Source
r/Fallout•
JebusChrust

Why is there so much junk in Bethesda Fallout worlds?

This applies to Fallout 3, 4, and from images seen from the TV series. Does Bethesda ever give a reason why humanity in their worlds are so comfortable living in junk and filth? Fallout 1 took place a bit over 80 years after the bombs fell, and by that time most of the towns and settlements already cleaned up and dedicated junk to junkyards (or even built a whole city wall made out of it). Fallout 2 took place 80 years later (164 total) and you have almost every location being clean cities and towns, even a town run by ghouls. Then Fallout 3, 4, and this series takes place almost 200 years later and everywhere looks to be an absolute mess. If Bethesda wrote American history which has a similar timeframe, it would be the year 2023 and America would still be a forest with dirt roads, a handful of towns, and dirty water.

Was there some sort of retcon, or is it just a way to justify a lower number of fleshed out settlements and factions?

Posted Nov 29, 2023, 4:49 PM UTC

1396
Ranos131•

Out of universe explanation is that it makes the world look more bleak and adds to the post-apocalyptic ambiance of the game.

In universe, it’s hard to have a junkyard that’s away from your settlement to throw all of your trash when there are so many dangers in the world. In the real world we don’t have to deal with super mutants, feral ghouls, raiders, deathclaws, giant scorpions or any of the other mutated creatures that exhaust. How far would you leave home if there were deathclaws wandering the world?

60
ThatFatGuyMJL•

Frankly. I like how Dr Stone showed a major issue with humanity 'restarting'

​

we've used up all the 'easy' to find resources.

​

Iron? We've mined most of the easy to find surface stuff. we focus on the deep stuff now.

​

Gold/Platinum etc? Used to be fairly abundant in rivers. We've basically sucked those dry.

​

The same is true for a great many materials that makes 'restarting' possible.

6
JebusChrustOP•

I don't have to worry about wildlife when I leave my home because the people who lived here 200 years ago figured out how to establish civilizations similar to how they did 140 years ago in the Fallout universe on the West Coast (excluding the new TV series). Multiple settlements have junkyards in Fallout 2, it isn't a difficult concept in the world.

-36
Celtic_Fox_•

I'm going to put you in a position where I've completely decimated 99% of your land, animals, buildings, infrastructure, and populace. Also, many remaining animals are now extremely irradiated, violent and deadly... and some people have banded together into tribes, many are looting and killing whoever is left trying to survive. I'm also going to remove technology for the most part, no power or infrastructure to produce anything necessary or expedite the process of getting food into bellies. No long range communication without difficulty. Rebuild using whatever scraps you're able to find. Going to need some technical know-how or hope a survivor is left that understands how a lot of these things work to try and help you get things going. There are mutants roaming that will kill or eat you, among other things.

Now understanding all that I'm gonna need you to clean this place up it's filthy, grab a broom you've got hands you lazy PoS, c'mon get those dust bunnies.. I have company coming over in an hour and if this place isn't spotless so help me...

20
TheMarkedMen:minute: Minutemen•

That last paragraph is Codsworth after a few trips to the robot workbench and the power going to his CPU

2
Celtic_Fox_•

When those "couple dings to the ole chronometer" turn out to be more of a problem than you thought!!

2
JebusChrustOP•

Why do you all keep acting like Super Mutants and massive mutant creatures existed on every square foot of the entire country. Again, you act like humanity never went through sudden destruction of its infrastructure, and that lifting a fucking branch would take over 200 years

-17
Gootangus•

“You act like humanity hs never been annihilated by nuclear war!”

Man you’re annoying lol.

13
MjollLeon:atomcats: Atom Cats•

People mention super mutants because they can be a threat in some places not because they are a threat everywhere.

And from what we know large mutant creatures definitely roam almost the whole country. West coast has deathclaws, East coast has deathclaws, Midwest has Deathclaws, and Maine has fog crawlers

Deathclaws alone likely span the continent and that’s only one species. Stop being a prick when people answer a question that you asked.

9
Celtic_Fox_•

You're being willfully obtuse to try and cater to a point that you'd like to be correct whilst ignoring what every other commenter is telling you, do better.

8
_Joe_Momma_•

They don't need to be everywhere, they just need to show up once.

Carthage wasn't built in a week. But it was destroyed in one.

5
Ranos131•

But 200 years ago their weren’t 9 foot tall lizards with foot long claws on their hands that can run much faster than a human. There weren’t bugs the size of large birds with a two foot long proboscis that could skewer a human. There weren’t giant scorpions that could burrow underground and pop up right in front of you with claws that could cut a human in half.

And you seem to be forgetting the super mutants, feral ghouls, raiders and other non-animal dangers. Just because the west coast was able to rebuild a bit doesn’t mean that would happen everywhere. It didn’t happen in Boston because the Institute was constantly destabilizing the region with their various experiments.

Look at the real world. There were great cities in the Middle East four thousand years ago while the rest of the world was still tribal. Even in modern times there are still areas that aren’t civilized.

10
Space-Fuher•

Feral Ghouls, Bethesda Style Super Mutants, and Raiders are so suicidal and short sighted they would be near extinct within several decades.

-1
JebusChrustOP•

Everyone brings up the mutants as if they existed on every square foot of the country. Similar to how bears aren't swarming our neighborhoods, the mutant animals wouldn't just exist to swarm humans.

-10
MjollLeon:atomcats: Atom Cats•

Yeah but who’s gonna risk a trip to the dump when it’s entirely possible to be killed, and way more likely than today.

3
0002niardnek•

Bears are largely territorial and drivel solely by animal instincts. Super Mutants are sentient creatures that are actively looking for people to kill and eat or turn into more Super Mutants. And whether you like the decision or not, Bethesda has decided to make different areas have their own breeds of Super Mutants.

And most mutated animals are actively predatory hunters now, and those that aren't will move out in response to more dangerous beings moving in. A pack of mutant wolves will move to avoid a Yao Guai, who will move to avoid a Deathclaw, who will move to avoid a large enough group of organized armed sentients. The only ones that won't are likely Feral Ghouls, who seem to have no capacity for fear or self preservation instinct.

And that's not even including human threats like paranoid scavengers or raiders.

So yes, literally everywhere is at risk of something unfriendly living or being there. And when people in-universe are just as frail as they are in real life, the possibility of encountering something that could kill you or render you unable to help your community is not worth the effort of moving trash to a junkyard.

2
Jaw43058MKII•

Shit even in game (I’ll use F04 as an example) it’s not like you’re getting swarmed with foes and that’s just in game, where action is thrown in your face.

Like yes the Commonwealth is a shithole, but if soldiers can create relatively hygienic foxholes while getting shelled day and night, with bullets overhead, then I think some settler living behind some walls can pick up the damn trash.

I agree with you wholeheartedly. Besides, if you grow up in the apocalypse, that’s all you know. You’d probably become pretty decent at staying alive and aware of your surroundings. Im pretty certain a fucker could pick up a broom and clean

1†
supersaiyanswanso•

The mutants are enough of a threat that diamond city the largest settlement by far in the commonwealth has to deal with them. The capital wasteland is pretty much under constant threat of the mutants,. They regularly stage raids and kidnap people for more mutants. New Vegas and the Mojave are the least threatened by mutants but way more threatened by damn near everything else. And say you don't get kidnapped or killed by mutants in a raid, now you have everything else that living in a post apocalypse comes with and by the way, there is no clean water or food, have fun cleaning!

1
MjollLeon:atomcats: Atom Cats•

The East coast is not nearly as rebuilt as the West

People are still struggling to survive and no massive government has risen up.

3
reallobotomitehours•

If Bethesda wrote American history which has a similar timeframe, it would be the year 2023 and America would still be a forest with dirt roads, a handful of towns, and dirty water.

Real-life Americans have never had to deal with super mutants, synths, or scorched.

38
Asesomegamer•

They also didn't have access to mid 21st century technology in the beginning.

12
wizardyourlifeforce•

"Real-life Americans have never had to deal with super mutants"

Citation needed.

3
JebusChrustOP•

The setting of Fallout takes place in a time after the survival of humanity. Do you think real-life Americans didnt have to deal with tribes, disease, wildlife, weather, conflict with foreign countries in colonies, etc.

-23
Dagordae•

Currently? No. We killed those. Also if you want to see junk look at Tornado Alley after a storm.

Real life America is after we dealt with all the problems. Fallout America has MUCH worse problems that they haven’t fully dealt with. There’s a rather huge divide between ‘human survival’ and ‘human dominance’.

The West Coast looks better because it was hit significantly less hard by the war and has face FAR fewer issues to recovery. And when the issues come up the absurdly omnicompetent protagonist is there to solve them. The East Coast didn’t get any of those until long after the NCR was formed and stabilized.

Boston? Has an organization of technologically advanced hyper assholes very deliberately preventing recovery. DC? Had a toxic water table and a murderous horde of Super Mutants since practically day 1.

What did the West have? The Master? He didn’t do anything at all until shortly before the games, long after the people of the region rebuilt enough to easily trounce him in a fight. The Enclave? They kidnapped a few tribals before being wiped out in a raid. They never actually, you know, did anything big. Nothing anywhere near East Coast level fuckery.

10
JebusChrustOP•

The West Coast literally had all out wars between BoS and NCR, and Legion and NCR. A nuclear bomb had a direct hit on a biological testing facility soitheast of LA which caused hazardous waste to flow all the way down to San Diego. Super mutants on the East Coast are not as prevalent early on as they were 200 years later. Super mutants on the West Coast were being churned out by the Master into an army.

Funny you bring up Tornado Alley, how do those destroyed locations look a couple years later? Are they still rubble 200 years later? Or do they look completely rebuilt five years later?

-5
cmlee2164Gary?•

Do you know why Tornado Alley locations look less destroyed a couple years later? Infrastructure, relief organizations, massive national and global corporations, governments. Even WITH all of those things we still have places that don't get rebuilt after hurricanes or tornadoes or floods or wars. There are cities that had a single industrial disaster and never rebuilt, counties hit by hurricanes that never got proper relief support, nations bombed all to hell 60 years ago that still can't maintain a stable economy. One of the least unbelievable aspects of the fallout universe is that shit didn't get fixed after society collapsed and huge chunks of the population died while horrors never before faced by our species roamed the irradiated streets and fields.

5
_Joe_Momma_•

Funny you bring up Tornado Alley, how do those destroyed locations look a couple years later? Are they still rubble 200 years later? Or do they look completely rebuilt five years later?

Are those rebuilt with what's in reach? Or are they rebuilt off the back of massive, global supply chains, public utility works, government agencies, insurance corporations, and trained professionals?

Like, your house just got smashed and you have none of those supporting you. Where are you going to get cement mix? Where are you going to get the water for the mix? Do you know how to properly mix and set cement?

3
QTPie2338•

"Janitor" is far from the world's oldest profession.

36
Legitimate-Frame-953•

Just take a look at some third world countries that have been racked by near constant warfare for years. The west coast being cleaner is probably a result from the fact that it was nowhere near as devastated as the East Coast was thus some amount of civilization has been able to thrive. East Coast on the other hand was substantially more devastated leading to near constant warfare as people battle to survive in a nuclear wasteland.

25
JebusChrustOP•

The West Coast has massive scale wars between The Master and BOS, Enclave, NCR vs BoS, NCR vs Legion, the massive spread of Jet and war between mob bosses, ghouls vs mutants, Vault City constantly under attack by raiders, etc. but despite this massive scale conflict their territories are still cleaned up in the events of New Vegas. It seems that the East Coast is written to "be more devastated" as a means of still justifying a lack of fleshed out settlements and to justify a more apocalyptic world rather than the setting Fallout takes place in. I can understand the ruins of DC being a mess with the actual establishment of mutant/ghoul presence and lack of accessibility, but 200 years is a very very very long time to spend doing nothing. People were coming out of Vaults loooong before that.

-9
Darkshadow1197Responders•

The Master and BOS

Which is described as being fought without much problem, and we don't see the aftermath in the towns it was fought in, not even in 2. It's not a constant state of existence but a one time event.

Enclave, NCR vs BoS

There was no war with the Enclave. There was a single raid on one of their bases.

We do not know what the NCR looks like back in the west after the war.

NCR vs Legion

the massive spread of Jet and war between mob boss

And New Reno accordingly looks like shit and is described as being shit even in NV as that's their constant state of being.

ghouls vs mutants

Again the Necropolis looks like shit and is burned down ti be abandoned afterwards

Vault City constantly under attack by raiders

Their caravans are, their city is not and they never get past their walls with machine gun turrets.

People haven't done nothing in 200 years, they have been making their towns. We see these many places

11
JebusChrustOP•

I didn't say the Enclave had a conflict with someone, I was saying they were a destabilizing presence.

The Legion has already been claimed to have clean cities without crime or drugs for the lands they conquer. The initial refugee camps are for newly conquered land that hasn't been established.

New Reno, yes and you & I just provided actual justifiable lore for why it is a slum. This is what I am asking for, not just presumptive "uh well I guess the east coast is just worse off I guess"

The ghouls of Necropolis went on to form Gecko, despite their lack of resources, functioning bodies, and being picked apart by mutants and humans.

In Fallout 4, there are endless settlements with nearby resources and little danger that you personally have to clean up because no one else did. Bethesda establishes that you really don't need to do much to clean up and nobody did it for 200 years until the Minutemen are just like "hmm what if we just moved that pile of sticks out of the way". Hence why I am asking why no one did it for 200 years.

-2
MjollLeon:atomcats: Atom Cats•

You’re missing a crucial detail

Sometimes the video game does not fully represent the world. Because you still have to make the game entertaining so people will play.

7
Darkshadow1197Responders•

They weren't, they did very little to harm the region as a whole. They were only on the Rader if the Brotherhood and next to nobody else.

They don't claim to have clean cities just crime free and drug free, but they are still slaughtering anyone who steps out of line and burning down towns as they conquer. They are a raider army with people fleeing in their wake.

You're acting like New Reno is harming the overall NCR when it's localized to just the city, not the region. The other regions are suffering throughout, not just in one section. Also, they do give reasons.

In 3, aside from being the nation's capital, it suffered a drastic environmental change and a mutant population. In Fallout 4, they tried to come together but failed due to infighting as seen with the Minutemen and CPG as well as external forces like the Institute actively interfering with what's happening.

Gecko is said to have been a small population at first, but only became what we saw when more ghouls came with knowledge and know how. It's also said to be mismanaged and leaking rads.

In Fallout 4, there are endless settlements with nearby resources and little danger that you personally have to clean up because no one else did.

Execpt they aren't because while every enemy means nothing to us, even simple blood bugs can be very deadly to the population as seen at the taffington boat house. Ghouls are actual threats to the people of the world.

The only two settlements with nothing at them are Redrocket and Sanctuary. Bethesda also doesn't establish that at all as as we are the ones doing all these things and we are like gods in ever single game.

3
AtoMaki:13: Vault 13•

Two things:

  • If you hit up Google and search for some IRL shanty town pics then you can find people living in filth that makes the Bethesda settlements look like an operating room.
  • When you make a first-person game you must consider certain environmental clues like sterility. For example, a clean empty wall will look pretty bad in your game, more so if your engine can't quite handle nice textures. To fix that, level designers try to make the environment, well, not clean and empty. Sometimes, they get a little overenthusiastic, especially if the head designer and/or the game director don't bother to rein them in. When that happens, you get the infamous skeleton in the booth. When the development team takes level design more seriously then you get a more middle-ground-like aesthetics like New Vegas.
18
DreadedChalupacabra:tunnel: Tunnel Snakes•

And yet at the same time people are complaining that the clothes aren't dirty enough.

I swear I don't know why they bother. Just kill the franchise, the fans are impossible to please.

16
JebusChrustOP•

Who is complaining the clothes aren't dirty enough?

-2†
TheArizonaRanger451:oldflag: Old World Flag•

Theres no real structure. In some places with big civilized governments, like NCR, BOS and Enclave, they have the time, people and resources to dedicate towards cleaning up. A lot of these small settlements and weak factions dont have the motivation, resources, or manower to clean up the squalor they live in.

14
JebusChrustOP•

But NCR, BOS, and Enclave arent the ones who constructed the civilizations in the non-Bethesda games (at least NCR didnt in the sense that Shady Sands was a small town that built itself). Even in Fallout 4, Sanctuary is a street with little to no threats and fully built houses but no one thought to remove some tree branches and throw a couple pies of wood on a roof? Nobody went to the supermarkets in DC and picked through them? Building a shanty town around a bomb is less effort than a literal massive building?

1
TheArizonaRanger451:oldflag: Old World Flag•

Its likely that people didnt want to live in Sanctuary. Robots are bad news and people would be pretty uncomfortable if their new potential home had a Mister Handy present that acts like the war hasnt happened. As for other places, theres simply no resources or manpower. The average settler is focused more on day to day survival, stuff like tending to crops and watching for raiders, rather then making his homestead look nice.

11
JebusChrustOP•

You are describing current threats, but ignoring that 200 years is a really long time. Sanctuary was so safe that the Mr. Handy hung around there without issue for that long. Fallout's setting isnt about day to day survival, it is about the politics and conflicts of societies that exist in a beyond post-apolyptic world. Gang families, racial tensions between ghouls/humans/mutants, elitist cities, poverty, drugs. It isnt about trying to survive, that is for a setting that predates Fallout 1.

-4
Darkshadow1197Responders•

Gang families, racial tensions between ghouls/humans/mutants, elitist cities, poverty, drugs. It isnt about trying to survive, that is for a setting that predates Fallout 1.

All of this was added in Fallout 2, not Fallout 1.

6
Alternative_Hotel649•

Fallout has multiple instances of people living in buildings that still have war-era skeletons lying around.

-6
CharlieHRedditFollowers•

Y’all need to take a step back and not take these games so seriously. These skeletons are just a silly aesthetic choice and doesn’t need to be looked into any deeper than that

5
Gstary•

Well to render lots of ground debris in a 90s isometric game would be a huge waste of resources.

For the newer games, people don't pick up trash and litter now you think they're gonna pick it up in a wasteland apocalypse? Plus all the landfills probably blew debris and trash loose from the blasts then the wind picked it all up and scattered it around

14
TheMarkedMen:minute: Minutemen•

I didn't know visible cleanliness was the measure of writing quality. Institute's peak?

Visual fidelity and player perspective are design factors. The isometrics never could show as much on screen as the 3D games can, beit scale or detail.

It's not a matter of contrasting worldbuilding either. Look at Shady Sands, then look at the Boneyard. The Strip, then North Vegas. Foundation, then Goodneighbor. Tenpenny Tower, then Megaton. Development isn't a linear process, and the exceptions shouldn't be the expectation.

13
JebusChrustOP•

Shady Sands and Boneyard both are fully constructed towns, the main difference being that Shady Sands had the assistance of a GECK. Boneyard has a literal massive pack of death claw nearby yet still is a full town. North Vegas and the Strip also have established lore and are fleshed out exactly to explain the difference in whete they are at. Tenpenny Tower and Megaton are exact representations on how Bethesda world building is inconsistent. Building around a nuclear bomb is easier and more justifiable than having a normal town?

-1
MjollLeon:atomcats: Atom Cats•

It’s a game. Not everything must make perfect sense

5
Agent-c1983•

The junk asthetic predates Bethesda. Thats why.

9
TigerrBunny•

Go to Somalia and tell them their country isn't lore accurate lol.

"You silly Somalians. It's been like 60 years since you gained independence. Why is there still junk and trash everywhere. And why is everyone living in isolated villages and towns. What lazy writing."

Don't get me started on their raiders. In New Vegas gangs had names and you could talk to them and do quests. But in Somalia they're all just titled "pirate" or "pirate captain". And they try mug and kill you on sight. Not to mention how many there is, I swear have the country is 90% raiders. Immersion ruined.

9
AbbotThothDefault•

To be fair I only know the names of like 15-20 pirates tops, and one of those is Luffy

1
cmlee2164Gary?•

Everyone in the Fallout games is struggling to survive excluding a very small handful of groups in places like New Vegas. Disease, war, poverty, starvation, and various mutant monsters constantly trying to eat you make it significantly more difficult to maintain any kind of social support systems let alone waste management. Do you know how fast trash piles up? Earlier this year trash service workers went on strike in Paris, in a matter of days there was 4,400 tonnes of trash sitting in the streets and sidewalks waiting to be picked up. Look up the Memphis Sanitation Strike of 1968. On average each person creates roughly 5 pounds of trash per day and over 1,600 pounds per year. Waste management is one of the most crucial yet most overlooked aspects of maintaining a society.

A ton of pre-war knowledge was lost after just one generation. If there are folks walking around who don't know what baseball or Elvis were it's fairly reasonable to believe the complex knowledge of land fills, anaerobic digesters, and recycling plants were probably also lost lol.

6
JebusChrustOP•

I am not talking about dookie and sewage, I am talking about literal tree branches blocking the opening to a fully built house that just needs a couple pieces of wood for a roof. Stupid things like that where nobody thought that they could scrap any parts or move any blockages until 200 years later despite everyone always asking for scrap and resources.

-4
cmlee2164Gary?•

waste management isn't just sewage, I literally mentioned 2 real world examples of trash not getting picked up for a matter of weeks and it clogged entire roadways. Trash pickup delays in a city like LA or New York for longer than a few days can virtually shut down the city. Trash is a bigger thing than most folks realize.

The scrap and trash laying around isn't all necessarily from 200 years ago. Trees fall every day and in a world without any real infrastructure it's not gonna get picked up till it absolutely needs to be picked up. Same goes for anything else. Old tires blocking that doorway? Must not be a doorway anyone used enough to do something about it. Not to mention there isn't much large scale manufacturing going on so folks are reusing the same scrap materials over and over again but it still won't have a place to be disposed of properly.

At the end of the day it's just environmental storytelling by the developers. No one wants a well maintained wasteland with functioning trash trucks and recycling collection on Thursdays lol.

4
Baumgarten1980•

have you ever seen the streets on poor neighborhoods, specially at poor countries? Junk everywhere!

6
JebusChrustOP•

That makes sense with the context of poor neighborhoods often being dense and with little space/resources. I am talking buildings that are structurally sound and have a broken bed and tree branch in the way, or maybe a few metal scraps nearby, but would take maybe a few days to clean up and then have a perfectly good home without junk all over.

1
Baumgarten1980•

people that are born in the apocalypse would live that way

7
JebusChrustOP•

But they don't and it has been established they don't long before Bethesda's storytelling. Humans generally do not like living in unsafe and filthy conditions.

1
Baumgarten1980•

you clearly doesnt know humans in general... rich and or cultured people are not the majority of humanity, and most of all, not the people that know ONLY the end of the world.

"Clean streets" are a concept of OUR society, not the end of the world one. its a social construct.

5
CleanOpossum47•

Was there some sort of retcon, or is it just a way to justify a lower number of fleshed out settlements and factions?

The first Fallout had a town called Junktown and it was literally made out of trash.

6
JebusChrustOP•

Junktown had a surrounding wall built out of junk, yes that is my point. They didn't just have trees, cars, scrap, and shit sitting around for 140 more years.

1
WutIzThizStuff•

There's SO much silliness and so many artistic conceits that were deliberately chosen to make the feel and flavor of the setting. Obviously this is one of them.

You haven't noticed the silliness in most Speculative Fiction settings that give them flavor but really make no sense? Esp in video games?

6
JebusChrustOP•

I perfectly understand it in Fallout for many different settings, especially in abandoned facilities, but it always was just weird to me that in Bethesda Fallout specifically there are so many unused settlements and settlements that look like trash for little reason

1
sixthspeed11•

New and original

2
wizardyourlifeforce•

"Fallout 1 took place a bit over 80 years after the bombs fell, and by that time most of the towns and settlements already cleaned up and dedicated junk to junkyards (or even built a whole city wall made out of it). Fallout 2 took place 80 years later (164 total) and you have almost every location being clean cities and towns, even a town run by ghouls."

The scale you play in and the limitations on graphics and objects at the time probably have more to do with it. There may have been just as much junk lying around but the game wouldn't show it to you. Also the east coast seems a lot wilder than the west coast.

2
AlphonseLoosely•

This gets posted pretty often. It's a very 1st/developed world viewpoint. Travel (or just look online for pictures!) to many of the poorer/est parts of the world and you will see piles of garbage all over, derelict buildings with people living in them, waterways so clogged with plastic you can't even see the water. That's in this world, with no nuclear wars.

1
ADrunkEevee•

Woah! Cool wasteland!

1
[deleted]•

[deleted]

1