If the bombs dropped in 2077 then why they still play really really really old music? Wouldnt it actually be easier to get more modern stuff? Personally i cant stand the music in the game and turn it off when the guys not talking.

What you think of the music?
What would you have ideally?

I think ideally more classic rock songs would be good....or it could be quite funny to have cheesy pop music haha!

Maybe music didn't really evolve? Like most of the technology.

Well, the fallout timeline diverged from ours sometime in the mid fifties, so maybe the musical revolution did not occur. But it is not explained why :shrug:

Fallout is set in an alternate timeline that diverged from ours in the 1950s. In the 21st century, it looked like the future as imagined in the 1950s pulp science fiction. E.g. instead of transistors you have huge lamp-based computers with artificial intelligence, robotic servants, a pseudo-utopian society based on 1950s values, black and white TV, music from the 1950s considered all-time classics, and most modern musical genres never appearing, etc,. Weapon development was also different from ours and thus plasma and laser weaponry was introduced, 10mm became the most common ammo type, etc. The modern high-tech weapons were never created - instead, weapons based on how people in the 1950s thought 21st century weaponry would look like are used. And in 2077 all of that was nuked, while Fallout 3 takes place 200 years after that.

For more information, see:

http://fallout.wikia.com/wiki/Fallout_world
http://fallout.wikia.com/wiki/Divergence
http://fallout.wikia.com/wiki/Timeline

No doubt about that, thats a simple overlooking of game design, and the concepts thereof! The old games didnt use such old-time music outside of the title, it only focused on the brooding dark ambient of mark morgan and isolation. There also wasn't anywhere near the same level of "atomic era" influence. It shows up in some places, but not nearly as much as it shows up in Fallout 3...

Yeah, the swing/jazz is very over powering and pervasive in presence at times, but as three dog says, the radio breathes a life into the wasteland and carries a message of hope for it's inhabitants.

Ever since I played fallout 2, I started getting into cyberpunk and steampunk, in order to make sense of temporal divergences and better understand the orthogonal evolution of technology in alternate realities...

The music is important, as it is one of the game elements that we can "identify" with (elements such as swing/jazz, "green screen" computers, brass knuckles, flame throwers) would have all arrived right before the divergence could have occurred. Our own history would be in sync with Fallout's history until that divergence.

Then, Other elements such as the plasma weapons, would be a result of the atomic technology that continued to evolve past the 1980's, rather than become eventually replaced by the microprocessor, which was developed in our time line's history, now diverged from Fallout's time line. (And still remains as the supreme technological base of our current civilization).

And well, then you have some elements of the game, like the minigun, which was actually a vietnam war era technology, that should not be in the diverged timeline. You could saw it's a kind of overlooked game design concept, but on the other hand, i'm sure that some things are just "bound to happen" regardless of what alternate reality you might wake up one day and find yourself in.

But to answer your question, I certainly do think the game should have more flavor in music, possibly in a manner in which the player might choose from in a manner similar to GTA. But then, you would have to make it all "divergent" music, from all kinds of "new styles" that never occurred in our own world. That would be expensive, if even possible.

I don't know if an explanation for the music used was actually provided in the game, but it certainly could have been done. All popular music could have been in a digital format, and subsequently lost from EMP damage, leaving only old vinyl around. Technically, that would not account for "new" vinyl, (and would be rather lousy plot IMO) unless of course, the diverged time line didnt use that in the way our time line utilizes vinyl (hip-hop, or electronic music such as house, jungle, etc)

I personally really like this music. It carries out the whole world war two era/atomic theme very well in addition to paying homage to classic fallout. But it is in the future though, and so there definitely should either be much more variety there, as civilization did continue for over a hundred more years... Or there should simply be a mere grand total of three lousy crackly vinyls found in some jazz singers casket, dug up, and heavily guarded by the radio station by the brotherhood...



You can see these actual divergences in technology and civilization in classic fallout much more often however, The Orwellian architecture looks liek something from equilibrium. fusion and plasma weaponry is more "high tech" and less "retro" (but not always, necessarily, it's all very convoluted and mixed up, which makes it very very philip k dike in flavor at times...) There also were included constant pop culture references to 101 things like pulp fiction, magic the gathering, army of darkness, mcdonalds, terminator 2, etc. That adds a real nice touch in bridging the disparity and alienation between this orthogonal "future world of tomorrow", and our diverged past for the sake of the player. And in fact, it would actually make for an excellent, excellent update for the DLC, in addition to other temporal "bridges" for the divergence not included in the core game. You could have various kinds of "themes", to replace that old 1950's retro world, in the same manner you can purchase themes for your house in Megaton... Maybe they've thought of this idea, it's certainly a lot of work, but what an amazing game it would create, with a very high degree of replayablity, not only as different character classes, different quests, but different "temporal divergences" to explore the heart of the American Empire through? Hmmm...

Who knows... Maybe they'll do it.

http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/Zeerust

My thoughts ran along the lines that given the political climate of the US between the time of the divergence and the bombs falling it seems very likely that McCarthyism and blacklisting would have remained in effect throughout, spreading in scope over the whole of the entertainment industry. The result of this would be that the musical styles of the 60's (and thus most of what followed) would never have come into being.

Plus doesn't Threedog mention at some point that they were the only ones he could find intact that worked?

Even if people's musical tastes remained static for over a century, it seems unlikely that people wouldn't have created any new songs after the '40s or '50s. The music is probably done to reflect the game's '50s theme, hearing rap and metal in a game where you have cars that look like they drove right out of the '50s and computers that still seem to use vacuum tubes would be a little out of place. It would have made more sense if Bethesda had instead made new songs in a similar theme to the ones licensed for Fallout 3, but that would probably have been more difficult for Bethesda.

Technology did evolve a lot though, that's why you get things like laser guns and nuclear cars, some technology in the game LOOKS a lot like items from the '50s, but that doesn't mean it didn't evolve, just because the computers lack a colorful interface or 3D graphics doesn't mean that on the inside, they're not more advanced than in the '50s, in fact, I'd say the fact that they can make robots with "simulated personalities" shows that computer technology has come a long way since the divergence, even if it looks pretty similar on the outside.

"And well, then you have some elements of the game, like the minigun, which was actually a vietnam war era technology, that should not be in the diverged timeline. You could saw it's a kind of overlooked game design concept, but on the other hand, i'm sure that some things are just "bound to happen" regardless of what alternate reality you might wake up one day and find yourself in."

the minigun was a veitnam era weapon, but the idea behind it came from the gatling gun, so all that you have to do is add electrical motion from a motor an wallah minigun

Music is my favorite subject, but as said the timeline changed and it didnt evolve.
Many instruments were destroyed, as seen by the quest where you have to get the violin.
When(if) humanity gets back on track it may evolve. But it wont be modern rock/metal most likely.

The FO universe diverged from ours November 12, 1955, the day of Hill Valley lightning storn. Jk.

I'm going to say that like the culture, the music didn't evolve.

If anyone knows of a place to find re-mixes of old songs, that might make an interesting music-mod. Maybe some Moby, for instance. He uses old spirituals in some of his work. An electronic update of the old classics might add something to the feel of the game, in the retro-futuristic vein. A techno remix of "Butcher Pete" would be a good combat tune!

gatling gun was invented before the civil war, a minigun is just a gatling gun with a motor on it

I'm going to be the simple person here and simply point out that (Apparently) the songs that you hear were the only records that Three Dog could find...

If you people do Agathas Quest you can listen to classical violin music instead of Jazz/blues

I think The Pitt DLC should have radio station where a old raider plays "This crazy crap, that they say came from outer space" and allow players to choose their music in radio and add some weird ambient/techno to playlist.

Despite being in the 1950's American ideals... What about other countries like the UK? IE Beatles(Not a fan to be honest but still...) or Hendrix (I know he's American but his first producer found him in London ) They were only early 60s...

PS I know they're the ones that Three Dog finds but it's the same with the other Fallouts, well the intros anyway.

The idea is they were stuck in a Utopian 50's or something, check the wiki.

Here's the Fallout soundtrack listing, http://fallout.wikia.com/wiki/Fallout_soundtrack

Lordsome does have a point, I also believe that Kennedy was never elected president; most of the social and cultural changes in our lifetimes stem from the Kennedy-Johnson eras. Other possibilities could include the Beatles never forming/getting popular.