Oh I can hear it now: "Beef how can you expect to review the greatest fic ever penned to MS word?"
Author: Kkat
Fallout. With ponies! Set in an alternate future, one pony must learn to survive in a blasted, poisoned land... and possibly, with the aid of friends made along the way, bring new light into the darkness of post-apocalyptic Equestria.
Ok, settle down, yes this fic is good... but I always love trying to make authors cry. En Guarde.
Oh, how do I want to start this... how about the good?
Littlepip, the main character, is quite the Mary Sue... oh wait that's bad. Let me try again: The antagonist is clearly defined and the reader is not inclined to hate him 'because the author said so'... wait, he is a slaver and leader of a large, impending army, and Littlepip hates slavery...
One more time: Pip's character development is minimal at best. "But how is that good thing?" Shut your face hole and I will tell you! Now this could be just me, considering that I was the 'Hero of the Wastes' in Fallout 3 and Littlepip made almost identical decisions to mine, but the fact that she has very little character development actually helped me get into her head; it allowed me to feel what she felt, think how she thinks, and made it all the more painful during her 'fall from grace'... and that whole awkward romance thing that Kkat loves to rub in your face.
Littlepip, the main character, is quite the Mary Sue... oh wait that's bad. Let me try again: The antagonist is clearly defined and the reader is not inclined to hate him 'because the author said so'... wait, he is a slaver and leader of a large, impending army, and Littlepip hates slavery...
One more time: Pip's character development is minimal at best. "But how is that good thing?" Shut your face hole and I will tell you! Now this could be just me, considering that I was the 'Hero of the Wastes' in Fallout 3 and Littlepip made almost identical decisions to mine, but the fact that she has very little character development actually helped me get into her head; it allowed me to feel what she felt, think how she thinks, and made it all the more painful during her 'fall from grace'... and that whole awkward romance thing that Kkat loves to rub in your face.
The plot can be summed up simply, and yes I love myself for coming up with this metaphor: Dragon Ball Z. Hero fights off enemies, nearly dies, new stronger enemy is introduced. Yeah, 624k words. But wait, there's more! So on her little journey to go find the only mare keeping the sanity of her vault stable together--and I don't think I will be beaten whipped I mean 'talked to' for spoiling the first chapter--the plot emerges. If you just thought that, go to your corner... you know who you are. Well, after saving a few slaves, drumming up some friends who love her unconditionally (including the resident Star Paladin, Steelhooves, from The Brotherhood Of Steel Steel Rangers), they trudge off to save the Wasteland in true vault dweller fashion... unless you played as the renegade; Pip is all Paragon.
Now for setting. Maybe playing Fallout 3 and New Vegas helped, but I could see the Manehatten ruins quite nicely. Even when things didn't add up, as in Tenpony Tower being in the middle of the Manehatten ruins, when Tenpenny Tower was far outside DC. "But how can this story even be considered MLP? It only has the biology and the geography, not the characters we know and love." BUT WAIT, there are the original characters! Kkat is a genius for this if nothing else. As Fallout 3 had messages laying about for you to find, Fallout Equestria has 'memory orbs' scattered about, each one showing memories literally extracted from the host. It is through these that we discover just how Equestria came to war, how it was fought, and what led up to the balefire bombs/nukes being delivered. The Mane six are all there, you see how the war drove them apart and made them different, but, most importantly, I can see this as being canon: how each of them dealt with the war and world around them.
The factions all seem to make an appearance: ghouls, BoS, even that small city to the south of DC... the one most people probably wiped out. Anyway, the Steel Rangers and their outcasts, Applejack's Rangers, are the exact opposite of their affiliates in FO3. Those odd ghoul... things from that hotel in New Vegas make an appearance in all their un-killable fun. Raiders though, raiders are nice... I mean evil, but point being that here they are actually evil. Instead of them just spamming "When I catch you, I'm going to eat your spleen!" which got old fast, Littlepip finds dismembered bodies. But there's more! She also finds slaves, ready to be eaten, and even a rape victim here and there. The raiders are actually given character. You have a reason to want to kill them, a reason to mutilate their corpses... wasteland justice. If you have to ask, you will never know... OBSCURE REFERENCE OF THE DAY.
The factions all seem to make an appearance: ghouls, BoS, even that small city to the south of DC... the one most people probably wiped out. Anyway, the Steel Rangers and their outcasts, Applejack's Rangers, are the exact opposite of their affiliates in FO3. Those odd ghoul... things from that hotel in New Vegas make an appearance in all their un-killable fun. Raiders though, raiders are nice... I mean evil, but point being that here they are actually evil. Instead of them just spamming "When I catch you, I'm going to eat your spleen!" which got old fast, Littlepip finds dismembered bodies. But there's more! She also finds slaves, ready to be eaten, and even a rape victim here and there. The raiders are actually given character. You have a reason to want to kill them, a reason to mutilate their corpses... wasteland justice. If you have to ask, you will never know... OBSCURE REFERENCE OF THE DAY.
So lets take a look at the scoreboard: A main character loved by everything she touches, a broken record plot, a messiah walking the wastes, things at the same time lining up with and spitting in the face of the game from which it was inspired. And yet, here I am, reading a side story with four more waiting in my queue. I loved reading this, I have more problems concerning the ending, but I can't tell you them without some massive spoilers. This fic stands out because it paints the world of Fallout in a more believable light. Characters fall in love, characters hate themselves for killing, raiders are no longer just people who want to kill you, etcetera. I found myself going back to play Fallout 3 just to walk around Evergreen Mills with my regulator duster, black cowboy hat, and sniper rifle, shooting anything that moved... and a lot of things that didn't. I, for once, actually had a reason to hate raiders, to hate the Enclave, to have a true respect for the Brotherhood, and to detest the outcasts. There is one thing, though, holding me back: 624+k words. Yeah, this one is a doozy. It makes your little one shots cower in fear before releasing their bowels. It took me a solid month of reading about two chapters a day to get it done.
So where does this leave us? If you have the time, read it, if you don't have the time, quit reading your Rainbow Dash clop and make the time.
TL;DR
Everything I wanted Fallout 3 to be.
Stay Dizzy My Friends
Dizzy: TL;DR is mine, see how big I made it?
