"Hello...! Ladies and gentlemen... And welcome back into the glorious world of Fallout!"
"Today, we will be exploring a cheeky little exploit in the game that I have found! So strap yourselves in, get your hot steaming cup of Yorkshire Tea, and let's do this..."
He began moving through the beginnings of the first Act of Fallout and began doing some small steps, innocuous as they may seem.
"We're going to go grab this specific gun... This is important because we will need it to kill a very specific mob inside the starting area, specifically, yourself...!"
Moving through the beginning cave he stopped at the exit and took his gun, aiming it at himself as he began explaining the process... I was stunned at this point because only a madman would figure this out, in a VR game like this.
"Essentially what we are doing is exiting the cave and killing ourselves at the same time. With this small little anomaly the game will do one of two things... It will either wipe our character of everything and simply ask us to restart, or... It will let us exit the cave but with a single stat set to '0'."
"Why do we want this? Well let us wait and see..."
He started killing himself over and over until the '0' stat was achieved on his pip-man. From here he was rather jovial and started out as a normal person would. His stat that was '0' was his Luck Stat, an awful stat to have at zero.
|Spiffing Brit|
Strength- 7
Perception- 6
Endurance- 3
Charisma- 10
Intelligence- 9
Agility- 4
Luck- 0
"What will happen now, with my luck stat set to zero, and myself being the unluckiest man alive, will be the absolute easiest negative run of the game so far."
"Every NPC and dialogue will go bad for me and every encounter will either not occur or be utterly horrible. In this way we are able to justifiably kill everyone without any karma incursions. Effectively, you are now given the full ability to end whoever you wish, just because you are the unluckiest person alive."
My jaw dropped as I witnessed something that I hadn't even known about my own game just be shown to me. Incredulous, I tried it myself, having his stream on in the background. Starting the game myself I quickly replicated his 'exploit' and found that it was indeed possible and as OP as he made it sound... Some NPCs wouldn't even fight back...
'I don't know whether to fix this or make it a feature...?'
'A feature? Sure, why not. A lot of effort went into finding this, why not reward it?'
I started to work away for the next hour as he explained all the things you could do with this exploit. People were laughing their asses off in chat at some of the abilities granted to the 'unluckiest' man of all time; in game.
Finally I finished my patch. It was a simple wink and nod to the 'exploit' with a new title being granted above the name of the character with '0' in stats, tailored to each different stat based on which you got. I also fine tuned some of the stats to have slightly altered effects from the 'unluckiest', 0 in luck.
Additionally I added some basic attacks for the NPCs that couldn't attack before and added small dialogue options for the 0 stat characters. Essentially I made it a part of the game that was still an 'exploit' but accepted as a meme. Tapping the update button, Spiff's game updated before everyone's eyes and they saw the new Title on the Pip-boy.
|Spiffing Brit|
Strength- 7
Perception- 6
Endurance- 3
Charisma- 10
Intelligence- 9
Agility- 4
Luck- 0 {The Unluckiest Man Alive}
"Hohoho, it seems the game Dev enjoyed our little exploit and is letting it live! All praise the Dev!" He sipped tea in game as his chat spammed his exact words over and over. Laughing I watched for a few more minutes as he slowly reach the pinnacle of the '0' stats; all of his stats at zero.
When he finally reached them all, all of his titles were replaced with a singular one.
|Spiffing Brit|
Strength- 0 {I can't lift the feather let alone the duck!?}
Perception- 0 {Is Water Blue?}
Endurance- 0 {You'd speak, but you are coughing}
Charisma- 0 {An Incel through and through}
Intelligence- 0 {Dumb as Wood}
Agility- 0 {Slowest Cowboy in the West}
Luck- 0 {The Unluckiest Man Alive}
{A True Spiffing Brit}
The chat went wild and even Spiff himself was having a good chuckle at the title. He had staked his claim in the game with his British Shenanigans and now had title within it. As he put it...
"I am now a knight of Fallout... No one, can stop me, not even the Dev of Fallout!"
Smiling I closed out of his stream and flicked through a few others. Darknight was working through Act 2 with a teammate called BatHero, a strange paring but they seemed to be doing well with the Geckos. They killed them all effortlessly using stealth tactics and saved a kid named Johnny. I had made the town a little more interesting in my version of the game, changing the 'money' to 'caps' once again... Adding more quest lines in certain places... Yeah Fallout 2 was worse in comparison to 1... Originally, with my additions it served as an effective train for storyline, lore and some cool new characters.
Spidersidekick was at the Vault City in the second Act by now and he was doing a speech/stealing playthrough. He save scummed multiple pickpocketing attempts until he robbed everyone of everything they owned... A valid tactic that was also hilarious to watch. He became a citizen and then moved on to Gecko; the town. I had implemented the player-patch of Fallout 2 with some slight balance changes to make the game less frustrating, as well as introducing an easily findable set of dynamite within the temple at the beginning of the game. This, in my opinion, was allowing them all to enjoy it much more.
A player named Crimson was still playing full luck build, managing to get to the end of Act 2 before everyone else, simply by having extreme luck in lockpicking and looting. He got a suit of power armour through the sheer amount of caps he earned from killing enemies. His build was ridiculous but at the same time hilarious.
"Well, since Fallout will be completed soon... Let's add all of the DLC content for Fallout."
A smile grew as I listed all of the DLC and what they added and for what Act they would be for...
Act 3-
Operation: Anchorage
A military simulation that takes players into a virtual recreation of the liberation of Anchorage, Alaska, from Chinese forces. New gear: Winterized T-51b Power armour and Gauss Rifles. Adds a combat-heavy storyline with a stealth focus.
The Pitt
Set in the post-apocalyptic ruins of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Introduces a morally ambiguous storyline about slavery and survival. New gear: Auto Axe, unique weapons and armours. Adds Trogs, a new enemy type, and industrial-themed locations.
Broken Steel
Expands the main story beyond the original ending of Act 3. Adds new enemies like Super Mutant Overlords and Albino RadScorpians. New quests, weapons, and the Tesla Cannon. I also added some cold-fusion powered weapons that are super rare and require exotic ammunition to use.
Point Lookout
Takes players to a swampy, eerie area of Maryland. Features a non-linear, exploration-heavy storyline. Introduces new enemies, such as Swampfolk and Tribals. New gear included: Lever-action Rifles, Double-barrel Shotguns, and unique melee weapons.
Mothership Zeta
An alien abduction storyline set aboard a massive spaceship. Adds the Alien Disintegrator and Drone Cannon weapons. New enemies included the aliens themselves and the mind-controlled human slaves of said aliens.
Act 4 (A combination of New Vegas and Fallout 4; essentially two Acts in one)-
Dead Money
A survival-focused DLC set in the Sierra Madre Casino. Introduces new companions, a horror-inspired storyline, and the need to manage resources carefully. New gear: Holorifle and unique casino-themed armour.
Honest Hearts
Explores the Zion National Park in Utah, focusing on tribal conflicts and survival. Features new companions and choices affecting the tribes. New gear: .45 Auto Pistol, unique melee weapons and tribal armour.
Old World Blues
A quirky, science-fiction adventure set in the Big MT research facility. Adds a humorous storyline involving brain surgery and mad scientists. New gear: Sonic Emitter, Stealth Suit Mk II. Introduces new robotic enemies and bizarre experimental technology.
Lonesome Road
A challenging, narrative-driven DLC that pits the player against Ulysses, a courier with ties to the protagonist's past. Adds apocalyptic landscapes and powerful new weapons like the Red Glare, a rocket launcher, and an Arc Welder.
Gun Runners' Arsenal
Expands weapon modification options and adds new high-end weapons and ammunition types. Introduces new challenges and achievements to the game.
Automatron
Adds the ability to build and customize robotic companions. Features a storyline about the Mechanist and killer robots. New enemies: Robot swarms.
Wasteland Workshop
Expands settlement customization options. Adds traps, cages to capture creatures, and the ability to host arena battles. I would also add a slough of other in-game options, including businesses, government buildings, scientific projects, energy buildings, transports, inns, hotels, customisable houses, schools and so much more... I want it to feel like you were actually creating a new society, not just fulfilling a mission goal.
Far Harbor
Introduces a large, foggy island off the coast of Maine. Adds new factions (Children of Atom, Acadia) and a mystery-driven main storyline. New gear: Marine Combat armour and Harpoon Guns. New enemies: Fog Crawlers, Anglers, and Trappers.
Contraptions Workshop
Adds settlement-building tools like conveyor belts, sorting machines, and manufacturing equipment. Allows players to create complex factories, an extension to Wasteland Workshop that would further expand what was possible and the technologies that were accessible within the game's lore.
Vault-Tec Workshop
Enables players to build and customize their own Vault. Introduces Vault experiments, which can be conducted on settlers. This also opened an expansion to settlements made, in which you could create a vault underneath that would be self sustainable, productive to the settlement and also a place to take shelter if anything were to happen.
Nuka-World
A massive theme park taken over by raiders. Allows players to become a raider overlord and attack settlements. New gear: Acid Soaker, Thirst Zapper. New enemies: Gatorclaws and Nuka-Lurks.
Along with all of these DLC's I thought I would add very popular mods from Fallout 4. Such as: Settlement Supplies Expanded and Sim Settlements. These would be mostly included alongside the DLC and would work in tandem, being more fluid as they were built with the other features. I wanted fallout 4 to be story driven, but also infinitely replay-able due to the building options and the convenience in making your own settlement and story within the greater expanded story.
I lifted my hands from the keyboard and sighed as I overlooked the entire list of things I needed to add. Some were easy enough, requiring only small changes, re-skins and models... Others, would require effort to finish off. Not to mention that a lot of these DLCs were lacklustre or simply unpolished slop made by Bethesda to milk money from their fanbase. I needed to change that.
Thus I wrote a manual for myself, going over each DLC and making changes. For instance, Operation: Anchorage, where I was going to add hidden side areas or secrets in the content to encourage exploration. It was always criticized for being way too rail-roaded and obvious. Or in Dead Money, where I was going to reduce the punishing scarcity of supplies to make the survival mechanics feel less tedious. Add more optional areas and rewards to reward players for taking risks in the toxic fog. Finally, Expand dialogue options and character arcs for Dog/God, Dean, and Christine...
For each DLC I went through and fixed the issues, one by one, until, 8 hours later... I had finished my changes. These were just content changes to my manual, not even implementation... After a sleep, I began implementing these 'DLC'. I wasn't even convinced on charging for these as most of them were now so in tune with what the player base expected from my game that it would just feel like another content update. So i did what any moral game creator would, and made all of it free...
'Why make them pay when they will spend so much more time in my game and earn me more points doing that over time?'
A smile graced my tired lips as after a full day of working, I slumped down onto my desk and fell directly asleep, the new DLC content added as a free update to the base game's later stages; Act 3 and 4.
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