Warning: Spoilers for Amazon’s Fallout TV Show lie ahead.
Ok, so, you remember that bit in the Fallout TV Show when Norm finally discovers the truth behind the experiment that’s been going on in his and Lucy’s home vault? More specifially, do you remember a certain little funny robot that’s by his side when he learns exactly what’s being going down. Well, a modder’s now working on bringing that Roomba Robobrain to Fallout 4, but sadly not as the world’s most adorable Dogmeat subsitute.
Yup, stop crying because Fallout 4’s next-gen updates have – probably – messed up your load order, it’s time to think about downloading something kinda bizarre that you’ll inevitably forget about, then encounter midway through a modded playthrough and think ‘oh, when did I install that?’. Hey, at least this time it’s not pictures of Walton Goggins’ face that’ll make you feel things downstairs.
So, that robot I talked about earlier – the one that’s actually Bud Askins overseeing Vault 31’s grand experiment – a modder with the handle m150 has been busy working on additing it to Fallout 4, as an abomination enemy to go into an established collection of weird and wonderful baddies they put out back in 2017. They’ve just shared a video of some of these Askins Roombas motoring about near Fallout 4’s most famous Red Rocket, and quite frankly it’s quite a nice way to spend 39 seconds of your life.
The bots don’t speak in it – arguably a good thing given the temptation that might create to use some AI voice bollocks – all they do is gently scoot about in quite endearing fashion. A bit like guinea pigs or rabbits, only you can see the bots’ brains.
“I’ve made some changes to the model, textures, and materials since the previous screenshot,” m150 says in the tweet above, as translated from Japanese by Google. They add that as well as making it part of that enemies mod – ‘M’s Abominations’ – whenever they release it, they’re also hoping to make it a part that can be added to Automatron DLC robot builds.
That last bit has me holding out hope I’ll somehow be able to get it as a follower in a way that doesn’t compromise its general titchy hilariousness too much. For example, by making me have to lob it onto a Sentry Bot’s bulky torso. Hey, a man can dream.
If you’re looking for Fallout 4 mods, make sure to check out our recently revamped list of the best ones to grab if you’re constructing a fresh load order in 2024. One of those lets you ride a Deathclaw, by the way.