Era (Before 2077)**
- **1945:** End of World War II, leading to a timeline divergence from our own history.
- **1969:** The United States wins the Space Race, but unlike our timeline, technological advancements lead to the widespread use of nuclear energy and fusion power.
- **2052-2077:** The Resource Wars begin due to dwindling fossil fuels, causing global tension and conflict.
- **2077:** The Great War occurs on October 23, 2077, a catastrophic nuclear exchange that lasts only two hours but devastates the planet.
#### **Post-War Era (After 2077)**
- **2077-2161:** The survivors emerge from Vaults and begin to rebuild society amidst the ruins.
- **2161:** The events of "Fallout" (the first game) take place, focusing on the Vault Dweller's quest to save their vault.
- **2241:** "Fallout 2" occurs, following the Chosen One, a descendant of the Vault Dweller, on a mission to find a Garden of Eden Creation Kit (GECK).
- **2277:** "Fallout 3" takes place in the Capital Wasteland, with the Lone Wanderer searching for their father and encountering the Enclave and Brotherhood of Steel.
- **2281:** "Fallout: New Vegas" focuses on the Courier's journey in the Mojave Wasteland, involving the conflict between the New California Republic, Caesar's Legion, and Mr. House.
- **2287:** "Fallout 4" follows the Sole Survivor from Vault 111 as they search for their kidnapped son in the Commonwealth.
- **2102:** "Fallout 76" is set in Appalachia, focusing on the Reclamation Day, where Vault 76 opens and survivors begin to rebuild after the Great War.
### **Fascinating Aspects of Fallout Lore**
1. **The Great War and Its Aftermath:**
- The brief but devastating nuclear exchange of the Great War left a profound impact on the world, shaping the post-apocalyptic setting of the series. The fallout (pun intended) of this war is evident in every game, showcasing the resilience and adaptability of humanity.
2. **Vault-Tec Experiments:**
- The Vaults, ostensibly designed to protect people, were actually social experiments conducted by the Vault-Tec Corporation. Each vault had a unique, often sinister experiment, like Vault 101's perpetual isolation or Vault 22's plant-human hybrid research.
3. **Factions and Power Struggles:**
- The various factions, such as the Brotherhood of Steel, the Enclave, the New California Republic, and Caesar's Legion, each have distinct ideologies and goals, creating complex power dynamics and moral dilemmas for players to navigate.
4. **Technological Retro-Futurism:**
- The "Fallout" series features a unique blend of 1950s aesthetics with advanced, yet decayed technology. This retro-futuristic vision, filled with robots, power armor, and laser weapons, contrasts sharply with the desolate '
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GamingTranscript
00:00Welcome to WatchMojo, and today we're doing a deep dive into the Fallout timeline.
00:13The Fallout lore isn't too complex, but there is a lot of it, with the game world
00:18having an entire alternate history that begins centuries before you step out of your first
00:23vault.
00:24Much of Fallout's history is the history of our own world, with a few differences deep
00:29in the past, things like the influence of the fictional Cabot family on Boston way back
00:33in the 18th century.
00:35But things get notably different around the Second World War, when Fallout pursues alternate
00:40forms of technology to us in the real world.
00:43Specifically, they invest hugely in nuclear physics, mastering nuclear fission and eventually
00:49nuclear fusion, to create vast amounts of power.
00:53Energy is revolutionized, but other forms of technology, like television and radio,
00:58remain stuck in the 1950s, never moving on, except that they're nuclear powered now.
01:04People enjoyed luxuries once thought the realm of science fiction, domestic robots, fusion
01:11powered cars.
01:13Fallout is so concerned with technology, and exploring the impact its futuristic tech has
01:18on the world, that all of its biggest private companies work in science and technology,
01:23many of them becoming defense contractors for the US government.
01:27These are companies like Vault-Tec, Robco, and Repcon.
01:31Vault-Tec is, of course, hugely important, because it's the company behind the vaults
01:36that save humanity, at least on paper.
01:39Robco Industries, meanwhile, was run by Mr. House before the war, and is responsible for
01:44practically all of the robots we encounter, as well as inventing the Stealth Boys.
01:49Finally, Repcon largely built rockets, but was crucially contracted by the US government
01:55to create new fuel sources, including nuclear fission, which makes the world go round.
02:01War.
02:05War never changes.
02:07The world was also reliant on fossil fuels by this point, a finite resource, but nuclear
02:12power was a finite resource too, because it depended on uranium.
02:17This eventually led the world's two largest superpowers, the United States and China,
02:22into conflict through the Resource Wars, beginning in 2052.
02:27Our only real look into what the world was like at this time is through the liberation
02:31of Anchorage Simulation, which shows American soldiers freeing Alaska from Chinese occupation.
02:38Alaska had been under occupation since 2066, when the Sino-American War broke out, but
02:43in early 2077, it was brought back into the US.
02:47China's power led to extreme paranoia within the US about the impact of Communism, which
02:53again mirrors real life in the 1950s, when America was gripped by the second Red Scare
02:59and thought Communism was hiding around every corner.
03:02But in Fallout, these fears weren't unfounded.
03:06Not only were spies genuinely working to undermine America, as we see in Fallout 3's Point
03:11Lookout DLC, but China had armed submarines stationed around the coast.
03:18This, of course, culminated in the Great War, which lasted for all of two hours on October
03:2723rd, 2077.
03:30America and China together, in the last hours of the Sino-American War, destroyed the world.
03:35Some people survived, either by descending into vaults or by finding refuge in other
03:40places.
03:41We can see this play out at the beginning of Fallout 4, as the sole survivor descends
03:45below the Commonwealth to be cryogenically frozen.
03:49In Fallout 3, we see that a community managed to survive by hiding in the Lamplight Caverns,
03:55creating Little Lamplight.
03:56On the other side of the country, Vegas was left largely unscathed because of Mr. House
04:01protecting it with his superior technology.
04:04But it would take a long time for the world to even begin to recover.
04:08They returned with tales of a city untouched by the warheads that had scorched the rest
04:13of the world, and a great wall spanning the Colorado River.
04:18With the exception of Fallout 4's opening, the earliest we've ever gone in the Fallout
04:23timeline is 2102, which is when Fallout 76 begins.
04:28You start in Vault 76, a vault designed to celebrate the signing of the Declaration of
04:33Independence back in 1776, when it opens 25 years after the war.
04:39Luckily, Vault 76 was one of Vault-Tec's control vaults, meaning it didn't have any
04:44sinister experiments running in the background.
04:47Even better, Appalachia is definitely a more pleasant place than other Fallout settings,
04:53though it's been ravaged by Scorch Beasts, which are enormous mutated bats.
04:58Because it's an MMO, the plot of Fallout 76 is always growing, with expansions released
05:04following the Zeta Aliens and returning to Pittsburgh.
05:07But you spend the early hours and initial quests in the game trying to rid Appalachia
05:12of the Scorch Beasts and the infected humans they leave behind, known as the Scorched.
05:17It ends when you drop a nuclear bomb, but Appalachia bounces back from this quickly
05:22enough.
05:23Crucially, this is one of the earliest iterations of the Brotherhood of Steel we see, even though
05:29they were actually established in 2076, right before the Great War.
05:34But Fallout 76 is still set far away from the main continuity of games, since the story
05:39really begins in the year 2161 in California.
05:50This is where Fallout, a post-nuclear role-playing game, starts, almost 90 years after the war
05:56that destroyed the world.
05:58You're playing as the Vault Dweller, who's been chosen to leave Vault 13, another safe
06:03control vault, because the vault needs extra water chips to operate their water purifier.
06:09Otherwise, it's not going to survive.
06:11You leave the vault and soon encounter Shady Sands, a small town that's beaten the odds
06:16and already learned how to grow fresh crops in the wasteland.
06:20But it hasn't all been plain sailing.
06:23Shady Sands was founded by Dwellers from Vault 15, a vault that was a social experiment gone
06:29awry when the Dwellers, chosen because they held beliefs across the political spectrum,
06:34came into conflict.
06:35A group left and stole the vault's GECK when they did.
06:39That's a Garden of Eden creation kit, the crucial piece of pre-war technology that terraforms
06:44the wasteland to make it habitable.
06:46In Shady Sands, you're witnessing the birth of the new California Republic, which will
06:51be officially founded in 2189, 27 years after the first game begins.
06:57More on them later.
06:58Back in the 2160s, the wasteland is under threat.
07:02A group calling itself The Unity is growing, a cult with the aim of turning every human
07:08being into a super mutant, a giant green monster.
07:12Its leader is The Master, a mutant himself who wanted to use the Forced Evolutionary
07:17Virus, or FEV, to transform mankind.
07:22Like the GECK, the FEV is a key part of Fallout lore that will return time and time again.
07:28The quest for the Water Chips eventually leads the Vault Dweller into conflict with The Master.
07:34To pull off this final dramatic confrontation effectively, you'll have needed to explore
07:38the wasteland to get several key pieces of information, so that you can prove to The
07:42Master that the super mutants are sterile.
07:45This means that his all-mutant society is doomed because it will be impossible for them
07:51to reproduce.
07:52When The Master realizes this, he sets his base, The Cathedral, to explode, scattering
07:58The Unity, known to others as The Master's Army far and wide.
08:10Between Fallout 1 and Fallout 2, we've actually got two spinoff games.
08:14These are the confusingly named Fallout Tactics Brotherhood of Steel, released in 2001, and
08:20Fallout Brotherhood of Steel, released in 2004.
08:23The former follows a Brotherhood campaign in the Midwest in 2197, as soldiers journey
08:29southwest to find the semi-mythical Vault Zero to claim its technology.
08:34They again come into conflict with mutants and a villain called The Calculator, a grotesque
08:39supercomputer powered by an amalgamation of real human brains.
08:44Not too dissimilar to The Master himself.
08:46It's not clear which ending is the canon ending, but it almost certainly ends with
08:51the Brotherhood getting its hands on even more powerful, world-ending technology, for
08:56better or worse.
09:01The 2004 game, on the other hand, is set 19 years on, in 2208, following an initiate recently
09:08brought into the Brotherhood.
09:10Interestingly, 2208 is the same year that the original Vault Dweller leaves their town
09:15Arroyo for good.
09:17Unfortunately, this game was critically panned and doesn't offer too much new.
09:22Though it is the only Fallout game set in Texas, taking place in the city of Carbon.
09:28You're fighting yet another army of mutants who are, in-game, modeling themselves on The
09:33Master.
09:39Fallout 2 sees another big time skip.
09:42It begins in the year 2241, and you're a new player character, nicknamed The Chosen One,
09:48living in Arroyo, grandchild of The Vault Dweller.
09:51At the end of the first game, The Vault Dweller returned to Vault 13 to bring back the Water
09:56Chips, but was exiled by The Overseer.
09:59By 2167, Arroyo had been built in Northern California.
10:04But the town is hit by a severe drought, and there's only one thing that can help,
10:08another Gek.
10:10The Chosen One leaves to find it, but the Enclave soon emerge as a new threat.
10:15You find out that before the war, the US government made a lot of contingencies, with many top
10:20government officials escaping nuclear annihilation and forming the Enclave, which has been biting
10:26its time for over 150 years.
10:29Its main base is Control Station Enclave, an offshore oil rig, but it also has a major
10:35presence in Navarro, a military base on the west coast.
10:39The Enclave plan is, again, preoccupied with the Forced Evolutionary Virus.
10:44They want to modify it so that it's lethal and airborne, capable of infecting and killing
10:50everybody in the wasteland.
10:52When this is done, they'll move in and rebuild America to their own specifications.
10:57Obviously, you can't let this happen, because it turns out that while the Chosen One is
11:02successful at retrieving another Gek, the entire population of Arroyo has been kidnapped
11:07by the Enclave to serve as test subjects for the modified FEV.
11:11The Enclave is ultimately destroyed when the oil rig's nuclear reactor is detonated by
11:16the Chosen One, who uses the Gek to turn Arroyo into a powerful force in the west.
11:21Crucially, by this point in time, the NCR has been founded officially, and is building
11:27shady sands into one of the most advanced cities in the entire wasteland.
11:32Proving, once again, that genocide is a viable solution to any problem.
11:37But it's time to skip another few decades, ending up in the year 2277, and in a brand
11:43new location, the Capital Wasteland, the ruins of Washington, D.C.
11:48A lot of people join the franchise with Fallout 3, with this game serving as their introduction
11:53to the world of Fallout.
11:55It starts officially in 2258, though, when the main character, this time dubbed the Lone
12:00Wanderer, is born.
12:02Your father James, aka Liam Neeson, decides to break out of Vault 101, another Vault-Tec
12:09experiment where the populace was ordered to never open the vault doors.
12:13The Lone Wanderer decides to follow him and is violently expelled from the vault, where
12:17you begin the long journey of tracking James down.
12:21Eventually, the Lone Wanderer discovers that they were born outside the vault, and that
12:25the Observer remarkably let them and their father in, after their mother dies in childbirth
12:30right at the beginning.
12:32Their parents were working on something called Project Purity, a high-tech installation built
12:36around the Jefferson Memorial designed to deliver clean water to the wasteland.
12:41But it needs a geck to get up and running properly, and that's where James has gone.
12:46The Lone Wanderer tracks him down to Vault 112, where he's been trapped in a simulation
12:51called Tranquility Lane.
12:53The simulation is being controlled by sadistic scientist Stannilus Braun, who incidentally
12:58is also the creator of the geck, but unfortunately, Vault 112 doesn't have one.
13:04The Wanderer breaks James out by either going along with Braun, or breaking his control
13:08of the simulation and freeing the residents.
13:12James rallies the former Project Purity scientists, now all working in Rivet City.
13:26They return to the Jefferson Memorial to get it up and running, but are thwarted by the
13:30Enclave, many of whom have survived the events of Fallout 2.
13:35To stop the Enclave's leader, Colonel Autumn, from activating the purifier, James seals
13:39himself inside and gives his life, dying from the equipment's massive radiation output.
13:46The Wanderer and the other scientists fight off the Enclave and flee through the sewers,
13:53eventually finding sanctuary in the ruins of the Pentagon, now renamed the Citadel and
13:59occupied by the Brotherhood of Steel.
14:01This faction of the Brotherhood has, by now, gone against the group's original mission
14:05statement of hoarding technology for technology's sake.
14:09They want to help the people of the Wasteland to rebuild.
14:13This has led to the formation of the Brotherhood Outcasts, who roam the Wasteland in red power
14:18armor and dismiss outsiders.
14:20More on them later.
14:24With the Brotherhood's help, the lone Wanderer determines that Vault 87 still contains its
14:29geck, the only one in the Capital Wasteland.
14:33You've got two options for how to get in, through the front door, which requires a lot
14:38of anti-rad medicine and equipment, or through the back tunnels, which require you to get
14:44in good with the people who live in the caves.
14:46The catch is that these people are children, and in their town of Little Lamplight, they
14:51hate adults and won't want to help, unless you do a quest or pass a speech check.
15:02Whatever the case, the Wanderer gets into Vault 87 and acquires the geck, only to be
15:07snatched by the Enclave at the last second.
15:10They awaken in the Enclave's high-tech base, Raven Rock, and make their way to the President
15:15of the United States, John Henry Eden, at his invitation.
15:19This is where they find out Enclave's grand plan, which is, yet again, to release the
15:24modified FEV and reclaim the Wasteland.
15:27Eden is easily talked into blowing up Raven Rock, and the Wanderer makes their escape.
15:32The final assault begins, with the Brotherhood activating its enormous pre-war robot, Liberty
15:38Prime, and taking back Project Purity.
15:49At the end of the game, the lone Wanderer has two choices.
15:53Activate Project Purity themselves, dying in the process, or send Sarah Lyons, one of
15:58the Brotherhood, to do it instead, in which case, she dies.
16:02The game was later patched to give you the third option to send Fox, the super mutant
16:06companion to do it, since Fox is immune to radiation.
16:10But they don't actually die, because the Broken Steel DLC sees them awakening back
16:15in the Citadel.
16:16From there, you're tasked with wiping out all the remains of the Enclave.
16:20Along the way, you'll also get abducted by aliens and have to fight your way off their
16:24ship, you'll help the Brotherhood outcasts to gain access to a pre-war stash of dangerous
16:29weapons, you'll journey on a riverboat to Maryland and have part of your brain removed,
16:34and you'll return to Pittsburgh, seen much earlier in its history in Fallout 76, to free
16:39its slaves and cure its plague.
16:48Finally we're moving on from the surprising density of Fallout 3 to 2010's Fallout New
16:53Vegas, where we return to the West to see the expanding NCR, which is now one of the
16:59most powerful forces in the Wasteland, come up against a new faction, Caesar's Legion.
17:04The Legion model themselves on ancient Rome, and have brought peace and security with them
17:09from Arizona, albeit peace and security enforced strictly by slavery and crucifixions.
17:15The two groups are fighting for control of the Hoover Dam, and subsequently, Vegas.
17:20We're also going to catch back up with Mr. House, owner of Robco, who still controls
17:24Vegas from the shadows.
17:26Since the war, Vegas has regained its pre-war reputation for hedonism, with large casinos
17:32now run by the three families.
17:34They were originally Wasteland tribes that Mr. House saw potential in, giving them control
17:39of the Tops, the Ultra-Lux, and Gamora, while he kept control of the Lucky 38.
17:45The game opens with you, Courier 6, being shot in the head and buried in a shallow grave
17:51in Goodsprings in 2281.
17:54You wake up with no memory of your previous life, and decide to hunt down the man who
17:58shot you, tracking him all the way to Vegas.
18:01The Courier discovers that this was Benny, the leader of the Chairman who run the Tops.
18:07He killed the Courier to retrieve the coveted Platinum Chip, which they were trusted to
18:11deliver to the Lucky 38.
18:20It turns out that the Platinum Chip is a computer chip, carrying upgrades to the Scuritron robots
18:26that patrol the Strip and keep its citizens, and Mr. House, protected from the NCR and
18:32the Legion.
18:33There are four ways the Courier can proceed.
18:36They can side with the NCR, the first and largest faction they encounter, and work to
18:41reclaim the Hoover Dam and the city for California.
18:45They can work with the Legion and do the opposite, undermining the NCR from within and dispatching
18:51Mr. House.
18:52They can take Mr. House's side and let him have absolute control with his upgraded army.
18:57Or finally, they can take Benny's plan for themselves and become his legacy, creating
19:02a truly independent Vegas.
19:05We don't know which of the four endings is canon, despite widespread debate, and we won't
19:09know until the series revisits the Mojave.
19:22But we're traveling all the way back to the East Coast for Fallout 4.
19:26After being sealed in cryostasis for decades, the sole survivor is briefly awakened, only
19:31to see a hardened mercenary kidnap their newborn son and kill their spouse, before they're
19:37sealed away again.
19:38They finally wake for good in 2287, six years after New Vegas, and leave Vault 111 to track
19:45down their son, Sean.
19:47This search takes them to Diamond City almost immediately, a large settlement built in the
19:52ruins of Fenway Park in Boston.
19:54They learn about an alleged conspiracy by members of a shadowy group that may or may
19:58not exist called the Institute, to kidnap and replace the citizens of the Commonwealth
20:03with synths.
20:04By tracking down the mercenary who kidnapped their son, and getting the help of one of
20:08the factions, the sole survivor discovers that not only is the Institute and its plan
20:13real, but that its leader is their son Sean, who's far older than initially thought.
20:18We then head into Act 2 of the game, where the sole survivor helps all four factions
20:23until reaching various points of no return.
20:42If they decide that Sean is right, there's another plan to get rid of the current human
20:46population with pure, non-irradiated people, albeit not by releasing a dangerous virus.
20:52They side with the Institute and destroy the other factions, taking the Commonwealth
20:56for good.
20:57Alternatively, they can side with the Brotherhood of Steel.
21:01This is another iteration of the East Coast Brotherhood, but now they've only got one
21:06mission, purge the world of synths, mutants, and anything else that isn't completely
21:11human.
21:12Third, you can team up with the Railroad.
21:14They want to destroy the Institute and the Brotherhood because they threaten the synths
21:19and their freedom, but they don't care half as much about humankind.
21:22Finally, you've got the Minutemen, who just want to protect the people of the Commonwealth.
21:28Only the Minutemen and the Railroad can coexist.
21:31The other factions all demand you destroy two of the others, leaving the Minutemen alone
21:36in most cases.
21:37Whether Fallout 4 has a canon ending or not, we also don't know, and likely won't until
21:42the next game in the series.
21:54And that was the Fallout timeline explained.