But all we have is a video for now
Those who play Fallout: New Vegas are used to an arid and hot landscape, but one upcoming mod based on Bethesda’s 2010 game flips those tables. It’s trading desert stereotypes for a frigid tundra environment, and it all plays right into the nuclear fallout lore everyone loves about the series.
A team of slightly fewer than 50 community developers is working on Fallout: The Frontier, a New Vegas mod that introduces nuclear winter. Weather serves as much more than a backdrop for this, though; according to the project’s website, surviving in winter conditions is one of the main draws. Weather will be dynamic, meaning it can go from sunny to freezing rather quickly. Players have to be prepared, lest they end up frostbitten and stranded in the snow.
Despite the relatively small development team, The Frontier is a massive undertaking. It’s estimated to be about the size of the Mojave Wasteland, which is the setting of New Vegas. This mod doesn’t take place there, however. The Frontier‘s set in and around Portland, Oregon — an environment that the creators state is fairly unexplored in Fallout canon. Although there’s a new locale, the developers say they’re connecting the Mojave and the Frontier.
A big means by which they’re doing this is through factions. The mod’s description provides the following for faction feuds and overarching plot:
Mr. House may have saved New Vegas from being destroyed, however The Frontier wasn’t so lucky. What was once a majestic and a buzzing city, is now reduced to a shadow of its former glory. It slowly became a city of ice shrouded in mysteries. Rumors of these mysteries have traveled far and wide from the few who managed to escape the icy ruins.
With the NCR and the Legion locked in a bloody stalemate, the possible means to end this war once and for all has intrigued both sides. Now the NCR and the Legion are vying for control of the Frontier.
As it typically goes for these sort of things, we don’t have a firm date for a release. That’s because everyone involved is doing this as a passion project, and sometimes real life jobs get in the way. It must be relatively far along, though, as it’s said that they’re aiming for a winter launch. Wouldn’t a winter launch just be so wonderfully fitting?
Fallout: The Frontier [Fallout: The Frontier]
[Update: Andrew Lee, the project lead on The Frontier, reached out to share a recently uploaded video that shows off some main quest gameplay. The five-minute clip is from the “Walk of Shame” mission. It’s one more glimpse to hopefully sate your appetite until this eventually releases.]
