Fallout: New Vegas Was Originally Going to Be a ‘Big Expansion’ For Fallout 3

Fallout: New Vegas definitely stands on its own as a full game, but it was originally conceptualized as a huge expansion for Fallout 3. In a Fallout retrospective video posted by Bethesda, Bethesda executive producer and Fallout 3 director Todd Howard explained how New Vegas came to be.

Fallout 3 comes out and it’s a really, really big hit for the company, and they’re like, ‘Okay so what’s the followup?’, and I was like, ‘Well we’re doing Skyrim, so [then] it’ll be Fallout 4, and there was a push like… ‘We shoud do a big expansion pack or something like that. Are there companies that we could have do it?’ and we knew the folks at Obsidian, and there was sort of this immediate [thought that] there’s only one group we would really want to do this. And it actually started as a big expansion pack for Fallout 3, and I felt really strongly it should be its own game.

Fallout fans are definitely glad the project turned into a full game, as Fallout: New Vegas is one of the greatest open world games of all time. Microsoft now owns New Vegas developer Obsidian, making a potential follow-up a possibility. However, just last week, Obsidian CEO Feargus Urquhart said the studio isn’t working on a Fallout game right now, but “there’s not a question” about doing it if the opportunity arose.

Instead, Obsidian is preparing to release Pentiment, a 16th century mystery game set in Bavaria. The game is coming to Xbox and PC on November 15. If you’re interested, you can check out our interview with Obsidian developer Josh Sawyer.

Meanwhile, Howard and Bethesda Game Studios are currently busy with Starfield, but we already know the studio is planning Fallout 5… After Elder Scrolls 6, that is.

Logan Plant is a freelance writer for IGN covering video game and entertainment news. He has over six years of experience in the gaming industry with bylines at IGN, Nintendo Wire, Switch Player Magazine, and Lifewire. Find him on Twitter @LoganJPlant.