Fallout 4 is feverishly obsessed with the past, fetishizing the post-war American lifestyle to the point of nausea. Around every corner is some sort of 1950's iconography presented as some mythical lost ancient glory. The series began as a brutal condemnation of 20th century consumerism, the first game's opening having the military execution of civilians sharing airspace with a commercial for a grossly overpriced nuclear powered car. Somewhere along the line, perhaps not somewhere as easily place-able as the Bethesda acquisition, The Fallout name has become a celebration of the cruelty, violence, and conquest that allowed Americans to partake in the vapid culture the franchise is now so tied to. This world feels dated but in all the worst ways.

This game is absolutely fucking vile. Sickening manufacturing consent for what would only shortly after happen in Bolivia. Systematically dismantling an entire country run completely by the "cartels" the current administration likes to fearmonger so much about. The actual people of Bolivia are dehumanized; never talked to or about. One mission has you heading into a school, filled with children, to interrogate a teacher related to a target. Students sit in their desks as you, a CIA agent, point guns around, ready to shoot as the chaos of the open world format ensures you are in danger at every moment. Everyone who worked on this should be ashamed, absolutely ashamed.

I used to be a lore guy.
I used to get so caught up in the specifics of details interlocking and having causal relationships to each other. Skyrim has none of that. Instead it has vibes. It's all vibes. When I was younger I tried to dig too deep and was resentful of what wasn't there. I'd kit it out with a billion mods and try to make it something it wasn't. Some games that could loosely be thrown in the same genre - New Vegas, Disco Elysium, Baldur's Gate, are novels with added dimension. Their art is text; the game around them is just their interface. In this realm, Skyrim cannot compare. But why would it? It's not literature, it's a virtual diorama. It's a gorgeous landscape accompanied by the beautiful soundtrack of Soule that, somehow, no matter the angle, is always serene and mystical.
I convinced myself I despised it, yet every few years I boot it up and go for a lovely little stroll around a familiar old countryside. There's a reason this has become such a totemic piece of culture.

I had a long-winded and dense few paragraphs written to give context to understand all the specific intricacies and plot developments but honestly, that's very boring and mostly irrelevant. What is relevant is that the world is doomed. Furthermore, it has been doomed by people in close cultural - and physical - proximity. Maybe even by people we love. A previous generation has well and truly failed the future. Are we able to stop? What disgusting lengths will we go to to avoid having to sit down for a second and consider the actual consequences of our continuing? What moral ground do we have to stand on when someone takes issue with this?
I have seen a great deal of writing calling this "suffering porn". The violence is indeed gross and unceremonious, and after a while you become desensitized to the guttural screams and desperate flailing and gain a comfortability with what is happening. That does not make it any less wrong. At the end when you are beating to a bloody stump a character you have now spent more time with and likely empathized with more than Ellie, for reasons not even remotely justifiable, you finally snap out of this comfort. Every punch is a new abhorrent crime, but every one has the potential to be the last. We do not have to be bound to the sins of our fathers. The functioning of this violent machine we find ourselves in requires active participation. Whoever constructed it is long dead, but we're still pushing the buttons.

The back half of the game is the true jewel. Abby, the surprise main character, shows the possibility for optimism to triumph in a world without hope. Given every opportunity to succumb to cynicism and cruelty, she instead finds purpose in helping a young trans boy, Lev, flee the death cult he was born into towards safety. Not a violent quest to kill some dangerous faraway leader, not some homesteading fantasy, but accompanying a refugee.

To stop beating around the bush; we are on a path of destruction. We've torn apart the Middle East out of rabid vengeance for an act that, upon two decades examination, was more our own fault than anyone else. In our conquest we've tapped the Earth for fuel that will burn us all off of it. We want the people we love to be able to engage in the same reckless consumption as us, cost to the world be damned. We are enthralled in a social machine manufacturing our own death. We can keep it functioning until everything we recognize is gone, fully desensitized to the suffering our gluttony has, is, and will cause to people - real people, people who love, cry, laugh and dream - or we can become conscious of the material function we all play in each others lives.

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To speak of the game itself, as I know capital G gamers are quite fearful of metaphor and subtext, it is a wonderful experience. The dirt and grime are paired with moments of truly transcendent beauty. The astronaut scene, the quiet moments where you can pluck away at a lonely guitar, practically any scene with Abby and Owen. The brief moments of extreme violence are appropriately tense and frightening. Some highlights are the sewers (don't let the fact that it's a sewer level in a video game dissuade you), the suburbs packed with hunting dogs, and the forest at night. It's a proper stealth game this time, and the tight windows for quiet progression combined with your relative fragility makes every encounter a mad scramble.

When I heard there was going to be a sequel my expectations were low. I loved the first one and was wary that a sequel wouldn't have much new to say. Thankfully, I was very wrong. It relies on having played the first one for the fullest effect, for sure, yet it is telling a vastly different story, only ever retreading old ground to dig it up and plant something new.