I use the word functional instead of usable or controllable because that’s kind of under the umbrella of how they could be implemented.
Both Fallout 3 and Fallout 4 had rail systems you could see moving (the presidential metro and Nuka-Express) opposed to Fallout New Vegas (Camp McCarran’s monorail) for example.
I feel like the two major concerns would be how their addition would effect map design and how the engine is going to handle them.
FO4 also had vertibirds.
but, like, land vehicles? i don’t think so.
first of all, all of the pre-war land vehicles in the Fallout universe were nuclear-powered, and that’s a fuel source that requires a lot of refining, not to mention mining for the raw materials. for that to be available - even in the much smaller quantity required for the population alive in the 2280s-90s, it would require a pretty huge infrastructure which does not currently exist, and to build it would likewise require a pretty big industrial and manufacturing infrastructure which doesn’t exist. even if they made/adapted them to be ICE-powered or electric, the same problems emerge.
whatever precious few vehicles that survived The Great War have been maintained for centuries and kept functional using scraps of those that were destroyed or broke down in the past 200 years, powered by whatever scavenged fuel sources still exist.
certainly, it stands to reason that, in some remote regions untouched by war and destruction, some small facilities for both fuel storage/refining and even vehicle manufacturing might exist somewhere, but they’d probably be under the control of, for example, the BoS and/or The Enclave and only produce extremely limited quantities of either/both which is why they’re rarely seen or used.
they also would strongly impact gameplay negatively if they were used more widely than to progress storylines at certain points, eg to advance between chapters/move between major map sections. one of the key game elements is that all major travel infrastructure is destroyed, and the player must travel between destinations on foot (and the danger that entails, as well as the destination, characters, monsters, and loot encountered on the way). in many ways, the journey is the destination and a major part of the adventure of the game!
I think there have always been liberties in the lore about energy capabilities so I don’t think that would stop them.
I don’t think it would be a major leap to go from power armor to vehicles.
I’m also pretty sure there are non-nuclear vehicles in Fallout like the Highwaymen from Fallout 2 and if I recall correctly there’s also mention of super mutants using steam powered trucks in one of the original games. Plus there’s combustion engines scattered across the wasteland as typical post-apocalyptic clutter and gas powered generators in Fallout 4.
The NCR in Camp McCarren also use the trucks present on the base. I think there’s probably a lot of that “It’s there but not shown in game” kind of stuff.
I do see what you mean though. In those situations it could almost feel like an interactive version of the transition zones between DLCs and the base game and not much else. I imagine they’d have to limit the amount of points of interest and make those sections relatively barren.
There’s a reason you don’t get access to the teleporter until very late in the Institute/Minutemen/Railroad storyline: it suddenly makes the game feel very small— or, at least, much smaller. By that point, you’ve already hit most of the major and even most of the minor spots, met most people, and leveled way up. And even then, teleportation only gets you to key map points. Places that you’ve already been.
Plus, vehicles would screw with combat, since they’re giant weapons.
I don’t deny that they wouldn’t be a ton of fun, but I think they’re best relegated to rarities on the sidelines as they are now.
I feel like it wouldn’t be that difficult to largely limit vehicles to a segment of the map. Even if they didn’t want to set a hard boundary like a fenced border with Fallout 4 levels of clutter on the road they could be made impractical for certain areas. I don’t think that would necessarily make the map feel smaller or mess with combat.
I think the big concern though would be people pushing them into locations they were intended like Skyrim horses.
I know what you’re talking about, however, I think that any kind of limit that they could practically set in order for it not to screw with gameplay too much would kind of suck all the fun out of it, defeating a purpose. Ultimately, there would need to be some sort of balance, and I think that balance might just be too hard to find.
It might be interesting to experiment with it though.
That’s probably how they just settled on the teleportation device.