

However, constant delays and Catherine’s death during childbirth forced James to abandon the project and seek refuge in Vault 101, where he took the Lone Wanderer to raise within a safe environment far away from the dangers of the wasteland. Li informs the Lone Wanderer that their parents were not born in Vault 101, but lived outside of it, where they worked together upon a plan they conceived to purify all the water in the Tidal Basin and eventually the entire Potomac River, with a giant water purifier built in the Jefferson Memorial, called Project Purity Fallout 3. Escaping from the Vault with the aid of the Overseer’s daughter Amata, the search for James across the Wasteland begins at the nearby town of Megaton, named for the undetonated atomic bomb at the center of town, and eventually into the ruins of Washington.ĭirected by Three Dog towards Rivet City, a derelict carrier serving as a fortified human settlement, the Lone Wanderer meets with Doctor Madison Li, a scientist who worked alongside James. Upon reaching their 19th birthday, chaos erupts when James suddenly leaves the Vault, causing the Overseer to lock down the Vault and send security guards after James’ child. While growing up, their father comments about their deceased mother Catherine and her favorite passage from the Bible – Revelation 21:6, which speaks of “the waters of life”. While the Enclave is analogous in goal to their western brethren, the eastern branch of the Brotherhood of Steel seeks to help the people of the Wasteland, though a small group rejected this and have become outcasts who seek to resume their original goal of salvaging high-level technology.įor the first 19 years of their life from 2258 to 2277 Fallout 3, the player character grows up within the isolated confines of Vault 101 alongside their father James, a doctor and scientist who assists in the Vault’s clinic.

The region has two major factions within it: the Enclave and the Brotherhood of Steel. The game’s scaled landscape includes war-ravaged variants of various real-life landmarks like the White House, the Jefferson and Lincoln Memorials, Arlington National Cemetery and also the Washington Monument, with a small number of settlements dotted around the Capital Wasteland that consist of descendants of survivors from the Great War, including one that surrounds an unexploded bomb, another consisting primarily of ghoul inhabitants, and another formed within the hulking remains of an carrier. Fallout 3 takes place in the year 2277, and within the region that covers most of the ruined city of Washington, D.C., Northern Virginia, and parts of Maryland.
