Fetch Quest Journeys Special: Navigating the Moral Landscape of Fallout 4

SPOILER WARNING: Major plot reveals are discussed regarding Fallout 4 and its DLCs.

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Game: Fallout 4, Automatron, Far Harbor, Nuka World

Quest: Multiple

Location: The Commonwealth, Nuka World, Far Harbor

Summary: Bethesda's flagship post-apocalyptic title is unrelenting in its depictions of a brutal alternate future, brimming with dilemmas as it is with cross-cultural references. The Sole Survivor's journey undertakes a realm of possibilities among the rugged wastelanders striving to eke out their claim for an uncertain - and often unforgiving - future. A product of the pre-War era, the former vault-dweller must adapt to an unfamiliar world, re-evaluate their own ethics, and define the role they play in shaping the Commonwealth.

More information: Fallout 4 | Fallout Wiki | Fandom

Riches to ruins: A bygone era of excess in the Commonwealth. Photo credit: FetchQuester

Coming to Terms with the Commonwealth

Thrown into the chaos from a long cryo-sleep, the Sole Survivor's first impressions of post-War life are leaden with anguish as they face the loss of their family in a world entrenched with decay and warfare; the jarring displacement they undergo will demand rigorous training and resilience to survive where mercenary ethos is upheld as the dominant social construct. Despite this barren prospect, they find themselves among small pockets of communities which reflect the greater attributes of the human spirit, surviving - and thriving - on generosity and inventiveness.

That such oases exist is a beacon of hope in itself; in the aftermath of the Great War and Vault-Tec's socio-psychological experimentation on unsuspecting dwellers, there is scant aspiration for altruism. Scenarios seldom fall into dichotomies of "right" and "wrong", yet citizens of the Commonwealth persevere with belief systems they have fostered and the Sole Survivor finds themselves at the heart of complex decision-making while they become invested in their lives. Navigating this strange and alien territory of scavenger culture, cultist movements, military oppression, and artificial intelligence, they experience mutual wonder and disillusionment with the player themselves, having no familiarity with this world prior to awakening. In this way, player and protagonist alike bring their modern sensibilities and conceptions to what is often bewildering fringes of society, unearthing its secrets quest by quest.

The Sole Survivor's exceptional circumstances place them in a unique position as they traverse the wasteland forging alliances, building communities, and initiating a renewed rite of passage through self-discovery. With freedom over character arc and narrative alike, meta-gaming and role-playing comprise a large part in how this world is interpreted and shaped, often provoked with the question of balancing agency and acceptance: How much power does the Sole Survivor have to enact change, and how will this experience define them in turn? 

This adds a large degree of ambiguity into the mix as "good" and "evil" characters can make the same decision (but for vastly different reasons). Sometimes these choices can only be forcibly justified; take the chaotic hedonism of Nuka World, where revellers engage in an indulgent culture of violence and a pacifist approach is nigh impossible to execute. The player is pressured to partake in this morally sordid playground unless they annihilate competing factions at the beginning.

The Disciples, the Pack, and the Operators each rule their turf with a distinctive style of bloodlust ranging from barbaric to methodical, and dancing between the greater and lesser evils - or most profitable ally - depends on the Sole Survivor's own preferences. It is understandable that Preston Garvey, the Minutemen's paragon of goodwill, refuses association with the Sole Survivor after negotiating prospective settlements in the Commonwealth - even if the player's reasoning is that bargaining empty locations will subdue the raiders' hunger for large-scale assaults. 

Nuka World: Once a childhood paradise, now a raider's playground. Photo credit: FetchQuester

Garvey's principles may seem naive and idealistic, but his unbreakable resolve provides solid grounding for the Sole Survivor and citizens of the Commonwealth. Having endured its cruelty first-hand with the Quincy Massacre, a broken Garvey nurses no illusions about the world he lives in - yet he understands what the core foundation of building a sustainable society entails: Survival is successful when people work together and meaningful when there are values worth surviving for. Just as our hero questions the kind of legacy they wish to leave for the future, Garvey's relentless settlement-building and do-good mantra are aiming for a greater purpose - one which is obtainable with effort.

Like many citizens, Garvey isn't seeking renown or influence, but a simple life for him and his people. Like any wise man he grasps one basic facet: If all of us wish for such a blessed life, then it is our obligation to put a little work towards it collectively; to remove ourselves from the sphere of responsibility while expressing skepticism towards progress is counter-intuitive. Regardless of the Sole Survivor's own moral code, working with the Minutemen produces one of the few tangible transformations of the Commonwealth into a promising new land. 

This in turn creates the one essential emotion survivors need for sustenance: Hope. Hope that lingers in the laboured fields before harvest brings forth its recompense, in the haphazard scrap contraptions of inventors and traders slowly elevating settlements into towns and cities, in the voices of the people who begin to be heard. Whether it is the self-sufficient pride of Diamond City or the inexhaustible spirit of justice-seekers like Nick Valentine, Piper Wright, Hancock, and the Silver Shroud, hope is an idea which can assume many forms but never be suppressed - an idea the Sole Survivor can either embody or usurp.

Life at All Cost

While the Minutemen are upheld as the moral and ethical standard, other factions veer into murkier territory: The Railroad carries noble intentions, but their methods (ex. wiping the memory bank of rescued synths) negate the agency and identity integral to a person's individuality, even if performed with consent and under the premise of erasing trauma and preserving their safety (a similar question of identity is raised when Curie, a modified Mr Handy, believes her full potential can only be reached by taking on a physical human form). The anti-nonhuman Brotherhood of Steel is a heavy techno-militaristic presence in the wasteland, but the main questline urges us to explore the motivations of the soldiers, researchers, labourers and leaders who believe in its promise of brighter days ahead. Like many extremist organizations their methods and manifesto are misled and dangerous, but the individuals behind it reveal stories of a well-intentioned desire to bring safety and stability to the world. The Sole Survivor can confront their prejudices (especially in the case of Paladin Danse) as well as understand the why and how behind such groups for strategic and/or anthropological/socio-cultural/historical purposes.

While their integral principles are in conflict with one another, much of what drives these factions boils down to the same truth: The desire to survive. Each radioactive scrap and threadbare cloth is worth its weight in bottlecaps, and it's a small wonder why society is half-inclined towards a ravenous, cynical nature. For scavenger, merc, tradesperson and farmer alike, life is as precious as it is expendable.

The Institute believes the answer to this hardship is replication of life and distribution of labour through synth production. Burrowed deep beneath the wasteland's surface, their assembly line of creations are engineered for a life of servitude while replicas of humans infiltrate positions of power above ground, remotely manipulated by the Institute's deft hands. The clandestine operation cannot remain anonymous for long, and suspicion of synths soon turns to fear, hysteria, and persecution.

Yet the synths neither surrender nor seek vengeance. Programmed with a consciousness akin to the human psyche, their basic needs echo the needs of our own: Survival. How the Sole Survivor perceives the validity of their personhood and whether they feel ire or inspiration towards the Institute will steer their moral grounding within the greater context of the question driving many of their encounters: What is life, and what makes it meaningful? 

The Mechanist from Automatron pursues the preservation of life at any cost, and to their formidable army of robots this equates to eliminating the single greatest threat to humanity: Ourselves. The full-scale massacre of peaceful civilians tears away the gloss of this initially sound premise. And what of the Cabots, whose exploitative procedures to procure a life-extending serum leave the Sole Survivor with the anxiety of deciding whether to free their prisoner, Lorenzo, who is an unquestionable danger to society? Or idyllic and pristine Covenant, whose sinister operation of eliminating synths - bringing to the fore the rescue of one synth in question - involves the entire slaughter of the town to "right" their wrongs?

Far Harbor. Photo credit: FetchQuester

Often the "solutions" we reach are as troubling as the problems themselves: If we are to posit the least amount of harm caused is the most ethical answer, this simplistic intent is upended when considering other factors such as an individual's right to freedom which may be at odds with that faction or establishment. Do we choose the one over the many? Do we decide upon our ideals and principles which channel into the society we wish to build over the immediate needs of our settlement? Would we be prepared to make the same "sacrifice" should our family become part of the cost?

Too often the cost of protecting those principles is so great that it is almost antithetical to the principles themselves, and why the reluctant farmers-turned-raiders are representative of many faces across the wasteland: Desperate people forced into desperate means.

The prototype synth-turned-refugee DiMA, a pacifist at heart whose sole endeavour is to balance the tenuous peace between the zealous Children of Atom, the synths of Acadia, and the residents of Far Harbor is compelled to commit atrocities to maintain this harmony with minimal collateral damage. When called to account by the Sole Survivor, he remorsefully acknowledges that he should be brought to justice in a righteous world - but this revelation threatens the fragile truce he has (unscrupulously) achieved between the factions. DiMA's predicament resembles the hypothetical proposition: You can save the world, but will be remembered as the most notorious figure in history (except here DiMA's crimes can remain concealed). This should pose no enigma - a good person will choose salvation. But is the truth about you, their saviour, not integral to the world as well? Is the "good" (peace) outcome better than the "right" (truth) outcome?

And just as importantly, does the end justify the means? When the Sole Survivor earns the trust of ex-slave-turned-cage-fighter Cait (whose life of abuse and neglect led her to alcoholism and drugs), they learn of her desperation to rid her body of the addiction which has been plaguing her for years. The answer is Vault 95, which implemented a sophisticated rehabilitation program through building communal bonds and encouraging discussion within isolation - only to "test" the success of the program by unlocking the chems stash after the vault dwellers achieved full recovery. The cruelty of this is unparalleled, yet Vault 95 houses a machine which can supposedly "cleanse" all addiction; can the Sole Survivor condone a "solution" which has obtained its function through the work of unethical scientists? We often ask the same question of life-saving medication whose murky origins we'd prefer to forget. 

It is easy to be moral when we are healthy, have sufficient access to resources, and are shielded from confrontation and conflict. In this world, morality is a luxury for the privileged who often cast it wilfully aside, and the measure of integrity can only be weighed within the context it is judged.

The ethical/moral codes constructed from our consciousness, our culture, and our inborn nature alike may be immovable in their stance until we are placed in a specific situation which turns askew our comprehension of all these, our proximity to those involved, the agency we wield, and the consequences we face. This is what allows Fallout 4 to flourish as a game whose primary purpose is to challenge our conscience, where we find our actions and principles changing in unpredictable and revelatory ways. Intent matters just as much as the outcome: The greater goal is always guided by the beliefs behind it. 

- Lucy A.

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Sources: 

Fallout 4 + DLCs (Bethesda Game Studios/Bethesda Softworks); fandom.com