With the recent release of the second season of the Fallout TV series, Fionn reflects on Bethesda’s handling of the franchise.

By Fionn Reid-Kelly | Jan 29 2026

The original Fallout games were brutal, but it felt as if civilisation was returning to the wasteland. By contrast the newer titles tend to feel empty barring a few sparsely populated settlements. Thinking back on my time with those games I can’t help but get the feeling that Bethesda does not understand the point of the original games.

I feel that the original Fallout titles and New Vegas put serious care and effort into imagining what a post nuclear civilisation may look like. They do this by drawing inspiration from a broad range of historical systems and ideas, as well as envisioning what a post apocalypse would look like for ordinary people.

The Bethesda Fallout games in contrast seem to be hung up on satirical 1950’s nostalgia and brutality without purpose. Bethesda’s factions feel paper thin, more so built around stereotypes than complex groups of people.

One of the most egregious examples of this in terms of factions has to be the Minutemen from Fallout 4. As a faction the Minutemen are effectively speaking an homage to revolutionaries from the American war of Independence. Their name and attire are incredibly on the nose in this respect, and if you go down their questline you effectively colonise parts of the Commonwealth on their behalf. You do this by clearing out raiders and other enemies from these prospective settlements and then attracting people to settle them.

Something which consistently bothers me with how Bethesda creates its Fallout games is the sheer number of enemies. This in my mind creates a very simple world building problem, how are all of these raiders feeding themselves? The amount of people growing food in this post apocalypse is simply too small. Fallout 3 and 4 each have a scattering of relatively small villages (if they can even be called that), but their wastelands are teeming with super mutants and raiders, and again I ask where they are getting all of their food from.

The way that I see this on the part of Bethesda is that they really haven’t thought through their worldbuilding. There are plenty of raiders and other enemies in Fallout 1, 2, and New Vegas, but where there are raiders there are also normally settlements nearby for them to raid. In the case of New Vegas there are plenty of raiders along the road because of the trade that is constantly flowing in from the New California Republic. These traders and caravans are great targets for raiders to attack, and the soldiers of the NCR are stretched thin.

The Bethesda Fallout games in contrast seem to be hung up on satirical 1950’s nostalgia and brutality without purpose.

The return of Super Mutants in Fallout 3 and 4 are another example of Bethesda’s mishandling of worldbuilding in their games. In the prior entries to the franchise, Super Mutants had a great amount of variety. In the first game they were the main villains, and were actively trying to replace humanity in the wasteland. By the time of the second game they were scattered with many trying to integrate into society as best they could. Bethesda does not grant such intelligence or agency to its Super Mutants. The mutants in 3 and 4 barring a handful of exceptions shoot on sight and are generally just another enemy to fight.

The treatment of the factions in Fallout New Vegas starkly contrasts their counterparts in 3 & 4. In Bethesda's Fallout entries, all raiders are treated as hostiles that will shoot you on sight, and while New Vegas does have many groups of raiders that will do this there are several others that can be interacted with peacefully. Groups such as the Khans, Powder Gangers, and even the blank were able to display their personalities and the player could go down their quest lines and build a positive reputation with them if they pleased.

As an inevitable announcement for Fallout 5 creeps ever closer, I can only hope that the next addition to the franchise can bring back the standard of worldbuilding from the non-Bethesda entries to the series.