Highlights
- The Fallout series is dark, but the developers add whimsical humor, making players forget the bleakness.
- Some choices in the game lead to seriously dark outcomes, going against the preferred romances.
- Players can make dark choices like nuking entire areas or attaching explosives to a child’s body, showing the game’s dark nature.
The Fallout series takes place in a post-apocalyptic wasteland where much of Earth’s residents were wiped out in a nuclear war. As such, the games are inherently dark. Skeletons litter the open-world, and many of the games’ enemies consist of mutated humans or animals. However, the series is so fun to play and the developers add so much whimsical humor to the environment that many players forget just how bleak the world of Fallout can be.
That is until they are forced to make some choices. As an RPG, the Fallout games will often task players with making a decision that affects the narrative or open world around them. Most of these choices are safe enough; however, there are some decisions that can take players to some seriously dark places, rather than the romances that they might prefer to pursue.
7 Nuking The Institute
Fallout 4
Fallout 4
- Platform(s)
- PS4, Xbox One, PC
- Released
- November 10, 2015
- Developer(s)
- Bethesda
- Genre(s)
- RPG, Action
- Final Quest Given By Minutemen, Brotherhood of Steel, or Railroad
- Complete Every Other Story Mission First
The main story in Fallout 4 sees the player navigating the politics of four different wasteland factions in an effort to find their lost son. This journey leads players deep into the science labs of a group known as the Institute, an elitist faction who experiments on other individuals for personal gain who is run by the protagonists grown son as some kind of cult. All other factions want to rid the wasteland of the institute’s evil, and the final quest of the game sees the player succeeding in nuking the place.
However, choosing to nuke an entire section of the map isn’t the good victory most players view it as. Once the bomb goes off the melancholy music begins and players are reminded of the game’s upsetting mantra that war never changes. In an effort to get rid of one perceived evil, the players actually end the game by re-starting the same dark cycle that began this mess in the first place.
6 Nuking Megaton
Fallout 3
Fallout 3
- Platform(s)
- PS3, Xbox 360, PC
- Released
- October 28, 2008
- Developer(s)
- Bethesda
- Genre(s)
- Shooter
- Head To Tenpenny Tower
- Talk To Mister Burke
The town of Megaton in Fallout 3 is a quirky place. Players will instantly notice that there is an unexploded nuclear bomb in the center of the town that the townsfolk view as a miracle instead of a devastating ticking-clock. Players can prove just how dangerous this monument is by simply walking up to the device and detonating it. However, this choice will result in an immediate game over. If players want to end the lives of everyone within Megaton and the surrounding area, there is a darker option.
When visiting Tenpenny Tower, players will meet an NPC called Mister Burke. Heading to this location will start a quest where players can choose to save Megaton and its inhabitants or set off the bomb. Clearly, needlessly killing this innocent population is the darker choice, but one that grants plenty of bottle caps.
5 Vault 22
Fallout: New Vegas
Fallout New Vegas
- Platform(s)
- PS3, Xbox 360, PC
- Released
- October 19, 2010
- Developer(s)
- Obsidian Entertainment
- Genre(s)
- RPG
- Found East of Jacobstown
- Find Vault Among Shrubbery and Enter
Vault 22 is not a nice location in Fallout New Vegas. The underground bunker was once a science lab used to experiment on and study various plant-life. Sadly, much of this plant-life has mutated due to the radiation from the fallen bombs. This means that players will be confronted by giant Venus fly traps and other plant-based horrors when entering Vault 22.
However, further exploration would reveal that one of the scientists survived down here and is struggling to know what to do with the out of control lifeforms. The ghoul will ask the player if their vaults’ research should be wiped or not. Wiping the data would mean that something like this will never happen again, but keeping it would mean that an equally dark mind could replicate these monsters to the further detriment of the wasteland.
4 The Covenant Dilemma
Fallout 4
- To the North of the Tucker Memorial Bridge
- Pass Entrance Test
- Speak With Honest Dan
One of the player’s primary objectives in Fallout 4 is finding and building new settlements for the wasteland survivors. However, when they come across the town of Covenant, it appears that this place has everything all figured out for its citizens. Dig a little deeper, though, and the player willl unravel a dark conspiracy in the town.
The town is kept running with the intention of comitting a mass genocide on synths, and any human that discovers this secret is sent underground for a life-time of torture. Players who start this quest have the choice of passing the town’s tests with a series of speech checks or releasing the prisoners and wiping out the town. Either choice results in a large amount of bloodshed.
3 Killing Frank Carlson
Fallout 2
Fallout 2
- Platform(s)
- PC
- Released
- October 29, 1998
- Developer(s)
- Black Isle Studios
- Genre(s)
- RPG
- Talk To John Bishop
- Find Child Outside Compound
Before Bethesda got their hands on the series and could bring it into the 3D realm, many fans agree that the early Fallout games were much darker. That sentiment is most evident in the Frank Carlson quest.
In Fallout 2, Frank Carlson is a politician who players are tasked with assassinating. This objective can be achieved in many ways. Players can opt for stealth and leave NPCs wondering who killed Carlson, or they could blunder through the front door with guns blazing. However, players who want to do something really dark can get the man’s child involved. When players find Carlson’s kid outside his safe house, they can attach explosives to the boy and detonate them once they are inside. It’s not pretty, but it gets the job done.
2 Joining Caesars’ Legion
Fallout: New Vegas
- Enter Caeser’s Tent in his Fort
- Offer To Join His Faction
On the surface, Caesars’ Legion does not seem like a bad faction to join in Fallout New Vegas. The people that fall under their command are well catered for and seem safe enough. However, this level of safety comes at a price. Caesars’ Legion is kept alive by a history of slavery and abuse. In other words, they are the bad guys.
That makes it all the more confusing when the game lets the player side with this faction. Choosing to side with this faction as part of the story means that players are interested in seeing the darker side of what New Vegas has to offer, and want to serve their own self-interest.
1 Child Killer Reputation
Fallout 1 & 2
- Kill Any Three Children To Get Reputation
- This Activates Bounty Hunters
It is normal in modern open world games for child NPCs to be immune to player attacks or completely immortal. However, the first two games in the Fallout series did not get this memo. Players are perfectly capable of killing all children in the games, and there is even a reputation bonus for those commit such dark crimes.
Once a player has killed three children in the wasteland, they will gain a new reputation as a Child Killer. This will cause all NPCs to react negatively toward them and bounty hunters to appear on the map in search of the child killing menace. These may not be good bonuses, but just having this feature in any game is truly dark.
