Fans of Bethesda have less than 24 hours to get two classic RPGs for free. As you may know, Bethesda is both a publisher of games and a developer of games. And its best-known games are the games it makes itself via Bethesda Game Studios, the studio behind and shepherding the Fallout and The Elder Scrolls series. That said, what a lot of people don’t know is that while Bethesda created The Elder Scrolls series from scratch, it actually acquired the Fallout series in 2004, a few years before it made Fallout 3.
It wasn’t until Fallout 3 that the post-apocalyptic RPG series went mainstream. This is when it was debuted on console, and it’s when most were introduced to the series. However, as the name implies, there was a lot of Fallout before this, primarily two mainline games: 1997’s Fallout and 1998’s Fallout 2. Many have never played these two RPG classics. If you are one of these people, you may be able to remedy this without paying anything for either game because right now, and until January 27, both games are free with Prime Gaming. Meanwhile, once claimed, they are free to keep forever, regardless of whether or not an active subscription is retained.
Prime Gaming specifically has PC codes distributed through GOG for all with an Amazon Prime subscription. Of course, the vast majority of those with an Amazon Prime subscription do not have it for Prime Gaming, so in this sense, these are bonus free games for anyone with a Prime subscription. That said, you will need a GOG account to redeem.
Old-School 1990s RPGs
The first two Fallout games were not RPG shooter hybrids, but hardcore, isometric RPGs with turn-based combat. They were more stat-driven, slower, and more hardcore. In essence, they were classic PC RPGs of the time, whereas the series now is a more casual RPG experience with more mainstream systems and gameplay.
Made by Interplay Productions, the original Fallout released to an 89 on Metacritic and was lauded as the best RPG of its year. Further, it was a pioneer in the Western RPG space. At this time, the space was still dominated by Japan. This happened in 1997. A year later, Fallout 2 was released to a similar reception. As a sequel, though, it is not often accredited as a milestone RPG like its predecessor was.
All of that said, and as always, feel free to leave a comment or two letting us know what you think, or join the conversation over on the ComicBook Forum.
