Fallout 3: Inside the Vault Q&A

In a special anniversary edition of the Inside the Vault feature, the Bethesda Blog asks, "What did you like about the original Fallout?"
Todd Howard, Executive Producer
It's always been the initial opening for me. It's one of the all-time great intros. From the opening strums of the Ink Spots, Vault Boy watering his plants while being locked in a Vault, Galaxy News, (our boys) in Canada executing someone and waving at the camera, a car that does 0 to 60 in .5 seconds with (no electronics), the final pull-back to a destroyed world, to the opening line of (War. War never changes.) Within one minute, you're completely sold.

Emil Pagliarulo, Designer
I loved the true open-endedness of the world, and the fact that I was this lone guy in a completely unknown world, and had the power to shape my own destiny in whatever way I saw fit. In Fallout, the Vault Dweller could be anything I wanted. So in a lot of ways Fallout was the progenitor of the (sandbox) game, and its principles have been replicated in everything from Oblivion to Grand Theft Auto.