Fallout 3 Riddle me this

[Imperioratorex Caprae]

I would say that most of the "modern" music was kept on tapes or digital and with an EMP blast by a nuke, the recordings would be useless so the only things that would be left would be what was on hardcopy (ie: records, things you may or may not have heard of). Thus most modern music would be destroyed or warped beyond repair.
And I dunno how well most records would survive radiation since I haven't attempted that experiment for good reason...

 

[Outlaw Torn]

I remember their was only one instrument....................that one stradivarius violin.

You can find a special instrument, don't know if it was a violin or a chello anymore but if you find it....

Spoiler

And bring it to an old lady somewhere near fault 101 (as far as I recall), you will unlock another radio station.

That is the same violin as the one they mentioned, it's Agatha's Stradivarius Soil.

 

[Harbinger_]

Its set in an alternate reality. End of story

 

[Darzen]

Think about it,old 50s records were worth alot of money and rare so people locked them away in places where they couldn't be damaged. when the Nuclear Bombs came down vinyl record are probably all that survived because they were locked away while Cd's,Cassette Tapes,the internet, and most instruments were destroyed by either the Initial blast or the Nuclear Fallout.

 

[SeanTheSheep]

Well the Fallout universe divides around WWII-ish, after which I would assume culture went in a different direction, and things developed differently, so they arrived in what we would know as 50's culture in the 2070's.

Another possible reason is that culture kind of stalled in the 50's while scientific advancements were made, such as Laser and plasma rifles, robots (Some of which have the ability to hover a foot-ish in the air), fully functioning AI systems that talk, power armor, shelters from nuclear blasts, a gigantic robot with laser eyes [http://melancholy-protection.net/lolwut/gaby_libertyprime3.jpg] and various other things which we take for granted in the post-nuclear-holocaust world the games take place in

 

[Nitpicker of the Wastes]

You sound like you are implying that Interplay are behind fallout 3's writing. Fallout 3 is responsible for the misonception that the apocalypse happened in the fifties.

It is? I guess it's also responsible for the misconception that there weren't two other Fallout games that occured in the same universe.

Fallout 1 should be responsible for the 'misconception', not Fallout 3. What with the "BUY WAR BONDS" on the TV intro while Maybe is playing in the background and all.

 

[CheckD3]

Not only is it hard to find an instrument in playable condition, think also that you need people who can play the instruments well enough, very few musicians live in Fallout times

But question, what's wrong with the old jazz? Nothing is more awesome for me than a nice stroll through the wasteland with some good old jazz and I know this is off topic but I swear I just saw a ninja outside! But anywho, the calm relaxing jazz is ideal because it's freedom, what the wastelanders want.

 

[Megacherv]

Well it's better than the music nowadays, so I'd say yeah

 

[Angerwing]

What's self explanatory about stating a simple fact that anyone who has played a Fallout game would know? What you stated is the cause, but with absolutely no reason behind it. Everyone in this thread is aware that the two split. What the discussion is over is why the alternate history didn't make any more music.

Plot hole? Maybe. Budget restrictions? More likely. Explainable? Definitely. That's what is going on here. Don't act like a smart ass and treat everyone like a child, because you clearly don't know everything.

Games cost alot of money. So why spend the extra money to write music that sounds like it came out in the 50s instead of you know actually using 50s music. All of you people are thinking way to deeply into this. Fallout is supposed to have that 50s feel but with some futureistic technology. Using music from the 50s actually helps with that and its far more practical then paying somebody to write new music.

When your living in a place as harsh as the wasteland and every single day is a struggle to survive writing new music is the last thing on your mind. They dont have the time to do that or the technology to record it. So that would explain why no new music came out after the war. Also the vault built for the great musicians of their time didnt exactly end well. You know everybody being driven insane and killed off. Most of the instruments were destroyed and with all the mirelurks its not a very popular idea to go exploring there. This may not be true in other parts of the world but in the fallout areas it seems very plausable.

There may have been new music before the war but it wasnt as popular as the other stuff so it wasnt as well circulated. Three dog also most likely gets most of his music from stuff the brotherhood finds or what has been scavanged up by others. This would obviously lead to the conclusion that the more popular, more circulated music would have a better chance of surviving and being found. If you really think about it its extremely unlikely that anything that music was recored on ie cds, data disks, etc would have lasted that long anyways. The fallout universe doesnt make any sense when you think about it for a min so stop dwelling on the music and just enjoy the game.

The post you quoted, along with the post of mine I'm about to quote:

I'm of the opinion that the only music that survived was the classics, as they'd probably be in larger circulation if they stayed in that particular societal scene.

Said basically what you just said. Why are you arguing against me? I think it's for the same reasons you do. And there's nothing wrong with using old music, I enjoy the effect, but I was just saying that budget restrictions were a likely factor.

 

[Ava Elzbieta]

Yes but before the war, no new music?

I wondered this too. While it was mentioned that most instruments were destroyed, why would only 50s era music survive? There would've been 120 years of music and its technologically-advanced storage methods to choose from. Furthermore, the 50s theme is prevalent from cars to household appliances and decor (aside from Mr. Handy) and wardrobe. Maybe people in the 2050s, 60s and 70s decided retro was "in" and reproduced relics from over a century previous. Maybe, as many have suggested, the events took place in an alternate timeline.

If we introduced Three Dog to Led Zeppelin, as Chicago Ted hilariously suggests, what would happen to his adorable 50s howl?

 

[Ava Elzbieta]

Silly, of course they did.

Not only did they make new music, but they re-invented a rocket capable of launching into the stratosphere. Once they accomplished that, they shot wireless speakers up all over the country. In case you were wondering, they also had to cobble together materials to create all these speakers. I believe the schematics called for Nuka Cola Quantum, 4 irons, 6 vacuum cleaners and a microfusion cell.

Once they did this, they then worked on re-building orchestras. It took some time, as they had to work with the scraps they had in the wastes. But then, oh the magnificence of it all!

They began composing some of the most brooding music ever heard, and piped it over the airwaves. If you listen closely while you travel the wastes, you can hear its haunting melody.

*applause*
You are the winner, good sir. My hat goes off to you.

 

[Buleet]

They just stayed into the 50' era for a long LONG time.thats the official reason.

 

[Escapefromwhatever]

I agree that it's a tad silly. I really like the idea of a post-apocalyptic 50's style world, and while one can give an excuse that only 50's iconography survived the war, I don't see why they couldn't have set the nuclear war in the 50's, and then the actual game in the future. My suspension of disbelief can easily acccept some sort of 1950's vault system and occasional strides forward in technology made by the survivors over 50's culture lasting as long as it did in the Fallout universe.

 

[Denamic]

So American culture is locked in the 50's idea of Jazz and the American Dream, i get that. BUT did they just decide that after the music of the 30's-50's that they didn't need to make anymore? Did NO ONE want to make anymore of it? Were the people of the 2070's fine with listening to music from over one hundred years ago over and over again?

No, see, the 2070s of Fallout Is our 1950s.
Or rather, it's how a person from our 1950s might have envisioned the future.
It's not like the cultural development just halted for 120 years.

 

[TheDrunkNinja]

It's an alternate reality.

... That's all I got, but that's all that's needed.

 

[Surggical_Scar]

It's established that the Fallout universe diverged from our own around the 1950's, and at least American culture fixated on the idea of the 'Nuclear Age'. Feasibly, music would have continued in the same vein, stagnating and reproducing the same old melodies.

I always thought it was a little depressing that almost 200 years after the war, there's hardly any sense of creativity out in the Wastes. Granted, most people are just trying to survive, but even in the richer, better protected settlements (Vault City, Rivet City, etc), no-one has the wherewithal to bang a couple of old tin cans together, let alone string out a tune.

As a personal long-term dream, I'd love, no, pay to see some burgeoning cultural growth in the Fallout universe. Music, writing, art, it can't stay buried forever. Just a couple of ideas off' the top of my head:

* A Super-Mutant writes a book for kids, 'Grog Says Safe', where Grog teaches children about the dangers of the wastes by illustrating just what happens when you run into a Deathclaw.

* A retired Raider, looking for some caps without having to spill too much blood, happens upon a battered, cracked old electric guitar. Somehow, it still works, but the notes sound so much more...savage than before.

* All over the ruins of the Wastes, bright, beautiful murals start springing up, portraits, landscapes, painted and sprayed for the world to see. An anonymous artist has found his calling.

 

[Jonci]

The Fallout universe was created on the idea of what did people in the 50s see the future of the world as becoming if the worst happened. A state of paranoia and nuclear technology, where captialism ran out of control and the big war happened.

People rarely are capable of figuring out what the future will hold for culture and technology. So, given the premise of what would be known in that era, Fallout is the nuclear apocolypic view of someone from the 50's-60's era. Computers were big and bulky with green screens and no one thought computers would get smaller. Nuclear technology was the way of the future and everything would one day use it. People thought records and tapes would be used forever. And the music of the time is the best ever and would last the ages.

The rest is just fiction based on that. That's why the world seems locked in the 50s style, because if you were in the 50s and thought about the future, you'd probably just see some flying cars that looked a lot like what you were driving now.