After that divisive Fallout 76 announcement, fans of the beloved post-apocalyptic franchise may be on the hunt for more wasteland wandering beyond what can be found through official channels.
Although it's possible we may be in for a surprise hit, the notion of playing ARK: Fallout Survive isn't exactly pushing the excitement meter into the red for a lot of fans (the only way they could have chased bubble-bursting trends any harder would be if it were a battle royale game).
While several major total conversion mods have been announced in recent months for Fallout 4, they are likely years off, if they ever even see a full, finished release.
There are still plenty of other ways to experience the wasteland without a proper, new single-player Fallout, though, thanks to the hard work and dedication of all the killer modders out there.
Here we're rounding up 8 of the best major overhaul mods available that give you entirely new areas and ways of playing classics like Fallout 2, 3, and New Vegas.
Fallout 1.5: Resurrection
Still got your old Fallout discs or have a digital version from GOG? It's time to reinstall because there's more for the vault dweller to do besides just haul water and find the GECK!
Originally a Czech total conversion, Resurrection recently got an English translation and is well worth playing for fans of the early isometric titles in the franchise.
Set between the events of the first two games, there's nearly 25 hours worth of unique content to play through here. The only downside is that the new characters don't have the "talking head" animations, so it does feel a little more static than vanilla Fallout 2.
Fallout: DUST
OK, so I fully appreciate that this may be an odd entry to include in a list specifically about not wanting a survival RPG version of the franchise, but it absolutely deserves a place here.
Yes, DUST is, in fact, a survival rendition of Fallout: New Vegas. There are some key differences here, though, from what you can expect to get from Bethesda, and a few reasons why DUST might be more worth your time. First and foremost is the difficulty. DUST is unforgiving in the extreme, to a level we can be nearly certain Fallout 76 won't feature.
DUST also includes something a bit different from the standard survival formula: insanity. Killing people, eating rotting flesh, and taking drugs for an edge in combat all take their toll, making this somewhat of a Darkest Dungeon-like take on the series, with a dash of Don't Starve. If you want to be challenged in a very different way from the base game, DUST is worth at least checking out.
Wondering just what Fallout 76 might look like and want to try out something similar ahead of time? You've got your answer right here, although in what is probably going to be a harder, darker rendition. For another take on this idea, be sure to also check out the Obscurum - Pandemic survival mod.
Beyond Boulder Dome
If you've already played all the New Vegas DLC and still need to get your Wasteland fix, Beyond Boulder Dome is where you need to go next. New areas, new weapons and armor, new robots, a cast of fully voiced and lip-synced characters -- you get a ton of extra content here.
Weirdly enough, the story from this 2012 mod has a lot of echoes of what would become Fallout 4, with two warring factions stuck in cryogenic sleep and waking up hundreds of years later to a different world.
Fallout Zero
Although it's a bit buggy and could use some more work, Fallout Zero offers an entirely new quest line for the Fallout 3 experience that takes place a mere two months after the Great War.
What makes the mod worth installing is the amount of work that went into voicing the lines, all those extra quests, and the dialogue-over-combat focus. The reactive helmet that shows if NPCs will give up and join you when you point your gun at them is also a really nice touch.
Alton, IL
A simply massive addition to the Fallout 3 universe, this mod gives you an entirely new location to explore, quests to complete, factions to side with, voice acting, and more.
It's essentially a completely free DLC location in the vein of Point Lookout, and is a killer expansion to vanilla Fallout 3. Off the strength of this creation, the modder actually got a job at Rockstar!
Hell on Earth
The various modders out there are consistently able to take the Fallout franchise and give you something radically different within an overall familiar framework. Hell on Earth is one such entry, essentially giving you Silent Hill with the New Vegas style.
This (not lore-friendly, obviously) mod has you traveling to another dimension to try to track down lost mercenaries who went to investigate a nightmare realm. Hell on Earth really plays up the dark and bloody aspects of the franchise and manages to create a survival horror vibe even when you are gunning down monsters with a laser gatling.
Five Nights at Vault 5
Wait, wait, wait -- there's even a Five Nights at Freddy's version of Fallout?!? Yes, there is, because modders are nuts (and awesome).
Weirdly, it's not all that outside the lore of the universe either, since we know many of those vaults were specifically created to perform cruel and unusual experiments on their occupants, rather than just keeping them safe from radiation.
Just like the franchise that was the inspiration for this mod, Five Nights At Vault 5 has you trying to survive from midnight to 6 a.m. while killer robots patrol the halls.
Fallout: New California
- This Fallout: New Vegas mod arrives in October!
Now here's an oddity in the world of epic and ambitious total conversion mods: Fallout: New California actually has a confirmed release date for the full version!
After starting life as Project Brazil and going through years of work, New California is set to drop on October 23, 2018. This has easily got to be one of the most anticipated total conversion mods for the franchise, with fully voice-acted characters and an entirely new story in a completely different location than the base game.
With side quests galore and 16,000 lines of dialogue, expect to essentially get a whole extra New Vegas-sized game this fall!
What did you think of our list of Fallout major overhaul mods, and are there any we missed that should be added?
Sadly, the options for Fallout 4 these days are still quite lacking. Total conversion mods tend to create much rejoicing and fanfare when they are announced... and then promptly fall off the map. It's not hard to understand why.
These are huge projects, nearly the equivalent of a full game development, and when you aren't getting paid and just have volunteers working in their free time, feature creep and lack of drive kill a ton of total conversion mods.
A few are worth keeping your eye on that may still arrive in the future, like Fallout Cascadia and Fallout: The Frontier. If those ever finally see stable, feature-complete releases, we'll be sure to get them added here.
Published: Jun 7, 2018 03:06 pm