Fallout 2

Fallout 2
Developer(s)	Black Isle Studios
Publisher(s)	Interplay Entertainment
Designer(s)	Feargus Urquhart
Series	Fallout series
Engine	Fallout engine
Platform(s)	Microsoft Windows, Macintosh
Release	September 30, 1998
Genre(s)	Post-apocalyptic RPG
Mode(s)	Single player

Fallout 2 is a critically-acclaimed computer role-playing game published by Interplay in 1998. The second game takes place 80 years after the first Fallout, in 2241. It tells the story of the original hero's descendant and his or her quest to save their primitive tribe from starvation by finding an ancient environmental restoration machine known as the "Garden of Eden Creation Kit," or GECK. Although featuring an almost completely new game world, stories, and adventures that are several times larger than its predecessor, the game mechanics from Fallout remain practically unchanged.

Gameplay

Character Attributes

Further information: SPECIAL System

Attributes

Fallout 2, like its predecessor, uses a character creation system called SPECIAL. SPECIAL is an acronym and initialism of Strength, Perception, Endurance, Charisma, Intelligence, Agility, and Luck. These are the seven basic attributes of every character in the game. They are used to determine the skills and perks of the given character.

Skills

There are 18 different skills in the game. They are ranked from 0% to 300%. The starting values for those skills at Level 1 are determined by the player's 7 basic attributes, but most of those skill would fall between 0% and 50%. Every time the player gains a level, he will be awarded skill points to be used to improve his skills, equal to 5 points + twice his Intelligence. The player may choose to "Tag" 3 of the 18 skills. A tagged skill will improve at twice the normal rate.

• 6 combat skills: Small Guns, Big Guns, Energy Weapons, Unarmed, Melee Weapons, Throwing.
• 8 active skills: First Aid, Doctor, Sneak, Lockpick, Steal, Traps, Science, Repair.
• 4 passive skills: Speech, Barter, Gambling, Outdoorsman.

Books found throughout the gameworld can also improve some of those skills permanently, although books are scarce early in the game. However, after a skill reaches a certain level, books no longer have any impact. Some NPCs can also improve Skills via training. How high a Skill can be developed is affected by the character's Attributes - a character with a low Intelligence will not be able to boost their Science rating as high as a character with high Intelligence, for example.

Some skills can also be improved while having certain items equipped. (E.g. equipping a lock pick would improve lock picking skills.) Stimulants can also temporarily boost player's skills; however, they often have adverse effects such as addiction and withdrawal. As Skills grow higher in rating, they begin to cost more Skill Points to increase.

Traits and Perks

At character creation, the player may choose 2 optional traits for his character. Traits are special character background. Most traits have profound effects on gameplay. A trait normally contains one beneficial effect and one detrimental effect. They are listed under perks in the character sheet. Once a Trait is chosen, it is impossible to change, except by using the "Mutate" Perk that lets them change 1 Trait, 1 time.

Perks in the game are special elements of the level up system. Every 3 levels (or every 4 if the player chose the "Skilled" Trait), the player is granted a perk of his choosing. Perks grant special effects, most of which are not obtainable via normal level up in the game, such as letting the player have more actions per round. Unlike traits, Perks are purely beneficial - they are offset only by the infrequency of acquiring them.

Changes from Fallout 1

Fallout 2 featured a much wider array of items, weapons and armor from Fallout 1. Most of the items from Fallout 1 returned, but had alternate and upgraded forms: the minigun, for example, is now joined by the Avenger and Vindicator miniguns. Item prices were also increased at stores, making scavenging for items more important. In addition to old, upgraded weapons, several new weapons were introduced for all branches of combat, thus making no one combat skill the best, and allowing the player to be powerful with any firearm. The range of enemies was also increased to a wider diversity. The end result is a much more complex combat environment.

Skills start off at a lower rate than the first game, and the various skills are also more important. Previously, skills like Unarmed, Doctor and Traps were used sparingly, but now, all skills are useful to a degree. The maximum level of a Skill was increased from 200 to 300. The Unarmed skill in particular was made much more sophisticated by adding different types of Punches and Kicks depending on the player's Attributes and skill level. Several new Perks were added while most others were retained, allowing a greater degree of customization.

Karma is accompanied by Reputation, and while Karma affects the player on a whole, Reputation affect how the player is received in a single town. While Karma is achieved by doing good things and killing monsters, Reputation grows based on how the player helps the city, usually by completing subquests. By nature, Reputation and Karma tend to grow parallel to each other. As in Fallout 1, good/evil characters react differently to players with different Karma. Also, the player can acquire certain titles (Gigolo, Made Man, Slaver) based on their actions that also affect the game and how others react to them.

Recruitable NPCs were very simplistic in the first game, and the only extent of control the player has over them is controlling what weapons they use and telling them to stay at a certain distance. In Fallout 2, team NPC control became much more sophisticated, with them being able to level up, equip armor and be issured orders before combat ranging from when to run away to when to heal themselves. The NPCs also possessed distinct personalities and characteristics, similar to previous games. The recruiting process has also been made more complex, with NPCs refusing to join the player if he has negative Karma or before a certain quest has been completed. Finally, there is a limit to the number of NPCs a player can recruit, as well as a larger amount to recruit (over a dozen).

In the original Fallout, subquests in the towns and cities were usually solved within that in their entirety city, with only a few subquests requiring the player to travel. The cities, fairly isolated except for caravans, were concerned with their own problems. In Fallout 2, however, the cities have a great deal on contact with each other, and with the sole exception of Klamath, actions in one city will affect the state of another, and subquests will often require the player to go back and forth from location to location to kill enemies and deliver messages and items.

The game's overall theme matter was more R-rated, with drugs and prostitution becoming major elements of the setting and the drug "Jet" is one of major subplots. Profanities are also encountered more often. During the course of the game, players can join the Mafia, become a porn star, get married and subsequently divorced, and nearly every town in the game features some sort of prostitute that can be slept with. Slavery also becomes an important subplot, and players can either side with the Slavers or join their opponents that try to stamp slavery out. NPCs can be bought and sold as slaves during the course of the game.

Also, a speedrun is much more difficult than in Fallout 1. In Fallout 1, players could go straight to the Military Base, destroy it, then travel to the Cathedral and do the same. In Fallout 2, the final base cannot be accessed until a computer part from Vault 13 is found, and Vault 13 in turn cannot be found until one of two quests have been completed, thus requiring a great deal of fighting that makes doing these tasks difficult for a starting character. Also, while they can recruit allies for the battle, there is no way to avoid the final boss battle in Fallout 2, again, encouraging combat and making a speedrun difficult. In spite of these factors, the game was completed in 17:51 on a video posted on the Speed Demos Archive website.

Plot

Setting

At the end of original Fallout, the hero Vault Dweller was exiled by the Vault Overseer for his prolonged exposure to the outside world. Unable to return home, the Vault Dweller with a group of willing companions traveled far north. Eventually they started their own tribal village called Arroyo in what is modern day Oregon. Decades have passed since the original Fallout, and the Vault Dweller has died.

In the time since the Vault Dweller's exile, a new government known as the New California Republic (abbreviated NCR) has begun to unify the southern towns and is spreading to the north. A mysterious new organization known as the Enclave has emerged with the most sophisticated technology in the wastes, even surpassing the Brotherhood of Steel. And a new drug, Jet, has become a cancer on many towns with a nearly 100% addiction rate, forcing many to rely the town of New Reno to keep them supplied.

Story

During 2241, Arroyo suffered the worst drought on record. Faced with the difficulty, the village elders asked the direct descendant of the Vault Dweller, referred to as the Chosen One, to perform the quest of retrieving a Garden of Eden Creation Kit (GECK) for Arroyo. The GECK is a device that can create thriving communities out of the post-apocalyptic wasteland.

The player, assuming the role of the Chosen One, is given nothing more than the Vault Dweller's jumpsuit, a RobCo PIPBoy 2000 handheld device, a Vault 13 water flask, and some cash to start on his mission. Template:Spoilers The player eventually finds Vault 13 (the first place possible to obtain a GECK) devoid of the majority of its former human inhabitants. The Chosen One returns to find his village captured by the remnants of the United States government known as "The Enclave". The player, through variety of means, activates an ancient oil tanker and its autopilot, thus allowing him to reach the Enclave's main base on an offshore oilrig.

It is revealed that the dwellers of Vault 13 were captured as well, to be used as test subjects for FEV (Forced Evolutionary Virus). Vault 13 was supposed to be closed for 200 years as part of an Enclave experiment, this makes them perfect test subjects. The Enclave modified the Forced Evolutionary Virus into an airborne disease, designed to attack any living creatures with mutated DNA. With all genetic impurities removed, the Enclave (who remain protected from radiation) could take over. The player frees both his village (Arroyo) and the Vault 13 dwellers from Enclave control, and destroys the Enclave's oilrig. In the ending, the inhabitants of Vault 13 and Arroyo villagers create a new prosperous community with the help of the GECK. Template:Endspoilers

Characteristics

The fact that in both Fallout and Fallout 2 player characters are raised in an isolated community works with the plot structure, allowing the character to be as ignorant about the game world as the player would be and explaining why the map the character starts with is almost completely unexplored.

Recruitable Characters

Like the original Fallout, there are numerous NPCs (non-player characters) in Fallout 2 that the player can recruit to assist in his or her quest. Unlike the original Fallout, these characters are more customizable in combat AI and equipment. These characters can level up as the player gains more experience. Additionally, these NPCs have skills, such as repair and doctoring, which would come into play if the player is lacking in such skills. The appearance of the recruitable NPCs (except for their weapons) are at their default in-game visuals despite being issued different suits of armor and instructed to wear them.

The number of party members the player can recruit is based on the player character's charisma statistics. Most recruits also have personal preferences or qualifications for the player. The majority of the recruits require the player to have good karma standing and to have not committed atrocious acts such as becoming a slaver. Template:Spoiler-blank

Name	Race	Location	Skills	Notes
Vic	Human	The Den	Repair, energy weapons, small guns (pistols and rifles)	A trader whom the village elder instructed the player to find at the beginning of the game and is a vital link in the discovery of the GECK. He can join the player's group as soon as his radio is fixed and his debts repaid, or if the player eliminates Metzger, his captor.
Sulik	Human	Klamath	Melee weapons, small guns (SMGs)	A tribal human who's village was decimated, and seeks his sister who he hopes survived. He will be willing to join player's party if the player repays his debt. He is the first NPC the player may recruit.
Cassidy	Human	Vault City	Small guns (pistols and rifles), unarmed, energy weapons, and melee weapons	A bartender, who is sick of Vault City, but lives there because they have the best healthcare in the area. This can be further attested to the fact that in certain random dialogues, he hopes that his 'heart will not act up' while travelling, and using any stimulating drugs will cause his heart to collapse.
Myron	Human	New Reno (the Stables)	Science	A brilliant young scientist who is employed by the Mordino family for chemical research but feels they are not treating him properly. He is the boy who created the drug "Jet", and is highly arrogant.
Lenny	Ghoul	Gecko	Doctor	A Necropolis survivor, Lenny is the medical doctor for the Gecko shantytown and would gladly follow a descendant of the Vault Dweller. He is possibly the oldest, or at least one of the oldest, characters in the game, so old he lived before the Great War (World War III).
Marcus	Supermutant	Broken Hills	Big guns, (large) energy weapons	The sheriff of Broken Hills who was a member of The Master's army until he befriended the Brotherhood of Steel. The player has to solve some quests in Broken Hills before Marcus consents to join the party.
Goris	Deathclaw	Vault 13	Unarmed	A deathclaw and a scholar from Vault 13 who wants to experience and learn more about the world by travelling with the player
SkyNet	Robot	Sierra Army Depot	Depends on brain	Asked for assistance by an AI in Sierra Army Depot, the player would have to find a robot chassis and a compatible brain for the entity to occupy. The quality of the brain depended directly on the player's Science skill, with the most desirable one, hardest to obtain, being the cybernetic brain. SkyNet as a robobrain bot is highly skilled with rifles, but cannot wear armor of any kind.
K-9	Robot dog	Navarro	Unarmed	A robot dog belonging to a malevolent Enclave scientist Dr. Schroeber, who removed his motivator. He possesses exceptionally strong ethical programming.
Cyberdog	Robot dog	New California Republic	Unarmed	A gift from a scientist in NCR after completing his quest
Dogmeat	Dog	Cafe of Broken Dreams	Unarmed	A surviving teammate of the Vault Dweller, this mixbreed canine will join the Chosen One if he shows his Vault 13 jumpsuit.
Miria	Human	Modoc	Unarmed	Grisham's daughter; if the Chosen One (regardless of gender) has sex with her, she will join the party via a shotgun wedding. Unlike normal characters, a spouse does not improve with experience, and will not leave the party short of death or divorce.
Davin	Human	Modoc	Unarmed	Grisham's son; if the Chosen One (regardless of gender) has sex with him, he will join the party via a shotgun wedding. Unlike normal characters, a spouse does not improve with experience, and will not leave the party short of death or divorce.

Cultural References

Places

Fallout 2 takes place in what is modern day Northern California, Southern Oregon, and Nevada. Several locations in Fallout 2 are based on modern day cities. They include Klamath Falls, Modoc, Redding, Reno, and San Francisco.

Other town names are often derived from real-world references.

• Arroyo, player-character’s home village, could be named for any number of different locations ranging from parts of Arizona, to different areas of Mexico.
• Broken Hills, a uranium mining town in the game is a reference to the town of Broken Hill in Australia where Mad Max 2: The Road Warrior was filmed, though the photograph that appears when the character arrives there resembles the ghost town of Broken Hills, Nevada.
• New California Republic is the new name of the original Fallout town, Shady Sands. It is named after the California Republic.

People and Culture

There are other cultural references, typically in the form of dialogue which occur throughout the game. Some examples are more overt than others.

• While travelling, random encounters may force the player to fight (or run from) enemies such as parties of Yakuza, bounty hunters, mutant scorpions, etc.; . More rare is the occurrence of Special Encounters, many of which include references to other fiction, including a crashed Star Trek shuttlecraft and its late crew, clad in red and blue shirts and equipped with Hypos, the pop-quizzing, robe wearing Bridge Keeper from Monty Python and the Holy Grail, a 'Tin Woodsman' (a man in Power Armor), rusted motionless, pleading for an "Oil can!" and a technician Dorothy in NCR where a robot dog can be obtained (both of course, The Wizard of Oz). Arthurian Knights also appear, albeit clad and armed in the more indigenous garb and weaponry of Power Armor and Chainguns, and found on one deserted spot of ground are what remains, after their precipitous descent, of the sperm whale and a Bowl of Petunias that materialized high in the atmosphere in The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. Special encounters are only jokes and not considered canon.
• The primary objective of Fallout 1 was to find a replacement for a malfunctioning, and vital, computer component called a 'water chip' for Vault 13. Good evidence for the power of interactive games as engaging fiction can be found in the reaction of players of Fallout 2 when they find, in Vault 8, a thousandfold redundancy of water chips, and computer evidence of the shipping mistake that prevented them from reaching Vault 13. This creates two ironies in that first, Vault 13 is deprived of water chips, triggering the first game, and second, with Vault 8 not receiving their second G.E.C.K., the Chosen One cannot acquire one as easily as they would hope.
• Special Encounter: A portal similar to that found in the Guardian of Forever episode of Star Trek. If the player enters it, he is transported to a small section of Vault 13, uninhabited and devoid of any interactibles but for a single computer. Accessing it, a warning message is given that a 'water chip' has malfunctioned; a predestination paradox.*
• In the town of Klamath, the player can be taught boxing by a man named John Sullivan, referring to the infamous bare knuckle boxing champion, John Lawrence Sullivan.
• Metzger (no first name) is a slaver in The Den, south of Klamath. Tom Metzger is the leader of the White Aryan Resistance. Metzger is also a reference to the German word, meaning "butcher". When player enters his house, one of Metzger's employees says "Ahh, fresh meat!", referring to The Butcher from Diablo.
• The NPC and potential party member Vic, a trader, is probably named after Victor Jules Bergeron, Jr. who founded the Polynesian-themed restaurant chain named after his nickname, Trader Vic.
• The robot dog NPC and potential party member K-9 is a reference to the robot dog K-9 from the TV series Doctor Who.
• In a random dialogue initiated by the NPC and potential party member Cassidy, he mentions that his father named him after a character from a comic book. His name alludes to Proinsias Cassidy, the Irish vampire from the comic book Preacher. Also, during battle, Cassidy can say "I wish I had a Limit Break." This is a reference to a game mechanic in the popular RPG series Final Fantasy.
• There are two extremely mutated mice in Fallout 2. One of them is a pinkish flesh colored, giant, hairless rat named King Rat, another is an arguably more normal mutated giant rat named "Brain". Brain hides in the city of Gecko and is planning world domination. This is a reference to the Pinky and the Brain cartoon series.
• A NPC (Non Player Character) found in the town of Gecko named "Gordon of Gecko", reference to Gordon Gekko. The player can undertake a quest from him, and the dialogue leading up to this paraphrases Gordon Gekko’s "Greed is Good" speech from the film Wall Street.
• In the mining town of Redding, the protagonist (player character) may bring to justice, for his crime of assaulting a prostitute, Obidiah Hakeswill. This character is a reference to Sergeant Hakeswill in the Sharpe series of historical fiction books. His comments about nobody insulting his mother and being unable to die are references to the character in the book.
• A Redding mine operator: "Dangerous Dan McGrew" - the victim in Robert Service's well-known poem "The Shooting of Dan McGrew". The name also was Arnold Rimmer's alias in the Western AI game featured in the Red Dwarf episode "Gunmen of the Apocalypse".
• The other, competing mine in Redding is run by a character named "Marge LeBarge"; a reference to another Robert Service poem, The Cremation of Sam McGee, which is set primarily on the marge of Lake Lebarge.
• When entering the town of Redding, one of the musical selections that play whenever a town is entered is drawn from the TV miniseries The Stand--specifically, a track titled "Project Blue."
• There are recurring posters of Maynard James Keenan of the band Tool. They were taken from the liner notes of their album, Undertow, and appear in almost every town/city in the game.
• In New Reno on poster on the wall of the Shark Club (the first right from the entrance) is from the Japanese BDSM themed movie Tokyo Decadence.
• On the first level of the Military Base, the player finds a super mutant named Grundel, a reference to Grendel from the epic Beowulf.
• H.R. Giger, whose artwork was subsequently developed into the monster of the Alien film series, is surely among the most referenced of modern science fiction artists. Warhammer 40K and Starcraft are notable examples of games that have drawn on the look of his creatures, for their monsters. The Alien monsters north of San Francisco, and their kindred, named Wanamingos, for the mine in Redding they inhabit, are Fallout's homage to this timeless sci-fi creation.
• The Hubologists of San Fransisco in Fallout 2 are visited by guest speakers named Juan Cruz and Vikki Goldman, perhaps meant as references to real life Scientologists Tom Cruise and his ex-wife Nicole Kidman. A datadisk outlines the Hubologists view of the afterlife. Parallels might be drawn to Scientology. The name 'Hubologists', and their founder 'Dick Hub', is likely a reference to L. Ron Hubbard, the founder of Scientology.
• The NPC and potential party member Skynet computer in the abandoned Sierra Army Depot is a reference to Skynet from the Terminator movies.
• In Klamath, the player encounters a robot near a fallen helicopter. During combat the robot says "I'm sorry, Dave"; a reference to HAL from 2001: A Space Odyssey (film).
• In a holodisk the player can read the following text: "Memo: Word List. From: Vice-President Daniel Bird. To: Me. Subject: My Word List Difficult Words: Potato. Tomato...Change To: Potatoe. Tomatoe...". That's a reference to former Vice President of the United States Dan Quayle.
• In the town San Fransisco, the player encounters Lo Pan and The Dragon. Lo Pan was the villain in John Carpenter's Big Trouble in Little China. The Dragon is a reference to Bruce Lee.

Items

Many of the in-game items and weapons and other entities that the player encounters are based on real-life objects.

• "Nuka Cola" is a blue cola in a coke bottle in the game, a reference to Coca Cola.
• "Mentats", a drug in the series that temporary raises your intelligence, is named after the human computers Mentat in the Dune universe.
• A major subplot in the game involves "Jet", a highly addictive drug created by a New Reno crime family to take control of Redding by addicting the miners there. On a larger scale, many towns are scourged by Jet as the only way to defeat the addication is to go cold turkey, causing severe withdrawal. Eventually, players with a high Science skill can spark a joint effort with Vault City and Redding to develop a cure: however, this is entirely optional.
• There are many other fictional drugs in the Fallout series, including Stim-Packs, which are loosely based on modern battlefield medications. In Fallout, they are supposed to have been produced in vast quantities before the game's nuclear war, and are used as a game device, as the healing side of the damage/healing game mechanic. In Starcraft, Stims are used by Space Marines for an attack and movement speed increase.
• The Red Ryder BB Gun makes an appearance in both series of Fallout. This reference is inherited from the classic computer game Wasteland, on which the Fallout series is loosely based. In turn, Wasteland was referencing the movie A Christmas Story. In the movie, the main character wants nothing more for Christmas than a Red Ryder BB gun.
• In the ghoul town of Gecko, the barkeeper at the pub teaches the player a collectible card game called Tragic: The Garnering, a parody of Magic: The Gathering. Several of the cards he mentions have parallels.
• The Chrysalis Highwayman is modeled after a gas turbine engine series of cars that Chrysler produced starting in the 1950s.
• After beating the game, if the player visits the priest in New Reno, the priest will give the player the Fallout 2 Hintbook. This item gives the player massive amounts of experience, sets all the player's skills at their maximum levels, and can be used as often as the player wants. The book is ironically labeled with the text, "Well, THIS would have been good to have at the beginning of the goddamn game." This item is a reference to the official Fallout 2 strategy guide.
• You can find several Cheesy Poofs boxes throughout the game, a reference to the fictional snack on the cartoon South Park.
• TV Dinner items are described as "not edible, and you're not sure it ever was", an obvious jab at TV dinners.

Trivia

• The song that plays during the intro sequence is Louis Armstrong's "A Kiss to Build a Dream On". The Fallout intro song "Maybe" reappears in the sequel, being sung by a minor character as floating text.
• Holding Shift and clicking the Credits button in the beginning game menu brings up a series of humorous/lewd comments by members of the Interplay team that developed the Fallout games.
• "War. War never changes" is the famous phrase uttered in the intro by Ron Perlman. The phrase is one of the foremost iconic catch-phrases of the game.
• Breakcore composer Venetian Snares used a dialogue sample from the game on his album Doll Doll Doll, specifically on the track "Befriend a Child Killer".
• The music playing when you enter the town of Redding changes, but one track you will hear comes from the soundtrack to the TV miniseries The Stand from the book by Stephen King, which was about a world devastated not by nuclear war, but by a supercharged version of the flu. The name of the track is titled, "Project Blue," and it played at the beginning of the miniseries. The artist's name is W.G. Snuffy Walden.
• On several buildings in towns, you can see posters depicting an angry man's face with his mouth open. This is an image of Maynard James Keenan of the band Tool from the liner notes of their 1994 album, "Undertow".
• In New Reno Jungle Gym,the boxing names that you can give your character are references to several fictional boxers such as Glass Joe,Piston Hurricane(name is in 2 separate parts) and Raging Bull(reference to the Martin Scorcese movie and Punch-Out).

External links

Official

• Fallout 2 Product Help - Interplay Self Help
  • Fallout 2 Hints and Cheats - Interplay Self Help
• Mirrors of the original Fallout 2 website: NMA Internet Archive

Others

• The Vault, A Fallout wiki
• Fallout 2 at MobyGames