Fallout creator confirms who dropped the first bomb in game's nuclear armageddon

Fallout is full of mysteries, with the leading one being, just who started the apocalypse by firing the first nuke? For years, fans have wondered which country was responsible and the game’s creators have stayed relatively quiet on the topic.

At one point, fans believed it could be aliens, or Vault-Tec trying to sell their technology, perhaps it was a world power and the war started in the more traditional sense. Of course, this is a pivotal plot point that has been hidden for decades. We’ve all wanted to know just how it all started - what created the mutants, the endless skirmishes and created the wasteland.

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In a recent interview on YouTube, game creator Tim Cain has finally answered the question. So, who dropped the first nuke? Cain disclosed that China was the first country to use their nuclear arsenal in retaliation for the United States conducting experiments with bio-weapons, which ended up giving birth to a range of mutations, including the super mutants.

According to Cain, China requested the US cease experimentation and it seemed like they had. However, the experiments continued in secret which, after China discovered the ploy, forced the hands of the Chinese who launched the first nuke.

This tells us a lot and fills in some very important information because this nuke set off a chain reaction that brought us to where we are today, in the Fallout canon. Cain also mentioned that Vault-Tec created the vaults in order to test the isolation and confinement on the population and these would protect people from interstellar technology testing happening aboveground. Pretty handy then, eh?

Whether Bethesda considers this official canon or not we’re yet to find out, as they currently hold the rights to the Fallout franchise, but given that it’s a detail that shouldn’t impact their future creations, it’s nice to hear from the creator himself.