Fallout Series Timeline Adds Up, Says Todd Howard | Push Square

19.04.2024 - 05:32 / pushsquare.com / Todd Howard / Jonathan Nolan / Graham Wagner

The release of Amazon's adaptation of Fallout has sparked a resurgence in the series and increased focus on the alt-history that binds it all together. Some fans recently raised concerns that events in the TV show seemingly retconned the events of the black sheep of the Fallout family, New Vegas, developed by Obsidian Entertainment. Vague spoilers for New Vegas and Amazon's show to follow!

Bethesda Game Studios director Todd Howard and Fallout TV executive producer Jonathan Nolan sat with IGN to hash out the timeline. According to Howard, showrunners Graham Wagner and Geneva Robertson-Dworet shocked him with the idea of nuking Shady Sands, the capital of the New California Republic, shortly after the events of New Vegas. Howard eventually came around to the idea: «We talked through it, and it was, 'This would be a pretty impactful story moment that a lot of things anchor on.»

It sounds like they had to cut things quite finely to make everything work, but according to Howard, the Fallout timeline remains sacrosanct: «We're careful about the timeline. There might be a little bit of confusion in some places. But everything that happened in the previous games, including New Vegas, happened. We're very careful about that. All I can say is we're threading it tighter there, but the bombs fall just after the events of New Vegas.»

The black sheep of the Fallout family left out in the cold

What do you think? Does that pass muster? It's not like it ultimately affects the quality of games in the series or the show itself, but we're at least glad to see it's considered at the highest levels. Let us know what you think in the comments section below.

Khayl Adam is Push Square's Australian correspondent, a reporter tasked with scouring the internet for the most succulent PlayStation stories. With five years of experience as a freelance journalist and mercenary wordsmith, RPGs are his first great love, but strategy and tactics games are a close second, genres in which he is only too happy to specialize.

That's good to know… but i still hate the story told in the show wasn't on a fallout 5 instead. It has major revelations for the whole series and many won't even know about them.
Like… why were the bombs dropped? Who dropped them and why?
These are very core pieces of story for the franchise and to see them dropped in a tv show is sad.

Glad someone put these nerds in their place

New Vegas a black sheep? It's the best game, the closest to the spirit of the original Fallout, with all the modern bells and whistles. Bethesda is the black sheep. Fallout IP is like Star Wars. It's dead, sold to a corporate entertainment company. They can generate all the content they want, it's a dull shell.

'They' nuked Shady Sands?! WTF?