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Officially speaking, Bethesda Game Studios has never released a horror game. Todd Howard’s studio’s bread and butter has always been role-playing games. However, certain titles developed by that team contain some of the most effective horror that gaming has seen in the last 20 years. One of these is Fallout 4.
The Fallout Series has always been famous for its variety of memorable locations. Some of these could give the locations in Silent Hill and Resident Evil a run for their money. This shines through in the series' environmental storytelling, whether that is done through the dead bodies posed and displayed around a Raider camp, or the more questionable experiments carried out by Vault-Tec.
Fort Hagen
Like The Backrooms, But With Guns
Fort Hagen is memorable because it plays a role in the game’s main story, but it can be easy to forget how oppressive and unsettling the location becomes as you venture deeper in. The cold, militaristic vibe is carried throughout the facility and leads to the ruin feeling abnormally clean and clinical in a way that feels completely different than anything else in the Commonwealth.
The first time I made my way through Fort Hagen, I remember it feeling strangely uncomfortable despite there being nothing explicitly scary about it. The narrow corridors, artificial lighting, and endless concrete walls create a sense of isolation similar to that of The Backrooms, to the extent that you can almost forget that Fort Hagen is located within the same universe as the other abandoned buildings in the game.
Suffolk County Charter School
Proof That Vault-Tec Should Never Be Allowed Near Children
One of Fallout 4’s greatest strengths is rewarding players who are willing to go the extra mile to read terminal entries and handwritten notes left behind by those who suffered at the hands of evil. Maybe “rewarding” is the wrong word. Perhaps “traumatizing them beyond belief because they dared to dig a little deeper” may be more appropriate.
Suffolk County Charter School fits this mold. At first glance, it just looks like another abandoned educational facility. That is until you start uncovering the details of the experiment that took place there. The school's students and staff became unwitting participants in a nutritional experiment that left many of them transformed into bright pink feral ghouls.
If it wasn’t for the posters and children's artwork still adorning the walls of the school’s classrooms, you might not even be able to tell that this place used to be a normal school before cruel, inhumane experimentation destroyed it by infesting it with monsters.
Parsons State Insane Asylum
The Place Where Fallout Stops Making Sense
I mean, exploring an abandoned insane asylum is going to be pretty creepy at the best of times, but exploring an abandoned insane asylum in the aftermath of a nuclear apocalypse is a whole different ball game. Just look at the exterior of this building. Its architectural design alone is foreboding and off-putting before you've even stepped through the front door.
The deeper you get into the questline, the more apparent it becomes that Lorenzo Cabot is not simply another wasteland eccentric. Fallout is usually pretty good at explaining away its mysteries with radiation or pre-war science, but Parsons State Insane Asylum is one of the rare locations where those explanations stop feeling sufficient.
HalluciGen Inc.
Trust Me, That Gas Is Not Good for You
HalluciGen Inc doesn't just creep the player out, it outright messes with your perception of reality. At first, the location actually seems quite unassuming in comparison to some of the others on this list, but soon it becomes clear that things within the walls of this place are just as dangerous as things on the outside, if not moreso.
The first time that I made my way through the facility, looting everything in sight, (as one does in a fallout game), I remember being put on edge when a cloud of experimental gas suddenly hit me in the face, causing weird hallucinations. It happens abruptly and all of a sudden, you are questioning your eyes, not knowing whether what you are seeing is real or not.
Federal Ration Stockpile
Help Is Not Coming
Fallout 4's ability to tell stories of desperation and tragedy in a subtle, indirect way is one of the game's greatest strengths. Often, titles like The Last of Us get praised for their environmental storytelling in the post-apocalypse, but the Fallout series laid a lot of the groundwork for that type of narrative design.
The Federal Ration Stockpile is a perfect example of this. The facility was originally created with the intention of distributing food and supplies during a crisis. However, when you come across the evidence left behind, you soon realize that the people who required these resources never received them. People were relying on this place in order to help them survive and that help never came.
Vault 81
This Place Almost Had Me Fooled
When you first stumble upon and enter Vault 81, the strangest thing about it is that it actually seems to be thriving. I remember being lulled into a false sense of security, naively thinking that this may be one of the few Vault-Tec facilities that actually resulted in success.
Unfortunately, when something seems too good to be true in Fallout 4, it usually is. Once you explore the hidden section beneath the vault, you will find the remnants of a dark experiment which involved human test subjects. It is a reminder that Vault-Tec never had any intention other than turning each of the vault's inhabitants into human test subjects.
Vault 75
Vault-Tec Somehow Found a Way to Make School Even Worse
Anyone who is even remotely familiar with Vault-Tec will know that if they are allowed anywhere near the identification of genetically superior children for the purposes of experimentation, things are likely not going to end well for anybody involved. Unfortunately, that is what is going on in Vault 75, located beneath Malden Middle School.
As you explore Vault 75, it isn't the enemies that are disturbing. Instead, it is the act of reading through the logs and piecing together what happened there. Ultimately, what you uncover isn't just scary, it is truly sad. Innocent children were separated from their parents, subjected to constant testing, and ultimately disposed of if they failed to meet Vault-Tec's lofty expectations of them.
Pickman Gallery
The Commonwealth's Worst Interior Designer
I remember when I first stumbled upon Pickman Gallery, I just thought it was yet another typical raider hideout. Then I realized that the dead bodies around the camp weren't just leftover casualties from a firefight, they had been posed and arranged like an exhibition. It made my skin crawl.
Before you even meet Pickman, you already have a firm idea of the type of sadistic, twisted man he is. He considers himself a sort of twisted artist, but it is clear that you are dealing with one of the most disturbed individuals in the Commonwealth; and that really is a high bar.
Museum of Witchcraft
The Deathclaw Encounter You Will Never Forget
Instead of immediately throwing enemies at the player upon entering it, The Museum of Witchcraft slowly builds a feeling of palpable suspense and tension within the player through environmental clues and careful pacing.
The first time I played through this location, I moved through it slowly, expecting a jump-scare around every corner. When the Deathclaw finally appears, the reveal feels earned because the game spends so long building the anticipation for its arrival. The Museum of Witchcraft proves that Bethesda understands the structure of a well-constructed horror level, and knows how to recreate that in a Fallout game.
Dunwich Borers
The Quarry That Feels Like It Belongs in Silent Hill
There are plenty of creepy locations throughout Fallout 4, but Dunwich Borers is the only one that genuinely made me wonder whether I had accidentally transitioned into a different game altogether. When you first wander through, it appears to be little more than a quarry occupied by raiders. However, things start to get a lot stranger the deeper you venture into its tunnels.
Unlike the rest of Fallout's horrors, Dunwich Borers cannot be neatly explained away practically with radiation or some pre-war experiment gone wrong. As you explore Dunwich Borers, you begin experiencing hallucinations showing strange visions of the past that suggest this quarry was a hellish place to find yourself long before the bombs ever fell.
