Fallout Shelter is a facility building and management game. It is a spin-off of the Fallout franchise that uses a different genre and gameplay style from the mainline entries. It is a free-to-play single-player game first released in 2015. Longtime Fallout developer Bethesda Studios created it in collaboration with Dead by Daylight developer Behaviour Interactive. Though it was originally only available on iOS and Android mobile devices, Fallout Shelter is now also available on modern consoles and PC.
Fallout Shelter Premise
©Fallout Shelter gameplay screenshot – Original
Fallout Shelter is an extension of Fallout, a post-apocalyptic first and third-person role-playing game. This Fallout entry is set underground in the retro post-apocalyptic world but in a 2D-style and more centralized location. As the role of the Overseer, players must build up their fallout shelter. The vault is a series of buildings all protected by walls and defenses against outside radiation and enemies. The residents are called dwellers who require food, water, and power to remain satisfied. It’s the Overseer’s responsibility to take in dwellers from outside the vault and put them to work in the shelter for their safety and in an attempt to sustain the vault. Overseers build rooms and send dwellers off to do tasks that take time.
The gameplay involves acquiring and balancing the resources mentioned above. Dwellers are assigned to various buildings and rooms in the vault, each with their own resource-based purpose. Each dweller has SPECIAL attributes similar to other Fallout games, allowing them to excel at a specific task to help the shelter. Dwellers level up over time and become stronger with more capabilities, including being armed. There are rooms where dwellers can train to improve each of their stats. Certain constructed rooms train dwellers or provide other bonuses to the vault. The vault’s population can vary, and couples can have babies to help increase it.
Fallout Shelter Main Characters
©Fallout Shelter gameplay screenshot – Original
The game has many characters as the vault is filled with residents. Among these characters, some are essential for quests, while others are just pawns and a part of the shelter. There are various types of dwellers based on affiliation and rarity. These rare and legendary characters come from opening lunchboxes.
Lunchboxes contain cards that provide:
- Outfits
- Dwellers
- weapons
- Resources
- Caps
- Junk
- Nuka-Cola Quantum
- Mister Handies
- Pets
Types of dwellers:
- Rare dwellers — There are 20 rare dwellers who each wear a different unique outfit. These outfits can also be crafted and equipped for other dwellers providing them with bonuses to their stats.
- Legendary dwellers — There are 27 legendary dwellers. Most of the legendary dwellers have both a functioning rare weapon and a legendary unique outfit. These characters come from Fallout 3 and Fallout 4.
- Quest characters — There are 39 quest characters with various roles, attached quests, and original locations. These are a mix of friend, neutral, and enemy characters enemies.
Games in the Fallout Series
The Fallout games all take place in the same universe. They are available on many different platforms and don’t all play the same. They have evolved throughout the years, and each offers a different look at the world of the Wasteland. Titles in the Fallout series include:
- Fallout (1997)
- Fallout 2 (1998)
- Fallout Tactics: Brotherhood of Steel (2001)
- Fallout 3 (2003)
- Fallout: Brotherhood of Steel (2004)
- Fallout: New Vegas (2010)
- Fallout Shelter (2015)
- Fallout 4 (2015)
- Fallout Pinball (2016)
- Fallout 76 (2018)
- Fallout Shelter Online (2019)
Fallout Shelter Cheat Codes
There are a few approved cheats with no actual codes to input in Fallout Shelter. Available cheats come from either tips and workarounds or unapproved methods. The unapproved methods include a cheat trainer and editing a save.
Fallout Shelter Cheats for PlayStation 4, Nintendo Switch, Xbox One, and Mobile
Save Editing
Editing a save will give you anything you want in the game. To make it work, go to a link and upload your save. You edit the save on the site, which shows you many cheat options, such as Heal All Dwellers. Select what you want and replace your old game save file with the edited one.
Fallout Shelter Cheat Codes for PC
Cheat Trainer?
The cheat trainer is a Fallout cheat app that is unapproved. It only works on PC versions of the game, not mobile apps. It mods the game through a third-party app and gives you many options. These come from two sources and involve two styles of cheats.
Cheat trainer mods on Wemod you can toggle include:
- Unlimited health
- SuperSpeed
- Max Electricity
- Max Food
- Max Water
- Max Happiness
- Max Stats
- No radiation
- Instant Level Up
- Max Storage Space
- Unlimited Caps
- Unlimited Nuka Cola
- Unlimited Radaway
- Unlimited Stimpaks
- Freeze Lunchboxes
- No rats
- Never fail Rush
And mods you can repeatably input on the Plitch:
- Add 1 stimpack
- Add 1 Rad Away
- Max Dweller stats
- Dweller Invincibility
- One hit kill within quests
- Infinite Resources
- Add 1000 Caps
- Add 100 Food
- Add 100 Energy
- Add 100 water
- Add 10 Nuka Cola Quantum
- No rush failure
- No disasters
Fallout Shelter Tips
The Mysterious Stranger
The Mysterious Stranger is a Fallout NPC from the other games that appear within your Fallout shelter. He appears about every 10-15 minutes and stays for a limited time. Listen to hear his musical entrance sound and find him to score caps. Cap rewards for finding the Stranger range from 100 to over 2000. Continually wait for and find the Stranger to boost up your caps.
Don’t Horde
After getting far enough in the game and no longer being a newbie, you can sell your excess items. Once you focus more on maxing out characters than trying to find items to equip them with, sell everything extra. Tap on the Pip-boy and select item storage to rummage through and sell your stock.
Dwellers = Caps
Dwellers earn you caps each time one of them levels up. As the game goes on, you’ll have the opportunity to add more dwellers to your vault and level them up. Focus on gaining dwellers and leveling them up to earn caps. Don’t send them outside the vault for tasks until you level them up.
No Such Thing As Luck
Dwellers sent out to explore outside the vault earn you items and caps. Dwellers with high luck stats make the most out of these trips. Build a game room to boost luck, especially on dwellers with naturally high luck.
Caps
Earn caps as they help with everything in Fallout Shelter. Completing objectives (viewable under the radio icon and then the award icon) earns caps quickly. Objectives range in difficulty, with simple ones only taking a few minutes and more complex ones earning a lunchbox as a reward.
Fallout Shelter Cheat Code FAQs
What are lunchboxes in Fallout Shelter?
Lunchboxes are a resource/reward in Fallout Shelter. They have five cards, one of which is at least a rare card.
You can get lunchboxes through multiple channels including:
- Finding them on dead bodies.
- Purchasing them from the store — 1 lunchbox costs $.99
- Completing objectives
- Keeping happiness at 100% for weekly reports, which occur every seven days.
- Collect rewards from the daily report for seven days in a row. Day seven’s reward is a lunchbox.
How do you get unlimited lunchboxes?
New or early on, shelters have a way to earn unlimited lunchboxes. When you begin the game, don’t do the first or second objectives: “Equip 1 Dweller with an Outfit” and “Sell 1 Weapon or Outfit”. Complete the third objective instead. Doing this will provide you with a stream of easy objectives to complete as long as you don’t do the first and second. Each time you do it, it should give you easy lunchboxes and is repeatable.
Can I prevent raiders from coming to my vault?
Yes, in a sense. Raiders naturally come randomly and sometimes frequently to your vault and try to get inside. Once inside, they steal, damage your vault, and kill your dwellers. Therefore, plan appropriate defenses such as a reinforced door and armed dwellers near the vault entrance to slow or stop them.
Does Fallout Shelter end?
No, Fallout Shelter has no ending. There is no way to finish the game. It will still be where you left it whenever you return.
The image featured at the top of this post is ©Fallout Shelter key art.