Fall 2020 Progress Update

Summer’s behind us, and we’re back with another Fallout: Miami development update. Hope you all enjoyed the environmental showcase we released recently. Things have gotten pretty crazy this year, so we hope you and yours are doing as good as possible, all things considered. Current events haven’t stopped us from working on Miami, and we’re stoked to show you a few of the things we’ve gotten done over the past months.

You guys remember those cool songs we always start these update videos with? Yeah, well, there’s still more of the soundtrack you haven’t heard, so here’s another one.

This dark dirge, titled Grim Fandango and composed by Garrett Beelow, will haunt players as they explore the remnants of Miami’s Bayshore region at night. That’s Cubanos territory, and the goal of this track is to capture the feeling of that old-world Cuban charm still clinging to life in the Vacation Wasteland.

We’ve already talked about most of the factions you can expect to see in Miami, but most doesn’t mean all. We’re not going into any detail about these guys, gotta keep y’all guessing, right. But here’s a look at some tribal coconut masks.

The group wearing these is pretty infamous. They cause a lot of trouble for plenty of people. Concept art by Marko Lipovac. Most of the 3D models for them are ready, so we can’t wait to show them to you next time when we have them implemented in the game, adorning the faces of their mean-as-hell owners.

Sticking to the theme of factions and concept art, we’d like to take a step back and revisit the slavers of Sunshine Cove. They’ve seen a substantial redesign over the past few months, courtesy of Oliwia Białek, our 2D art lead.

Since they had their start at the time of the Great War and were originally the workers of the Sunshine Hotel & Casino, we wanted to more accurately represent this in the outfits worn by their descendants.

These staff uniforms would embody the strict hierarchy of Sunshine Cove in its early days. If you were at the hotel and wearing one when Mr. Goodman began styling himself as a slaver king, then you had the honor of working for him. If you were a guest just visiting, you were now his property.

And speaking of Goodman, we’ve also redesigned the man himself. Well, his progeny and current king of Sunshine Cove, Gabriel Goodman. Concept art by Annabel Coe.

Despite recent setbacks at the hands of the Nuclear Patriots, Gabriel has been able to maintain his operation and opulent lifestyle. But the clock is ticking for his castle on the beach, and there are many players who want to claim the jewel in pre-war Miami’s crown for themselves.

One faction that’s not so interested in that is the Rovers. They might not be the smallest fish around, but compared to Sunshine Cove, they swim in the shallows.

These insular shwashbuckling scavengers only look out for themselves. They put in a lot of effort maintaining a fierce reputation. Whether it’s warranted or not, it sure does keep people away from the pier and the pirate ship restaurant they call home. We have Mipply to thank for bringing Oliwia’s concept for these outfits to life.

Oliwia was also responsible for the concept art for the new plants players can encounter when exploring Miami’s more overgrown areas, like The Green. We gave you a glimpse of that in the “A Day in Miami” environmental showcase.

Last year, we showed off the concept art for some of our new harvestable plants, but we didn’t talk about the ones meant to just enhance the look and feel of the Vacation Wasteland’s wilder spots. Mustafa Ali has done an amazing job realizing these weird, exotic plant designs.

You don’t often think about, but stuff like this can really help set a location apart and give you the sense that you truly are somewhere else in the world. It’s our goal to make Miami feel distinct, with a touch of strangeness to make it wholly its own and unforgettable. A big part of that is the flora, and we’ll show you more of it later down the line.

Brands are also pretty important, and we’ve already talked about many of our own in previous development updates, so let’s add another one to the list!

Gasolina Caribica, stylized as GasCar, is a subsidiary of Poseidon Energy and was one of the last remaining suppliers of traditional fossil fuel before the Great War. GasCar was a strong regional competitor to Red Rocket, becoming a dominant gas station chain in the Gulf Commonwealth, sourcing all of its oil from offshore drilling platforms, before they ran dry that is.

These days, all that’s left are the curious-looking, bongo-shaped kiosks, ravaged by time, weather and… well, ravagers. Yoshift came up with the design and Oliwia did the logo. The 3D model for them is actually done, courtesy of Tom, an absolute unit of an asset artist. We’re still working on getting them set up ingame, so expect some screenshots of that next time.

We’re not gonna do our boy Tom dirty though. Since he joined, he’s been kicking butt and turning out assets for all kinds of things that really help make Miami feel lived in. Especially The Center, our main town hub. Tom took all of the wonderful sign concepts drawn by Annabel and brought them into 3D. We’re not showing you all of them, gotta keep our powder dry, but we hope you like the ones we picked out.

The Center School is exactly what it says on the tin, or painted sheet metal in this case. It’s a schoolhouse where Centrian children learn to read, write, do math and about as much as history as can be salvaged from pre-war books and holotapes. Just like any similar location, there are characters to talk to, such as the principle and sole teacher – Ramón Pacheco. He’s a kind, thoughtful, intelligent man who has been able to devote his life to learning and teaching due to the security that The Center’s walls and police force provide.

Magic City Mementos on the other hand is a general store owned and operated by Joan Tuttle, the City Treasurer and mother of Lew Tuttle, one of The Center’s many guardsmen.

Santos Firearms, also a store, just a lot less general, is the place to go if you want to augment your arsenal or unload some surplus shooters found out in the wasteland. Unload is a pretty appropriate word too, since you’re not really allowed to carry loaded guns within the main structure of The Center itself. The shop sells weapons direct to the public. The company makes most of its money from selling wholesale to organizations like Marsh Company, and through exclusive contracts that allow them to buy weapons elsewhere and sell them in Miami.

Santos Firearms is owned by the Trafficante Brothers, Vinnie and Joey, though you’ll mostly see the latter tending the shop, his older brother is usually too busy at the Gillmore Theater with his associates at the Napoleon Room.

While we’d love to go into more detail about what that is exactly, we’d like to have things there a little more finished before we start showing them off.

For now, let’s just say that the Napoleon Room is where the Top Cats of The Center meet away from Mayor Andersen’s hawkish gaze. Word on the street is that one of their golden boys is going to run against her in the upcoming mayoral elections.

Let’s close off with a screenshot from inside the Cuban Liberation Museum, mostly because we really want to show off the amazing mural drawn by Anatoly Muschenko, depicting our alternate version of the Bay of Pigs invasion.

It’s important for us that locations in the Vacation Wasteland make sense and fill some role both before the war and presently when players explore them 200 years after. The museum itself is in a rough part of town, one you’ll be passing through soon after your arrival in Miami.

All right, I’d call that an update. We’re always working on more, and while we’d love to show it to you guys, we think it’s better for us and you when things are a little more spaced out. Gives us some time to focus on development and make sure what we’re showing you is as close to final as possible, since things can always change or be revised. Catch y’all later, stay safe out there.


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