I feel like the answer to that question is “you know even if you don’t know.” Given what we know about nuclear weaponry, I’ll refrain from being too cheeky about the vast, devastated, irradiated landscape known as “The Glowing Sea” in Fallout 4. Its story hits close to our past, and, hopefully, does not portend our future.

In the Fallout universe, the world entered into nuclear conflict on October 23, 2077. In Fallout 4, the story goes that The Glowing Sea, located in the far southwest corner of the game’s version of Boston, Massachusetts, was the site of a nuclear bomb drop on that fateful day. Though this is a legend, considering that the game takes place more than 200 years after the war, the fact that there remains giant crater in The Glowing Sea that would certainly suggest a nuclear event occurred. History shows us what happens in the wake of atomic warfare, so why The Glowing Sea stayed an absolute mess of an area is beyond me. The thought of it becoming a forgotten and dangerous wasteland within a wasteland is as horrifying as it is heartbreaking.

Looking at The Glowing Sea from the standpoint of our Spooktober theme, it strikes that the area itself, while deadly, is not outright scary. The place looks more menacing than it is; but that’s not to say it’s all fun and games. Covered in a sickly green haze thanks to the constant flow of radiation storms, The Glowing Sea is home to roaming packs of feral ghouls; mutated insects and arachnids; and, of course, everyone’s favorite Fallout monster, Deathclaws. The region is hazardous in more ways than one. Traversing the area requires power armor, a good hazmat suit, or a giant supply of radiation-reducing chems…and at least a little chutzpah.

The Glowing Sea reeks with anguish. Between its swaths of decimation, there are ruins to find – businesses, buildings, even a church — evidence that life once thrived before the bombs fell. Happening upon the crater within the sea, one finds that humanity, however, hasn’t actually given up on the place. For the crater is the home of the Children of the Atom. Members of this sect worship “Atom,” a deity representing nuclear weapons. They are somehow immune to radiation, and therefore seek it out as part of their veneration of Atom. The Children of the Atom are a story unto themselves, and finding that they’ve somehow made a home in The Glowing Sea is unsettling. They aren’t hostile, so, to each their own, I suppose. In the new Fallout 4 update released earlier this year, the Children received new neighbors in the form of an Enclave outpost. Life really does find a way, so matter the threat of radiation.

Suffice to say, I’m certainly not ready to set up a summer home in The Glowing Sea. It’s a hostile, unpleasant place that needs more radiation scrubbers than one could possibly construct. (See Fallout 76; perhaps The Commonwealth needs to take a cue from Appalachia.) The feeling of dread it instills comes not from its appearance, but rather it stems from the horrors of nuclear war itself. That’s far scarier than any Deathclaw, glowing or otherwise.

All images, including lede, were captured by author during Xbox Series S gameplay of Fallout 4 (© Bethesda Game Studios.)