I doubt anyone is really surprised about what is currently transpiring within the Fallout brand following the success of the Amazon show. I mean it's just the way of things, right? A half-dormant brand is unveiled upon a brand new audience and everyone flocks to the source material hungry for more, exactly what happened after the Netflix Witcher show's first season, exactly what happened after Cyberpunk Edgerunners, exactly what happened after The Last of Us. (I wonder if 'Arcane' had the same effect, considering how narratively lacking that franchises' source material is?) Of course, this means that the old games are selling like hotcakes on hotcake appreciation day in the middle of Williamsburg Virginia- the Pancake capital of the world. (Hotcakes are Pancakes apparently, who knew?) And with that comes a thrist for a new Bethesda first person shooter game to fill the void that has been in our hearts since 2015- yes, I know what I said.
Of course that is a little bit of problem given the fact that Bethesda's next title is going to be The Elder Scrolls Six- (Not a problem for me, baby! I LOVE Elder Scrolls!) which means people are going to have to gorge themselves silly on what's already out there. Luckily considering the Fallout franchise has been going strong for decades at this point- that isn't exactly an 'exhausting well' of content by any stretch of the imagination. The Classic Fallout 1, the empire building Fallout 2, the reimagination of Fallout 3, the sheer majesty of New Vegas, the modern gameplay of Fallout 4 and the ongoing meandering of 76 is enough to drive any new fan drunk on the brand before they ever get to the stage of withdrawals the rest of us are at. But what about existing fans? What do they have to look forward to?
Well Fallout 4 is on the verge of getting it's biggest mod ever, a total conversion of the base game to fit the locales of London derived totally from scratch by the hands of countless talented artists, landscapers and programmers. Fallout London is one of those projects you hear about being worked on and promptly forget about, reasoning such a grand idea would never make it to market. But London turned out to be one of those rare few that actually sucked in a crowd of the interested and the driven to take over the project with actual potential once the 'dreamers' vacated their infant idea. Right now we're sitting on the verge of Fallout London's launch, as long as Bethesda don't screw up Fallout 4 too badly with their next gen launch, because we're all currently crossing our fingers praying their isn't a new FormID for mods about to drop. (Just love how Bethesda frankly refuse to warn us about this stuff until it happens. Real nice of them.)
But there's only so far that fans can go to keep the Fallout franchise churning with new stuff to do. And I'm sure there are a lot of modders now interested in making some Fallout stuff- even I actually want to try my hand at Creation Kit coding, which I've never done before but given my new hobbyist programming stuff I figure I might be able to make something cool with a little bit of imagination- what the average layman wants is a new product. Most people don't know how to Mod and are afraid of trying it out. Understandably. So how do we bridge the divide of new content for Fallout despite the fact Fallout 5 is probably looking at a mid 2030 launch date? How do we make people happy? And scoop in some of that juicy cross-medium profiteering money? (I use the royal 'we'. I ain't Bethesda.)
The obvious is laying right in front of us but I'm going to spout it anyway. Hire Obsidian to make an in between game for you. Seriously, Bethesda- if you trust Johnathon Nolan with your franchise, why not Obsidian? I'm sure anyone would be happy to make a Fallout RPG right now, but Obsidian are the only guys who really get it- and that's including Bethesda themselves! Sure, the team are currently slapping up their latest Pillars-world title, Avowed, but after that... I'm sure they have room to fiddle around with one last Fallout before Sawyer retires or whatever it is the man is planning to do. (I still half suspect him to try and bring about actual Fallout through some under-table dealings with Zetans from the stars.) But the chances of that happening are so damned low, I won't hold my breath.
Alternatively, there are so many studios out there who could expand the Fallout licences out even more to other styles of game! I cannot comprehend how Bethesda haven't tried to launch a proper Party based RPG version of either of their flagship franchises, but with the rise of CRPGs currently upon us- this would be the time! I'm not even talking about anything as fancy as Baldur's Gate 3 (because that would be a wholr dealing of it's own!) But what about a small scale adventure from a purely isometric angle, taking advantage of the low-poly models you can get away with from that angle? Give us a brief version of one of the Wasteland games set in the Fallout world. Tell the story of a bunch of Wastelanders trying to escape the advance of the Legion across Arizona, or a wayward squad of NCR soldiers following the second battle for Hoover Dam trying to make their way back home. Something linear, short and sweet that keeps the fanbase churning!
And from a more scattershot and wild perspective? Why haven't we got a factions-style Hearts of Iron Fallout game? A Total War style game? A Dynasty Warriors type title? (Okay, maybe Dynasty Warriors is taking it a bit far...) Fallout has travelled for so long at this point you'd have really thought some of the more niche communities would have been fed with some decent licenced titles over the years that expand the universe out. Don't get me wrong, I'm not campaigning for Fallout to 'Warhammer' their franchise, or anything! (God knows that would be a disaster!) I just think Fallout would make a damn fine 4X strategy game if Bethesda were looking to expand. Heck, if bloody Divinity can do it- why hasn't Fallout already?
There really is money on the table with the Fallout brand, and I don't mean in that in the cynical and grim way a marketing executive would. By making a series Bethesda have already established that Fallout is bigger than it's Open World games, and that should pan out to the games. Every non open world Fallout game has been made non canonical and for a world as vast as this one that just seems nigh on non-sensical! Are we really content with letting Fallout 76 be their franchise's only canonically recognised step out of it's comfort zone? Because I certainly am not! Don't let Fallout fall back to sleep, Bethesda! Feed the beast!
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