Bethesda gave fans of Fallout a surprise with the reveal of Fallout 76. The game is going to be a move in a different direction for the post-apocalyptic RPG series, with the title reportedly set to step away from single player and instead focus on online multiplayer gameplay. Rather than an action RPG, Fallout 76 is also going to be a survival game akin to DayZ or Rust.
Something that has already been the subject of much discussion is the setting of Fallout 76. The game looks as though it revolves around Vault 76, one of the as-yet-unexplored vaults that humanity used to survive the franchise lore's nuclear war. Vault 76 was set to open its doors twenty years after the war ended, and allow its population to then take back the overworld.
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This may sound like a struggle, but it's nothing in comparison to some of the other vaults that Vault-Tec built. Vault 76 stood as a control vault, but others were not so lucky, instead forcing their inhabitants to take part in terrifying experiments as a test of how humans would react to different pressures. With that in mind, here's a rundown of the ten scariest vaults from the Fallout series.
Vault 92
First appearing in Fallout 3, Vault 92 might not have been the easiest vault for the player to come across. Lying just clear of the deathclaw-infested Old Olney, even reaching the vault was something of a challenge. Those after a feel-good story to find inside, though, were left extremely disappointed.
Vault 92 was billed to its inhabitants as a place to preserve the best musical talent of the world, and reportedly only the most talented musicians were invited to enter the vault. However, its real purpose was very different, and instead acted as a testing ground for white noise generators in an attempt to create super soldiers. Unsurprisingly, it didn't entirely go to plan, and according to logs half the population of the vault erupted into uncontrollable rage.
By the time the Lone Wanderer reaches Vault 92, the vault is no longer inhabited by any humans, with instead bloatflies and mirelurks taking up residency. It's unknown whether any of the non-affected humans from Vault 92 survived, but it's clear that the white noise experiments were more powerful than anyone could have predicted.
Vault 111
Vault 111 will be familiar to anyone who has played Fallout 4, acting as the player character's own vault. However, although it acts as a jumping off point for the game, this doesn't take away from the horror of the situation. Although it was billed as a vault to simply survive a nuclear war, instead Vault-Tec had a much more sinister goal in mind.
This vault's experiment was aimed at studying the long-term effects of cryogenic freezing, and its poor test subjects were duped into entering the freezing pods upon entering the vault. The experiment was supposed to run on the relatively short term in comparison to some of the other vaults, with a team of security and scientists monitoring the test subjects. However, things didn't exactly go according to plan.
Instead, the player character of Fallout 4 wakes a long time after the war, into a world they know longer recognise. Vault 111 may not be the most awful of the events that have happened in Fallout, but it's a prime example of Vault-Tec's folly.
Vault 106
The unknowing test subjects of Vault 106 thought they were going into a vault for their own safety, but Vault-Tec had other ideas. The residents of this vault were once again subject to the company's experiments. This time, the vault was filled with psychoactive drugs, distributed via the vault's air filtration system.
When the Lone Wanderer gets to Vault 106, there are vault dwellers still there, but all of them have been driven insane by the use of the drugs in the vault. As such, they are incredibly hostile, and the player is faced with either leaving the vault entirely or clearing it of its doomed survivors. To make matters worse, the player character is susceptible to the drugs themselves, and as such there's also the difficulty of hallucinations to deal with.
Reading the terminal entries found in Vault 106 shows that the vault's Overseer was complicit in the experiment, playing down any changes in behavior early on. It's not clear what Vault-Tec would get out of the test subjects of the vault, but the end result for the player is another tense encounter in the Capital Wasteland.
Vault 11
Encountered in Fallout: New Vegas, Vault 11 was a different kind of experiment to some of the others seen in the Fallout series. Rather than using invisible drugs to alter the state of mind of the inhabitants or forcing test subjects into cryogenic freezing, instead Vault 11's experiment was a social one.
In Vault 11, the idea of sacrifice was put to the test. The residents were told that a vault dweller would need to be sacrificed every year, and if not the entire vault would be killed. Eventually, the vault combined the role of the Overseer with the role of the sacrifice, and each year a new Overseer would be selected to eventually be killed.
A fight for power resulted in only a handful of survivors remaining, and faced with the prospect of another sacrifice they decided to refuse the rules of the vault. In a moment of tragedy, the true purpose of Vault 11 was revealed: by refusing to sacrifice a resident, the vault dwellers had completed the test and shown themselves to be a "shining example of humanity." At this point, the vault doors opened, but the shame of the history of the vault led all but one of the survivors to commit suicide.
Vault 75
Vault 75, which is found in Fallout 4, was built as one of the most noble uses of a vault. Positioned at Malden Middle School, the vault was meant as a safe place for the school's students in the event of a nuclear war. When the bombs fell, the students, their parents, and teachers made their way to the vault in order to survive.
However, at that point the children and adults were separated. The adults were taken to a supposed "orientation" session, but in reality they were all executed, leaving just the children and those running the vault behind. The vault's true purpose was to select only the strongest and smartest children to improve the gene pool, killing the weak outright, "harvesting" the strong, and recruiting the most intelligent.
Eventually, things would go awry for the vault's scientists, with the Vault 75 logs suggesting that a revolt was led against those in control. When the player arrives that the vault, none of the original inhabitants remain, and the vault has instead been taken over by the Gunners.
Vault 112
Sometimes, Vault-Tec's experiments steered away from the real world. One such example was Vault 112, which put its inhabitants into a virtual reality simulator. Although the initial plan was apparently to allow those stuck in the simulation to live in an ongoing utopia, in the end the experience was anything but.
Those who were trapped in the simulator were instead imprisoned there indefinitely. Meanwhile, Overseer Dr. Stanislaus Braun was able to control his test subjects on a whim. Braun, who was the creator of the Garden of Eden Creation Kit, was given complete control over the experiments, and over time became more and more sadistic with the inhabitants of the vault.
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Eventually, the Lone Wanderer happens upon Vault 112 as part of the main quest of Fallout 3, and is thrown into the simulation themselves. Although the player can make different choices within the vault itself, nonetheless the end result is always a tragic one.
Vault 95
Although other Vault-Tec social experiments had toyed with drug use, few managed to do so in as insidious a way as Vault 95. The vault's given purpose was as a rehabilitation centre for those with drug addictions, and for five years the vault served this purpose, giving a lease of life to who sought shelter there.
However, after that the vault would allow access to a huge supply of drugs and alcohol, which had been hidden away prior to the vault doors closing. Vault-Tec would then observe to see how the dynamic of the group changed after the reintroduction of addictive substances. Unfortunately, it led to the downfall of Vault 95 entirely.
By the time the player reaches Vault 95, the vault itself is being used as a hideout by the Gunners, with the dead bodies of the original vault dwellers and computer logs the only evidence of what happened - the breakdown of society, as Vault 95 was pushed back towards addiction and towards violence by their grim situation.
Vault 12
First seen in the original Fallout, Vault 12 was originally billed as a place of safety for those who managed to escape from the nuclear war. The vault seemed to be perfect, with enough supplies to keep its inhabitants healthy long after the war took place, in order to then go and populate the surface.
However, once again Vault-Tec had other plans in mind. Although most of Vault 12 was fully functional, there was one deliberate flaw - the doors to the vault would not shut properly. As such, when war did break out, and the bombs began to fall, the residents of Vault 12 were susceptible to the toxic fallout of the nuclear blasts. The goal of Vault 12 was in fact to see the prolonged effects of radiation on humans.
When the player visits Vault 12, it has been abandoned by all but a few Glowing Ones, but the Vault 12 population did have a legacy. The vault led to the creation of some of the first ghouls, who went on to form the city of Necropolis in the ruins of Bakersfield, which plays a role in the story of the first Fallout.
Vault 87
Of all of the monsters found in Fallout, both human and otherwise, none are quite as terrifying as the creatures created by use of the Forced Evolutionary Virus. Initially seen as a bioweapon like no other, the FEV had unique properties that could make those infected immune to most diseases and potentially even transform humans into super soldiers. These human experiments would lead to the Super Mutants, a group that nearly wiped out humanity on the west coast during the first Fallout.
However, on the east coast the Super Mutants also had a major impact, through the use of Vault 87. The vault was actually a secret testing facility for the FEV, with test subjects locked away and the effects of the virus documented. Eventually, this led to the growth of a Super Mutant population from the vault itself.
This would cause huge problems for the survivors of the Capital Wasteland, however. With the Super Mutants unable to reproduce without infecting new subjects with the FEV, raiding parties would leave Vault 87 to kidnap other survivors, going even farther as the source of the FEV itself started to run out. As such, it changed the ruins of Washington D.C. into an even more dangerous place.
Vault 22
Sometimes, even good intentions can lead to dark places. Vault 22 was an experimental vault looking into the possibility of successful agriculture under extreme conditions. As such, its purpose was to see what plants could grow within the vault, and how to sustain the population of Vault 22 with just the plant matter created through the experiments.
In some cases, these experiments proved successful, but one failure led to the death of most of the vault's inhabitants. Tests were carried out on a strain of fungal spore that was meant to act as a pest control. However, the spore began to infect those in the vault. Once those that were infected died, the fungus would still control the host body, and become extremely hostile to those around it, leaving the inhabitants in a Last of Us-esque situation.
Although a small portion of the population of Vault 22 made a break for freedom, most succumbed to the fungus. The vault then lay as a deadly place to explore, and though many tried to access the research found within, few ever made it out alive. It's scares like this that make fans sad that Fallout: New Vegas 2 has never been confirmed.
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That concludes our rundown of the most horrifying vaults of the Fallout universe. It just goes to show that the overworld, even though it's full of deadly creatures like radscorpions and bands of raiders, is sometimes not as horrifying as what Vault-Tec had in store for unsuspecting would-be survivors. Then again, there's no real winner when it comes between being stuck between a science experiment gone wrong and a deathclaw attack.
What did you make of our list? Did it miss any other unsavory experiments from Vault-Tec? Let us know in the comments.