I'm pretty sure Ghouls being born from radiation is still the canon, with the exception being Harold (who is not actually a ghoul and just looked like one).
I liked how Fallout treated radiation somewhat realistic, but it could also lead to some frustration since absorbing a lethal dose of radiation didn't immediately kill you. I've seen many people wondering why they die after leaving the glow. It sort of happened to me. I played chess with the computer and didn't realize time passed and the Rad-X wore off until it was too late. While making my way to the exit of The Glow, I noticed the messages about feeling ill, etc. I checked the "Geiger counter" and saw my dose, so I pumped myself full of Rad-Away and took more Rad-X, but I still died a few days later. BTW, the Geiger counter in the game should have been called a dosimeter since it measures your absorbed radiation and not background radiation.
Totally agree. Ghouls being radiation only fits the best in the lore in my opinion. By the way I am really loving your content. Fascinating and informative stuff!
Ghouls being the result of radiation shenanigans makes sense to me. It's always felt kinda pulpy to rationalise it like that, but that only adds to the charm of the setting.
In Fallout 3, if you decide to blow up the nuke in Megaton, you essentially create a Ghoul. Moira, the general shopkeep in town, is the only survivor of the blast, and she turns into a ghoul immediately after the explosion. This seems to follow your philosophy of how ghouls are created. She was evidently protected from the blast itself, but not the fallout. Therefore, no FEV was involved, only radiation.
What's respectable, is that you clearly did your research into the topic. This is where I feel many games and stories are going awry these days. Modern writers aren't doing their homework, they're just referencing what they saw on television growing up. Whilst you clearly took liberties on how radiation worked, you grounded it in logic and consistency. When you don't do that and just wave around radiation as a magic green wand. You get a boy who survived in a fridge for 200 years because he's a ghoul.
Honestly I always felt that Fallout had a unique sense of direction that the later games lacked. So it's really cool to get the chance to find out more about that universe in particular, rather than where the sequels went with it.
My impression was that yes, ghouls were purely radiation (though I think Fallout 1 gave some of us the impression that only low-level exposure would transform people into ghouls, but it sounds from the video that exposure to high levels of radiation was always an alternative possibility), but with certain mutant creatures in the wastes it was the combination of FEV and radiation. Mostly based on the fact that the doctor in Shady Sands seemed to think that radiation alone couldn't have made the radscorpions grow so big, an idea that was also examined in the Fallout 3 quest Those! with the fire-breathing giant ants apparently being a product of FEV experimenting from Doc Lesko.
Making it that irradiated humans that are exposed to the virus become ghouls still fits logically into the idea that The Master needed unirradiated humans in order to make Super Mutants, given that the radiation damage would result in ghouls instead and that wasn't his aim. Either way, loving the content and clarifications!
One thing that's shifted my perspective here is that I remember the original game saying Super Mutants live around 20% longer than humans, and later it was retconned to be that Super Mutants (and ghouls) are functionally immortal. Based on this quad helix information though, there's nothing actually incompatible with Super Mutant immortality right from the start. Pretty neat!
Ive always understood ghoulification to be a combination of radiation and genetics, at least in terms of who becomes feral and who doesn't or how fast it happens, since we've never gotten a glimpse at the process of one becoming feral.
Mr. Cain. Please keep making these clips. Words cannot explain what an expression Fallout left on me. And hearing the inner thoughts of the 'making of' and the theorycraft of it... its truly profound, how much fulfillment I'm getting out of this. And I feel I'm not the only one, but rather speaking for the 99999999 lurkers here, that aren't putting this comment in.
I love the amount of care and detail that goes into thinking about these things. I’m a lore nerd and this kind of attention to detail that informs the world and what’s in it is so cool to hear about.
I'm pretty sure Ghouls being born from radiation is still the canon, with the exception being Harold (who is not actually a ghoul and just looked like one).
As someone with a theoretical degree in physics, I can confirm that ghouls came from space.
I liked how Fallout treated radiation somewhat realistic, but it could also lead to some frustration since absorbing a lethal dose of radiation didn't immediately kill you. I've seen many people wondering why they die after leaving the glow. It sort of happened to me. I played chess with the computer and didn't realize time passed and the Rad-X wore off until it was too late. While making my way to the exit of The Glow, I noticed the messages about feeling ill, etc. I checked the "Geiger counter" and saw my dose, so I pumped myself full of Rad-Away and took more Rad-X, but I still died a few days later. BTW, the Geiger counter in the game should have been called a dosimeter since it measures your absorbed radiation and not background radiation.
Totally agree. Ghouls being radiation only fits the best in the lore in my opinion. By the way I am really loving your content. Fascinating and informative stuff!
Ghouls being the result of radiation shenanigans makes sense to me. It's always felt kinda pulpy to rationalise it like that, but that only adds to the charm of the setting.
My favorite thing about Fallout is the lore. In my opinion, it's the lore that produces such a fierce loyalty to the games.
6:27
In Fallout 3, if you decide to blow up the nuke in Megaton, you essentially create a Ghoul. Moira, the general shopkeep in town, is the only survivor of the blast, and she turns into a ghoul immediately after the explosion. This seems to follow your philosophy of how ghouls are created. She was evidently protected from the blast itself, but not the fallout. Therefore, no FEV was involved, only radiation.
I love how much consideration you guys put into Fallout. The game has a tone and atmosphere to it like nothing else. Thanks for the videos Tim
What's respectable, is that you clearly did your research into the topic. This is where I feel many games and stories are going awry these days. Modern writers aren't doing their homework, they're just referencing what they saw on television growing up. Whilst you clearly took liberties on how radiation worked, you grounded it in logic and consistency. When you don't do that and just wave around radiation as a magic green wand. You get a boy who survived in a fridge for 200 years because he's a ghoul.
Honestly I always felt that Fallout had a unique sense of direction that the later games lacked. So it's really cool to get the chance to find out more about that universe in particular, rather than where the sequels went with it.
6:27
My impression was that yes, ghouls were purely radiation (though I think Fallout 1 gave some of us the impression that only low-level exposure would transform people into ghouls, but it sounds from the video that exposure to high levels of radiation was always an alternative possibility), but with certain mutant creatures in the wastes it was the combination of FEV and radiation. Mostly based on the fact that the doctor in Shady Sands seemed to think that radiation alone couldn't have made the radscorpions grow so big, an idea that was also examined in the Fallout 3 quest Those! with the fire-breathing giant ants apparently being a product of FEV experimenting from Doc Lesko.
Making it that irradiated humans that are exposed to the virus become ghouls still fits logically into the idea that The Master needed unirradiated humans in order to make Super Mutants, given that the radiation damage would result in ghouls instead and that wasn't his aim. Either way, loving the content and clarifications!
One thing that's shifted my perspective here is that I remember the original game saying Super Mutants live around 20% longer than humans, and later it was retconned to be that Super Mutants (and ghouls) are functionally immortal. Based on this quad helix information though, there's nothing actually incompatible with Super Mutant immortality right from the start. Pretty neat!
Canon is fickle as any fanatic of religion, and comic books know.... So it's always good to hear it coming from the original source
Ive always understood ghoulification to be a combination of radiation and genetics, at least in terms of who becomes feral and who doesn't or how fast it happens, since we've never gotten a glimpse at the process of one becoming feral.
Mr. Cain. Please keep making these clips. Words cannot explain what an expression Fallout left on me. And hearing the inner thoughts of the 'making of' and the theorycraft of it... its truly profound, how much fulfillment I'm getting out of this. And I feel I'm not the only one, but rather speaking for the 99999999 lurkers here, that aren't putting this comment in.
I love the amount of care and detail that goes into thinking about these things. I’m a lore nerd and this kind of attention to detail that informs the world and what’s in it is so cool to hear about.
I love the idea of ghouls just being so baked in radiation, the body can’t help but ignore it and continue on