Prologue - Great War
The discovery of the atomic bomb in the 1940s has given humanity a question the FALLOUT series has strived to answer. If ever there would come a day when mankind possessed the capacity to destroy himself, what would come of us? Some predict that's where our story will end, but what if it was only another bloody chapter of human history? You've experienced the FALLOUT series in your own way, but want to learn more about its story. Well- to get to the heart of the story- you have to go back to the beginning...
Change comes to all nations...
In the early twentieth century the great powers of the old world thought that their rule would never end. The Czars of Russia met their downfall at the hands of a bloody revolution. Western Europe fought a great war against fascists who sought to build a reich that would last a thousand years. It crumbled in less than a decade. The Japanese believed their Imperial rule was eternal, yet they were the first to have their pride seared away by atomic fire.
The United States of America emerged as the world's great power by the nineteen fifties. Vast nuclear arsenals ensured that open warfare was a thing of the past, and soon after, America entered a cold war with their enemies. It was a long uneasy peace - a perpetual status quo as though the world were freeze dried and sealed in a vault for a century.
Those wandering the wasteland today might find it hard to believe that only two hundred years ago the richest nation in the world existed here. No deathclaws, no super mutants, no ghouls...
Most folk back then didn't have to fight for survival, or scavenge supplies. Factories produced everything a person could want - by the millions. Walking into a store with a stack of paper money, they could buy as much food, ammo, or clothing as they could carry. In fact the biggest "problem" people faced was finding a place to keep it all.
Highways stretched three thousand miles from coast to coast with roadside diners selling fresh burgers made from something the Old World called a "cow". Riding in gas-guzzling Chryslus cars, and drinking ice-cold soda pop, the Americans enjoyed their prosperity for generations. Secure in their belief that their way of life would never alter. That they would never be forced to evolve.
Change came slowly at first. And it was welcomed. People weren't satisfied just having a house where fresh water came right out of a pipe in the wall. No, they wanted more. Always more. They wanted robots to do their work for them, and they needed electronic computers to do their thinking for them.
Companies like RobCo filled the demand for domestic robots so that citizens didn't have to lift a finger. A robotic Mister Handy could walk the dog, do the laundry and watch over the kids too, leaving mom and dad free to spend an evening on the town, or to watch the latest show on the old Radiation King television set.
If they got lost on the road, an American consumer could use the new Personal Information Processors to see where they needed to go without ever needing to open a map.
Of course all of these new-fangled technological wonders needed power to run. Gasoline had been plentiful for over a hundred years, but the Earth had started to run dry by the middle of the twenty-first century. More and more of the power came from atomic energy and, thanks to companies like General Atomics, there were atoms to spare for decades to come.
Cities lit up, robots kept on humming and computer monitors kept glowing. Some factories even started turning out atomic-powered cars with fuel cells that still have some juice in them today - so don't go using those rusted old Corvegas for target practice.
Factories churned out toys for the kids, teddy bears, tricycles and comic books by the ton. Dad could mix his rum with a bottle of Nuka Cola, and mom had new spring fashions every year. Shelves were filled with snack cakes, canned meats and sugar-coated cereals - all of it pumped full of preservatives so that it would stay fresh forever and mom wouldn't have to take so many trips to the grocery store. You see, when it came to consumption- the Americans were the best.
