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Friday, January 18, 2019

West Virginia native 'pleasantly surprised' by Fallout 76 depiction of her home state

Politicians, writers, journalists, and pop culture often reduce the complex realities of Appalachia to a few tired stereotypes and tropes, so West Virginia native Sarah Einstein said she wasn't expecting much better from the recently-released video game Fallout 76, which takes place in a post-apocalyptic West Virginia.

Instead, Einstein was "pleasantly surprised" that Bethesda Game Studios mostly got it right, she writes for Rewire News. Bethesda's design director said in a recent interview that he hated "redneck post-apocalyptic" cliches and felt it was important not to fall into that trap when depicting West Virginia.

"The careful work that went into realizing this mandate can be seen throughout the game. As a player, you enter the game through Vault 76—a fallout shelter meant to house people through the toxic years—and find yourself in a wooded area just outside of Flatwoods," Einstein writes. "And the thing is, these are the right woods, with the right trees, the right bird songs, with rhododendron and fern. It feels like home. The game’s recorded voices have a variety of accents, from the deep drawl of the middle counties to the clipped consonants of a non-native speaker, but all of them feel authentic and, except for a few robot characters clearly programmed to be 'down homey,' none seem overdone."

Even the nuclear mutants encountered by characters are a neat bit of symbolism, and "are the direct result of outside corporate interests exploiting the people and environment of the state—and while this is a constant throughout the Fallout franchise, it feels especially apt in a game set in West Virginia," Einstein writes.

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