Fallout 76
Buy GameFallout Community Spotlight: The MODUS Files
Fallout 76
Buy GameIn our latest community spotlight, we chatted with Lawrence, creator of the Fallout-themed audio drama podcast, The MODUS Files. At the heart of Fallout is our vibrant community, and The MODUS Files is a testament to the passion and creativity that thrives within it. Join us as we delve into the inspiration and storytelling behind The MODUS Files.
First, please introduce yourself!
Greetings Fallout Community! I’m Lawrence McNamara, creator, writer, director, editor and narrator of the MODUS Files. It’s a Fallout-themed audio drama podcast set in the world of Fallout 76, currently in its third season.
Can you tell us a bit about the inspiration behind The MODUS Files and how it all started?
As an avid Fallout fan, I spent a lot of time immersed in the lore and background of the games and the expanded Fallout universe. The stories told really inspired me, so when Fallout 76 was released, I jumped right in with both feet…and found a world ripe for exploration and a blank slate to start writing our own stories.
One day, while I was playing Fallout 76, I returned to my camp and discovered it had been attacked by Scorched. As I was getting ready to repair things, another player just happened to be there and was kind enough to fix my walls for me.
It just so happened that he was a fan of the Enclave and had created a backstory for his character. Over the next few weeks, we became good friends, and as we played the game together, we began to craft the outline of what would become The MODUS Files.
Together, we finished up the back stories for our own characters, one that would become Colonel Valeria Faustina, while his character served as the basis for Major Lilith Alistair. Soon, we had a rough outline and from that spark of imagination, I started to write.
At first, it was just a series of short stories and encounters, based on our experiences in Fallout 76, but soon it was dozens, then hundreds of pages of our adventures. I reached out to some Fallout Creators for feedback and was lucky enough to be invited to the Apocalyptic Aristocracy Discord, where I met Ken Vigue with the CHAD Podcast.
When I told him what I had written, he said, “Hey, why don’t you do a podcast?”
I was a writer. I had no idea how to even begin. Ken gave me some great advice and soon after, I sat down in front of my laptop, pulled out my original writing, and recorded our first episode.
Out of all the factions, why did you choose to focus on the Enclave for your podcast?
In the Fallout Universe, the Enclave has always been viewed as the bad guys. Villains do bad things, but they aren’t doing them to be evil; they are doing them because they truly believe in their cause and that they are doing the right thing.
That gray area is what drew me to write the MODUS Files from the perspective of what just about every Fallout Fan would call “the bad guys.” And, Fallout 76, with its wide-open story and world was the perfect backdrop for building a New Enclave…our own faction with its own characters.
Valeria Faustina, our main character, was trained by her Enclave-affiliated parents in the Vault to follow in their footsteps. She believes in duty, honor and country, but through the lens of old-world ideals. For her, the ends always justify the means, and she will do whatever is necessary to accomplish her mission.
Lilith Alistair, Valeria’s best and only friend from the Vault, is a child of FEV. Experimented on by her Father, a former West Tek scientist, she is the culmination of his exploration of the potential of the Forced Evolutionary Virus. Stronger, faster, and smarter due to her early exposure to the virus as a young child, she’s also completely psychoticr, the perfect weapon for Valeria’s New Enclave.
The Whitespring provided the ideal location for our story to begin. Imagine you are a resident of Vault 76, having spent decades in the Vault, being told you are the best and brightest America has to offer, fed constant propaganda from Vault Tec about Reclamation Day and the importance of restoring the country.
You then find yourself in a wild Appalachia. When you arrive at the Whitespring, you discover a remnant of the Old World. A bunker full of weapons and technology, all controlled by a helpful AI named MODUS.
It wouldn’t take a genius to understand the value of what MODUS has to offer…and all he asks for in return is a little assistance; helping restore what has been lost. The birth of this New Enclave, populated by dedicated former residents of Vault 76, would provide fertile ground to tell the story of Fallout 76 from their point of view - where the ends justify the means, and atrocity is just another word for getting the job done.
How do you develop the storylines and characters for The MODUS Files? Do you have a specific process or team involved?
The original storyline for the MODUS Files came from one simple question: “Why do Mutant Hounds get infected with Scorched Plague?”
It was something I noticed while playing and remembered some lore I had read that FEV prevented Super Mutants from being infected, but if that was the case, why would Hounds be different?
A lot of my process begins just by sitting down at my laptop and writing. It usually starts with the small germ of an idea, and I put myself into the shoes of the characters.
I don’t have notes or an outline, beyond what I wrote in those original volumes. Each draft script comes directly from my own ideas and flows as I write.
Several times, new storylines and characters have come through interactions with our fans, either on our Discord or meeting them in game. These conversations are great sources of inspiration and have also resulted in several of our fans joining our cast as well.
Overall, it’s been a very organic process. As I have told the story, I’ve had the pleasure of incorporating brand new player-based characters and giving life to beloved (and sometimes hated) NPCs, to allow them all to interact together in new and interesting ways.
What has been the most rewarding part of producing The MODUS Files for you and your team?
Originally, I was just happy to be telling what I hoped would be an engaging and interesting story based in Fallout 76. Instead, I found myself in the middle of an incredible cast and community who has supported us throughout thick and thin for the past six years.
Our cast of more than forty voice actors, some of whom play multiple roles, are some of the most incredible folks I’ve ever had the pleasure to work with. They aren’t just members of our crew; they are part of the MODUS Files Family.
Rather than just being a solo creator, engagement with the community and the cast has created a rich tapestry of new characters and new storylines and taken us places that I never would have been able to do alone.
For example, the character of Major Stein was never part of our original story, but after I met AJ Rivera, the lead in another Fallout Podcast called “Almost Heaven,” we got to talking and it led to bringing his game character into our own story.
We also were able to include valued members of the Fallout Community into our tale, including Ray Middlethon, also known as Commander Johns, and his wife Lucy Middlethon, who plays the ever-menacing Lilith, co-founders of the Fallout Five-O, the enigmatic Cryptid photographer Antlers, and the amazing content creator Jessica Star, who voices Commander Sofia Daguerre, and Brad Williams, our very own voice of MODUS and creator of “Once Upon a Wasteland,” just to name a few.
How do you balance staying true to the Fallout 76 lore while adding your own creative twists to the story?
I’ve always used the backdrop of Fallout 76 to drive our story. Whether its locations, like the Atlas Observatory and the Whitespring or in-game events like Encryptid and the Scorchbeast Queen Fight, I’ve been able to incorporate them into our story, but told from the point of view of our characters.
As more events, locations and factions were added to the game, such as Wastelanders, our story naturally grew with the game, to include Foundation and the Crater Raiders.
The Overseer is also an important part of our story. Of course, since we are writing from the perspective of the “bad guys,” it means that the Overseer and her faction and her chief lieutenant, a character named Day, voiced by Ryan Negron, act in opposition to our main characters.
This role reversal is just another example of wanting to tell the story from an entirely different perspective, where it casts doubt on who’s right and who’s wrong, and opens up all kinds of interesting possibilities when building out our world.
Through it all, Fallout 76 and the lore of Fallout remain as the cornerstone of our story, and we enjoy hearing from our fans when they come across landmarks and events in Fallout 76 they recognize or understand better after hearing about them in our podcast.
I believe it’s a huge part of why so many players have embraced our story, as it brings an entirely new perspective to the game they know and love.
Are there any particular episodes or moments in The MODUS Files that you are especially proud of?
I am very proud of our first miniseries, “The Last Days of Appalachia.” In the game, we only get to see the aftermath of the Scorched Plague.
Not satisfied with just holotapes and notes, I ended up writing a series of five episodes detailing the last days and hours of each faction. A lost Enclave patrol, cut off from the Whitespring, finds itself face to face with a horror of their own creation, while the Brotherhood fights its final battle at Fort Defiance. Then we follow David Thorpe, Raider King of Appalachia, as he takes his last walk through the wreckage of his Empire.
The final story of the Responders, standing alone at Point Pleasant, giving their lives so that some remnant of Appalachia might escape across the Ohio, was my homage to that group of hearty volunteers who gave their last full measure for their fellow man.
And the last episode followed the final days of Abigayle Singh, last of the Free Staters. Her holotapes, found in her family’s bunker, inspired me to want to tell her story. She left her bunker one final time, perhaps the last human left in all of Appalachia…where she might go and what would happen to her always haunted me.
In the main series, our first season finale, “The Battle of the Bog” represented a huge milestone. Colonel Valeria, Major Lilith, Stein and the collective might of the New Enclave face off against the Scorchbeast Queen and her hordes of Scorched in what was an epic showdown.
The episode was incredibly complex and required a level of sound design that far exceeded anything else we had done to that point.
And finally, our Halloween Episode from 2021, “From the Journal of Bethany Miller” is an amazing example of how a voice actor can elevate a story far beyond expectations. VitriolPlays as Bethany Miller, a young settler seeking her fortune and the rumors of gold in the Appalachia hills, finds herself trapped in an old mine down in the Ash Heap…her scavenger crew having crossed paths with the Cult of the Mothman.
Dictating her final words, Bethany Miller leaves a warning to all who might come seeking their fortune…the Cult is not to be trifled with…and the horror of the Mothman is real.
How do you manage the technical aspects of podcast production, such as recording, editing, and sound design?
It isn’t easy. Unlike traditional podcasts, audio dramas can be exceedingly complex, with a dozen or more characters, multiple scenes and complex sound design. When I first started, I really had no idea just how complex things would get.
Our first few episodes were very basic, but as I felt more comfortable with the technology, I started getting more ambitious in crafting the atmosphere of the story and adding characters along the way.
A lot of our sound design involved experimentation and research. I’ll never forget the moment I figured out how to make someone sound like they were on the radio. I was such a simple thing, but being a novice, it really felt like an amazing accomplishment.
I handle the bulk of the hands-on work myself. Luckily for me, I have a wonderful copy editor, Pandora Beatrix, who also plays our lead, Colonel Valeria Faustina.
She takes my rough drafts and turns them into scripts which we distribute to the cast. While I wait for the lines to come in, I create the overall structure for the episode, including placeholders for SFX, then record my own narration.
Krissi Williams, the voice of Trader Red, is also a key part of our production team and acts as casting assistant. She helps with the distribution of the scripts and keeps track of when our cast submits their lines for each episode, as well as updating our website.
I try to use as many authentic sound effects from the game as possible, filling in the gaps with a very large library of other effects as required. Over time, we’ve collected a huge number of samples…everything from people drinking, to gunfire, to nuclear explosions.
It’s a lengthy process and given that some of our episodes are nearly three hours long, each one can take 30 – 40 hours to finish. While time-consuming, it’s always a hugely rewarding experience when we can release a new episode for folks to listen to.
How do you see The MODUS Files evolving in the future? Are there any new projects on the horizon?
I wrote the final episode of the MODUS Files almost five years ago. Even as the story evolved over time, I knew exactly how it was going to end.
While I don’t want to reveal any spoilers, I always intended to use the story to be a jumping off point and a way to connect to the larger Fallout universe.
Later this year, we plan on releasing at least two mini-series, each one focused on the future adventures of several fan-favorite characters in their further journeys through the Wasteland.
We also plan on expanding beyond the Fallout Universe, building on our special anthology episode written for Starfield. This new mini-series will be based on the gritty, crime-ridden and corrupt city of Neon. A take on the space noir genre, our characters will have to survive in a very morally grey environment, where it’s hard to tell who the bad guys actually are, and sometimes just surviving is its own reward.
Beyond that, I don’t believe we’ll ever run out of stories to tell. I have an amazing team of extremely talented and dedicated voice actors and an incredible community of fans. Their inspiration keeps me going and I’m dedicated to continuing telling engaging tales and epic adventures.
Thank you so much, Lawrence! If folks want to check out The MODUS Files or follow you on social media, where can they find you?
X (formerly Twitter): @ModusFiles
BlueSky: @themodusfiles.bsky.social
Instagram: @themodusfilespodcast
Website: https://themodusfiles.com/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/themodusfiles
