The Season 1 finale of “Fallout” is disquieting for a whole host of reasons, chief among them being the awkward reunion between Lucy and her father Hank (Kyle MacLachlan). When Lee Moldaver (Sarita Choudhury) claims that Lucy’s father is actually a Vault-Tec envoy, Hank confirms this horrible truth by entering the passcode to activate the cold fusion reactor. The precise code he enters is “101097.” This can be translated to the date October 10, 1997, the date the original “Fallout” game was released to the public. But there’s a catch to this Easter egg.
For whatever reason (be it poor record keeping, online stubbornness, or something else entirely), there’s some debate about when the first “Fallout” was actually released. October 10 is the date you’ll find on the game’s Wikipedia page, which itself references an old “Now Shipping” article from PC Gamer. However, Steam lists the release date as September 30, and even commemorated this date at least once with a special anniversary discount for the game.
Fans have even reached out to developers directly for clarification, but even they are largely split on the issue. The general consensus among them seems to be that September 30 was the date the game was prepared for shipment, and that it was released in stores between October 6-10. Programmer Tim Cain, who co-created the game, said on Reddit that he considers the exact date of release to be October 7. Still, the code is a fun if potentially imperfect inclusion for “Fallout” experts.