Of the many things that keep me awake at night—tinnitus, climate collapse, the fourth coffee of the day, man’s inhumanity to man—none is more pressing than the continued and inexplicable absence of Beamdog-style Enhanced Editions for Fallout 1 and 2. I don’t ask for much: just versions of the classics that run out-of-the-box at modern resolutions. And maybe even have less aggravating inventory systems, if someone could see their way to it.
Alas, I’m probably not getting that any time soon, but at least I can content myself with drooling over gameplay footage for Fallout: Bakersfield, a GZDoom total conversion remake of Fallout 1 that recently resurfaced after going silent for three years.
Well, it ain’t silent now. It just got a new extended gameplay footage reel that I’ve been poring over like a one-man Warren Commission, desperate to find the subtle flaw that reveals the project as some kind of elaborate hoax.
I’ve not found it. What I have found is one of the most delicious and faithful recreations of the OG Fallout vibe in first-person that I’ve ever had the pleasure of seeing. Really, it’s nuts how good this thing—filled to the brim with art by dev Alexander “Red888guns” Berezin—looks.
The 3D Fallouts of the Bethesda and Obsidian era have never quite captured the grimy, pulpy aesthetics of the original games (a limitation of the engine as much as anything, I think), but GZDoom is an absolutely perfect match for it. The way the ghouls of Necropolis melt into puddles of gore ‘n’ goo when set upon by our heroic(?) protagonist is pitch-perfect: a startlingly effective recreation of the isometric original, just transplanted to ground level. There’s even a bit where he misses despite a 94% chance of hitting. We’re home.
Release date? Ah, well, there’s the rub. Fallout: Bakersfield has no date on it, and despite how incredibly slick Berezin’s art looks here, I suspect it’s still a long ways away—if it ever releases at all. Still, even a sumptuous-looking mod that may or may not ever come out is more than anyone official has done with FO1 and 2 in the last couple of decades.
Even if Berezin’s work never sees full release, dare I hope it might spark some inspiration over at Bethesda to do something with the OGs? I hear that Oblivion Remaster did pretty well, guys. Maybe try something like that again?
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