Touche. However I really cannot write off the DLCs for Fallout 3 thus-far to be on the same level as those DLCs. The closest would be KotN, however I think there's far more to the Fallout 3 ones then the quest for dead mens' relics.

However, I think this really has drifted from the original purpose of the thread - Are aliens acceptable, or should the Fallout series be racist and segregate our bug-eyed, green noggined neighbors?

They were not included in the Goty and so can be viewed as cannon non-cannon or semi-cannon you are correct with that. Again, the reason for not all of Oblivion's DLC not being in the Goty is because it was nerfed. Fallout 3's DLC is not nerfed and is going to be in the Goty and even if there smaller expansions how does that make them not official?





Indeed it is an official expansion in the Goty just like how Fallout 3's expansions are official and are going to be in the Goty.



Okay that makes no sense whatsoever when you consider every guild/faction is based on archtypes.



They may or may not mention it in TES V but your argument still makes no sense.




:bowdown:

Officially, they are added to the enjoyment of extra content, but these DLC may or may not be canon to the story itself.

Since whenever they mention the hero of the past installment, they just mention only his/her title on how he/she did the main quest and the expansion and how it turn out in the newer installment. Everything else remain a mystery on all the other hero's action so the players (and those who played these previous heroes) can speculate what he/she did, which is not written in stone. In other words, a background story that fits all players.

I think we all can agree on this.

What your saying here is the same with there previous games expansions. There questlines are completely seperate from the main quest in the main game and neither effect the other. If you want to go by what effects the main story as official only then the only add on they ever did that was official is Broken Steel like nemetoad said.



You don't think the events in the Pitt, point lockout etc. might be mentioned? Also to when was Tribunal expansion mentioned? Besides there religion falling apart which was already covered in main game's MQ.



The talk about Bethesda's previous games came up because of discussing how Bethesda does it's Game of the year editions and how the content in them are official cannon which couldn't be avoided considering Fallout 3's Goty comes out in October and the fact that someone asked if it's official cannon or not.

What funny is that I would agree and really consider Broken Steel as a canon. Such ending the PC went through in vanilla was undignified and just plain wrong.

May or may not. That what I mean on semi-canon. Potential, might be in, or might not. Or that these event might never happen. We have to wait and see in the future in the release of Fallout 4 for this to know what really happen and what is consider true.

Tribunal-wise, . That the main point. , There almost nothing that stand in King Hlaalu Helseth and his House way of becoming powerful and highly influential in Morrowind.

So the game can never explore anything else, huh? I mean you can survive a mini-nuke at a few feet, Super Mutants and Centaurs can exist...but aliens are OMG NO BREAKING CANON STOP BETHESDA!

You realizing how insane you sound?

That about sums it up.

Amusingly, it's not so much whether or not they're considered 'canon', although I think evalating them above a mere special encounter is stupid, it's about how out of place from the story they are. I don't expect there to be any real 'roleplaying' in the alien DLC. Just lots of shooting aliens, and lots of pew, since pew pewing is uber cool. There is so much to explore storywise in Fallouts world, but we're going on a dungeon rompt in a UFO because it's cool. That quote from Tim Cain really highlights just how much different Bethesda is from Black Isle/Interplay when it came to the people tasked with making the game. Creating a story worth telling isn't high on the priorities.

Come on, just look at what we're getting here. Short 2 hour contents, that almost entirely consists of fighting, fighting, a little smidge of poorly worded dialogue (since that's not a battle they want to fight), and more fighting. Yay. Go team.

Aye it is annoying. I'm curious now if New Vegas, however bland a name it has, will be much better. I mean, another company is making it sure, but it's still using the same gameplay setup.

Although, all things considered I enjoy the fact that with each DLC, Bethesda is more or less releasing more tools to create an actual plot to the game.

On the question of whether this is acceptable in the Fallout world or not. I would say I'm undecided and to be perfectly honest if it is done in a jokingly adds nothing to the story apart from a lil run around on a spaceship sort of thing that most are suggesting, it will more than likely not effect anything in future. It would just be an add on purely for enjoyment and to add nothing to or take away anything from the original scope.

Ofcourse that may be deemed unacceptable outright to alot of people, I can understand that but I really doubt ANY DLC will impact the franchise greatly other than BS, since ofcourse it expands the main quest.(Which typically Bethesda only ever references in any sort of great detail).

Also it could be done in a more mature way(How I don't know? I'm not a writer by any stretch of the imagination), which could then provide a lil fun being on a spaceship while attracting some sort of moral dilemma.

Those are basically the reasons I am undecided, I'm firmly in the 'wait and see' camp before I make any sort of decision one way or another. I can't jump to conclusions on the title of a dlc and a one sentence description of a plot.

Although the canon status of aliens is entirely secondary to the simple fact that they're horrendously out of place and inappropriate to the setting, I'd note the Fallout Bible "reference" referred to by the OP is plainly a tongue-in-cheek aside about the tendency of Earth scientists to develop some sort of deus ex machina technology to repel more advanced alien invaders in 50s science fiction and B-movies.

My question is who gets to decide what is and what is not cannon at this point? Really...if it does not contradict existing cannon...who exactly decides and from what authority?

IMO since Bethesda owns the franchise, whatever they decide is canon is now canon. That doesn't mean that their additions to canon cannot fly in the face of existing canon and thereby irritate many people (including myself) or just be plain stupid or ridiculous. Clearly, however, just because something is canon doesn't make it good or somehow immune from criticism. Talking deathclaws from Fallout 2 are canon, and I think most of us felt they were really stupid and out of place. New Reno is canon, and that town made no sense in the Fallout universe, although it was fun as hell.

In my mind, it depends to some extent on whether or not the Mothership DLC gets referenced in later Fallouts. I mean, if this is just a little fun DLC to play around with what has always been an isloated, one-off encounter then I'd say it could be considered "semi-cannon." In other words, if it's just an isolated event and you don't see a whole alien faction in Fallout 4 referencing events in the DLC, then if I'm someone who doesn't like the content I can just not download it and ignore that it ever happened. (Kind of like Highlander 2...) Or along the lines of what Tactics is considered - some events from that game might get referenced in Fallout 3, but beyond that each individual can make up for their mind to what level Tactics actually "happened."

Or if you do enjoy that particular DLC, then you can consider that something that "officially" happened. If it exists outside of the rest of the events in the franchise, then I'd say it doesn't really matter what it's status as "canon" is. If you played the DLC and enjoyed it, then it's "canon." If you didn't or you didn't play it, then it's not. Unless future Fallout games do end up referencing those events.

For example, there are things that what I consider my own personal "official" character did in Fallout 1 that don't "officially" fit into established canon. There's a couple changes I had to make in my own mind because some of the events from my own ending in Fallout 1 directly contradicted the setting in Fallout 2, but beyond that I don't care what the official lore says actually did happen in Fallout 1. I played that character, things happened, and there were consequences. Regardless of what official lore says about the matter - I don't care so long as it doesn't contradict events that happen in later games.

Anyway, that's just my own view on the whole thing. I think we'll have to wait and see for later Fallout games to come to see whether or not this whole discussion even matters all that much.

ah, yes, one of my first Derp Derp Derp feelings from Oblivion.

Aliens fit the '50s style sci-fi, one of the two major sets of tropes Fallout draws on.
They have appeared in the games.
There is no in-game documentation showing them to be non-existent.
Nothing about the idea of aliens existing in the Fallout universe contradicts established canon.

Therefore, this statement is false.



And you haven't shown that this is true for aliens.

Ultra-Fallout nerds, that's who!

Seriously, Bethesda OWNS the property now. Guess what? They control what goes into it, not some uber nerd who thinks aliens don't belong when they clearly do. Anyone complaining is basically wrong, it's that simple.

I mean Super Mutants and Behemoths are okay, and canon. But aliens are OMG TOO GOOFY RUINS EVERYTHING STOP IT!?

WTF? It's insane. They're part of the world, can it nerds.

If I might play Devil's Advocate for moment:

I still find the issue less whether Aliens qualify as "canon" in the Fallout lore, and rather the extent to which they are included. Clearly, there's a history of Alien random encounters in the Fallout games. In the original Fallouts you also had a number of rather odd encounters (especially in Fallout 2) that weren't really meant as "canon" but more as little in-jokes and winking humorous encounters. Along with a crashed alien spacecraft (containing a Velvet Elvis Painting,) you also encounter a number of Monty Python references, the TARDIS, and even a time travel portal from the original Star Trek series through which you can travel back to Vault 13 and steal their Water Chips. Maybe because aliens "clearly" fit in with the 50's pulp sci-fi mood, Bethesda decided to continue with that running joke, and not the TARDIS or Knights of the Round Table, etc.

The worry is not that there are any aliens in the game at all (I thought the encounter in FO3 was kind of neat - but others might possibly have felt they went a bit far with it,) but the extent of the role they are going to be playing in the game, now that the precedent has been set. An occasional random encounter is one thing, even a stand-alone DLC that is isolated from the other events in the game - but an entire Alien Faction in Fallout 4 would be pushing. But, maybe that would be okay - it would fit the 50's sci-fi theme, there's already a precedent for it - why don't we just have Fallout 4 be a War of the Worlds where the Brotherhood and Enclave team up to fight off the Alien Invasion?

It's less about the issue of whether or not aliens qualify as "canon" in the game - but where that line gets drawn.

Oh well that settles that, then.

/thread

I just don't get the issue, it's insane to me. People finding major issues with aliens being brought into a DLC are making it an issue for weird reasons.

How does it adversely affect the world, at all?

Its an odd retro alien reference. Not necessarily taken serious in the previous installment as its just these as easter egg/reference. Though Beth is now in control of what in and out, the Fallout Bible is still there as stand point of Fallout's lore.

Though I can point out that ya a nerd for posting in a game thread.


Its more that they took in a reference/joke, and make a whole story out of it. Its like (assuming ya play Oblivion) taking Adoring Fan and give him a whole DLC base on him alone. Kind of insulting to the Franchise.

50's vision of the future, and 50's style sci-fi are not the same thing, and not are necessarily connected at the hip. Prior to Fallout 3, they've been a gag reference. nu_clear_day hit the nail on the head when he said:



The precedent that Mothership Zeta can potentially set for the Fallout universe has the potential to ruin the entire feel of the setting.

There's nothing really insulting to the franchise though.

I am a nerd myself, but it's UBER nerdy to be [censored]ing about something like this. Including aliens as a DLC is not canon-breaking, not insulting nor damaging to the franchise. Fallout has never been 100% grounded in reality, so including aliens that people refuse to believe were canon and only a joke isn't a problem.


I mean they've included things that don't exist in that timeline, like an Assault Rifle based off the G3 and things of that nature. I just don't see the issue. How does it damage the "setting"?

Franchises need to move forward and adapt. Keeping everything the same forever is boring.

Just ouf of curiosity, how does that not fit in the timeline?

Moving forward, sure - but in what direction? Not all change is inherently good, after all. Moving forward in a direction that is counter to the thematic elements of the franchise is not necessarily going to be good thing. If the premise of Fallout 4 was to be that your character teams up with Doctor Who to travel back in time to 2077 to try and stop the war, that might not be a very good step forward. But the TARDIS showed up in the previous Fallouts, and it fits as pulp sci-fi (and very nearly 50's sci-fi, as well.)

And no one's actually arguing that nothing new can ever be added to the franchise.

To be fair, though - I am inclined to give them the benefit of the doubt in this case. My guess is that MZ will count as an isolated DLC that doesn't later get referenced, meaning that players will be able to safely ignore this DLC and that Aliens won't be playing a significant role in future plans. There was an interview at IGN about the upcoming DLCs where Todd mentioned that this one started out as a kind in-house joke that they later decided to run with. So it looks like it's going to be a heavily expanded version of what the original alien spacecraft was in Fallout 1 - a winking random encounter with no bearing on the rest of the game.

But yeah, the potential is there. We'll just have to wait and see. I can see both sides, is all I'm saying.

Different stand point, other said otherwise.


I would assume the most DLC are just there for fun and extra content for the players to play with. It more a mistake if these same players taken into account they think these DLC are actually lore or "written in stone", though the main purpose for some of the DLC is just for fun. THAT where things get spicy.

Rest, nu_clear_day pretty much nail'd it.

Of course it's going to be standalone, I figured that was pretty much evident. I mean Operation Anchorage doesn't really get referenced in the game other than with the whole questline. Why do people think that suddenly aliens will be a major faction/influence on the game world? The Pitt didn't really do anything either and it's entirely seperate.

I just don't get how Super Mutants are cool and normal, and aliens are some taboo subject that "ruins the feel" of the game world. Is that okay simply because it was in a previous fallout and not a "joke"?

I was wrong about the G3, I'm thinking of something else but can't remember what it is.