#project restroom

[this-is-fallout]

Gun nut should have been a dialogue perk. Like, a lot of people will react differently to being asked about their guns, and talking about guns in the wastes is pretty useful, but it’s something that all sorts of people would react poorly to.

[this-is-fallout]

I think that bunker hill is a really cool idea, but I think it should start in shambles. I like to think that bunker hill didn’t just form at the bunker hill for no reason. Like I understand it’s important that it’s a signal, but you don’t just form at a monument like that because of the monument.

I think that reason is that it was a central location surrounded by a lot of large settlements that was close enough to the water for that to protect them from one side, but not enough for mirelurks to be a problem. Before you start you had 4 large farms and a major settlement to the north diamond city to the west good neighbor university point and Quincy all to the south. There are probably more that I’m forgetting.

And I think they are in a sore spot right now because everything but diamond city is on fire and the mutants are doing their level best to remedy that situation. And the barely any farm is doing enough while dealing with raiders to give bunker hill nearly enough food to trade. This is why I think that every settlement had to grow food.

[this-is-fallout]

One element that I would love to see in fallout is dynamic relationships. Like sure this is definitely something that can or should be limited to select characters, but like. I have personally built really good relationships with several store owners. Real “I know a guy energy” and I think that fallout would benefit a lot from introducing the ability for venders to have personalities and preferences. And then doing things for them builds a relationship with them.

Like one of the venders in diamond city - Solomon chemicare - has this one quest you can do where you have to go out and acquire some ferns for his chems. This quest leads you to a small flooded town with several dead bounty hunters who had the misfortune of running into ghouls trying to fufill Solomon’s order. Solomon will reward you pretty well for doing this quest, but I want more. This quest should create the beginning of a relationship between him and the player where he can rely on us to get something while he can get us chems.

Like in real life if you have a good relationship with your grocer you ask for specific items or if they can save a specific part of an item.

[this-is-fallout]

Themes

There are a few themes that the original game hints at but never truly asks the player about

Humanity

This game is about humanity. What is it? What does it mean to be human? Who can be human? It asks the player to decide if gen 1 synths can be human while also asking the player about robots, ghouls, and supermutants.

It allows the player to play as these people to imbue perspective about each type of person as well as to give them a textured view of the world. Because humanity is not one perspective. Nor is it two or three or four. It is everyone’s perspective and a complete view of humanity is only attained through seeing all perspectives even if you disagree with some of them.

War never changes

War has always been a huge part of fallout and here it’s no different, but the nature of the idea shifts lenses to crimes against humanity. Some of them are gendered, some of them are based on who you are, some of them don’t care that your human or not human just that you aren’t one of them. This game is about violence that wounds your, humanity or others humanity, or the humanity.

War always hurts all people and this is a game about how humanity is brutalized in war. Their is always a cost that humanity pays in war and we want to talk about it

Illness and disease

This is a natural consequence of war with dark ramifications. How do you deal with disease. How do people treat others with disease.

Art and culture

Any conversation about humanity must talk about art and culture. They way that the different humanities communicate with each other. The ways that art expresses itself in war and during the apocalypse. What are the conditions that spring up with art? Who makes new art and when? What about food and music and sculpture.

Note to self: use the granite mines to build sculptures

This should also weed its way into other aspects of creation. Cooking, weapons making. The player doesn’t have to engage with art if they don’t want to, but they have the option. The player should be encouraged to create, while also feeling the pressures of needing to eat and live and work.

Joy

The original fallout had a killer sense of humor, but here I want to depict what humans do for love and joy even with the amount of strife. While I do think this is also a necessary part of depicting humanity, I also think that it’s an important part in talking about the violence of war against it. Not just because that violence shapes the joy that we have but because the joy shapes the.violence.

Love

Love is love. This is about the interpersonal. The singular the private. This is about sex and love and romance but it can also be platonic. It is about intimacy. Do not think of this as love - the inter partner relationship, think of this as intimacy and vulnerability we experience from all relationships.

Procreation

I struggle to avoid this thematically even though I so desperately want to, because to do so would to avoid talking about the previous themes especially in relation to mutants and non-humans. Sure, it could be avoided, but I think it’s cowardice to avoid talking about how the FEV essentially makes you infertile or how ghouls have sex or the questions humans have about sex in the apocalypse.

What does sex ed look like in the apocalypse and what do people know about it.

Community.

Community is important. It’s the most evident part of society and this is not a fact challenged by the games. What is important to ask is how does community change? Not just under the constraints of war but also from other communities struggling to survive. What situations create communities and what situations destroy communities