Jesse Heinig on ghouls and FEV

[Arr0nax]

If FEV caused the ghouls, I think it largely removes a lot of the post-nuclear stigma of radiation and the dangers of a nuclear holocaust. Radiation works for me largely to make the mood of the game more pronounced.

Well, we know the effect of increased doses of radiation isn't to accelerate the mutation process : it just slowly kill people. We know for sure it wouldn't produce the effects we encounter in Fallout.
The designers probably knew this, so it makes sense they used FEV as the catalyst for all the new mutated species in Fallout.
It's a very convenient plot device, and I have nothing against it. You just have to keep it simple and coherent. Which are concepts unknown to Bethesda.

Also, regarding the initial quote, I'm glad I got to read it.
I'm still amazed at how the Fallout team seemed to gather developpers with brains, and actually interested in the world they created.
Todd should learn a thing or two from them. Like, how not to hire "monkeys" to write the background, plot and dialogues of your game, but people with a passion and talent.

 

[UncannyGarlic]

Well, we know the effect of increased doses of radiation isn't to accelerate the mutation process : it just slowly kill people. We know for sure it wouldn't produce the effects we encounter in Fallout.

Yeah but remember that Fallout is heavily influenced by 50's pulp, in which radiation does cause mutation. Fallout, or most fantasy settings for that matter, isn't about being realistic, it's about having consistent and coherent rules by which the world functions.

 

[Geech]

Besides, nothing even remotely like FEV exists in the real world either. It is incoherent to argue for FEV over radiation as a cause of mutations for reasons relating to actual science or medicine.

 

[TheRatKing]

Besides, nothing even remotely like FEV exists in the real world either. It is incoherent to argue for FEV over radiation as a cause of mutations for reasons relating to actual science or medicine.

The issue isn't even remotely what exists in the real world, or even what is plausible in the real world.

 

[Lexx]

Super mutants don't exist in the real world either.


How I see it: Everything that makes some living object bigger or really mutates them has FEV involved. Like...

# Radiation + a little bit FEV (out of the atmosphere, as example) == Bigger animals (rats, rad scorpions, gigantig geckos and lizards, etc.)
# Some more FEV in direct contact (maybe with or without radiation invovled) == FEV-Ghouls like Harold.
# Bigger amounts of FEV in direct contact with more or less radiation == Dumb / smart super mutants.

Etc. Looks plausible to me.

 

[Geech]

The issue isn't even remotely what exists in the real world, or even what is plausible in the real world.

It seemed to be the issue for Arr0nax:

Well, we know the effect of increased doses of radiation isn't to accelerate the mutation process : it just slowly kill people. We know for sure it wouldn't produce the effects we encounter in Fallout.
The designers probably knew this, so it makes sense they used FEV as the catalyst for all the new mutated species in Fallout.

That's the post to which I was responding.

 

[TheRatKing]

Yeah I don't really see what he was getting at.

 

[Yamu]

Fallout 1 gives us ample cause to believe that FEV was originally intended to be the (or at least a) source of ghoulish mutation. Harold's transformation after his visit to Mariposa is practically a giant neon arrow pointing in that direction, and even disregarding that, the tale that Talius the Ghoul relates to you in the basement of the Followers of the Apocalypse library all but spells it out. Certain non-optimal subjects (likely those with a moderate degree of radiation exposure, given how well-traveled Harold and Talius were), rather than dying, seem to "ghoulify" on exposure to FEV.

Of course, as has been said, there is no definitive answer, as there wasn't even a single canon point of view among the designers as they went forward. FEV couldn't account for the ghouls of Necropolis, for instance, without some kind of massive viral contamination that's wholly unaccounted for by canon. (You could retcon one in by assuming the Bakersfield Vault was an FEV experiment, but given that the vaults-as-experiments plot element wasn't conceived of until Fallout 2, it would be just that-- a retcon, and not original intent). The most interesting thing about all this to me is that Heinig- one of the original game designers- can only say he "suspects" certain things about what was planned from the start. I get the impression that the development of Fallout wasn't really a very "let's all sit down and get on the same page" sort of affair.

 

[UncannyGarlic]

How I see it: Everything that makes some living object bigger or really mutates them has FEV involved.

It really doesn't work for the East coast or then, as I'm pretty sure there wasn't some FEV leak that exposed it to the surrounding area. Arguing it for even the west coast is quite a stretch. Had that been decided and Beth did something completely different with the East Coast (or better yet, a different nation), such as a different nasty experiment with far reaching consequences, it could have been interesting.

 

[Snowguy]

A small note but, as I understand, FEV causes sterility in affected subjects by overwriting incomplete DNA strands, such as gametes, and often kills radiated subjects because there's too much genetic damage to correct.

If there was some sort of Airborne FEV, wouldn't it cause widespread sterility?

From my point of view, there's no such thing as a little FEV. Nothing short of an I.V. transfer or complete immersion is going to bring about changes. I seem to remember the AI at the Glow saying something similar. A link to the message file. Not sure if ZAX is the final authority on FEV, but it's something.

 

[TheRatKing]

unless reproductive systems are only affected when dipped (i.e. fully immersed). If FEV is airborne it might only affect torso/lung/skin areas?

 

[Lexx]

How I see it: Everything that makes some living object bigger or really mutates them has FEV involved.

It really doesn't work for the East coast or then,

Who cares about the eastcoast? :>

I am pretty sure that Bethesda didn't thought about it a lot, so I don't think about the east coast a lot as well.

 

[Arden]

According to Bethesda ghoulification occurs after standing next to a nuclear explosion. Moira proves that ghouls have nothing to do with FEV.

And people wonder why some other people wont accept FO3 as canon.

 

[The Dutch Ghost]

Personally I am sticking to the 'It was radiation all along' explanation, but that other elements are also involved in it, and not just rads alone.

Sadly FNV threw up some difficulties with Camp Searchlight, I found it far better that only some people become Ghouls, and only over a span of months or years and not in one blow of severe radiation.

I still wish Obsidian had created a new kind of mutant for this situation instead.

 

[grayx]

According to Bethesda ghoulification occurs after standing next to a nuclear explosion. Moira proves that ghouls have nothing to do with FEV.

And people wonder why some other people wont accept FO3 as canon.

What Moira proves is only how easy idiotic ideas pass trough to the final product if there is no sane and/or educated person to oversight it.

Or, simply, they don't care.

 

[DustyTraveller]

I prefer the "Massive Radiation" explanation for ghouls instead of FEV since that means there's ghouls in other areas apart from the west coast. Even if nukes mutated FEV to Ghoul-FEV it wouldn't spread over the world carried by the winds alone. Either Ghoul-FEV would multiply in their host organism (Ghouls?) or there wouldn't be a lot of people infected. Ghouls would have to be contagious or they would only come from a small part of the west coast.

The idea of small doses of FEV spread all over the planet has some weaknesses too. It's a virus not some highly potent nerve poison or chemical. If it infected and mutated someone it would multiply in that host, that's what viruses do. Again mutations would be infectious.

Some Sci-Fi Post-Apocalyptic settings have had infectious mutations but I don't think Fallout is one of those. For starters it would have required a FEV-vaccine to have any chance against the super-mutant army or most "normies" would become mutants just from battle wounds.

Of course we wouldn't have needed a broken water chip as excuse for entering the outside world; We'd be out there looking for a cure before the infection could rob us of our humanity. The need to avoid being "cured" by the Overseer or his flamethrower would also prod us to avoid Vault 13 until we had found a cure.


Maybe it's an age thing.. I'm a bit older and remember when our greatest fear was WW3 and the radiation-poisoned desert it would create. Maybe the virus fear works better for the younger crowd.