Now this has probably been asked before, but it has always made me wonder why the cars, and TV's and soda machines and other things are from the old days, if the war happened after 2000, why is everything like the 60's. mind you fallout 3 is where i started playing fallout. did the first fallout's give you an explanation. even the computers look like they are from the 60's.

The Fallout timeline diverges from ours mid-century.

It's set in an alternative timeline where the world never evolved past the social norms and attitude of the 1950's, but technology still advanced at an impressive rate. So basically it's set in the "World of Tomorrow" which is what people in the 1950's thought the future would be like. You know like flying cars, robot servants, laser guns, etc. They also thought the world would end due to nuclear war and it did.

Right, like the others said the basic premise of the fallout setting is "what the 1950's culture of America believed both the future and a nuclear war would be like, and if those ideas proved true".

Personally I find this setting much more interesting and atmospheric than had the setting involved our present culture.

I agree, the 1950's setting makes the world feel so unique. And it gives it kind of a dark humor, considering all the bad things that came from the 1950's like racism, sixism, atomic bombs, and care-free tobacco smoking.

oh ok i had always wondered about it. but they had all that tech looks like they would have atleast had a flat screen lol

This is straight from he fallout wiki concerning that

"the rapid miniaturization of digital computers and electronics never occurred. The transistor, invented in our world in 1947, was not developed in the Fallout universe until the decade just before the Great War in 2077, while its successor, the semiconducting microprocessor chip, may have never been developed at all. "

and

"Television sets and radios also failed to evolve past the early 1960's level, and television in the Fallout universe remained in the same monochromatic hues as its computer screens."

That's pretty cool. It's like some technology advanced really well to allow things we have yet to achieve, yet some things we have achieved in our time were still untouched in Fallout's universe.

Because of it being such a war-centric time, any and all resources were implimented toward the developement of tools of war (plasma rifles, power armor, etc). Technology for things developed for the purpose of entertainment and convenience like TVs and computers would have been somewhat abandoned. Ironicly our modern society would fall apart if computers were to suddenly dissappear.

You know I never thought about it that way, that actually makes a lot of sense. The 1950's and before that was a time when Americans were heavily focused on war, so if the world stayed in the 1950's mentality for 200 years they would put more effort into using technology to improve weapons and war then to improve the everyday lives of people. That's why they have laser guns and millitary robots and still use old radios and TV sets. Though some things were improved like the cars that run off radiation fuel (though that seems awfully dangerous) and the Mister Handy Robots that help around the house, though both those things were known for being unpredictable and potentially dangerous.

I hope I'm not getting too political, but I kind of see the Wasteland era as the US after the 1950's. When things like six, drugs, and cynicism became an accepted part of everyday society. People started using words and phrases that didn't exist in the 50's, and fashion changed to be less conservative then before. Though the wastelander's fashion consists of sewn-together rags and leather, unlike ours today.