All Fallout games in order, chronologically and by release date

By Sam Hill April 25, 2024 11:27AM

A woman and a dog leaving a vault in Fallout 4. — Bethesda

War never changes. The retrofuturistic apocalypse world of Fallout has graced fans with pretty regular releases since 1997, letting us explore the North American wasteland in the aftermath of a nuclear war in a variety of regions.

Contents

Fallout games by release date
Fallout games in chronological order

It can be a little hard to keep track of the series’ timeline if you aren’t listening to every holotape in every game and keeping your own log of events. On top of the best Fallout games, we now have to consider where the new Fallout TV show fits in the timeline. We aren’t going to get into every timeline detail here (the series’ lore is surprisingly deep and detailed) but we will let you know exactly what year every mainline titles takes place in and how you can play them in order.

Fallout games by release date

Fallout Shelter — Bethesda

The Fallout series is coming up on its 30th anniversary, and there are a few more entries than most people think there are. While the mainline games get a lot of attention, there are a handful of oddball spinoffs as well.

Fallout (1997)
Fallout 2 (1998)
Fallout Tactics: Brotherhood of Steel (2001)
Fallout: Brotherhood of Steel (2004)
Fallout 3 (2008)
Fallout: New Vegas (2010)
Fallout 4 (2015)
Fallout Shelter (2015)
Fallout Pinball (2016)
Fallout 76 (2018)
Fallout Shelter Online (2019)

Fallout games in chronological order

Fallout 76 American flag power armor. — Bethesda

The Fallout series takes place after what is referred to as the Great War, a global thermonuclear war that took place on Saturday, October 23, 2077. Nuclear blasts across the globe wiped out civilization in a matter of two hours.

The games have not been released in an entirely linear timeline, so to play them in chronological order, you’ll need to bounce around a little. Here’s every mainline title and its place in the Fallout timeline:

Fallout 76 (2102 – 2104)
Fallout (2161)
Fallout 2 (2241)
Fallout 3 (2277)
Fallout: New Vegas (2281)
Fallout 4 (2287)
Fallout TV series (2296 – 2297)

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Gaming Guides Editor

Sam Hill is a journalist and the gaming guides editor at Digital Trends. He's also written tech guides for Input and has…

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The best Fallout 3 mods

An alpha deathclaw enforcer attacking in Fallout 3.

Right alongside Skyrim, Fallout 3 is one of the most modded games of all time. Bethesda took this series and transformed it into an open-world adventure that had never really been seen up to that point. As much as there was to do in that base experience, there was a limit to what could be done. However, dedicated fans didn't let that end their fun and began modding the game with new features, quality of life improvements, and new content to extend the life of Fallout 3 to the point where you can still play it today and have an amazing time. Now that modders have had well over a decade to work with the game, there are potentially thousands of mods you can try out, but these are the best ones we've found.
FWE - FO3 Wanderers Edition

Let's kick things off with a bang and talk about the FWE - FO3 Wanderers Edition mod. Calling this a single mod is kind of a misnomer since it actually integrates over 50 other mods into one massive package. The purpose is to rework the balance and depth of the game to be more fair and give players more opportunities to role-play. This mod does make the game intentionally harder than the base version. Combat is faster and more determined by player skilll. Also, which perks and skills you have make a bigger difference. Injuries need to be treated more carefully, over 40 new weapons and pieces of armor have been added, AI has been enhanced, and dozens of other changes were implemented to make the game more immersive. It's the simplest way to give another playthrough some spice.
Fellout

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Hades 2: release date prediction, trailers, gameplay, and more

Melinoe standing in a stone circle.

Just like Zagreus' never-ending quest to escape the Underworld in Greek mythology, it seems we too are destined to continue fighting through new levels of demons and monsters in the sequel to the amazing roguelike Hades. We're not complaining, as that game was one of the best games released in 2020, and no one expected a sequel at all, let alone one announced so soon. Hades 2 will be the first sequel studio Supergiant Games have ever made, and it makes sense given how successful and popular the first game ended up being. Aside from some notable exceptions like Rogue Legacy 2 and Spelunky 2, not many roguelikes ever get a direct sequel, so there's a lot of mystery surrounding how Hades 2 will be different from the first game. But there's no need to dive into the depths of the Underworld yourself in search of answers, as we've pulled all the information we could from the jaws of Cerberus.
Release date

Hades 2 has no release date quite yet. However, the team has apparently been working on it since early 2021, and, just like the first, will come out first in early access. Supergiant has stated that details about this early access period would be revealed in 2023, however, that does not guarantee it will actually begin in 2023. The first Hades was in early access for almost two years, but we know that a slightly bigger team is working on Hades 2 from the start so this game may hit 1.0 a bit faster.
Platforms

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The best Fallout 76 mods

Fallout 76 covered in snow.

It's fair to say that Fallout 76 wasn't exactly what fans were hoping for when it launched. Instead of being a single-player RPG like Fallout 4, 3, and New Vegas, 76 was a pseudo MMO where you joined multiplayer servers to play in a persistent world. A multiplayer Falloutsounds great on paper, but the execution wasn't what people were looking for. Many years and updates later, the game is in a far better state, but not quite up to the standard of some hardcore fans. However, Bethesda games are among the most famous for the quality of mods made for them, and at this point, there are thousands of mods available for Fallout 76. We've scoured every inch of Appalachia to collect only the best Fallout 76 mods.
Ultimist's High Detailed Map Plus

The default map in Fallout 76 looks ripped right out of a tourist's guide. That's cool for theming and everything, but not so useful when trying to find anything besides major locations. The map is surprisingly bare in detail considering how much walking around and exploring you do. Ultimist's High Detailed Map Plus rips up that old map and replaces it with a much more detailed and appealing map to navigate. It marks all the normal locations you need, plus every vendor and 440 resource deposits (which you can toggle on or off to reduce clutter). It might not sound like a big deal, but any Fallout fan knows how much time you spend on the map menu.
Better Inventory