After the bombs fell was there nuclear winter any where? or did i just change the seasons? or some other 3rd thing?

I would assume there was nuclear winter, NCR soldiers talk about wishing there was a nuclear winter (jokingly) in New Vegas so I would assume it did at least happen.

There's no indication a nuclear winter occurred. Just that the world sort of slipped into a dark abyss of the atomic wasteland.


I wouldn't take that as any sort of evidence. "Nuclear Winter" is has become a cultural idea just as much as a scientific one.

Or possibly this is pointing to Bethesda looking into adding snow in the future fallout franchise which I would accept. I would rather see rain, but snow could work.

Nuclear Winter is the scientific hypothesis that soot, ash and dust kicked up in a nuclear war would block out the sun. Strictly speaking, it wouldn't be like a second ice age that lasted for years and years. It also wouldn't be comeplete. Most theories indicate that the worst of the blackouts would occur over cities where more material would ignite and be thrown into the atmosphere. The resulting lack of sunlight would most likely kill the majority of plant life, reduce the Earth's global temperature and might last anywhere from a few months to a few years . However, I imagine by the time of the first game, any residual effects would have faded away decades ago.

There's a wikipedia page that goes into more detail, but this is my best guess: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_winter

Kdn's definition is pretty much what I understand the theory of a "nuclear winter" to be, but it appears that in the Fallout universe, (at least in the parts that we have seen) it turned into more or less a "nuclear summer." That could, however, be explained by the fact that all of the games take place a good while after the Great War took place, and therefore after the nuclear winter causing soot and dust would have settled. Or SCIENCE! could be to blame, I'm not really sure.


There are frequent rain showers in Zion (Honest Hearts)

I think that a nuclear winter drops the temperature by a degree or two, whichever it is it is enough to kill off mostthe plant life from lack of sun and a rapid change in the climate. And since there are little plants even in the first two games, I think it is safe to assume a nuclear winter happened.

Well there was the great winter but that didn't happen until 2130.

A nuclear winter DID occur according to the Surivivalist in Honest Hearts' terminal entries. Stating the rads were so high it'd be lethal just going NEAR the cave entrance.

The http://fallout.wikia.com/wiki/Great_Winter happened before the start of Fallout1, when the Master was first building his army, and is the reason why by the time of Fallout1 his Army hasn't overrun the entire Core Region.

If you look at the http://fallout.wikia.com/wiki/2130#2130, winter is mentioned several times, whether this means nuclear winter or just the seaonal time isn't clear. But it's not mentioned often enough, and it's elemental effects aren't said either - looked at post-war mentions

So lets hope to see another 'Nuclear Winter' maybe, where it hits a vast civilization causing a lot of damage

A "Nuclear Winter", and it's length would depend largely on the global scale of the nuclear war. If it were just the US and China that were bombarded there would be a shorter, more localized "Winter" where the temperature would drop and the sun would be blocked out. Based on the scale of the damage to the US in the game, it is likely that this would have occurred in most of the country for at least some time.

Radiation itself wouldn't have killed off all the plant life--it would be affected--but not necessarily wiped out. The bombs themselves would have generated immense heat and burned large areas, but they still would have been small in comparison. A few miles at most. It's the temperature drop, layers of ash and the lack of sunlight that would kill off the plant life.

As the fallout is carried around the globe it would dissipate. Unless most other areas suffered similar attacks, then the fallout from those areas would be moved around the globe as well. Eventually the air would clear, but it would take much longer if in addition to China and the US, Europe, Russia and other areas were hit as well.

Clearly some plant life survived, or was able to regenerate. Point Lookout is full of plant life, albeit mutated. This indicates that some parts of the world were likely unharmed and the fallout was able to clear without a total die off. There's not a ton of info on all that though, so I suppose we are left to speculate. I'd hate to see a Fallout game take place outside of the US, but I wouldn't mind a quest or something that can tell us what the rest of world is up to while we wander the wastes.

Strange considering snow covers radiation extremely well.

The Survivalist Entry: Year 2078 - January 15th:

"Took a peek. Snow. It glows green."

Beat me to it. ^This^

patrollingthemajavealmostmakesyouwishforanucleurwinter

There was snow in New Vegas, around Jacobstown, it wasn't falling from the sky, just on the ground but even so.

Right but I want to see some falling radiated snow. Maybe even some massive storms or something, weather affects in general are cool.

I'd be soooo happy if they implemented a Seasonal Change in the climate that either matched the time in the game. It could run on a random chance kind of generator, like in the summer months the chance of snow is 0-3% and in winter its 10-40% ... The same would be for rain, cloud, wind, sun, hail, frost, sleet and a mix of a few.

From the sounds of what is was like during the Survivalist time, it would be rather harsh.

Though if it occurred again, it would be interesting.

Obviously no nuclear winters, otherwise patrolling the Mojave would be bearable.

By the time Fallout NV takes place, its just about 200 years after the Great War. Most of the effects of the War directly (Radiation, Fallout, etc) would've worn off by now.

This.
F3 was 200 years after the Great War and it looked like its only been 5 years.

NV was 204 and it actually looked 204 years later.

Yes. I want the next game to be even more civilization, but some people just don't understand that.

Yes, radiation particles will still probably be floating around, and destroyed buildings still around, but I want to see more groups of people

I like what they did with F3, but it doesn't feel 200 years later- tbh, when I first played it and payed no attention to story line, I thought it was ~30-40 years later- and only because the atmosphere felt so destroyed.

The destroyed atmosphere was Beth's explanation for so few people being around in the wasteland. Maybe they were trying to say that there's simply not enough resources not in these parts at least to support a real emerging civilization not until now anyway.. It could be because DC being the capital of America took a lot of hits in the great war and the fallout being one of the worst in the country not many people survived here. People only started settling here in the last one hundred years..

(I know Megaton's supposed to be around for two hundred years according to Manya but she's probably just boasting or at least obviously has her facts wrong about the year of the big war. Could have been started by the end of 2100's.)