Fallout 2: A Post-Nuclear Role-Playing Game (1998) (VG)

Director:

Feargus Urquhart

Release Date:

29 October 1998 (USA)

Genre:

Action | Adventure | Sci-Fi

Plot:

In a post-nuclear future, the descendant of an ancient exiled hero must leave his tribe in search of the Garden of Eden Creation Kit, the last chance of survival for his people.

Plot Keywords:

Rock | Flare | Mutant | Graveyard | Jacket

Cast

  (Credited cast)

Charles Adler	...	Harold (voice)
Flo Di Re	...	Elder of Arroyo (voice) (as Florence Dire)
Michael Dorn	...	Marcus / Special Agent Frank Horrigan (voice)
Greg Eagles	...	Sulik (voice)
Peter Jason	...	Drill Sergeant / Gate Guard (voice)
Jeffrey Jones	...	The President (voice)
Tress MacNeille	...	Tandi (voice)
Jason Marsden	...	Myron (voice)
Ron Perlman	...	Narrator (voice)
Kevin Michael Richardson	...	Com. Officer (voice)
Dwight Schultz	...	Hakunin (voice)
Cree Summer	...	First Citizen Lynette (voice)

Also Known As:

Fallout 2 (USA) (short title)

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Color

Certification:

USA:M

Company:

Interplay Productions

Trivia:

At a certain point in this game, a character called Cassidy says he was named after a character from a 90s comic book. Indeed, this comic book exists and is called "Preacher", written by Garth Ennis with art by Steve Dillon and published by DC\Vertigo. In Fallout 3, there is another small homage to "Preacher": a female ghoul named Tulip.

Quotes:

Jules: Name's Jules, and I would be MOST pleased to make your acquaintance, show you around, and set you up with whatever you're looking for.
Chosen One: All right. How can you help me?
Jules: I can get you ANYTHING you need, brother. If you need to fly, get high, slide down low with a luscious ho, Jules knows where to GO. Question is: I gots the treasure, so what's YOUR pleasure?

Movie Connections:

References Network (1976)

Soundtrack:

A Kiss To Build A Dream On

Fallout meets humor

Taking place many years after the original Fallout, Fallout II places you in the gecko gut-stained boots of your own descendant. For your withering tribal village, you seek a Garden of Eden Creation Kit, a miraculous and fabled gizmo issued to the Vaults (surprise, surprise), intended to miraculously terraform the Earth and recreate civilization. You, who automatically earned the status of Chosen One due to your lineage, get to take a spear and the treasured Vault 13 jumpsuit, and go find it.

My dry description aside, I haven't played any RPG that had the same strange appeal and lasting quality. Fallout redefined RPGs with its post-apocalyptic gunslinging gameplay, now Fallout II takes the redefinition and makes a whole lot of fun of it.

Though it retains the ragtag, gritty backdrop of Fallout, the sequel takes itself *far* less seriously and keeps an attitude of upbeat, perky cynicism combined with silliness throughout. Movie quotes and inside jokes abound, from "The Wizard of Oz" to "Austin Powers," from Macbeth to Mike Tyson. Everywhere you go, somebody's got a snide comment that is a reference to something, somewhere. I've learned more movie lines from Fallout II than from movies themselves. It's a cross-section of American pop culture, to be sure.

The graphics have changed little from the original Fallout, but it's hard to mind, because nothing was really wrong with them in the first place. The music is unobtrusive and always appropriate, it truly evokes the wandering-the-dusty-wastelands feel the Fallout universe has always intended to have. Sound effects are roughly the same but effective as always, lots of very nice, appetite-inducing sounds of gunfire and its effects. The voice-acted characters are enjoyable as ever, and your choices for responses in dialogue are sometimes so side-splitting that you'll have just one more reason to save your game before talking to *anybody*. ("Hey! I worked hard to earn the 9 Perception and Intelligence required to reach this dialogue node! Who are you calling a moron?!")

Despite the fact that there are almost no changes in the interface, Fallout II has enough adventure, storyline, and lung-destroying humor to keep both fans of the original game and newcomers playing, and almost certainly multiple times, because there are many things you will miss on the first go-round. To fully appreciate everything Fallout II has to offer, you'll have to go through it a few times with different characters - which, by the end, will feel like a very, very good idea, because Fallout II is every bit as good as the original, with a delightful new pretension towards cynical humor to boot.