One fan figured out how to port Fallout 1 to Nintendo 3DS, and it’s a lot easier than you think

Nintendo 3DS
(Image credit: Nintendo)

The isometric role-playing game Fallout has inspired two decades of striking, apocalyptic media, but that doesn't mean fans can't find room for its improvement. 

While IP holder Bethesda is distracted, focusing on its popular new Amazon Prime Fallout TV show (and, apparently, a follow-up to 2015's Fallout 4), one fan put their efforts into innovating. Ultimately, they managed to take Fallout where it's never gone before: the Nintendo 3DS.

"I’ve had the first Fallout for years, but it’s always ran too crappy on my PC and I never get far," the Reddit user u/Loopuze1 writes in a recent post. "This awesome 3DS port is running great (even if it is a little clunky having to cycle between left and right click with the L button)." 

Finally gonna play through and finish Fallout 1 on my 3DS from r/classicfallout

Fallout released 27 years ago, which translates to 27,000 mods ago. In its first few years of existence, you could only play the game on Mac and Windows, but now easy-to-follow port instructions have let Fallout fans play the RPG on strange devices like their Android phones and the 2011 handheld PS Vita.

So, playing on 3DS seems natural at this point. The port u/Loopuze1 uses seems to efficiently adapt Fallout to the Nintendo console's dual screens, making it so that the top screen either shows a heads-up display or a more cinematic and zoomed-in version of what's on the bottom screen.

Bringing Fallout to your device like this is a simpler process than you'd expect. As u/Loopuze1 describes it, all you need to do is "install it, copy over files from your original, legally purchased copy, and you’re good to go." They reference instructions posted on the video game forum GBAtemp, where the user MrHuu shared their GitHub link for the necessary port downloads. They released their latest version on May 6.

When you're done playing, discover the best Fallout games, ranked.

Ashley Bardhan
Senior Writer

Ashley is a Senior Writer at 12DOVE. She's been a staff writer at Kotaku and Inverse, too, and she's written freelance pieces about horror and women in games for sites like Rolling Stone, Vulture, IGN, and Polygon. When she's not covering gaming news, she's usually working on expanding her doll collection while watching Saw movies one through 11.