A “SPECIAL” Fallout Chess Set Fans Will Love

Take your Fallout chess game out into the Wasteland – the safety of your Vault’s residents depends on you!

Since its release in 1997, Fallout has become one of the most popular video games in the world. In its first year alone, over 120,000 copies of the game were sold. Fallout has ranked highly on a number of “best of” lists and was even featured in the Smithsonian American Art Museum’s exhibition The Art of Video Games in 2012.

The game takes place in the year 2161, in a post-apocalyptic, alternate timeline version of a United States that’s been ravaged by nuclear war. Survivors find themselves up against mutants, robots, and human bandits. In 2024, Fallout remains an incredibly popular game, which has also spawned three official sequel games, and a handful of spin-offs. Fallout has also been re-imagined into several role-playing style board games, Fallout-themed Monopoly, and even a Fallout chess set!

The exciting high-stakes, strategy-based nature of the Fallout video game translates really well to Fallout chess! As an added plus, the Fallout chess set is so reasonably priced that it could easily be a birthday present for a young child – without breaking the bank.

Fallout Chess Set (50$)

The Fallout chess set is absolutely beautiful and features exceptionally detailed easy-to-identify character chess pieces. The Fallout chess pieces are made of vinyl – heroes in ivory and villans in a shade that resembles tarnished metal. Each piece has its role labeled on the base (king, queen, pawn, etc).

Hero Fallout Chess Pieces

The Lone Wanderer is the hero king, shown armed and standing on a Bottlecap Mine – a Vault-Tec lunchbox turned explosive weapon. The queen piece is Dogmeat – the Lone Wanderer’s faithful canine companion – regally standing atop a boulder. The rooks are the utility robots known as Mister Handys. The bishops are Brotherhood of Steel Scribes. The knights are, very fittingly, the Knights of the Brotherhood of Steel. The pawns are an assortment of male and female Vault Dwellers.

Villain Fallout Chess Pieces

The Fallout chess villain king is the Super Mutant Master – the diabolical creator of the super mutant race. The queen is a Deathclaw – a reptilian mutant who can destroy its enemies in just a few quick swipes (or chess moves, perhaps?). The rooks are Protectrons, RobCo’s specially designed protection robots. The bishops are Glowing Ones – the terrifyingly dangerous ghouls who’ve suffered so much radiation that they glow neon green. The knights are Sentry Bots, powerful military robots who were constructed before the Great War. The pawns for this side are an assortment of Raiders, the bandits who terrorize the Wasteland.

The Fallout chess board has a stylish yet battle-worn look to it, with the iconic Vault-Tec symbol printed on each player’s side. This chess board folds for compact and easy storage. This Fallout chess set comes in in a really cool vintage-style collector’s tin box, that will look terrific on display in your home.

The Fallout Experience – On and Off the Chess Board

It shouldn’t be too much of a stretch for Fallout fans to envision their chess board as the Wasteland setting from the video game. The Fallout Chess Pieces – Lone Wanderer, Dogmeat, and Vault Dwellers versus Super Mutant Master, Deathclaw, and Raiders bring a variety of the conflicts from the Fallout video games to life on the chess board.

The exciting and dangerous world of Fallout’s “Wasteland”

The alternate timeline of the Fallout series takes the United States through a global war for the Earth’s limited remaining petroleum and uranium resources. These conflicts span the years 2052-2077. China invades Alaska, the United States forcibly takes resources from a displeased Canda to fight the war. And then, on October 23, 2077, nuclear war breaks out, destroying most major cities on the planet within two hours – though it is unknown which nation strikes first. The effects of the radiation and mass-destruction linger for the next century, leading us to 2161, the year in which the Fallout tale begins.

Some people did survive the war in fallout shelters – or “Vaults” as they are called in the Fallout series. The first Fallout game begins in the area around Vault 13 – in what was once Southern California. When a computer chip essential to the supply of clean water for Vault 13’s residents malfunctions, a vault dweller is sent out into the Wasteland to find a replacement before the water supply runs out.

The vault dweller also comes across a disturbing race of Super Mutants and must also destroy the base from which the Super Mutant Master is purposely turning people into them. However, if the vault dweller is in for an unpleasant surprise if they successfully return to Vault 13 after destroying the Super Mutants’ base and defeating their Master. The Overseer of the Vault is concerned that the other vault dwellers may begin to idolize their returning hero and leave the Vault in pursuit of their own glory. So he banishes the victorious vault dweller to roam the Wasteland, citing “the greater good of the Vault” as the reason. Fortunately, winning a match of Fallout chess as the heroes doesn’t feel as backward as the end of the Fallout video game!

The Lone Wanderer character (the hero king piece in Fallout chess) does not appear until the third major Fallout game, Fallout 3. So it is worth noting that the Fallout chess set blends together many different aspects of the Fallout universe, across a few different time periods. Fallout 3 is set in the Capital Wasteland – the area in and around what was once Washington D.C. – in the year 2277. The Lone Wanderer ends up in a harrowing situation trying to prevent the intentional radiation contamination of the water supply by an unscrupulous military organization.

Skill, talent and karma – what it takes to play as a Fallout character

The skills and talents of each character in Fallout are determined by an assessment of seven basic attributes: strength, perception, endurance, charisma, intelligence, agility, and luck – referred to altogether by the acronym SPECIAL. In the video game, of course, you only get to play as one character. In a game of Fallout chess, you may not need to score highly on all seven attributes (though perception and intelligence do help!), but you’ll also have access to an entire team of characters (with varying degrees of strength and agility – from pawn to queen!).

The concept of “karma” is also incorporated in later versions of Fallout (starting with Fallout 3). This means that the gameplay experience is altered depending on the types of decisions the player makes. For example, killing the bad guys isn’t going to wreck your karma level, but killing innocents will. Any time you stop and help someone, freeing captives, for example, you can rack up more good karma points, which can help players get specific perks in the game, or even affect the ending of the game. At least the pieces in The Fallout Chess Set are neatly separated into heroes and villains. So you don’t need to worry about bringing your karma score down by capturing the wrong person (piece)!

Our Final Thoughts

This Fallout chess set is beautifully styled, attractively packaged, and the character pieces are remarkably detailed enough to impress true fans, as well as conveniently labeled with their “chess role,” in case your opponent isn’t as familiar with Fallout as you are! We highly recommend This Fallout Chess Set to fans of the Fallout video game series and collectors of unique themed chess sets, alike! To pillage and lay further waste to what’s left of the land? Or to keep the remaining non-mutant survivors as safe as possible? The choice is now yours, as you experience Fallout’s story and characters in an exciting game of chess.

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