Fallout 4

Fallout 4 is an action role-playing video game developed by Bethesda Game Studios and published by Bethesda Softworks forMicrosoft Windows, PlayStation 4, and Xbox One. It is the sixth major installment in the Fallout series, and was released worldwide on November 10, 2015.

The game is set in a post-apocalyptic Boston in the year 2287, 210 years after a devastating nuclear war. The player character emerges from an underground nuclear fallout shelter known as Vault 111, and subsequently explores the world, completes various quests and acquires experience points to level up their character. It is the first game in the series to feature full voice acting for the protagonist.

Fallout 4 received positive reviews from critics with many praising the world depth, player freedom, overall amount of content, crafting, and soundtrack. The game shipped 12 million units and generated $750 million (USD) within the first 24 hours of its launch. The game received numerous awards and nominations from various gaming publications, including the Academy of Interactive Arts & Sciencesand British Academy Games Awards, making it both a commercial and critical success.

Story

The story begins on the morning of October 23, 2077 at the player character's home Sanctuary Hills, with the player character, their spouse (Nate or Nora depending on the player character's gender), their son Shaun, and their robotic butler, Codsworth. As the player character is preparing for an event at the Veteran's Hall in Cambridge, a representative from Vault-Tec comes to inform them that their family is approved for admittance into Vault 111, the local fallout shelter. Moments later, a news bulletin warns of an incoming nuclear attack, prompting the family to evacuate to the Vault. They enter just as a nuclear bomb explodes. Upon entering the Vault, the player character and their family are tricked into entering cryogenic tubes by the Vault-Tec staff and frozen alive. After an unknown period of time, the player character and their spouse are re-awakened by two strangers, and the player witnesses Shaun's kidnapping and their spouse's murder. The player is put back into cryogenic sleep, but manages to get free themselves when the life support system malfunctions. The player discovers that they are the sole survivor of Vault 111, and vows to avenge their spouse's death and find Shaun.

The player character, known as the Sole Survivor, heads home to find Sanctuary Hills in ruins. The Sole Survivor meets a distraught Codsworth, revealing that 210 years have passed since the war. Codsworth suggests that the player character to go to Concord for help, where the Sole Survivor rescues Preston Garvey—one of the last of the Commonwealth Minutemen—and his band of settlers from a group of raiders. After assisting Garvey and his group, the player is recommended to travel to Diamond City, a fortified settlement based in the ruins of Fenway Park, where they meet Piper, an intrepid reporter. From her they learn about a secretive organization called the Institute terrifying the Commonwealth, kidnapping people from their homes and sometimes replacing them with "synths," synthetic human beings indistinguishable from real humans.

The Sole Survivor seeks out Nick Valentine, a detective based in Diamond City, to locate their son, but soon learns that Valentine went missing two weeks previously. After finding Valentine—who is revealed to be a second-generation synth; a sophisticated biomechanical android—the Sole Survivor uncovers the identity of their spouse's killer, a man named Conrad Kellogg. The Sole Survivor tracks down Kellogg and learns from him that Shaun is currently in the Institute. The player kills Kellogg, avenging their spouse's murder, and retrieves a cybernetic implant from his brain, then heads to Goodneighbor to seek help from Doctor Amari—a scientist skilled in neuroscience—to access the dead mercenary's memories. During their hunt for Kellogg, the Survivor also witnesses the Brotherhood of Steel arriving in the Commonwealth with the Prydwen, their mobile airship headquarters, and has the option to travel to Boston Airport to offer their assistance to the Brotherhood in the fight against the Institute.

After viewing Kellogg's memories, the Sole Survivor is then tasked to go to the Glowing Sea—the ground zero of the nuclear blast shown early in the game—to find Brian Virgil, an ex-Institute scientist, to get help infiltrating the Institute. According to Virgil, the only way to enter or exit the Institute is with a teleportation chip that only Institute Coursers—trained synth killers—possess. The player must then track down and kill a Courser in order to obtain the chip.

The Sole Survivor tracks down the secretive Railroad organization for assistance decoding the chip. The Railroad is dedicated to rescuing synths from the Institute, believing them to be oppressed by their creators and mistreated by the inhabitants of the Commonwealth. After they decode the chip for the player, the Railroad asks for their assistance in fighting the Institute, in which the player can accept or decline.

Virgil provides the blueprints for a device to hijack the Institute's Molecular Relay signal and teleport into the Institute using the chip data. The Sole Survivor has the choice to ally with the Minutemen, the Railroad, or the Brotherhood to construct the relay device. The player successfully enters the Institute, where they discover that their son Shaun is now an old man and the director of the Institute. Shaun reveals that he was kidnapped from the Vault as a specimen for synth experiments thanks to his pure pre-war DNA, and that the Sole Survivor remained in stasis for a further sixty years before being awoken again. Shaun later reveals that he is dying of cancer and wishes for the player to take up his role as Institute Director and continue the organization's plans for the future of the Commonwealth.

Endings

The player then faces a choice to determine the future of the Commonwealth. They can side with Shaun by siding with the Institute:

• The Institute – the player must handle internal issues within the Institute, which was caused by Shaun's announcement making the Sole Survivor the next director of the organization. Siding with the Institute will lead the Sole Survivor to initiate a purge in the Commonwealth, wiping out the Railroad and the Brotherhood, who pose threats to their progress.

Or they can go against Shaun by siding with one of three other factions:

• The Brotherhood of Steel – siding with the Brotherhood will lead the Sole Survivor to rebuild Liberty Prime (last seen in Fallout 3) to be used as a weapon to destroy the Institute. The player must also lead an attack on the Railroad headquarters to wipe out the organization, as they pose a tactical threat to the Brotherhood's ultimate goal of wiping out synthetic life from the Commonwealth. After reactivating Liberty Prime, the Brotherhood of Steel leads a charge against the Institute and blows up its nuclear reactor.
• The Railroad – siding with the Railroad will lead the Sole Survivor to go undercover in the Institute and meet with a man codenamed Patriot, to devise a plan to free all the synths and destroy the Institute. The Railroad also deems the Brotherhood of Steel a threat to the freed synths and devises a plan coded "Red Rockets Glare", a plan to bring down the Prydwen and destroy the Brotherhood of Steel.
• The Minutemen – siding with the Minutemen will lead the Sole Survivor to rebuild the Minutemen in order to create an army to fight the Institute. Once the Minutemen is restored to its former strength, the player is then tasked to bring the fight to the Institute in order to protect the Commonwealth. If the Brotherhood of Steel is hostile towards the player, the Minutemen will launch a strike to put a stop to the their dealings with the Commonwealth. If they are not hostile, then the Minutemen will remain essentially neutral towards the Brotherhood and the Railroad.