Ambitious Fallout 3 remake canceled, as modders anticipate legal action

The team behind the impressive looking Fallout 3 remake Capital Wasteland, which used the Fallout 4 engine to update the earlier game, has terminated production on the project. Fear of potential legal action led development crew Road to Liberty to stop before they really got started, it announced on Twitter.

“With a heavy heart, I must announce that at this moment the Capital Wasteland project is no longer in development, there are more details on our discord, but I wanted to let everybody who’s been so gracious to follow and support us know,” the Road to Liberty team wrote.

“Recently we have communicated with Bethesda regarding our planned method to implement the voice acting and other audio from Fallout 3 Into the Capital Wasteland,” Nathan wrote, according to an archive of a longer message about the cancelation. “During this Conversation it became clear our planned approach would raise some serious red flags that we had unfortunately not foreseen. This contact resulted in us changing our methods to attempt to continue working.”

Although Bethesda Game Studios, developer of the latest Fallout games, has yet to issue a copyright strike against the unfinished project, Nathan said he’d be liable for any legal claims — a possibility he’d rather not court. But the prospect of replacing the entirety of the Fallout 3’s voice cast for Capital Wasteland, in order to circumvent Bethesda’s copyright, was also a dissuading factor.

“Without some of these voice fallout 3 looses its charm and personally I can’t bring my self to replace Them (sic),” wrote Nathan.

It’s a disappointing turn of events for fans of the Fallout modding scene, which continues to grow years after launch. Road to Liberty is composed of especially notable, longtime modders, another factor that played into the decision to cancel Capital Wasteland. It’s important to the group to maintain a healthy relationship with Bethesda, according to Nathan.

You can watch the most recent footage from the project below, and dream of what could have been.