Fallout's original creators say that Fallout 3 and 4 aren't quite what they would've done, but 'sales say people love what they did'

Fallout 76 - a player in a vault suit gives a thumbs up

(Image credit: Bethesda Game Studios)

It might be an unpopular thing to observe—please do not throw tomatoes at me—but whether you like it or not, Bethesda has spun a huge success out of the Fallout franchise, even while shuffling further and further away from its classic RPG roots. Ow, ouch! I asked you nicely to not throw tomatoes at me! I'm on your side!

I genuinely am not a fan of Bethesda's light-handed approach to RPG mechanics—the pre-voiced player character of Fallout 4, for instance, has me almost entirely disinterested in playing it despite the fact it's gathering dust in my library. But Bethesda's made a bajillion dollars and has a hit TV series so, like, what do I know?

That's a sentiment echoed in Game Informer's recent mega-interview, wherein the publication speaks with… well, just about everybody involved in Fallout, including its past iterations, the current TV show, and more recent games. This includes Tim Cain and Leonard Boyarsky, the two masterminds credited with the creation of the Fallout franchise writ large before it passed into Todd Howard's chess-piece callused hands.

Cain tells the publication that, overall, "I like what [Bethesda] has done." However, "it's not what I would have done. I know Leonard and I especially, we talk about these things a lot. We would have gone in a different direction, but obviously, sales say people love what they did, and I'm looking at my glass cabinet full of Fallout goodies, some of which are from 1 and 2, and some of which are from 3 and 4. So…"

It is hard to argue with the merch you've got on your literal shelf, this is very true. Boyarsky echoes that he also liked Fallout 3 and 4: "I liked both of them. I felt like where they were going with some of the art stuff was really cool in Fallout 4. I thought Fallout 3 was really good for what it was looks-wise, but it did have a little bit of that green overcast thing, and I feel like it wasn't as crisp as I might have wanted it to be, but this is hindsight talking.

"But I think Fallout 3, for me, was much closer to what we would have done with it in terms of RPG-ness, as opposed to something like Fallout 4, where they moved away from it a bit." It's interesting to hear that the third game was a happy medium—which makes sense. As much as I love a crunchy RPG, going full isometric grit probably isn't that popular anymore.

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Harvey's history with games started when he first begged his parents for a World of Warcraft subscription aged 12, though he's since been cursed with Final Fantasy 14-brain and a huge crush on G'raha Tia. He made his start as a freelancer, writing for websites like Techradar, The Escapist, Dicebreaker, The Gamer, Into the Spine—and of course, PC Gamer. He'll sink his teeth into anything that looks interesting, though he has a soft spot for RPGs, soulslikes, roguelikes, deckbuilders, MMOs, and weird indie titles. He also plays a shelf load of TTRPGs in his offline time. Don't ask him what his favourite system is, he has too many.

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