I am new to the forums and fall out in general so i was wondering what is the key moment in history where our time line and fallout's time line split. What i am saying is what was the butterfly that was stepped on to make the fallout universe so different from out own

Just think post World War 2, 1950's. But in the 22nd century. So what people in the 1950's imagined a post-apocalyptic scenario to be. Giant bugs, robots, government consipiracies, all that good stuff.

the split is the moment after the bombs dropped on japan the main differance being peoples opinion of the A-bomb, where we saw it as a barbaric destroyer of life, the fallout universe pressed forward embraceing nueclear power and techonologicly leaving us in the dust while popular culture ground to a halt.

To a degree, that "Technology solves everything" attitude did exist in the 50's and 60's. It's just that our society evolved past that. (For better or worse depending on whom you ask/what you believe I suppose).

If you mean what date where they diverged, my knowledge of the lore isn't all that complete, but without posting spoilers I know their version of the Apollo program to land on the moon (called something different by them) has different looking spacecraft from ours. Mind you, IMO my assumption/guess is that they could have built our version and vice versa, but at least as far as looks if not actual function their lunar lander and so forth looks pretty different. So, at least by 1969 or so the split was pretty signifigant. Or to put it another way, they probably had a President Rooseveldt, more likely then not Truman took over after he died (but even then I'm not sure on that). After that, it starts to get hazy, and in the 50's it very well could be that Eisenhower wasn't President, or if he was Nixon wasn't his VP and so forth. I'd be almost surprised if JFK was president, etc. Same with how technology, moral values, culture and so forth would split. Mid to late 40's probably close or exactly like us. Sometime circa 1950 the split and changes start IMO.

Mostly this is just opinion, someone with more knowledge of lore (which I suspect is a WHOLE lot more people then me) can probably clairify this and if needed (wouldn't be shocked if it is) correct me.

In FO2 there are mentions of Nixon (very well remembered, even had an action figure), and Reagan - though the last is generally considered non-canon

Nixon was already a prominent politician in the 1950s.

The physical laws of the fallout world are different. So that science and technology actually were (unlike in our world) able to follow the path envisaged by 1950s popular culture.

Things that we find hard or impossible (compact nuclear power sources/nuclear fusion/artificial intelligence etc) are easy in the Fallout world.


So it's not so much a butterfly event; the fallout world was always different to our own. It just wasn't apparent until science and technology reached a 1950s level.

Not saying Nixon might not be remembered, I just used him as an example of something that could change. To answer someone else, I am well aware that Nixon was prominent in the 50's IRL, obviously if I mentioned he was VP. (Unless you meant the Fallout universe too).

Anyway, my point is that it's more or less the 50's from what I can tell where notable changes happen. The 40's are probably the same or close to it, the 50's less so.

As for Reagan, he was a noted actor, albeit a B movie one way before he became a politician so he would be famous in both universes regardless of if he became a politician.

Robynah posted this in part: (Start Quote):

"So it's not so much a butterfly event; the fallout world was always different to our own. It just wasn't apparent until science and technology reached a 1950s level." (END quote)

Well yes, obviously some of the laws of physics are somewhat different then our own, and this influenced technology. But I'd still also debate that there is a "Butterfly event" too. Popular culture is different, morality is different, politicans are to some degree or another different and so forth. IMO the non technological differences are greater then what we'd see then if only the science and technology was changed.

Reagan is mentioned as a president though... But the holodisk in question is considered *tampered with by soldiers*.

Anywho, an earlier difference is "Lincoln's voice" - the recording technology hasn't existed in our timeline before his death. Though that might be an oversight...

The first sound recording device was developed in 1857, Lincoln passed in 1865. And there are rumours that Abraham Lincoln made a recording in 1863 during the Civil War.

It's just a minor mistake, not a divergence. The divergence happened after World War 2, it's been established by canon and mentioned by FO1, FO2 and FO3 devs (even mentioned in the FO3 manual).

Anyway, there is no single point of divergence, because Fallout's world is not an alternate history created by taking our history and changing one detail. It's simply a future as imagined by people in the 1950s.

By the way, I think that Nixon might have been elected in 1960 in the Fallout world, instead of Kennedy.

You can see from the history of the space race that there were already major differences between Fallout's timeline and ours in the 1960s:

http://fallout.wikia.com/wiki/USSA

Though, one of the biggest differences, was the fact that the USSR/Warsaw Pact & USA/NATO, did not become entangled in the "Cold War", in the same manner in which it occured in our time.

How so? I'm pretty sure it was, only China was more dominant than Soviet Union.

Maybe the Fallout world initially had less issues with the middle east. Having better options for energy from nuclear power even to the point of fusion power and compact reactors for cars and robots; they'd be less dependent on oil.

So maybe the cold war was less "hot" than ours without the middle east being quite such a vital interest. And their final resource wars were fought starting in the 2060s, rather than the 2020s as in our world.

In theese few sentences you've compiled the biggest "huh?" moment I have with FO lore in general. Okay, on the one hand - nuclear is good, fusion's here - even in cars - yay all cool. On the other - resource wars - Europe vs the Middle East (lasted 'till the oil wells went dry), China going through all the trouble of invading Alaska to secure an oil pipeline, and ultimately, the nuclear annihilation.

Why wouldn't their be a single point of divergence, even with it being a future imagined by people in the 1950's? It would seem like there would be one event, probably somewhere in the 50's, around 1960 at most that would be different from our history. Until then, it is my understanding that they are identical. That event may not have been NAMED yet by any developer or other official source of canon lore, but there would be IMO one event that would be different. Maybe caused by the changes in physical science, maybe a cultural change, maybe a large number of factors. But there would be some point where one event or occurance is different, and then another, and then things diverge more and more.

Sorry to do two replies in a row here.

I might be wrong, but one idea I got is the reason they started putting nuclear power plants in the cars was because the oil was all but depleted so they went with that. Even if I am wrong, plastic still needs petrolium oil to be made for instance, and I'd assume their use of plastic would be about the same as ours. Most lubricants for machinery are petrolium based, and so forth.

Yep, and like Robynah said, oil and other reasources run out later than predicted in our universe which suggests that with advancements in nuclear and fusion technology they weren't quite so dependent on fossil fuels but still needed them for many things, resulting in a slight delay in them running out.

Because, unlike many alternate timelines that are based around the concept of changing one event and then seeing how the world would develop, this one is based on an entirely different concept. The whole real-world history after a certain period of time was ignored, and a new one was built based on 1950s science fiction and culture, without the need for there being one event that caused the divergence, having many different, unrelated events that comprise it instead.

My theory is the Great Divergence occurred in 1947, when the transistor was invented. In the Fallout Universe this never occurred, and they continued to use (and improve on) vacuum tube technology. The main theory here is that since nuclear power became cheap and plentiful, the need for more compact and energy efficient electronics was never felt..

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

That should explain a great few things

I personally never considered a 'divergence' I just took the games as they were But thinking about it, it makes more sense that it is a complete alternate world from our own. The way radiation acts, mutating creatures and such, isn't how things would be with our laws of science (no, ghouls are NOT the result of F.E.V, and giant bugs are NOT the result of F.E.V, these have since been disproven by Chris Taylor and are present in one of the editions of the Fallout Bible).

And, just for a laugh, take a look at http://www.alternatehistory.com/Discussion/showthread.php?t=115990 thread discussing divergence Watch what happens to the healthy discussion and debate after Fenwick offers his thoughts