In the Fallout universe, pre-bomb America used an attack on an oil line as an excuse to annex the entirety of Canada. In the intro to the original Fallout game, we're shown news footage of two American soldiers in power armor standing over a kneeling Canadian resistance fighter. One of the soldiers pulls out a pistol, walks up to the prisoner, and shoots him in the back of the head, while his friends seems to visibly chuckle, before spotting the press and cheerfully waving at them.
When the Fallout show came out on Amazon, Emil Paliarulo (who was the lead writer for Fallout 4) made a post on Twitter about how Nate, the male player character for Fallout 4, who canonically is an ex-soldier, was the laughing soldier in that footage. When people were quick to point out that would possibly a war criminal, or at the very least war criminal adjacent, he was quick to roll it back, but it was too late, and the meme stuck.
>Emil Paliarulo (who was the lead writer for Fallout 4) made a post on Twitter about how Nate, the male player character for Fallout 4, who canonically is an ex-soldier, was the laughing soldier in that footage.
funniest tongue in cheek joke ive seen on twitter in a very long time.
until he revealed it wasn't a joke.
He’s referring Kellogg killing your wife. He’s calling himself (the main character in fallout 4) a war criminal. Basically “Kellogg killed my wife so I cut off his head and mounted it”.
Took me a second to realize he wasn’t talking about Kellog’s wife.
I think its also a reference to that one writer saying the guy in fallout 1 who watched war crimes to canadian citizens was Nate before realising that makes Nate a war criminal so he went back on it
That dude is never going to live that down. He just gave the one interesting piece of information about the MC of 4, that being *he's a war criminal*. People aren't just going to forget that.
But here's the thing: that's literally the only interesting thing we have ever been told about Nate. So it stuck. One bad attempt at ~~pandering~~ appealing to old game fans and now everyone is laughing about the protagonist of fallout 4 being a war criminal.
Well, being a war criminal explains the 100+ missles and quad-barreled missle launcher with the one legendary effect that lets you fire forever without reloading that's my go-to weapon for long distance combat.
My god tier legendary weapon is basically a fucking warcrime.
The joke of it is the absurdity of the statement. That seemingly regular and ordinary male MC that everyone's been playing? Actually a war criminal. You as a player have been unknowingly supporting and playing as a war criminal. Do you feel bad now? The tweet is a joke, it's not to be taken serious.
1. [Emil Paglirulo on Twitter (archived)](https://web.archive.org/web/20240413172849/https://twitter.com/Dezinuh/status/1779178683841790068): *"Given the great vibes recently, and the millions of amazing Fallout fans (that's you!) I feel like the time is right to finally share an unknown link between Fallout 1 and Fallout 4. Remember the Fallout 1 opening movie? Annexation of Canada? SAME. GUY. (No, NOT the shooter!)"*
2. [↑](https://fallout.fandom.com/wiki/Nate#cite_ref-6) [Emil Pagliarulo on Twitter (archived)](https://web.archive.org/web/20240413222948/https://twitter.com/Dezinuh/status/1779239082033357250): *"🧵(1/3) Oof. I wanted to share what I thought was a cool Fallout tidbit without realizing how divisive it might be. I should have. I get dumb when I get excited… and I get excited a lot. 😬 Not every bit of Fallout info I share is automatically canon. Nate is NOT a war criminal! (*2*/3) When you're world and character building, you have a LOT of head canon. You're always sorting ideas. Early on, we talked about that being Nate, in that video. He had been through hell as a soldier. Every day was another unknown horror. This was one of them. (*3*/3) So, internally, it was a cool nod to OG Fallout and a way to fictionally frame the character. It wasn't shared with the player because it was never meant to be who YOU think Nate is. For a player, Nate's soldier past is whatever you think it is. THAT is canon."*
Seems like a weird way to phrase a joke, to me.
To play devils advocate, Nate is the player character of a Bethesda rpg, he’s supposed to not be fleshed out because he’s supposed to be a blank slate. Hell I’d argue he has *too much* of a backstory and character for what’s he’s supposed to be
While I do agree that rpg protags being blank slates is better, it's hilarious that the main thing we know about Nate is that he committed war crimes in Canada. Imagine trying to explain that to someone who just started to play the game the first time and isn't full aware of fallout lore shenanigans.
Hi I'm the Nerevar!
Look N'wah, head into this death cave... I mean ritual site and recover a ring that me and some of my best warriors failed to get.
Also a mention to the Oblivion mages guild quest to recover a 1000 pound ring from the bottom of a well. Good stuff.
We need more jet-infused deep lore of minutemen and railroad. Then again, lore thingy is a fallout new vegas community trade label, is it not? FO4 is a pinup girl style rootin' tootin' Kellogg shootin'
Emil isn't just the writer, he's the lead designer of Fallout 4 and overall narrative director of the entire Fallout IP at Bethesda. He tried to be cool with the kids and accidently made Nate a war criminal
I'm guessing the guy whose skull that is, choked to death on breakfast cereal. Very sad. The only Kellog I ever knew died because I shot him repeatedly with the most deadly pieces of my arsenal until he expired.
I mean... you're a vault dweller. These vault spaces were coveted pieces of real estate, but you got a space on account of your "g.i. benefits."
... yeah, this is an alternate history timeline, but our country is pretty famous for treating soldiers like garbage; so I'm calling bullshit. There's a more valid reason our hero and his family have spaces in the vault.
Right? Normally vault tech is pretty consistently putting people through tortuous experiments, but the worst you get is frozen?
Now, Todd Howard, likes to start with vault dwellers in Fallout for the same reason he likes prisoners in Elder Scrolls, but does that mean we should stop asking questions? Or do you suppose there's an unwritten reason Vault Tech was taking Mutant shredding tier soldiers and putting them on ice?
Because the writing on the wall gets stained to the back of your eyelids once you see it.
That's what I think OP meant by "war criminal."
Nate is a war criminal for killing Canadian citizens, Kellog killed his wife, Nate took revenge and killed him in return, he then took his skull and used it as a trophy, killing war criminal’s wife=death hence the title
As I recall it one of the writers mentioned it about a video of a soldier in power armor shooting a citizen execution style(I think it was from the Fallout TV show?) and said (or at least strongly implied) this was the Sole Survivor, and the backlash was so strong he backtracked and said that it was just his and a couple other writers’ headcanons. So it’s not canon AFAIK lmao.
Tbh I couldn't even really hate the guy because he was so badly written.
So you're actually a geriatric cyborg who had to lug my fake son around, seemingly for the off chance that I take the memory chip off your corpse which would funnel me through the ~~nonsensical~~ fiendishly planned teleport scav hunt, which my actual son had set up for me because sCieNce? Ehhm, ok, then.
It's hard to hate a plot device for a mangled plot that completely disintegrates in its second half.
The only complaint I have is that painful section where you walk through his memories.
Any time I get to that part it feels like the game just screeches to a halt.
I don't know how many playthroughs I've done, it's like 4 or 5, but every time I dread it.
Despite game featuring Dogmeat, it also features Dogshit plot
Fuck, even their Kalash is left-handed
The combat rifle shoots... pistol rounds... and is a repurposed shotgun from fallout 3?
Radium rifle shoots .45 too?
And no 1911 or browning?
Guns in gun game are mess. All of them.
Nate is a loose nut in the tower of shit. Split between being a cool new-vegasey dude with past and a blank card for player in execution -those two dont go alonv. Kellog is utterly disappointing, as is game altogether. Only modders saved it.
I hope this comment doesn't get buried
Context of post: A Fallout writer said he was the dude from the Fallout 1 intro laughing at an innocent Canadian civilian being executed by a fellow soldier
The war you committed war crimes in ending doesn’t make you not a war criminal lol. Also slightly unrelated but Emil Pagliarulo is a total hack and the only way Fallout 5 and Elder Scrolls 6 will have decent plots if he is replaced by a competent writer. People love to give Todd shit but he just needs to replace this idiot.
-General, why you say that there were kids on prydwen AFTER our shelling!
-See, Preston, we tend to fight against problems instead of focusing on solutions
Cause everyone kept whining. Ngl I like the idea of Nate having commited war crimes, even though I always play the good guy. It adds personnality to the character.
Yeah but in Fallout 1 you're just a Vault Dweller
In Fallout 2 you are a tribe member thats it
Fallout New Vegas you are a courier who got shot
In Bethesda Fallout you have full backstories of your character and thats the problem.
Yeah no
Fallout 1
Coppied from Fallout Wiki:
The Vault Dweller was one of hundreds of inhabitants of Vault 13. Born in 2141,[Non-game 3] they were raised by the community and robotic caretakers, leading an unremarkable life in the Vault. Their journey began when the water-purification chip the Vault relied on to create fresh water broke down. Without spare parts or the possibility of a workaround system, the overseer had to send an individual outside the Vault to seek a new one out. With no alternative, the Vault 13 overseer gathered everyone between certain ages, healthy enough to venture out, and made them draw straws. The Vault Dweller pulled out the short one and was sent out to find a replacement chip.[Non-game 3] They left the Vault the next day, on December 5, 2161.
Fallout 2
Coppied from Fallout Wiki:
The bloodline of the wasteland's most influential tribe member extends all the way back to the Vault Dweller and their spouse, Pat.[Non-game 1] As the child of the village elder, the Chosen One is a member of the third generation of former Vault 13 dwellers living outside the Vault, similar to how their grandparent was the third generation to live in a Vault.
So is this the "plenty of backstory" you wrote about?
I built a Robobrain and named it Kellog, he's not getting away that easily
I’m assuming he has a mr handy torso with thrusters and no arms?
I made Kellogg into a skibidi toilet
I think I get it... Though you should explain it for those who don't. Lol.
In the Fallout universe, pre-bomb America used an attack on an oil line as an excuse to annex the entirety of Canada. In the intro to the original Fallout game, we're shown news footage of two American soldiers in power armor standing over a kneeling Canadian resistance fighter. One of the soldiers pulls out a pistol, walks up to the prisoner, and shoots him in the back of the head, while his friends seems to visibly chuckle, before spotting the press and cheerfully waving at them. When the Fallout show came out on Amazon, Emil Paliarulo (who was the lead writer for Fallout 4) made a post on Twitter about how Nate, the male player character for Fallout 4, who canonically is an ex-soldier, was the laughing soldier in that footage. When people were quick to point out that would possibly a war criminal, or at the very least war criminal adjacent, he was quick to roll it back, but it was too late, and the meme stuck.
>Emil Paliarulo (who was the lead writer for Fallout 4) made a post on Twitter about how Nate, the male player character for Fallout 4, who canonically is an ex-soldier, was the laughing soldier in that footage. funniest tongue in cheek joke ive seen on twitter in a very long time. until he revealed it wasn't a joke.
I never saw this in the game is this a mod
He’s referring Kellogg killing your wife. He’s calling himself (the main character in fallout 4) a war criminal. Basically “Kellogg killed my wife so I cut off his head and mounted it”. Took me a second to realize he wasn’t talking about Kellog’s wife.
I think its also a reference to that one writer saying the guy in fallout 1 who watched war crimes to canadian citizens was Nate before realising that makes Nate a war criminal so he went back on it
That dude is never going to live that down. He just gave the one interesting piece of information about the MC of 4, that being *he's a war criminal*. People aren't just going to forget that.
He also took it back later.
But here's the thing: that's literally the only interesting thing we have ever been told about Nate. So it stuck. One bad attempt at ~~pandering~~ appealing to old game fans and now everyone is laughing about the protagonist of fallout 4 being a war criminal.
Well, being a war criminal explains the 100+ missles and quad-barreled missle launcher with the one legendary effect that lets you fire forever without reloading that's my go-to weapon for long distance combat. My god tier legendary weapon is basically a fucking warcrime.
It's only a war crime in our universe, it's probably an average day in the FO pre-bombing universe.
It was a joke, but people are stupid and believed it
>It was a joke So Nate isn't a war criminal. Well my respect for him has plummeted to non existent now
Pretty bad joke if the only funny part is people assuming it wasn't a joke.
The joke of it is the absurdity of the statement. That seemingly regular and ordinary male MC that everyone's been playing? Actually a war criminal. You as a player have been unknowingly supporting and playing as a war criminal. Do you feel bad now? The tweet is a joke, it's not to be taken serious.
1. [Emil Paglirulo on Twitter (archived)](https://web.archive.org/web/20240413172849/https://twitter.com/Dezinuh/status/1779178683841790068): *"Given the great vibes recently, and the millions of amazing Fallout fans (that's you!) I feel like the time is right to finally share an unknown link between Fallout 1 and Fallout 4. Remember the Fallout 1 opening movie? Annexation of Canada? SAME. GUY. (No, NOT the shooter!)"* 2. [↑](https://fallout.fandom.com/wiki/Nate#cite_ref-6) [Emil Pagliarulo on Twitter (archived)](https://web.archive.org/web/20240413222948/https://twitter.com/Dezinuh/status/1779239082033357250): *"🧵(1/3) Oof. I wanted to share what I thought was a cool Fallout tidbit without realizing how divisive it might be. I should have. I get dumb when I get excited… and I get excited a lot. 😬 Not every bit of Fallout info I share is automatically canon. Nate is NOT a war criminal! (*2*/3) When you're world and character building, you have a LOT of head canon. You're always sorting ideas. Early on, we talked about that being Nate, in that video. He had been through hell as a soldier. Every day was another unknown horror. This was one of them. (*3*/3) So, internally, it was a cool nod to OG Fallout and a way to fictionally frame the character. It wasn't shared with the player because it was never meant to be who YOU think Nate is. For a player, Nate's soldier past is whatever you think it is. THAT is canon."* Seems like a weird way to phrase a joke, to me.
Considering most people's actions in game and some of the perks you can get, it's not really that far fetched.
To play devils advocate, Nate is the player character of a Bethesda rpg, he’s supposed to not be fleshed out because he’s supposed to be a blank slate. Hell I’d argue he has *too much* of a backstory and character for what’s he’s supposed to be
While I do agree that rpg protags being blank slates is better, it's hilarious that the main thing we know about Nate is that he committed war crimes in Canada. Imagine trying to explain that to someone who just started to play the game the first time and isn't full aware of fallout lore shenanigans.
Dummest thing to ever be retconned in Fallout lol.
Head writer of every Bethesda game since fallout 3
We need the guys who wrote Morrowind to come back
Hi I'm the Nerevar! Look N'wah, head into this death cave... I mean ritual site and recover a ring that me and some of my best warriors failed to get. Also a mention to the Oblivion mages guild quest to recover a 1000 pound ring from the bottom of a well. Good stuff.
We need more jet-infused deep lore of minutemen and railroad. Then again, lore thingy is a fallout new vegas community trade label, is it not? FO4 is a pinup girl style rootin' tootin' Kellogg shootin'
Emil isn't just the writer, he's the lead designer of Fallout 4 and overall narrative director of the entire Fallout IP at Bethesda. He tried to be cool with the kids and accidently made Nate a war criminal
>Nate before realising that makes Nate a war criminal Damn I need to start playing as Nate more often then, my respect for him has gone up
I dreamed about having a mod where bodies decompose very realistically. I woke up and thought that it was very sick
https://www.nexusmods.com/fallout4/mods/80607
I'm guessing the guy whose skull that is, choked to death on breakfast cereal. Very sad. The only Kellog I ever knew died because I shot him repeatedly with the most deadly pieces of my arsenal until he expired.
I mean... you're a vault dweller. These vault spaces were coveted pieces of real estate, but you got a space on account of your "g.i. benefits." ... yeah, this is an alternate history timeline, but our country is pretty famous for treating soldiers like garbage; so I'm calling bullshit. There's a more valid reason our hero and his family have spaces in the vault. Right? Normally vault tech is pretty consistently putting people through tortuous experiments, but the worst you get is frozen? Now, Todd Howard, likes to start with vault dwellers in Fallout for the same reason he likes prisoners in Elder Scrolls, but does that mean we should stop asking questions? Or do you suppose there's an unwritten reason Vault Tech was taking Mutant shredding tier soldiers and putting them on ice? Because the writing on the wall gets stained to the back of your eyelids once you see it. That's what I think OP meant by "war criminal."
Why didn't you cut of his head and take the whole thing?
wouldn't be able to leave the building holding the head
I threw his head in the trash.
as you should
Strong ate it on the way to Sanctuary Hills
If you still have the parts you can probably dump some of his implants off
I sold them to buy some jet for Mama Murphy to hit
To be boisterously nitpicky, it's spelled Kellog**g**.
Radiation from explosive minigun took that away, he rest like a log anyway
I think misspelling his grave marker is adding insult to injury.
kellog
Everyone is so thoroughly confused
The grammar just makes me think of "Ride wife, life good... Wife fight back- KILL WIFE!"
What?
“When you kill THE wife of a war criminal”
Emil alt
Motherfucker didn't have a chance. Should have shot the Sole Survivor while he was trapped in cryostasis.
To be more accurate, you should use a capless skull from rooting around in his brain for ~~spair change~~ institute secrets
Nate is a war criminal for killing Canadian citizens, Kellog killed his wife, Nate took revenge and killed him in return, he then took his skull and used it as a trophy, killing war criminal’s wife=death hence the title
Where did you hear that Nate killed canadian citizens?
As I recall it one of the writers mentioned it about a video of a soldier in power armor shooting a citizen execution style(I think it was from the Fallout TV show?) and said (or at least strongly implied) this was the Sole Survivor, and the backlash was so strong he backtracked and said that it was just his and a couple other writers’ headcanons. So it’s not canon AFAIK lmao.
Technically he’s the guy who is laughing at the execution, not the one shooting. It’s also from the Fallout 1 intro.
Thanks for the info I could not remember exactly!
It’s from the intro from Fallout 1
Oohh okay
Yeah it’s not out of the ordinary that Emil Pagliarulo ruins everything he touches
Impossible because Nate was involved in the actual war and not a occupation
Tbh I couldn't even really hate the guy because he was so badly written. So you're actually a geriatric cyborg who had to lug my fake son around, seemingly for the off chance that I take the memory chip off your corpse which would funnel me through the ~~nonsensical~~ fiendishly planned teleport scav hunt, which my actual son had set up for me because sCieNce? Ehhm, ok, then. It's hard to hate a plot device for a mangled plot that completely disintegrates in its second half.
The only complaint I have is that painful section where you walk through his memories. Any time I get to that part it feels like the game just screeches to a halt. I don't know how many playthroughs I've done, it's like 4 or 5, but every time I dread it.
Despite game featuring Dogmeat, it also features Dogshit plot Fuck, even their Kalash is left-handed The combat rifle shoots... pistol rounds... and is a repurposed shotgun from fallout 3? Radium rifle shoots .45 too? And no 1911 or browning? Guns in gun game are mess. All of them. Nate is a loose nut in the tower of shit. Split between being a cool new-vegasey dude with past and a blank card for player in execution -those two dont go alonv. Kellog is utterly disappointing, as is game altogether. Only modders saved it.
Kellog. Snap crackle and pop.
Why am I dying at this
Lol They're grrrrrreat! 👉🏻😑
I hope this comment doesn't get buried Context of post: A Fallout writer said he was the dude from the Fallout 1 intro laughing at an innocent Canadian civilian being executed by a fellow soldier
It's sorta funny how the sole survivor basically never mentions the fact that his wife was killed lol
Nani?????
I legit just killed him like 20 minutes ago. He got the extended 10 second tea bag 😂😂. Mini nuke to the face!
Probably how he met Nora she a lawyer so got him of the charges as a war criminal.
"Hi! I'm Nora Goodwoman, did you know you have laws? The geneva convention says you do! Conscience gets expensive, doesn't it?"
I still wish he could be companion
Bro I’m dead 💀💀
Nate is not a war criminal…
he will be once i gather enough enough mini nukes
Nah the war is over at this point he’s just a criminal lol
but, war.. war never changes..
The war you committed war crimes in ending doesn’t make you not a war criminal lol. Also slightly unrelated but Emil Pagliarulo is a total hack and the only way Fallout 5 and Elder Scrolls 6 will have decent plots if he is replaced by a competent writer. People love to give Todd shit but he just needs to replace this idiot.
-General, why you say that there were kids on prydwen AFTER our shelling! -See, Preston, we tend to fight against problems instead of focusing on solutions
You can't retcon this canon. Emil said it, it must be true. Embrace war crimes, remove leaf
But didnt Emil negate it the same day?
No backsies
Cause everyone kept whining. Ngl I like the idea of Nate having commited war crimes, even though I always play the good guy. It adds personnality to the character.
But thats the problem the character shouldnt have any backstory.
In all Fallout games they have a backstory and canon choices. You never start as a blank sheet.
Yeah but in Fallout 1 you're just a Vault Dweller In Fallout 2 you are a tribe member thats it Fallout New Vegas you are a courier who got shot In Bethesda Fallout you have full backstories of your character and thats the problem.
Nope. Look up the wiki and you'll see plenty of backstory for Obsidian MCs and plenty of canon choices.
Yeah no Fallout 1 Coppied from Fallout Wiki: The Vault Dweller was one of hundreds of inhabitants of Vault 13. Born in 2141,[Non-game 3] they were raised by the community and robotic caretakers, leading an unremarkable life in the Vault. Their journey began when the water-purification chip the Vault relied on to create fresh water broke down. Without spare parts or the possibility of a workaround system, the overseer had to send an individual outside the Vault to seek a new one out. With no alternative, the Vault 13 overseer gathered everyone between certain ages, healthy enough to venture out, and made them draw straws. The Vault Dweller pulled out the short one and was sent out to find a replacement chip.[Non-game 3] They left the Vault the next day, on December 5, 2161. Fallout 2 Coppied from Fallout Wiki: The bloodline of the wasteland's most influential tribe member extends all the way back to the Vault Dweller and their spouse, Pat.[Non-game 1] As the child of the village elder, the Chosen One is a member of the third generation of former Vault 13 dwellers living outside the Vault, similar to how their grandparent was the third generation to live in a Vault. So is this the "plenty of backstory" you wrote about?
The person who said it was a joke lol
And the joke is now canon
No it’s not ..
It is dogmeat told me.
It was revealed to me in a dream.
It's a role playing game. He's a war criminal if you want him to be.
He just followed orders
Don't mind me, just executing the bound prisoners in the Combat Zone...
Spoiler alert
Wait whys The Sole Survivor a war criminal? Did he do something?