Posting to Linkedin some days ago, but only spotted last night, Tony Hawks Pro Skater 3 + 4 remasterers Iron Galaxy dropped a pretty blatant hint that the team could next be working on a remaster of a Fallout game, which would either have to be Fallout 3 or New Vegas.
“Today’s our February company meeting,” the brief post began. “It’s time to catch up with what the company’s been up to and what’s coming next for IG.” And then there was a photo of a desk with two monitors, each displaying a Fallout “PLEASE STAND BY” screen. Which is to say, if the studio is not remaking a Fallout game, then it just really majorly screwed up.
The same was also put on the company’s BlueSky account, and similarly went unnoticed for the better part of a week.
The left monitor shows the “PLEASE STAND BY” message, in the distinctive Fallout format, while the right monitor shows this is a slide as part of an upcoming presentation for Iron Galaxy. (It’s slide 1 of 72, so commiserations to everyone who had to attend, no matter how exciting a prospect this might be. All presentations should be limited to 15 slides by law.)
Last year Bethesda released the Fallout 4 Anniversary Edition, leading many to call for the far superior Fallout 3 and Fallout New Vegas to receive similar attention, not least because both games are significantly older and pretty rough to get running on modern machines. But it’s generally New Vegas that fans cry out for the loudest, given Obsidian’s entry into the franchise is heralded as the best of the 3D era for the series.
Rumors have been spreading that a remaster of FO3 or New Vegas was in the works since the start of the year, with many being further fooled by the rather foolish decision to have a countdown clock associated with season two of Amazon Prime’s Fallout TV series. But this message from Iron Galaxy seems the most unambiguous hint yet.
Which game it is remains up for grabs. Clearly many would prefer it was Obsidian’s game, but that leads to further complications given it wasn’t made by Bethesda, and Todd Howard obviously resents it being better than his games and I won’t be told otherwise. Fallout 3, meanwhile, is over 450 years old, and as such a much bigger exercise to remaster, if this is to be more than just including a bunch of fan-made patches and widescreen mods. Then again, it’s two years younger than Oblivion, and that got the update treatment last year. It’s also of note that Bethesda seems rather taken with shadow dropping these things, rather than having a big press build-up, so expect the unexpected.
