My First (And Worst) Fallout Experience

My First Fallout Experience Was The Absolute Worst Time I’ve Ever Had Playing…

I’ve been a die hard fan of the Fallout franchise for many, many years now. By far it’s my favorite game series and one I’ve played over again easily a dozen times each. Typically when someone finds their favorite game it’s a fantastic and exciting experience, for me, not so much. I was unfortunate enough to experience the absolute worst the wasteland had to offer on my very first run through, and I’m talking RIGHT AWAY. An experience I’ve never seen anything come close to in my near 100 following play throughs of the series, you’d think I had a real life Luck of zero!

A few things to keep in mind before I get into it:

• The copy of Fallout 3 I purchased came with all the DLC on a second disc .

• I used to keep my TV relatively dark to get away with playing it last midnight on school nights.

Alright, so the year is 2010. I was the absolute last of my friends to play Fallout 3. I decided to pick it up from my local Game Stop after hearing my cousin talk it up for quite some time. Opting for the slightly more expensive Game Of The Year edition, I got home and began installing the DLC from the second disc. Later in the evening once everything was installed I began my journey into the Fallout universe.

Upon starting the game everything ran like expected, Tunnel Snakes, GOAT tests, Overseer , all that good stuff. Then, came time to exit the vault. Stepping into the bright blinding light of the wasteland with nothing but my vault security armor and a baseball bat, I was beyond excited to explore the Capitol Wastes. That lasted all about 15 seconds however. Taking roughly 10 steps from the door, I began to walk toward a tall black figure that stood just off to the right of the vault entrance. Immediately without haste I was greeted with a barge of fire flying towards me. That’s right, the very first enemy I encountered in Fallout was none other than an Enclave Hellfire Trooper. So here I am, level 1, never played before, wood baseball bat, and being repeatedly spawned in front of and killed by a Hellfire Trooper with a heavy incinerator. Fortunately after a dozen deaths and a few tears, I realized I had saved before I left the vault while figuring out the controls.

After loading a new save file and exiting the vault for a second time, I was able to leave in peace! Arriving in megaton I began the main quest of finding my dad. However once again my game wasn’t having it. After informing Lucas Simms about Mister Burke’s offer to blow up the town, I met the two at the saloon, as you do. Only before Burke shot Simms, Simms’ body vanished! Burke shot thin air and Lucas was nowhere to be found for the rest of the game…. alright… guess he’s dead then. Moving on. Exiting the building and coming to realize the day cycle exists, I began wandering aimlessly around Megaton unable to see a damn thing in the dark.

The run from hell wasn’t over there however, opting to help out Moira after the whole Mister Burke incident, I began to make my way down to Super Duper Mart. Now, while I was warned about the vast amount of Raiders that can be found there, what I was not warned about was a damn Deathclaw. Upon arriving to the parking lot I was greeted with the body of a wastelands being thrown about as the giant mutated monstrosity charged toward me. After several deaths, my level 2 ass had just about had enough. Finally having the sense to just turn around and run the opposite direction upon spawning, I opted to run down the map and AROUND Super Duper Mart, just far enough to not be noticed by the Deathclaw.

My plan was fool proof, until I began to get a little too close to the parking lot once again. Finding myself in [Caution] I slowly began to back away toward the bridge just south of the store before turning and running away in full sprint… well, Fallout 3’s equivalent to a “full sprint”. Sprinting right into a Mirelurk King. Keep in mind, I didn’t even know better than to try and engage it! So here I am running away from the Mirelurk King back TOWARDS the Deathclaw just praying one of them would target the other. Fortunately for me the Deathclaw wasn’t having it and decided to attack the king, providing me just enough time to get the fuck outta dodge.

After this, I promptly turned off my Xbox wondering if I had just wasted $40. It would take me about a month or two before I finally gave it a second chance with a new profile and a normal ass play through. Here I am 10+ years later still playing Fallout 3 and every other Fallout title 100 times over, yet I’ve never once experienced anything that has even come close to that first one.

I’d love to hear about your first and/or worst Fallout experience! Let me know if you’ve ever experienced anything like what I went through my first time around and be sure to check out more Fallout right here!

-Style

Fallout’s Cut Content

The Fallout series most interesting and mysterious cut content

The Fallout series has adapted, improved, and tested numerous new ideas and gameplay modifications over the years right in front of our eyes as the series progressed. However, there are still plenty of scrapped concepts and designs that we never got to experience first hand in post-apocalyptia. The following are just a few examples of interesting and mysterious cut content of the Fallout franchise we’ve been able to uncover.

Tenpenny Tower Radio

YouTube.com/ Ketaruz

Home to the “elite” of the Capital Wasteland, Tenpenny Tower is the brainchild of founder Allistair Tenpenny. The prewar hotel remains relatively untouched by the outside world and as such, the residents have taken up a prewar lifestyle to compliment that. Dressed head to toe in Casualwear and Parkstroller outfits, you can’t expect the residents of such a classy establishment to be subjected to the rough and rowdy sounds of Galaxy News Radio! Enter Tenpenny Tower Radio. A station seemingly cut for unknown reasons in the late stages of development, several audio files can still be pulled from Allistair Tenpenny’s file!

Vault 120

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Most likely to be an end result of completing Fallout 4’s cut quest, 20 Leagues Under the Sea, Vault 120 was to be located in the waters of The Commonwealth! Files and assets for this vault can still be found using the Fallout 4 Creation Kit as well as several unused scripts referencing the underwater vault. Furthermore, Vault 120 appears to have been tossed around as an idea for the wild wasteland of Appalachia in Fallout 76 as multiple unused cells can be found for Vault 120 that are not present in the files for Fallout 4. Don’t be surprised when the next Fallout title or even 76 DLC features this underwater mystery.

Catfish Mierlurk

Fallout.Fandom.com

Sticking to the underwater genre, there have been several references to a catfish like creature across multiple titles In the Fallout franchise. That being said there shouldn’t be any surprise the idea has been toyed with as to how it should be represented in game. The only official In game name given to the creature occurs in Fallout when a fisherman speaks of a “Giant Catfish” . However, Fallout 3’s concept art shows the idea for a mierlurk variant referred to as the “Catfish Mirelurk” a mutated bipedal fish with menacing teeth and barbs that very well could’ve been another obstacle for The Lone Wanderer. Yet another entry we are expecting to eventually see become canon.

Vault 65

Fallout.fandom.com

A vault cut from the final release of Fallout 76, Vault 65 contains numerous files depicting a large scale vault including several rooms, elevators, machinery, and crafting stations. Diving into the game files will find the vault also referred to as “Vault 75” which might have been an early prototype for Vault 76 or other larger scale vaults according to Fallout Wiki. Interestingly enough while this vault was cut and may not even have ever been intended for gameplay, a Vault 65 trunk does exist alongside the other canon vault numbered containers.

Vault 11 Survivor

Fallout.Fandom.com

Naturally, a game built around the idea of surviving nuclear annihilation via underground vaults is going to have plenty of vault related content that doesn’t make it off the cutting room floor. With that said, we tack on our third vault related entry to the list. Located in the barren wastes of the Mohave, Vault 11 played host to one of Vault-Tec’s darkest social experiments. For those not familiar, residents of the vault were told each year one member of their community must be scarified in order for the rest of them to be able to sustainably survive, failure to do so would result in all dwellers death. In reality, Vault-Tec had a prepared message once the residents refused to do so explaining they are a true beacon of humanity and as a reward for not killing one another would be granted access to the vault door. Unfortunately the dwellers found this out much too late, with only 5 remaining survivors. The final five are said to have gone insane form the realization of that they had done resulting in eventual suicide or homicide of all the remaining member except for one. This one remaining member was originally meant to be able to be discovered in game with game files containing a character model able to be spawned via console commands. However, unlike the previous entries, while the NPC itself was removed, this character as a concept is still canon thanks to the Holotapes able to be collected in Vault 11.

Mister Burke

DiviantArt.com/ Vincent-Is-Mine

Now I know what you’re thinking, “Mr.Burke? One of the primary characters in Fallout 3? Someone who is directly involved in one of the largest choices the player can make in game?” Yes. While the majority of us who have played through Fallout 3 are faced early on with the option to either save or destroy the town of Megaton courtesy of Mister Burke, players who revived the Japanese version of the game did not! The Japanese release of Fallout 3 featured the removal of Mister Burke and with him the players ability to revive the detonation device, meaning destroying Megaton wasn’t even an option! While this was removed for “Cultural Reasons” and understandably so, it just seems odd to play through the events of Fallout 3 without one of the biggest choices the character has to make, as well as seemingly removing much of the appeal of Tenpenny tower.

These are just a handful of the mysteriously interesting cut content found within the Fallout series. As always, we’d love to hear your favorite content that never got the chance to make it to release day! Let us know in the comments down below, and check out more Fallout related content right here!

-Style

“Fallout Wiki.” Fandom, fallout.fandom.com/wiki/Fallout_

“Fallout 3 Concept Art.” Neoseeker, http://www.neoseeker.com/fallout-3/concept_art/.

Best Video Games To Play Alone

When none of your friends are awake and online, you get a feeling of loneliness and isolation that can’t be put into words. When working night shifts, you would tend to find yourself in this situation every weekend. A way to cope with this feeling is to play these certain video games alone. This is a short list of what I came up with.

Assassin’s Creed

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With captivating environments and addicting combat, the Assassin’s Creed saga is always a go-to when nobody else is around to join your party or call. The 4th installment of the series, “Black Flag” is a fan favorite around the world for the unique environment and entertaining free-roam mechanics. Also…SHANTIES!

Firewatch

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This 2016 Campo Santo indie release is a game like no other. Though the main story is short lasting around 4-5 hours, this open-world is a visual masterpiece for anybody looking to just relax and feel free and isolated from anybody else.

Grand Theft Auto

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The king of all Rockstar games and a fan favorite all around, any game from the GTA series has hours upon hours of open-world fun for anybody mature enough to play it. Just don’t be that guy that goes into online and ruins everybody’s fun by constantly killing them.

Classic Halo Trilogy

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Ah…The great feeling of nostalgia. Whether you were 8 the first time you heard about these games or 18, playing it today gives almost anybody joy. Going back on the old times and remembering all of the fun memories that you had with your friends in custom games and multiplayer. There’s no other feeling.

The Fallout Series

gamespot.com

Of course Bethesda would be on here. While I could have put Skyrim as this entry, due to biased and personal experiences with friends, the Fallout series has one of the greatest communities in gaming history. The entrancing post-apocalyptic world has hundreds of hours of pure entertainment and fun experiences. Whether you started out playing the classic trilogy or began in the latest installment, this series is like no other.

The Metro Series

mobygames.com

There seems to be a trend with post-apocalyptic video games and single-player enjoyment. The incredible immersion in the Metro series is often regarded as the best for any survival-horror game ever made. The desolate environment and the intriguing characters will have you hooked for a very long time.

Minecraft

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This wouldn’t be a game list without Minecraft. Minecraft appeals to all ages and its thousands of mods offer years of playing experience and enjoyment. If you believe that there is nobody that wants to play video games with you, hop into a random server and meet new friends. You never know, they might become lifelong.

The Last of Us

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Do you want to play one of the most graphically impressive and immersive video games of the modern world? Well look no further than The Last of Us series. There has been great controversy over the story-telling of the most recent release, but if you’re like me and play video games casually and not like a neckbeard, you will enjoy every moment of The Last of Us.

-Evan “Pige”

Best Ways To Trash Talk In Video Games

The new era of trash talking is here. It all started in the golden days of Halo 3 and Call of Duty. But now that the new era of video games is here, there are new ways that people have discovered to trash talk. This list is to show you how to win every single psychological battle with the other player(s).

5.) Ear Rape

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The classic ear rape has been one of the most commonly used methods of trash talking in gaming history. “They can’t trash talk if they can’t hear themselves.” Is the philosophy behind this method. It is quite effective towards people that are clearly trying to shit talk your K/D. It is even more effective if you have an entire team use this strategy for the brief few seconds in between rounds. It does critical damage at all times but is mainly used during evening gaming.

4.) Playing Music On Your Phone

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Test out your enemies music taste by blaring your favorite rap or country song into your headset. This tactic is highly effective in getting muted by your targets. When you get muted, that shows that you have shown dominance over your enemies and they are too scared to battle with you. This tactic is highly effective against grown men that can’t take a joke, which is over half of the whole gaming community.

3.) Gamertag

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People that have way too many numbers or X’s in their names are naturally bound to be more toxic or sweaty than others. So, the best way to approach and strike these players is to either trash talk their beloved name or come up with your own ridiculous name and become the thing you sought out to destroy. There are not many things that are more infuriating than getting killed by xXx_No0bK1llR_XxX repeatedly. So the solution is to destroy their self esteem by striking their creativity and decision making skills, or lack there of.

2.) Being On The Bottom Of The Team

blog.miniclip.com

When you are doing poorly in a match, there is nothing more entertaining than to trash talk the top player on the other team. This move is highly effective and predictable. When using this move, the person being trash-talked will always reply with the same argument that you gave, making him unoriginal and inferior to your supreme wits. This is a move that trumps many other strategies and destroys your enemies psychologically.

Honorable Mention.) Racism

oldpolitical.com

The most commonly used way to aggravate anybody on the other team is to be highly racist toward them. People that were alive to be a part of the roaring modern racism movement of the late 2000s video games have grown to be immune to this method. But despite recent events in the world, this method has returned and is highly effective towards people that are clearly better than you at video games.

1.) Ole Reliable

harmonica.com

The rarest and most effective method of trash talking is by using Ole Reliable. The least expected and most ear-pain inducing instrument when blared into a mic is the best method of demoralizing your opponents. This method is even more effective when more than one harmonica is being used. Completely throwing your enemies off-guard, this method almost always guarantees a win for your team.

-MiztaPige