But that's completely misunderstanding what Fallout is supposed to be about.
Look at 1 and 2 and you'll see that the world is rebuilding and changing. The games were never intended to remain stagnant forever and ever, that's just completely besides the point.
Stagnation isn't the point as you can have countless different kind of civilizations emerge in the Wasteland without ever actually overcoming the apocalypse or ensuring stability. Basically, I'm going with Chris Avellone that the world is getting too civilized with NCR and keeping things from that point is a good idea.
For example, having 15 different weird cities in NCR's former territory is better than having one single state.
Why?, It's been 200 years. People shouldn't still be living in shacks and struggling to get by that long after.
Like I said, it's my preference it never gets better. At least until all of the radiation has died out and the salvaged world is completely gone.
Preferences are fair, but I still think you're missing the point here.
Fallout is about survival, but it is also about rebuilding and building new civilization in post-apocalyptic world. The first game defined this pretty clearly, though I admit that even by the time of Fallout 2 some elements of the original vision were lost.
No, I entirely know what the point is about "exploring post-apocalypse civilizations" indicates. The thing is that I agree with Chris Avellone in terms of my own preference. It's like The Wolf Among Us and Fables. The Wolf Among Us is subtly different from Fables despite the same characters and setting due to doubling down on the Noir Detective elements versus the Fantasy ones (as well as
making the characters more likable).
I prefer a grimmer, darker Fallout even as I enjoy the humorous sci-fi elements a great deal. This isn't me saying how Fallout was intended to be by the creators but saying how I'd like to see it go. Don't confuse my preferences for interpretation of how the games were envisioned. I'm not that arrogant.
I just would like to see NCR broken up because I think it'd be cool to deal with the fallout.
*rimshot*
However, while break-up of NCR is not impossible, breaking up just for the sake of making the setting more grim doesn't really work...nor is there a connection between state break-up and grim setting.
No, it does however mean that order and stability won't necessarily flow from NCR to the rest of the USA. It also means that we'd get some interesting potential stories like dealing with the people of NCR in a Civil War, how the cities who were apart of it deal with the failure of the state, and other struggles.
Besides, NCR is already pretty "dark", despite its external appearance. It's a country that is built upon the legacy of the Old World countries, those same countries who brought the world to the state of nuclear holocaust, and is repeating the same mistakes from before, again and again.
Which is part of why I think it needs to destroy itself.
Can only imagine how well-written your fanfic book is with logic like this.
You can only survive for so long, then you either die or begin thrive.
Humans always die. They also thrive then flounder. History does not move in an upward pattern. It moves in a zig-zag.
Cthulhu Armageddon's themes vs. Fallout
While I certainly drew inspiration from
Fallout 1 and 2 when creating
Cthulhu Armageddon, the world of H.P. Lovecraft's universe (and Robert E. Howard's Hyboria since my characters fight back against Lovecraftian abominations plus a little Stephen King on the side) is one which is fundamentally different from the original developers' California.
Humanity didn't destroy itself in
Cthulhu Armageddon. It was destroyed in a natural disaster (as much as a natural disaster of the Great Old Ones rising can be). The thing about the Great Old Ones is that they and the creatures like them are now in charge of the world or at least its apex species. Humanity is ill-adapted to the new environment, new predator races, and new conditions.
There's no retaking the world from them because reality bends to their will and they don't even notice humanity and could wipe them away with a thought. 100 years later, humanity is in very real danger of going extinct and a pressing theme is how they deal with the acknowledgement of that or what measures they'd be willing to sink to in order to survive.
The protagonist, John Booth doesn't care about humanity's survival. He's accepted that's out of his hands and is fairly certain that humanity is doomed but that doesn't really change anything in his life. His partner, Mercury, by contrast, is much more focused on the idea humans can survive and figure out a way to thrive. The antagonist, Alan Ward, is a man who believes the only possible survival for humanity is in transhumanism. In other words, if you can't beat the monsters, join them. He may also be right but is survival worth it if you have to sacrifice your humanity?
One of the interesting conflicts of the book is John
doesn't care that Ward is possibly the only salvation for humanity as Ward killed his friends. Therefore he has to die, regardless of the cost. He has that Joel from
The Last of Us sensibility which I admire.
