Ideal Locations for Fallout 5

Bethesda has described each Fallout wasteland as a character in itself, shaped by its particular region, history, and environment. That should be the primary rule for choosing Fallout 5’s location: the map cannot merely be another destroyed American city. It must create gameplay, factions, creatures, survival conditions, and stories that would be impossible anywhere else. (Fallout)

1. New Orleans and the Gulf Coast

Best overall choice

New Orleans offers the strongest combination of atmosphere, culture, geography, survival mechanics, and recognizable landmarks. The region naturally connects a dense historic city with the Mississippi River, Lake Pontchartrain, bayous, swamps, marshes, plantations, industrial corridors, small fishing communities, and the Gulf Coast.

The real city developed as a gateway to the Mississippi Valley despite being surrounded by wetlands and vulnerable to storms and flooding. Southern Louisiana is crossed by extensive waterways running through forests, swamps, and marshes. That geography practically designs a Fallout map by itself. (National Park Service)

Why it would work

Environmental variety

The player could move through:

The ruined French Quarter
A partially flooded downtown
Abandoned streetcar routes
Lake Pontchartrain settlements
Levee fortresses
Industrial river ports
Swamp villages
Oil platforms
Coastal islands
Submerged Vaults
Mississippi River trading towns

The water level could change after storms, levee failures, faction sabotage, or major player decisions. Locations accessible during a dry period could become submerged later, while storms might expose shipwrecks, drainage tunnels, and underground facilities.

Unique traversal

New Orleans could support boats, fan boats, ferries, improvised floating settlements, amphibious Power Armor, diving equipment, rope bridges, raised walkways, and settlement construction on stilts.

That would immediately separate it from the walking-heavy environments of previous games.

Faction potential

Possible factions could include:

The Levee Authority: Engineers who control pumps, floodgates, clean water, and elevated land.
The River Confederacy: Merchants operating armored paddleboats and floating markets.
The Crescent Houses: Rival families controlling sections of the old city.
The Gulf Directorate: Descendants of offshore energy corporations occupying refineries and drilling platforms.
The Baratarians: Smugglers, scavengers, and privateers using the swamps as concealed territory.
The Preservation Society: Historians attempting to restore old neighborhoods, music, records, architecture, and regional culture.
The Drowned: Survivors altered by contaminated wetlands rather than ordinary surface radiation.

Creature possibilities

The region could introduce mutated alligators, gar, catfish, nutria, wild boars, snapping turtles, pelicans, crawfish colonies, mosquitoes, snakes, and amphibious Deathclaw variants.

The creatures should not merely be oversized animals. Some should use mud camouflage, underwater ambushes, territorial nesting, pack behavior, and changing water conditions.

Major landmarks

Jackson Square, the French Quarter, St. Louis Cathedral, the Superdome, the Mississippi River, Lake Pontchartrain, cemeteries, streetcar lines, riverboats, refineries, bridges, and abandoned offshore facilities would give the game immediate visual identity. The French Quarter alone contains a dense historic street plan and distinctive colonial architecture that would be ideal for vertical exploration and faction-controlled districts. (National Park Service)

Fallout identity

The game could be called:

Fallout 5: Crescent Wasteland

Its central conflict could revolve around one question:

Who controls the water controls the Gulf.

2. Chicago and the Great Lakes

Best choice for an urban Fallout

Chicago would be ideal for a darker, politically complex Fallout focused on transportation, industry, organized factions, severe weather, and vertical city exploration.

The city provides skyscrapers, dense neighborhoods, rail yards, waterfront districts, bridges, elevated trains, underground freight tunnels, stadiums, industrial areas, and the enormous presence of Lake Michigan. Chicago also has a real network of historic freight tunnels beneath the city, giving Bethesda a ready-made foundation for underground settlements, military routes, smuggling networks, and creature nests. (Choose Chicago)

Why it would work

A truly vertical map

Chicago could contain three interconnected worlds:

The rooftops and elevated rails
The streets, neighborhoods, and lakefront
The freight tunnels, subway infrastructure, bunkers, and buried prewar city

Players could move between ruined towers using suspended bridges, maintenance platforms, monorails, ziplines, and improvised elevators.

Seasonal survival

A Great Lakes Fallout could feature freezing temperatures, radioactive snow, lake-effect storms, frozen waterways, spring flooding, and summer heat.

Winter should affect:

Weapon reliability
Settlement heating
Visibility
Food production
Water access
Creature migration
Power consumption
Travel across frozen sections of the lake

Faction potential

The Lake Federation: Settlements connected through water trade.
The Union: Factory workers operating restored manufacturing plants.
The Stockyard Clans: Competing meat-producing and Brahmin-trading families.
The Skyway Authority: A militarized faction controlling elevated roads and rail lines.
The Tunnel State: An underground civilization that rarely visits the surface.
The Midwestern Brotherhood: A reinterpreted or fragmented Brotherhood presence tied to earlier Fallout lore.
The Ward Republics: Neighborhood governments with different laws, cultures, and allegiances.

Major conflict

Lake Michigan would be one of the largest remaining freshwater resources in the region. The central war could involve purification plants, shipping lanes, hydroelectric systems, and control of the lakefront.

Best feature

Chicago would provide the strongest opportunity for a living transportation network. Trains, ferries, armored buses, cargo boats, and faction-operated rail systems could physically move people and supplies across the map.

3. Seattle and the Pacific Northwest

Best location for wilderness and technological factions

Seattle could combine a major city with islands, mountains, forests, military installations, ports, underground structures, and severe weather.

Historic Pioneer Square sits near Seattle’s waterfront and pier system, while the wider region connects the city to Puget Sound and numerous island communities. That geography would allow Bethesda to build a map in which water, elevation, forests, and urban ruins are equally important. (National Park Service)

Why it would work

Map variety

Downtown Seattle
The Space Needle
Pioneer Square
Waterfront piers
Puget Sound islands
Naval installations
Dense evergreen forests
Mountain passes
Volcanic zones
Underground sections of the old city
Corporate technology campuses
Canadian border settlements

Weather

Seattle could feature heavy rain, fog, radioactive storms rolling off the Pacific, landslides, forest fires, snow-covered mountain regions, and ash from volcanic activity.

Faction potential

The Sound Coalition: Island and coastal communities connected by ferries.
The Evergreen Tribes: Forest settlements with advanced knowledge of the regional ecosystem.
The Cascadian Republic: A regional government attempting to unite Washington, Oregon, and British Columbia.
The Cloud Cities: Rooftop settlements that avoid the dangerous ground level.
The Mariners: Naval descendants controlling shipyards and submarines.
The Tech Remnants: Corporate survivors preserving robotics, artificial intelligence, and communications technology.

Best feature

Seattle would be perfect for an expanded boat, island, and underwater exploration system. Some islands could be peaceful communities, while others contain abandoned Vaults, naval laboratories, mutated ecosystems, or forgotten missile facilities.

4. Detroit and the Rust Belt

Best location for crafting, vehicles, and industrial warfare

Detroit would be an excellent setting for a Fallout game centered on manufacturing, labor, automation, corporate power, and rebuilding civilization.

The region’s history is inseparable from automobile production, factories, industrial research, labor movements, and large-scale manufacturing. Ford’s Piquette Avenue Plant was where the Model T was conceived, designed, and first produced, while other Detroit facilities contributed heavily to automotive and military production. (National Park Service)

Why it would work

A meaningful vehicle system

Detroit is the most logical setting for Fallout to introduce functional vehicles without turning the series into a driving game.

Players could restore:

Motorcycles
Trucks
Armored personnel carriers
Factory carts
Snow vehicles
Boats
Limited-use atomic cars

Vehicles would require fuel cells, tires, replacement components, coolant, batteries, and mechanical specialists. Damage should be localized rather than represented by one health bar.

Industrial settlement system

Instead of every settlement operating independently, the player could create supply chains:

Steel mill
Ammunition plant
Vehicle workshop
Food-processing facility
Robot assembly plant
Power station
Medical laboratory
Rail depot

Each facility would need workers, raw materials, electricity, security, and transportation.

Faction potential

The Assembly: Factory communities governed through labor councils.
The Motor Lords: Nomadic vehicle factions controlling highways.
The Board: Corporate descendants attempting to restore prewar ownership.
The Foundry: A heavily armored industrial military state.
The Windsor Compact: A Canadian faction controlling the opposite side of the river.
The Reclaimers: Mechanics who believe rebuilding infrastructure is more important than rebuilding governments.

Best feature

Detroit would provide the ideal foundation for Create-a-Vehicle, mobile settlements, convoy protection, highway ambushes, and faction-controlled manufacturing.

5. Houston, San Antonio, and the Texas Gulf

Best location for an enormous regional Fallout

Texas should not be represented by one desert city. The ideal approach would combine Houston, San Antonio, the Gulf Coast, oil country, ranchland, military installations, and sections of central Texas.

Houston’s identity has been shaped heavily by oil, architecture, shipping, and NASA’s Johnson Space Center. San Antonio adds historic missions, military history, Spanish colonial architecture, and a completely different urban identity. (National Park Service)

Why it would work

Distinct zones

Flooded Houston districts
The abandoned Space Center
Petrochemical refineries
Offshore oil platforms
San Antonio missions
Ranching settlements
Military proving grounds
Gulf Coast fishing towns
Dry western badlands
Underground missile complexes

Faction potential

The Lone Star Republic: A government attempting to unify Texas.
The Petro Kings: Refinery owners controlling fuel and plastics.
The Mission Coalition: Fortified communities connected through historic missions.
The Astronaut Corps: Scientists and technicians operating out of a surviving space facility.
The Range Families: Ranchers controlling Brahmin, water, and open territory.
The Gulf Fleet: Coastal communities operating ships and oil-platform settlements.

Best feature

Texas could support the deepest regional economy in the series: petroleum, livestock, aerospace technology, shipping, weapons manufacturing, agriculture, and water rights.

6. Atlanta and the Deep South

Best choice for political and cultural storytelling

Atlanta would give Fallout a major Southern metropolis surrounded by forests, mountains, small towns, rail corridors, military sites, universities, and historic communities.

The city contains numerous locations associated with African American education and the civil rights movement, including the Martin Luther King Jr. historic district, Ebenezer Baptist Church, Morehouse College, Spelman College, and the wider Atlanta University Center. These places would require careful, serious treatment rather than parody, but they could support some of the richest questions about liberty, equality, propaganda, citizenship, and who gets included in a rebuilt America. (National Park Service)

Why it would work

Faction potential

The Peach Republic: A civilian government attempting to restore regional democracy.
The Rail Authority: A faction controlling freight lines and armored trains.
The University Compact: Scholars preserving medicine, agriculture, engineering, and historical records.
The Stone Guard: A militarized faction occupying Stone Mountain.
The Free Communities: Independent settlements refusing allegiance to larger governments.
The Broadcast Union: A propaganda organization controlling regional radio and communications.

Map possibilities

Downtown Atlanta
Underground transit tunnels
Historic neighborhoods
University districts
Airport ruins
Stone Mountain
Appalachian foothills
Rural Georgia
Military installations
Rail towns

Best feature

Atlanta could create a Fallout built around information warfare. Radio towers, television stations, historical archives, school systems, public speeches, and propaganda networks could be as powerful as weapons.

7. St. Louis and the Mississippi Crossroads

Best central-American setting

St. Louis occupies an ideal position for a Fallout about river commerce, migration, territorial expansion, and competing regional powers.

The city developed near the Mississippi and Missouri rivers as a major trading and transportation center. The Gateway Arch and riverfront would give the game one of the most immediately recognizable skylines in the franchise. (National Park Service)

Why it would work

The map could connect:

Downtown St. Louis
The Gateway Arch
East St. Louis
Mississippi River settlements
Missouri forests
Floodplains
Cave systems
Agricultural communities
Riverboat factions
Abandoned missile sites

The Arch could be turned into a major faction headquarters, communications tower, religious symbol, vertical dungeon, or contested neutral zone.

Central conflict

St. Louis could become the gateway between several expanding civilizations:

An eastern republic
A western frontier coalition
A Mississippi river empire
Midwestern Brotherhood forces
Independent farming communities

The player would decide whether St. Louis becomes a bridge between civilizations or the battlefield that destroys them.

8. New York City, Newark, and the Hudson Wasteland

Best ambitious megacity option

A New York-area Fallout could include Manhattan, Newark, Jersey City, portions of Brooklyn and Queens, the Meadowlands, the Hudson River, and northern New Jersey.

This should not be one continuous mass of destroyed skyscrapers. The region should be divided into sharply different ecosystems:

Manhattan vertical ruins
Newark industrial districts
Jersey Meadowlands
Hudson River settlements
Subway civilizations
Harbor islands
Airport ruins
Fortified bridges and tunnels
Wealthy prewar bunker communities
Dense neighborhood republics

Why it would work

New York and northern New Jersey would offer the strongest neighborhood-based faction system. Every borough, city, island, tunnel, and transportation corridor could develop a different identity.

The challenge is technical. A poorly designed version would become repetitive corridors and inaccessible buildings. Bethesda would need meaningful interiors, destructible access points, rooftop traversal, working transit lines, and a serious vertical navigation system.

Best feature

The player could gradually restore a transportation network involving:

Subways
PATH-style tunnels
Ferries
Bridges
Freight rail
Armored buses
Rooftop cable systems

This could become Fallout’s densest and most interconnected world.

9. Hawaii

Best radical departure

Hawaii could deliver a Fallout unlike any previous entry:

Volcanic wastelands
Tropical forests
Pearl Harbor
Naval bases
Island communities
Lava tubes
Resorts converted into fortresses
Underwater military laboratories
Mutated marine ecosystems
Inter-island travel

Central conflict

Because each island would have developed separately after the bombs, they could contain entirely different governments, technologies, mutations, dialects, and attitudes toward outsiders.

Travel between islands would make exploration feel like an expedition. Boats, aircraft restoration, storms, piracy, and naval warfare could become major systems.

The danger would be reducing Hawaiian and Pacific cultures to decoration. Bethesda would need regional historians, Native Hawaiian consultants, writers, artists, and cultural experts deeply involved throughout development.

10. Alaska and Western Canada

Best survival-focused setting

A full Alaska Fallout could revisit the territory associated with the Battle of Anchorage without simply repeating the military simulation from Fallout 3.

The game could include:

Anchorage ruins
Frozen military bases
Oil pipelines
Remote settlements
Glaciers
Mountain ranges
Submarines
Canadian resistance remnants
Chinese military survivors
Prewar listening stations

Survival systems

Body temperature
Shelter insulation
Seasonal daylight
Avalanche danger
Frozen weapons
Food preservation
Sleds and snow vehicles
Ice fishing
Migrating creatures
Whiteout navigation

Alaska would be the strongest choice for players who want a more dangerous and grounded wasteland-survival experience.

My Recommended Three-Region Design

Instead of restricting Fallout 5 to one city and its immediate outskirts, the game should use three interconnected regions, each large enough to operate as its own wasteland.

Region One: New Orleans

The political, cultural, commercial, and narrative center.

Region Two: The Louisiana Wetlands and Gulf Coast

Swamps, fishing settlements, refineries, pirate routes, offshore platforms, and submerged prewar facilities.

Region Three: The Lower Mississippi Corridor

River towns, plantations, industrial ports, military installations, farming territories, and trade routes extending toward Baton Rouge or farther north.

The Mississippi River would connect the entire game. Factions would move troops, settlers, merchants, prisoners, food, and weapons along it in real time.

Final Ranking

Rank	Location	Greatest strength
1	New Orleans/Gulf Coast	Most original atmosphere and environmental gameplay
2	Chicago/Great Lakes	Best urban, underground, seasonal, and political setting
3	Seattle/Pacific Northwest	Best city-wilderness-island combination
4	Detroit/Rust Belt	Best crafting, manufacturing, and vehicle systems
5	Houston/San Antonio	Best large regional economy and faction variety
6	Atlanta/Deep South	Best political, cultural, and historical storytelling
7	St. Louis/Mississippi	Best crossroads and river-trade setting
8	New York/Newark	Best vertical megacity, but hardest to execute
9	Hawaii	Most radical and visually different setting
10	Alaska	Best hardcore survival environment

Verdict

New Orleans and the Gulf Coast would be the ideal location for Fallout 5.

It would give the franchise something it has never fully had: a wasteland where water is simultaneously the primary transportation route, economic resource, environmental threat, defensive barrier, and political weapon. Chicago would be my second choice, especially if Bethesda wanted a colder, more urban, industrial game.

Fallout 5 Location and Regional Map Blueprint

These are setting proposals, not claims about Bethesda’s actual plans.

The best Fallout 5 location should not be designed as one city surrounded by a ring of interchangeable countryside. It should be a regional ecosystem containing several political territories, distinct biomes, transportation networks, economies, climates, and underground layers.

A strong map would contain:

One major metropolitan center
Two or three secondary cities
Rural settlements and wilderness
Industrial and military zones
Navigable waterways or rail corridors
Several underground networks
Areas that change through player decisions
Factions whose beliefs are connected to the land they occupy

1. New Orleans, Southern Louisiana, and the Gulf Coast

Proposed wasteland name

The Crescent Wasteland

This remains my strongest overall choice.

The French Quarter sits beside the Mississippi River, while southern Louisiana contains bottomland forests, cypress swamps, marshes, canals, bayous, and delta terrain. The Barataria Preserve alone covers more than 26,000 acres of wetlands relatively close to New Orleans. That real-world geographical compression makes the region ideal for a map where dense urban exploration, river travel, flooded ruins, wilderness survival, and offshore expeditions exist together. (National Park Service)

Overall map structure

The map should extend from:

New Orleans in the center
Lake Pontchartrain and the Northshore in the north
Barataria Bay and the wetlands in the south
Chalmette and the refinery corridor in the east
Baton Rouge or an equivalent secondary city in the northwest
Oil platforms and barrier islands in the Gulf

The Mississippi River would function as the map’s primary highway.

Area 1: The French Quarter

Fallout name: The Old Crescent

This should be the cultural and commercial heart of the game rather than just another combat zone.

The surviving streets would be narrow, crowded, vertically layered, and filled with balconies, interior courtyards, rooftop pathways, tunnels, hidden rooms, and interconnected buildings. Because the real French Quarter is a dense historic district beside the Mississippi, it would naturally support a walkable central hub with river access. (National Park Service)

Gameplay role

Primary neutral settlement
Merchant center
Political meeting ground
Main source of regional rumors
Music, food, medicine, gambling, and information market
Starting location for several faction questlines

Possible landmarks

Jackson Square
St. Louis Cathedral
Bourbon Street
Canal Street
Riverfront docks
French Market
Historic cemeteries
Streetcar terminals

Environmental design

The ground floors of some buildings would be flooded or collapsed, forcing players to enter through balconies, rooftops, adjoining courtyards, or sewer connections.

Certain streets could become dangerous after dark. Not because enemies simply receive more health, but because different groups, smugglers, nocturnal creatures, assassins, and scavengers occupy them at night.

Faction

The Quarter Council

A loose coalition of merchants, musicians, innkeepers, doctors, craftspeople, and neighborhood guards.

They are wealthy but politically divided. Each block has its own representative, laws, protection arrangements, and alliances.

Major dilemma

The Quarter Council claims to preserve regional culture, but it may also be restricting who is allowed to live, work, perform, trade, or own property inside the protected district.

Area 2: The Central Business District

Fallout name: The Glass Graveyard

This would be New Orleans’ principal vertical combat and exploration district.

Skyscrapers would lean against one another, creating bridges hundreds of feet above the streets. Some towers would be controlled floor by floor by different groups.

Vertical layers

Flooded streets
Parking structures and service tunnels
Office interiors
Skybridges and improvised walkways
Rooftop settlements
Helipads and communications towers

Signature locations

A partially collapsed Superdome
Luxury hotels converted into fortified towers
Corporate headquarters
Underground parking complexes
A surviving broadcast station
A skyscraper suspended against another building

Main enemy types

Rooftop snipers
Elevator-shaft ambushers
Corporate security robots
Feral ghouls trapped in sealed offices
Flying mutant colonies nesting on rooftops

Major dungeon

The Vertical Vault

A Vault built beneath a corporate tower whose inhabitants gradually expanded upward after its lower levels flooded. The society is divided by elevation:

Workers live underground.
Security occupies the lower tower.
Administrators control the upper floors.
The ruling families live above the cloud and fog line.

Area 3: The Superdome District

Fallout name: The Great Bowl

The stadium should be a settlement large enough to feel like a small city.

Interior communities

Seating-section neighborhoods
Locker-room barracks
Medical clinics
Underground food storage
Field-level marketplace
Luxury-box government chambers
Roof-mounted water collectors
Maintenance-tunnel criminal districts

Possible faction

The Dome Compact

A disciplined city-state built around emergency management, ration distribution, and crowd control.

Its founders survived because the stadium became a disaster shelter. Generations later, its government still treats every citizen like a displaced person under emergency authority.

Central conflict

The Dome Compact is extremely organized and capable of protecting thousands of people, but it refuses to end its permanent state of emergency.

Area 4: The Lower Ninth Ward and Broken Levees

Fallout name: The Drowned Blocks

This should be one of the most emotionally powerful regions in the game.

Entire neighborhoods would stand partially submerged. Houses could be tilted, stacked, overturned, or pushed against levees and industrial structures.

Gameplay mechanics

Swimming and diving
Rooftop movement
Canoes and shallow-draft boats
Underwater entrances
Electrified floodwater
Contaminated sediment
Floating debris fields
Buildings that move or collapse during storms

Settlement concept

The Rooftop Nation

A connected community constructed across roofs, telephone poles, bridge fragments, boats, and elevated platforms.

Residents rarely touch the ground. Children are taught to swim and climb before they are taught to read.

Major choice

The player may be able to:

Repair the levee and drain sections of the district
Break additional barriers to redirect contaminated water
Preserve the flooded ecosystem
Give one faction control over the pumps
Decentralize the water system among local communities

Each decision would physically change portions of the map.

Area 5: Lake Pontchartrain

Fallout name: The Inland Sea

Lake Pontchartrain should feel almost like a separate open world.

Major locations

Causeway settlements
Sunken suburbs
Abandoned marinas
Floating markets
Naval research platform
Bridge-fortress checkpoints
Partially submerged airport
Fishing colonies
Mutant nesting islands

Causeway concept

A surviving section of the causeway becomes the region’s longest settlement.

Different portions could include:

Merchant checkpoint
Residential platform
Wind-power station
Military gate
Fishing village
Raider-controlled dead section
Collapsed span requiring boat travel

Signature creature

Pontchartrain Leviathan

Not merely one boss animal, but a class of large aquatic mutants that attack ferries, shoreline settlements, and fishing equipment.

Players would first encounter evidence:

Destroyed boats
Bite marks
Missing fishing crews
Unusual sonar readings
Carcasses washing ashore

Area 6: The Barataria Wetlands

Fallout name: The Green Maze

The real Barataria landscape contains swamp, marsh, bayous, canals, and bottomland forest, making it a strong foundation for a wilderness region that plays completely differently from the city. (National Park Service)

Navigation

The player should not immediately receive a perfect map.

Navigation would depend on:

Water depth
Tides
Weather
Vegetation
Local guides
Boat size
Hidden markers
Animal migration
Faction-controlled channels

A route passable by canoe may be impossible for a large armored boat. A channel open during high water may become mud during a dry period.

Settlements

Communities built on stilts
Tree-platform villages
Floating farms
Salvaged houseboat towns
Old hunting camps
Isolated scientific stations
Tribal or family-controlled bayou territories

Creatures

Mutated alligators
Amphibious Deathclaws
Giant gar
Snapping-turtle mutants
Carnivorous marsh vegetation
Mosquito swarms
Mutated nutria colonies
Camouflaged swamp lurks
Burrowing crawfish creatures

Creature behavior

Alligators should not simply charge the player from a distance. They should:

Remain nearly invisible in muddy water
Track movement along shorelines
Attack drinking Brahmin
Drag wounded prey into water
Defend nests
React to boat-engine noise
Compete with other predators

Area 7: The Mississippi River Corridor

Fallout name: The Great Road

The Mississippi should function as a dynamic trade route rather than decorative water.

River traffic

Merchant barges
Armored paddleboats
Fishing vessels
Prison transports
Floating hospitals
Raider skiffs
Military patrol boats
Traveling communities
Smuggling submarines
Livestock ferries

Player activities

Escort convoys
Board hostile vessels
Smuggle goods through checkpoints
Salvage shipwrecks
Defend river settlements
Establish toll stations
Destroy or repair locks
Purchase and customize a boat
Follow traveling merchants between cities

Faction

The River Confederacy

A network of river towns that shares currency, navigation rules, distress signals, and mutual-defense agreements.

It is not a single country. Every member settlement retains its own government.

Rival faction

The Admiralty

A centralized naval power that argues the river cannot remain safe without one command structure.

The Confederacy represents local independence. The Admiralty represents security through consolidation.

Area 8: Chalmette and the Eastern Industrial Corridor

Fallout name: The Furnace Coast

The eastern region would mix battlefields, refineries, canals, chemical plants, rail yards, and fortified industrial settlements. Chalmette also provides a historical battlefield connection that could be reinterpreted through Fallout’s obsession with nationalism and repeating history. (National Park Service)

Environmental threats

Burning canals
Chemical fog
Oil-contaminated soil
Explosive pipelines
Industrial robots
Poisoned rain
Unstable storage tanks

Faction

The Refiners

A technically sophisticated industrial organization controlling:

Fuel
Lubricants
Plastic
Chemical weapons
Boat engines
Power generators
Synthetic materials

They are indispensable to the regional economy but may be slowly poisoning every community downstream.

Area 9: Gulf Coast and Barrier Islands

Fallout name: The Shattered Shore

This region would be open, exposed, weather-driven, and difficult to permanently control.

Locations

Fishing towns
Destroyed resorts
Coast Guard stations
Barrier islands
Ship graveyards
Fortified lighthouses
Submerged military bunkers
Hurricane research facilities
Floating scrapyards

Dynamic weather

Major storms should not be scripted visual events alone. They should affect:

Visibility
Water levels
Creature behavior
Settlement damage
Boat handling
Radio communications
Merchant schedules
Electrical systems
Newly exposed salvage sites

Players could receive storm warnings from functioning weather stations, experienced sailors, radio operators, or visible environmental signs.

Area 10: Offshore Oil Platforms

Fallout name: The Iron Archipelago

Offshore platforms could operate as isolated mini-regions.

Platform types

Working refinery settlement
Raider fortress
Scientific laboratory
Mutant nesting platform
Abandoned Enclave installation
Prison platform
Automated drilling complex
Floating casino
Vertibird refueling station

Faction concept

The Gulf Directorate

Descendants of executives, engineers, contractors, and security personnel who survived offshore.

They possess advanced industrial technology but depend on the mainland for food, replacement workers, and biological diversity.

Major question

Are they rebuilding the Gulf’s energy infrastructure, or attempting to restore the same corporate system that helped destroy the world?

New Orleans signature systems

Flood-state simulation

The world could contain several water states:

Normal
Drought
Heavy rain
Storm surge
Levee breach
Controlled drainage
Permanent player-caused rerouting

Boat customization

Players could select:

Hull
Engine
Armor
Storage
Weapons
Navigation equipment
Crew stations
Living quarters
Shallow-water capability
Radiation shielding

Settlement elevation

Construction height would matter. Low settlements cost less to build but face flooding. Raised settlements require more material but survive severe storms.

2. Chicago, Lake Michigan, and the Industrial Midwest

Proposed wasteland name

The Lakefront Wastes

Chicago would be the best location for a dense urban Fallout with weather, transportation, freshwater politics, organized industry, and extensive underground exploration.

Chicago has elevated rail lines and a historic network of freight tunnels beneath the city. The broader metropolitan landscape also contains river bridges, lakefront infrastructure, industrial corridors, rail yards, and dense neighborhood districts. (Choose Chicago)

Area 1: The Loop

Fallout name: The Iron Loop

The elevated rail system would surround the central city and act as both a traversal network and defensive wall.

Map layers

Street level
Elevated railway
Interior office floors
Rooftops
Pedestrian tunnels
Freight tunnels
Utility infrastructure
Flood-control system

Central settlement

Loop Authority

A government controlling the remaining trains, stations, switches, bridges, and rail power.

Citizens receive social status according to mobility privileges:

Platform access
Inner Loop travel
Freight authorization
Express-line access
Private railcar ownership

Gameplay feature

The player could gradually restore rail segments. Every restored line would:

Open fast travel
Move merchants physically
Increase settlement growth
Attract raiders
Change faction front lines
Create new escort missions
Alter local prices

Area 2: Downtown River District

Fallout name: The Split City

Chicago’s bridges would become political borders.

Individual bridges could be:

Raised permanently
Controlled by toll factions
Converted into settlements
Trapped
Destroyed
Operated only at certain hours
Used to isolate infected districts

Major questline

A conflict over whether to reconnect the divided city.

Restoring every bridge would improve commerce but also allow hostile armies, creatures, and disease to spread.

Area 3: Lake Michigan Waterfront

Fallout name: The Fresh Coast

Lake Michigan would represent wealth, survival, transportation, and power.

Locations

Water-intake stations
Purification plants
Naval facilities
Marinas
Museum fortresses
Beach settlements
Frozen winter routes
Offshore research platforms
Sunken ships

Main conflict

A faction controlling clean water could pressure inland settlements without firing a weapon.

It could:

Raise water prices
Restrict purification parts
Redirect pipelines
Contaminate rival supplies
Shut off pumping stations
Demand military service in exchange for access

Area 4: The Freight Tunnels

Fallout name: The Undergrid

The historic tunnel network beneath Chicago provides an ideal foundation for a hidden secondary civilization. (Choose Chicago)

Underground inhabitants

Tunnel settlements
Ghouls
Smugglers
Maintenance robots
Rail cults
Escaped experiments
Forgotten prewar workers
Water-system engineers

Environmental gameplay

Darkness
Flooding
Low oxygen
Collapses
Steam leaks
Electrical hazards
Maze-like navigation
Train movement
Vertical shafts into skyscrapers

Faction

The Understate

An underground civilization that controls routes beneath nearly every major surface faction.

Its greatest weapon is not an army. It is the ability to appear inside supposedly secure buildings.

Area 5: South Side and Former Stockyard Districts

Fallout name: The Yards

This region would focus on livestock, food production, labor, packing facilities, industrial machinery, and territorial communities.

Economy

Brahmin breeding
Meat preservation
Leather production
Bone tools
Fertilizer
Medical tissue
Caravan animals
Pack-animal markets

Faction

The Union Houses

Competing worker cooperatives that jointly control the district but disagree over automation.

One group sees robots as liberation from dangerous labor. Another believes automation caused the destruction of working communities before the war.

Area 6: Calumet Industrial Corridor

Fallout name: The Black Foundries

This would be the map’s heaviest industrial region.

Locations

Steel plants
Rail bridges
Chemical facilities
Scrap fields
Power stations
Shipping channels
Factory settlements
Power Armor foundries

Endgame importance

Whoever controls this region can manufacture:

Ammunition
Armor
Rail components
Heavy weapons
Construction material
Vehicle parts
Water-pump components

Area 7: Gary and Northwestern Indiana

Fallout name: The Ash City

Gary could function as a partially separate secondary city built around enormous industrial ruins.

Tone

Where Chicago is politically fragmented but populated, the Ash City would feel abandoned, windblown, contaminated, and mechanically alive.

Old automated factories could still be operating without human supervision, producing useless components according to prewar quotas.

Main mystery

Someone has recently changed the factories’ production instructions.

Area 8: Frozen Lake Region

During winter, sections of the lake become temporary travel corridors.

Winter mechanics

Ice thickness
Whiteout conditions
Frostbite
Weapon malfunction
Increased energy use
Frozen water pumps
Snow-buried entrances
Migrating creatures
Temporary ice settlements

A route across the lake might shorten a journey but place the player above deep water with cracking ice beneath them.

3. Seattle, Puget Sound, and the Cascades

Proposed wasteland name

The Cascadian Expanse

Seattle sits on the eastern shore of Puget Sound. The surrounding region includes extensive shoreline, hundreds of islands, freshwater lakes, locks, mountains, and access toward the Canadian border. This makes it ideal for a map combining dense city districts, maritime travel, forests, islands, military facilities, and mountain survival. (Visit Seattle)

Area 1: Downtown Seattle

Fallout name: The Rain Towers

Gameplay identity

Rain-soaked vertical city
Rooftop bridges
Collapsed monorail
Tower settlements
Fog-limited visibility
Moss-covered interiors
Landslide damage

The rain should affect sound. Heavy storms could conceal footsteps, gunfire, creatures, and approaching patrols.

Area 2: Pioneer Square and Buried Seattle

Fallout name: The First City

Pioneer Square is Seattle’s historic core and would be ideal for layered exploration involving street-level ruins, buried structures, basements, service corridors, and hidden communities. (Visit Seattle)

Faction

The Founders

A merchant society claiming authority because it occupies the oldest surviving district.

They treat history as legal ownership: whoever can prove a prewar deed, corporate title, or family connection receives superior property rights.

Area 3: The Space Needle and Seattle Center

Fallout name: The Needle

The Space Needle could function as:

Radio tower
Observation post
Weather-monitoring station
Sniper fortress
Vertibird port
Neutral diplomatic site

Control of the Needle would reveal troop movements, storms, fires, and maritime traffic across a huge section of the map.

Area 4: Port of Seattle

Fallout name: The Container Kingdom

A city built from stacked cargo containers.

Vertical settlement design

Lower industrial decks
Middle residential decks
Upper defensive walls
Crane-operated elevators
Suspended marketplaces
Ship-mounted power plants

Faction

The Dock Houses

Each major cargo terminal is controlled by a different house specializing in food, weapons, medicine, machinery, or maritime transport.

Area 5: Lake Union, Lake Washington, and the Locks

Seattle’s lock system connects freshwater lakes with saltwater Puget Sound, offering an excellent foundation for a strategic water-control system. (Visit Seattle)

Gameplay importance

A faction controlling the locks could decide:

Which boats travel inland
Which settlements receive fish
Whether saltwater contaminates freshwater zones
Whether military vessels enter the lakes
Which trade routes remain open

Main quest possibility

A damaged lock system threatens to permanently alter regional water levels.

Area 6: Puget Sound Islands

Fallout name: The Broken Sound

Every island should possess a different identity.

Island possibilities

Agricultural commune
Naval fortress
Cannibal settlement
Prewar luxury bunker
Ghoul retirement colony
Mutant wildlife preserve
Religious society
Prison island
Artificial-intelligence laboratory
Abandoned missile station

Some islands would be visible but unreachable until the player obtains a suitable boat or earns access to a ferry.

Area 7: Naval Shipyards and Submarine Territory

Faction

The Mariners

Descendants of naval personnel and shipyard workers.

They control:

Dry docks
Submarines
Torpedoes
Sonar
Navigation charts
Heavy ship-mounted weapons
Coastal radar

Internal division

One faction wants to create a protective regional navy. Another wants to isolate Puget Sound and sink every unauthorized vessel.

Area 8: Evergreen Forests

Fallout name: The Deep Green

The forest should be dense enough that conventional long-distance navigation becomes unreliable.

Threats

Ambush predators
Falling trees
Wildfires
Toxic spores
Landslides
Hidden camps
Tree-dwelling mutants
Camouflaged hunters

Settlement design

Communities would build around logging roads, fire towers, ranger stations, hydroelectric facilities, and elevated tree platforms.

Area 9: The Cascades

Fallout name: The High Divide

This would be the game’s high-level mountain region.

Hazards

Snow
Avalanches
Steep climbing routes
Volcanic vents
Thin air
Mountain predators
Isolated military facilities
Dam failures

Mountain passes could open and close according to weather, explosives, or faction control.

4. Detroit, Windsor, and the Great Lakes Manufacturing Belt

Proposed wasteland name

The Motor Wastes

Detroit’s history is deeply connected to automobile manufacturing, labor, factory development, engineering, and wartime production. This gives the location a strong thematic foundation for a Fallout focused on rebuilding machines, controlling production, and deciding whether industrial power should belong to workers, corporations, governments, or artificial intelligence. (National Park Service)

Area 1: Downtown Detroit

Fallout name: The Motor Crown

Locations

Renaissance Center-style tower fortress
Theater district
Government ruins
Financial towers
Stadium settlements
Underground transit
Riverfront defenses

A restored elevated people-mover could circle the downtown area and serve as an automated transport system.

Area 2: Detroit River

Fallout name: The Border Current

The river would separate Detroit from Windsor, creating the first major Fallout setting in which an international border meaningfully shapes the entire game.

Border infrastructure

Ambassador Bridge-style fortress
Vehicle tunnel
Ferry crossings
Smuggling routes
Customs bunkers
Underwater infiltration paths
Border artillery posts

Story question

Did the border continue to matter after the world ended, or did surviving governments recreate it because borders are useful tools of control?

Area 3: Windsor and Canadian Territory

Fallout name: The Annexed Shore

This region could finally explore the consequences of the United States’ annexation of Canada from the Canadian perspective.

Possible factions

Canadian resistance descendants
American occupation remnants
Mixed-border settlements
Prewar collaborationist families
Independent Windsor republic
Cross-border smugglers

This should not reduce Canada to a joke. It could reveal contradictory versions of the annexation preserved by different communities.

Area 4: River Rouge Industrial Complex

Fallout name: The Great Machine

An enormous factory complex could operate almost like a separate world.

Factory zones

Steel production
Engine assembly
Glass works
Chemical processing
Rail depot
Power plant
Robot assembly
Waste-treatment district

Dynamic production

The player could reactivate individual departments. Restoring one section would require resources from another.

For example:

Engine production requires steel and electricity.
Vehicle assembly requires engines, tires, glass, and electronics.
Power Armor requires advanced alloys and military schematics.
Rail repair requires steel, machine tools, and trained workers.

Area 5: Automotive Suburbs

Fallout name: The Endless Streets

The suburbs should not be repetitive rows of houses.

Different districts could have:

Prewar gated communities
Worker housing
Robot-managed neighborhoods
Abandoned shopping centers
Racetrack settlements
Drive-in theaters
Highway towns
Underground homeowner bunkers

Unique concept

A suburb preserved by automated municipal robots continues issuing fines, cutting lawns, towing vehicles, and arresting people for property-code violations.

Area 6: Flint and Secondary Manufacturing Cities

Fallout name: The Dry Works

Flint could become a secondary city dealing with contaminated infrastructure, abandoned factories, and political distrust.

Its storyline could focus on whether people can trust a government that promises to repair essential systems.

Detroit signature system: Vehicle reconstruction

Vehicles should be rare, expensive, mechanically demanding tools.

Vehicle categories

Motorcycle
Pickup truck
Armored van
Factory utility vehicle
Snow vehicle
Amphibious transport
Heavy military truck

Required systems

Localized damage
Replaceable parts
Fuel or energy cells
Tire condition
Engine heat
Cargo weight
Passenger seating
Armor weight
Noise generation
Repair specialists

Fast vehicles would attract attention and require roads. They would not replace exploration on foot.

5. Houston, Galveston, San Antonio, and the Texas Gulf

Proposed wasteland name

The Lone Star Expanse

This setting would work best as an enormous multi-city region rather than a single urban map.

Houston contributes spaceflight, refineries, ports, flooding, and industrial sprawl. NASA’s Johnson Space Center was established as the home of the American human-spaceflight program’s Mission Control and remains a major aerospace and research complex. San Antonio contributes historic mission communities, military installations, and a distinct inland identity. (NASA)

Area 1: Downtown Houston

Fallout name: The Bayou Towers

Design

Elevated highways
Flooded underpasses
Skyscraper communities
Underground pedestrian tunnels
Corporate arcologies
Medical facilities
Storm-damaged neighborhoods

The city would have multiple elevation levels because low routes would periodically become impassable.

Area 2: Johnson Space Center

Fallout name: The Star Command

This could be one of the most technologically valuable locations in the franchise.

Interior areas

Mission Control
Astronaut training facilities
Spacecraft simulators
Robotics laboratory
Medical research wing
Lunar-material storage
Vacuum-testing chambers
Prototype habitats
Communications center

Faction

The Flight Directorate

Scientists and technicians who organize society like a mission-control operation.

Every expedition is assigned:

Flight director
Medical officer
Engineering controller
Communications officer
Mission rules
Abort conditions

Central controversy

They are excellent at planning missions but treat ordinary citizens like replaceable mission assets.

Area 3: Houston Ship Channel and Refinery Belt

Fallout name: The Petrochemical Kingdom

Resources

Fuel
Plastics
Fertilizer
Explosives
Synthetic rubber
Lubricants
Chemical medicine
Toxic weapons

Environmental hazards

Burning water
Explosive vapor
Chemical rain
Mutated industrial sludge
Automated pipeline defenses
Contaminated wildlife

Area 4: Galveston Island

Fallout name: The Last Seawall

Galveston would be a storm-battered coastal city protected by an enormous fortified seawall.

Locations

Historic district
Port
Beach resorts
Medical complex
Naval defenses
Storm shelters
Pleasure pier
Submerged neighborhoods

Central question

Should the seawall protect one wealthy island settlement, or should its engineers help vulnerable communities across the entire coast?

Area 5: San Antonio

Fallout name: The Mission City

The real San Antonio missions were long-standing community centers, making them useful foundations for fortified settlements built around agriculture, water, craft production, defense, and shared identity. (National Park Service)

Settlement network

Each surviving mission could be a separate community with:

Farms
Workshops
Wells
Schools
Defensive walls
Religious or civic councils
Distinct laws

Faction

The Mission Compact

A defensive alliance rather than one unified government.

Its members cooperate against external threats but disagree over land, belief, taxation, and military command.

Area 6: Hill Country

Fallout name: The Stone Ranches

Features

Caves
Ranches
Springs
Limestone hills
Radio observatories
Isolated compounds
Military bunkers
Brahmin ranges

The Hill Country would act as a transition between urban Texas and the harsher western territory.

Area 7: Gulf Platforms

Like New Orleans, Texas could include offshore areas, but the Texas platforms would be larger, more industrialized, and connected to aerospace and military projects.

One platform might contain a failed prewar attempt to launch materials into orbit from the Gulf.

6. Atlanta and the Deep South

Proposed wasteland name

The Phoenix Territories

Atlanta would be strongest as a Fallout about transportation, communication, memory, political reconstruction, and competing versions of freedom.

Atlanta contains distinct historic neighborhoods, major transportation infrastructure, forested urban areas, and sites central to African American history. Sweet Auburn served as a major economic, cultural, and religious center, and the Martin Luther King Jr. National Historical Park preserves sites connected to King’s life and work. Any use of these places would require serious writing and historical consultation rather than Fallout parody. (National Park Service)

Area 1: Downtown Atlanta

Fallout name: The Rail Crown

Atlanta’s central settlement could be built around restored rail lines.

Faction

The Terminal Authority

It regulates:

Passenger movement
Freight
Settlement access
Mail
Military deployment
Food shipments
Immigration

Moral conflict

The trains create prosperity, but the Authority can starve a settlement simply by removing it from the schedule.

Area 2: Sweet Auburn

Fallout name: The Auburn Archive

This district should be treated as a protected community and center of historical memory.

Possible role

School
Archive
Legal center
Museum
Radio station
Community assembly
Repository of prewar testimony

Main conflict

Several factions want to selectively edit the historical record to support their claims about what America was and what it should become.

The player may have to protect original records even when those records undermine an allied faction’s mythology.

Area 3: The BeltLine Settlements

Fallout name: The Ring Communities

A former rail corridor surrounding the city could connect dozens of neighborhood settlements.

Each section might have its own:

Patrols
Market
Architecture
Rules
Food source
Political alignment

Restoring the full line could create a federation or make military conquest easier.

Area 4: Hartsfield Airport Ruins

Fallout name: The Endless Terminal

The airport could be a giant dungeon-settlement hybrid.

Interior areas

Terminals
Baggage systems
Underground trains
Maintenance hangars
Control tower
Fuel storage
Hotels
Parking structures
Customs areas

Faction

The Departures

A society that believes humanity’s future requires leaving the region. It collects aircraft, flight records, engines, and navigation technology.

Area 5: Stone Mountain and Eastern Territory

Fallout name: The Stone Fortress

This area could become a heavily fortified military position overlooking the surrounding region.

Because the real site carries complex and painful historical symbolism, the game would need to address how societies preserve, reinterpret, destroy, or weaponize monuments.

The location should not be used merely because it looks dramatic.

Area 6: Appalachian Foothills

Fallout name: The Northern Ridges

Features

Forest settlements
Mountain roads
Mining communities
Radio towers
Hidden military facilities
Caves
Moonshiner-style chem operations
Isolated religious communities

This region would connect Atlanta’s political world to a more independent rural frontier.

Atlanta signature system: Information warfare

Factions would compete through:

Radio broadcasts
Historical records
Schools
Newspapers
Propaganda
Public trials
Rumors
Counterfeit documents
Communications towers

Taking a radio station should change what settlements know, fear, and believe.

7. St. Louis and the Mississippi Crossroads

Proposed wasteland name

The Gateway Wastes

St. Louis sits directly on the Mississippi River near the meeting point of major river systems. The riverfront’s history of transportation and trade makes it ideal for a Fallout centered on migration, commerce, territorial expansion, and conflict between eastern, western, northern, and southern powers. (National Park Service)

Area 1: Downtown and Gateway Arch

Fallout name: The Gateway

The Arch should be more than a background landmark.

Possible uses

Communications tower
Observation post
Religious monument
Neutral diplomatic territory
Vertical dungeon
Weather station
Sniper fortress
Symbol of western expansion

Interior design

The narrow interior could contain maintenance stairs, tram machinery, emergency platforms, sealed compartments, and communication equipment.

Area 2: Mississippi Riverfront

Fallout name: The Steamboat Strip

Locations

Floating market
Riverboat casino
Merchant docks
Ship-repair yards
Grain warehouses
Ferry terminals
Floodwall settlements
Smuggler tunnels

Faction

The Boatmen’s League

Pilots, navigators, mechanics, and river traders who possess generations of knowledge about the river.

They refuse to share complete navigation charts with governments.

Area 3: East St. Louis

Fallout name: The Eastern Gate

This could be a fiercely independent city separated from the western settlement by bridges, river defenses, and political distrust.

The two cities might share water, trade, and family connections while remaining military rivals.

Area 4: River Confluence Territory

Fallout name: The Three Waters

The meeting of river systems would become a strategic military and commercial zone.

Possible installations

Fortified islands
Customs stations
River artillery
Floating farms
Dam controls
Navigation towers
Prison barges

Controlling the confluence would allow a faction to tax or blockade an enormous amount of regional trade.

Area 5: Missouri Cave Country

Fallout name: The Hollow State

Underground possibilities

Cave settlements
Prewar storage facilities
Mutant ecosystems
Hidden missile complexes
Smuggler routes
Underground rivers
Salt and mineral mines

Unlike city tunnels, these caves would be irregular, natural, vertical, and difficult to map.

Area 6: Agricultural Interior

Fallout name: The Grain Territories

The game should depict food production as a major source of political power.

Resources

Grain
Brahmin
Seed banks
Fertilizer
Farm machinery
Irrigation equipment
Food-preservation facilities

A city cannot survive because the player planted six corn stalks behind a shack. Large populations should require regional agriculture and functioning transportation.

Additional Strong Locations

New York City, Newark, and North Jersey

Wasteland name: The Hudson Ruins

Best areas:

Manhattan tower districts
Newark industrial territory
Jersey City waterfront
Meadowlands wetlands
Subway civilizations
PATH-style river tunnels
Harbor islands
Airport ruins
Fortified bridges
Northern New Jersey suburbs

Greatest strength

The densest vertical and underground Fallout map imaginable.

Greatest risk

Too many inaccessible buildings and repetitive streets. Bethesda would need a revolutionary interior-streaming and vertical-traversal system.

Philadelphia and Camden

Wasteland name: The Commonwealth Divide

Best areas:

Old City
Independence Hall district
Philadelphia Navy Yard
Camden waterfront
Delaware River
Industrial North Philadelphia
University City
Suburban Main Line bunkers
South Jersey forests

Central theme

Competing definitions of constitutional government.

Every faction claims to be restoring the republic, but each interprets rights, representation, and citizenship differently.

Miami, the Everglades, and the Florida Keys

Wasteland name: The Sunken Coast

Best areas:

Miami Beach
Downtown Miami
Everglades
Overseas Highway
Florida Keys
Cruise ships
Cape Canaveral expansion area
Submerged suburbs
Caribbean trade routes

Signature systems

Boats
Diving
Hurricanes
Island travel
Underwater Vaults
Tropical creatures
International maritime factions

Denver and the Rocky Mountain Front

Wasteland name: The Mile-High Expanse

Best areas:

Downtown Denver
Mountain communities
NORAD-style military complex
Ski resorts
Mining towns
High plains
Rail corridors
Red-rock formations
Isolated Vaults

Signature system

Altitude, mountain weather, climbing, avalanche danger, and control of passes.

Hawaii

Wasteland name: The Shattered Paradise

Best areas:

Honolulu
Pearl Harbor
Waikiki
Diamond Head
Volcanic territory
Lava tubes
Naval bases
Agricultural valleys
Resort fortresses
Separate island societies

Pearl Harbor’s naval and military significance would support a major prewar and postwar storyline, but Native Hawaiian history and the land’s cultural importance would require extensive consultation and respectful treatment. (National Park Service)

Signature structure

Each island would be its own political ecosystem.

Anchorage and Southern Alaska

Wasteland name: The Frozen Front

Best areas:

Anchorage
Chugach Mountains
Military bases
Port facilities
Oil infrastructure
Frozen highways
Remote settlements
Glaciers
Aleutian expansion islands
Canadian border routes

Alaska’s enormous public landscapes, mountain access near Anchorage, and widely separated regions would support a harsher expedition-focused Fallout. (National Park Service)

Signature systems

Temperature
Shelter
Seasonal daylight
Snow vehicles
Frozen waterways
Food preservation
Wildlife migration
Whiteout navigation

Best Overall Three-Region Design

Fallout 5: The Crescent Wasteland

Region One: Greater New Orleans

The dense political and cultural center.

Includes:

French Quarter
Central Business District
Superdome
Lower Ninth Ward
Cemeteries
Industrial Canal
Lakefront neighborhoods

Region Two: Bayou Country

The wilderness and survival region.

Includes:

Barataria wetlands
Bayous
Cypress forests
Fishing towns
Stilt communities
Hidden laboratories
Mutant nesting grounds

Region Three: The Gulf and Mississippi Corridor

The commercial, military, and exploration region.

Includes:

Mississippi trade settlements
Refineries
Chalmette
Barrier islands
Coastal towns
Offshore platforms
Shipwrecks
Submerged military installations

Final Recommendation

New Orleans remains the strongest complete setting because nearly every major system could emerge naturally from its geography:

Water control creates politics.
Flooding creates dynamic environments.
Rivers create trade.
Swamps create wilderness survival.
The historic city creates dense exploration.
Refineries create industrial factions.
Offshore platforms create isolated societies.
Storms create changing world conditions.
Music, architecture, food, and local history create a distinctive identity.

Chicago would be the best alternative for a colder, more industrial and vertical experience. Seattle would be the best for maritime exploration and wilderness. Detroit would be the best for production chains and vehicles. Texas would be the best for a massive multi-city game. St. Louis would be the best for a region built around trade, migration, and competing civilizations.