Crawl Out Through the Fallout Baby

 

I am a gamer. I think I may need to start going to AA for gaming, gamers anonymous, do they have that? It's a problem, I particularly have a love for RPGs, but adventure gaming as a whole is for me. Many, many, years ago, when computers had green screens with neon green type blinking fancifully across the monitor, I would sit in my father's offices, wherever we were posted, and play Zork I: The Underground Empire. I would describe this game as the godfather of adventure games. Each time I see, "West of House. You are standing in an open field west of a white house, with a boarded front door. There is a mailbox here," I am flooded with memories, imagination, and the urge to play. If you are interested, there are plenty of emulators out there, look it up and give it a try.

As time moved on, I got into 3/4 perspective role playing games, which simply means the gameplay takes place looking down on a map as you navigate your player, and/or party, through the story and environment. My preferred genre, Fantasy! Hey, having grown up with the "Hobbit, Lord of the Rings, Chronicles of Narnia, and Conan the Barbarian," I always wanted to live in an age of swords and sorcery. Then in 1997 Black Isle Studios and Interplay released the first "Fallout" game. It was a bit of a departure for me, more sci-fi, post-apocalyptic in genre, but the gameplay was the same, and it had story, my business partner and I always tell our students, and apprentices, story is king. Years later and 8 games, I have played almost all of them. Even though the property has been transferred through a number of different studios, the developers have worked to keep the story unified and moving forward. It's a great series. I hate to admit this, but I have played each game perhaps a minimum of two times, and the later console versions quite a bit more. 

Imagine my excitement, when, as a production artist, there was an announcement that Amazon was developing a miniseries based on the franchise. To be honest, I was excited, and then had the realization that it would probably be awful because almost every property that comes out today pushes an agenda, which annoys me to no end. Let me watch and enjoy and stop attempting to indoctrinate me. Darn.

Well, I love the franchise enough that I had to start the first episode to at least see what it would be like. I ended up binge watching the whole series. My wife gave me some guff about immediate gratification, mostly because I try to teach my kids to not do the same, but this series is good, I couldn't wait for the next episode. Be forewarned, the games are graphic, brutal, and are filled with a gruesome, sarcastic, dark humor, the Amazon series highlights this quite well. This show is not for the faint of heart, all of the gruesomeness in game is presented as clear as day on the screen. 

What really stood out is how poignant this series is. I know I said earlier that I didn't want to sit through an agenda, and there is one in there subtly, I will address later, but the plot line in this show is eerily similar to what is going on this world today. The series follows Lucy, a Vault Dweller; Maximus, a squire of the Brotherhood of Steel; and Cooper, or the Ghoul, a bounty hunter who has survived the 200 years since the nuclear war because radiation poisoning has extended his life in an odd way. These three characters meet in spectacular ways, each in pursuit of the same thing, for wildly different reasons. Their journeys open their eyes to the wickedness of mankind, and that wickedness favors no particular group, or faction. 

One of the core elements in a good story is having characters that grow, change, and adapt, in relation to the events the experience throughout they story. All three of these main characters do, in ways that make you smile, and ways that may make you angry at certain points. With that said, one of the things that I think has gone missing in a lot of stories these days is that character who has a world view that is unchangeable, they stick to their guns if you will. There is definitely a pun in there. This story has that, and honestly those world views are tested, yet the character, or characters, involved remain true to them. Well at least this far. The series ends with a clear implication towards a second season, which cannot come too soon if you ask me. 

I mentioned earlier the agenda in the story. It is there, it's kind of subtle, but if you understand economics and politics, you will see it. The story producers are taking shots at a particular economic and political ideology, which is sad. This taints the whole just a bit. And the focus is wrong, dead wrong. The similarities the story shares with what is going on in our world today are evident, but the focus on responsibility is misguided. All you need do is look at those amassing wealth today and attempting to exert control in the world with it, and you will see what I mean. The funny thing is an overall message is that we should do away with those responsible for the misery of the world and all will be well, or hopefully well, and we can see who those people are, they are simply mislabeled.

Even with that note, you should watch this. Take heed of my earlier note, it's not for the faint of heart, or faint of hearing for that matter. My wife, who really does not like this type of thing, and with as much garbage as she gave me for binge watching, got hooked on the show too. She is usually in bed and asleep by 10pm. We finished the final episode sometime after midnight on the last night of viewing. (I say binge watched, we did watch in groups over a period of days, but the last night we did four episodes in one sitting). She was really impressed with how the show mimicked the game. She has watched me play a time or two. As she rolled over to turn out the lights, she said, "that was a really good story." 

P.S. There's one thing that tickled me to no end in this show. If you watch it, you will know. It has to do with my description of myself in this blog.