If the actual nuclear Holocaust occurred, there probably wouldn't be much environmental storytelling to solve side quests or puzzles to complete, but it wouldn't be a fun video game, so Bethesda played it fast and loose in nuclear physics when designing fallout 3's Capital Wasteland. . Even on the face of it, YouTube's Austin, who has a bit of expertise in puzzling video game open World logistics, said that the bomb that actually landed in Fallout 3

was in the hundreds, according to capital-L Lore, but the actual evidence in the game is considerably shorter than that. Either Austin started with the most specific site in his survey — the one strictly spelled out somewhere in the game - and worked toward various sites where more "environmental storytelling skeletons cuddle each other." A radioactive puddle at the bottom of what looks like a crater? Sounds like a bomb site to me. How about knocking down flat trees and walls in Germantown to suggest an airburst explosion"What do you know, I bought it

There are only 2 bomb sites in the game with 100% story confirmed (aside from undetonated Megaton), but creative and investigative. By applying his eye to the wasteland and turning to forum forensics to unearth the bomb site musings from the half-shoes of past yeoman gamers, Austin was able to raise that number to a staggering 12.

The 12 nuclear explosions in and around the population centers of the metropolis are an immeasurable tragedy ushering in a new era of terror and terror not seen since World War II, but still far from the "hundreds" that supposedly landed in DC in 2077, or the 77 that Mr. House obstructed in his defense of Las Vegas.

But before we have to resort to barbaric defenses such as "stop distrust" or "artistic intent," Austin has a more elegant explanation: scale. In lore, places like Cyrodil and Skyrim are considered to be the size of the country, but in the game you will fill the area of a medium-sized suburban town. It's much better for gameplay, but turning them into condensed "suggestions" of real places is full of things to do. If you want to explore something the size of a real country, load daggerfall and wander in one direction for fifty hours enjoying the procedural generated nothingness- I'm waiting.

Austin said that Fallout 3's representation of Capital Wasteland is about an eighth of the real size, and if you multiply that by 12 nukes, the District of Columbia is under a strong attack of 96 bombs, not 3 figs of Fallout lore, but a little more respectable for such a strategically important target.

Austin's full, 19-minute voyage to the destruction of DC is worth the watch and you have his YouTube Chang for much investigation into the logistics of Bethesda's simulated world He also produces music as an excellent man from Minneapolis.