Fallout 5 ultimately has a wealth of predecessors to learn from when it comes to potential features that could show up at this point in the Fallout franchise, especially considering that Fallout 76 is still receiving frequent updates and The Elder Scrolls 6 will arrive sometime before Fallout 5 releases. Aside from Bethesda’s recent games potentially influencing Fallout 5, Skyrim could also be a big source of influence despite being over a decade old by this point.
One particular feature that Fallout 5 should consider adopting from Skyrim is a wider variety of playable characters. This feature doesn’t have much impact on how Skyrim’s story unfolds, but it still provides distinct gameplay advantages that allow for more immersive roleplaying opportunities, which would be right at home in the Fallout franchise.
What To Expect From Fallout 76 in 2025
While 2024 will be a hard year to compete with, 2025 is already shaping up to be another major year for Fallout 76 based on the franchise’s momentum.
Skyrim’s Character Creator Would be Right at Home in Fallout 5
Among the many features Fallout 5 should inherit from Bethesda’s past games, one element of Skyrim’s character creation should arguably be at the top of the list. Fallout 5 should finally take the chance to expand the franchise’s character creation to include a variety of different playable characters, potentially incorporating some of the iconic Fallout franchise’s factions and mutants. Overall, such a feature could be the key to taking the franchise’s RPG elements to the next level.
Especially in the context of Fallout 76’s upcoming playable Ghoul character releasing in March 2025, continuing to experiment with a wider variety of playable characters beyond humans and Ghouls seems like a natural progression for the Fallout franchise’s future.
There’s ultimately a wide variety of iconic cryptids, mutants, and factions from the Fallout franchise that could be a good fit as playable characters. However, some might be a better fit than others depending on where and when Fallout 5’s story takes place. While the game’s setting is currently unconfirmed, it’s safe to expect that some of the staple factions and mutants from the modern Fallout games will make a return appearance, namely including:
- Ghouls
- Humans
- Super Mutants
- Synths
This is only a small portion of the iconic mutants and factions from the Fallout games that deserve the opportunity to become a playable character. Still, though, these few candidates mentioned could present highly distinct experiences compared to human Vault dwellers nonetheless.
How New Playable Character Types Could Take Fallout 5’s RPG Elements to the Next Level
The main difference between the playable characters in Skyrim is their unique passives and special abilities. These character-specific abilities make some characters better suited for a particular playstyle than others, but not to a degree that necessarily locks players into a specific playstyle. Overall, the different playable characters mostly serve the purpose of providing distinct roleplaying opportunities, and in RPG games like the Fallout franchise, there can arguably never be too many roleplaying opportunities.
While there are several subtle world and quest interactions that are unique to the different playable characters in Skyrim, the main storyline in the game remains mostly unaffected by the player’s choice of playable character. Therefore, as much as Fallout 5 offering multiple different playable characters would initially be a big change for the franchise, Skyrim is living proof that this can be carefully executed without undermining the game’s core identity, yet meanwhile still managing to provide distinct experiences between separate playthroughs.
By the time Fallout 5 finally releases, it will have a wealth of predecessors to learn from in all of Bethesda’s past RPGs. Among all of these iconic games to draw influence from, taking a few pages from Skyrim’s book with an expanded variety of playable characters could be a game-changer for the Fallout franchise.
Fallout 76
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OpenCritic Reviews
- Top Critic Avg: 54 /100 Critics Rec: 9%
WHERE TO PLAY
Bethesda Game Studios, the award-winning creators of Skyrim and Fallout 4, welcome you to Fallout 76. Twenty-five years after the bombs fell, you and your fellow Vault Dwellers—chosen from the nation’s best and brightest – emerge into post-nuclear America on Reclamation Day, 2102. Play solo or join together as you explore, quest, build, and triumph against the wasteland’s greatest threats. Explore a vast wasteland, devastated by nuclear war, in this open-world multiplayer addition to the Fallout story. Experience the largest, most dynamic world ever created in the legendary Fallout universe. Expand southward to Skyline Valley – a brand-new region of Appalachia. Investigate the cause of the electric storm circling overhead and unveil the mystery around Vault 63 and its dwellers, including a shocking new Ghoul type – The Lost.
