Wasteland 3

Lore & Background

Wasteland 3 is set in the frozen wastelands of a post-apocalyptic Colorado. The player controls two members from Arizona Ranger Team November, who survived an ambush while on a mission in Colorado. They are forced to work with the local ruler, the Patriarch, to earn his support for the Arizona Rangers, who are struggling with shortages after the events of the previous game. The Patriarch tasks the rangers with hunting down his three heirs, who are fighting to succeed him, while also preserving his rule over Colorado. As the story unfolds, the rangers discover the Patriarch's brutality and are contacted by returning NPC Angela Deth, who asks them to spark a rebellion. The player must decide whether to uphold the original bargain or free Colorado, potentially endangering Arizona.

Reader's Guide

Wasteland 3 is significant as a crowdfunded sequel that expanded on its predecessor with a larger budget—three times that of Wasteland 2—mostly spent on conversational scenes and voice actors. The game was developed using the Unity engine by a team that included veterans of Torment: Tides of Numenera. Its release was delayed twice, first due to Xbox Game Studios' acquisition of inXile and later due to remote working conditions from the COVID-19 pandemic. The game received generally positive reviews, scoring 85/100 on Metacritic, and attracted over 2 million players by December 2021. It was nominated for Best Role Playing at The Game Awards 2020 and Role-Playing Game of the Year at the 24th Annual D.I.C.E. Awards, losing both to Final Fantasy VII Remake. Two expansions, Battle of Steeltown and Cult of the Holy Detonation, were released in 2021.

Did You Know?

• The game was crowdfunded on the Fig platform, raising over $3 million in October 2016.
• The soundtrack includes post-apocalyptic versions of 'Welcome Back (Kotter)' and 'Green Acres' theme songs.
• Mark Morgan, who worked on Wasteland 2, Fallout, and Fallout 2, returned to compose the atmospheric score.
• The game's budget was three times larger than that of Wasteland 2.