The original Fallout belongs to that small canon of games that changed the PC forever. Up there with Civilization, Half-Life, Command and Conquer, The Sims, and Myst, though I personally maintain it’s just as good and worth playing now as it was in 1997, Black Isle and Interplay’s apocalypse RPG is also an object of its time – unforgiving, inscrutable, and sometimes more fuss than fun. Fallout London may set a new standard for total conversion and fan-game mods, but there’s another ambitious project that deserves your attention. A would-be Fallout 1 remake built in FO4, Vault 13 is finally available to try.
The best Fallout 4 mods vary in scope. In some cases, they offer minimal tweaks and improvements, making existing systems sing a little more tunefully. On the contrary, there are dozens of full conversions out there which turn the Bethesda RPG into something entirely different – our full Fallout London review is a comprehensive analysis of one of the very best. 27 years since it first arrived, if you’ve never played it, you’d be surprised how much the original Fallout has in common with its various descendents. Now it has a fan-made remake.
When it’s completed, Fallout Vault 13 will serve as a complete remake of the original, built using the engine and systems of Fallout 4. Created by a small team of modders, it’s been in the works for a while now (the first gameplay was posted to YouTube in 2022) but the opening demo has finally just arrived. Playing as the Vault Dweller, this initial taste lets you explore The Inyo, the first area of Fallout that includes Shady Sands, the Khan base, Vault 15, and of course Vault 13 itself.
Like Fallout London, you need a legitimate copy of FO4 and all its DLC in order to play this. There’s no voice acting right now and a couple of bugs mean that your skills won’t automatically adjust when you change your SPECIAL stats, but the creators say these issues will be resolved come launch. If you want to try Fallout Vault 13, it’s available right now on Nexus Mods.
Otherwise, have a look at some of the other best games like Fallout, or get the latest on the Fallout 5 release date, which hopefully won’t be too far away.
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