Since its first release in 1997, the Fallout series has remained one of the most popular in all of gaming. The games tell a massive story that spans hundreds of years of lore featuring many epic stories which are both self-contained and are part of a greater shared Fallout universe.
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Set in an alternate timeline post-apocalyptic United States, players throughout the existence of the franchise have been able to explore a number of reimagined iconic American settings with that trademark Fallout aesthetic. With so many games and so many stories spanning such a large amount of time, keeping track of the whole story chronologically can certainly be a challenge, but one absolutely worthwhile for fans of the series.
7 Fallout 76 – 2102
Although it's the most recent game to come out, Fallout 76 is chronologically set earliest. The game takes place in the year 2102 and covers an event that is incredibly significant to the wider lore of Fallout. Serving as a prequel to the main games, it is set 25 years after the legendary nuclear war that devastated the world during the era of reconstruction.
The player controls one of the lucky (or arguably unlucky) few who survived the bombs in the Vault-tec-made shelter, Vault 76. These are the characters controlled by real people who populate the world of Fallout 76. The goal of these chosen few is to re-settle the wastelands and try and get the world back on track.
6 Fallout (1997) – 2161
While the residents of Vault 76 returned to the surface just 25 years after the great war, many of the people living in vaults are still underground by the time of the first Fallout game. This includes the player character, a dweller in Vault 13. The protagonist is sent by the vault's overseer to the wastelands to replace the water chip, a device used for the recycling of water.
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Development on the surface world at this point in the chronology is fairly modest, even by the standards of the wastelands. But there is a settlement in the game called Shady Sands. The protagonist of the first game is unable to return to their home vault at the end and by remaining on the surface, helps to kickstart the development of the wastelands.
5 Fallout Tactics: Brotherhood Of Steel – 2197-2198
The world of Fallout at this point on the timeline is still far from the landscape of many major factions and civilizations that many are familiar with. However, in the late 2100s, there are still early signs of what the world would become. This is because of Fallout Tactics' look into one of the franchise's most consistently represented factions — the titular Brotherhood of Steel.
Fallout Tactics is an interesting entry, as while most of the games will allow the player to explore different factions and groups as an individual and then decide if they wish to join one, this game starts the player out as an initiate member of the notorious Brotherhood of Steel. By the later games, the brotherhood has become a militaristic and technological superpower, so it's fascinating to see them at a much earlier stage of building up the military strength.
4 Fallout 2 – 2241
Although it takes place almost 100 years after the first game, Fallout 2 serves as a kind of direct narrative sequel to it. The player takes control of a descendent of the original game's main character who leads the humble surface village of Arroya (originally founded by the vault dweller of the first game).
This is a major point in time for the Fallout chronology as it shows the first signs of major development in the new America. After the player obtains the Garden of Eden Creation Kit, they help the village of Arroya become a major city as part of the New California Republic who would go on to become one of the biggest and most significant factions in the whole series.
3 Fallout 3 – 2277
The first of the 3D games and likely the first game a lot of fans played, Fallout 3 continues the series of world events established previously. However, it does jump to the opposite side of the country from New California over to the remains of Washington DC giving the player a fresh and oddly beautiful new location to explore. By now in the chronology, a proper sense of civilization can be felt in the post-war United States, though still a somewhat crude one.
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Fallout 3's placement on the timeline puts it well after the age of vaults. Despite this, players will remember in the introduction of the game the protagonist is shown to have been born and raised into adulthood within a vault. This is because Vault 101 was intended as an experiment to see a group of survivors living indefinitely in a vault, rather than until they can return to the surface to settle the wastelands. This makes the primary vault of the game rather unique as it continues its activities after everyone else has moved on.
2 Fallout: New Vegas – 2281
Returning to the West 40 years after the first great cities were being built in Fallout 2, the New California Republic is now a fully operational federal government with territory spanning almost the entirety of the West coast of the US and stretching into Nevada, They still face struggles however as they fight a brutal war for control against Caesar's Legion. The game takes place four years after Fallout 3 on the timeline.
Uniquely, the player character of Fallout: New Vegas is a courier instead of a vault dweller making it the only main game to have a protagonist entirely from the new society developed from the wastelands. The region may be more developed than in games further back on the timeline, but in true Fallout fashion, there are still plenty of terrifying monsters populating the vast desert region.
1 Fallout 4 – 2287
The latest game chronologically, Fallout 4 takes place 10 years after the events of Fallout 3 and only a few years after Fallout: New Vegas. The player can now explore a region known as "The Commonwealth" which is the remains of Boston and some of the wider New England region.
While officially the furthest into the future chronologically so far, Fallout 4's opening does provide a playable glimpse of pre-war America. Initially being set in 2077, which is the earliest playable time, the bulk of the game takes place 210 years after the bombs dropped, as the main character (known as the sole survivor) is cryogenically frozen, finally emerging in 2287.
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