Fallout is a series of post-apocalyptic role-playing video games created by Interplay Entertainment. The universe is set in a fictionalized United States alternate history scenario that diverged from our reality following World War II. The transistor was not invented, while vacuum tubes and atomic physics became the cornerstones to scientific progress, eventually achieving the technological aspirations of the early Atomic Age and locking society into a 1950's cultural stasis. Thus, in this alternative "golden age", a bizarre socio-technological status quo emerges, in which advanced robots, nuclear-powered cars, directed-energy weapons, and other futuristic technologies are seen alongside 1950's-era computers and telephones, and the aesthetics and Cold War paranoia of the 1950s continue to dominate the American lifestyle well into the 21st century.

More than a hundred years before the start of the series, an energy crisis emerged caused by the depletion of petroleum reserves, leading to a period called the "Resource Wars" - a series of events which included a war between the European Commonwealth and the Middle East, the disbanding of the United Nations, the U.S. annexation of Canada, and a Chinese invasion and subsequent military occupation of Alaska. These eventually culminated in the "Great War" in the year 2077, a nuclear exchange on an apocalyptic scale lasted for only two hours, and subsequently created the post-apocalyptic United States setting of the Fallout world. More: en.wikipedia.org.