ALL OUT FOR ‘FALLOUT’: Video Game Tourism is Cottage Vegas Industry

Posted on: September 25, 2024, 08:12h. 

Last updated on: September 25, 2024, 10:23h.

Corey Levitan Read More
Expertise: Commercial Gaming, Entertainment, Expert Insight, Las Vegas, Las Vegas Myths.

Tell a superfan of “Fallout: New Vegas” that you’re headed to Sin City and they’ll probably get jealous — not of your stay on the Strip but because you’ll be only 40 miles from Goodsprings, Nev.

A “Fallout: New Vegas” fan celebration gathers people dressed as their favorite game characters at the Pioneer Saloon in this undated photo. (Image: eventbrite.com)

That’s the location of the Pioneer Saloon, which inspired the most emotionally resonant settings of the post-apocalyptic video game released in 2010. Though its technology is already 14 years out of date, “Fallout: New Vegas” continues to be actively celebrated on social media groups, subreddits, and fan sites across the internet.

The Prospector Saloon in “Fallout: New Vegas” is really the Pioneer Saloon in Goodsprings, Nev. (Image: Bethesda Softworks)

On Tuesday, the Atomic Museum in Las Vegas announced a one-day-only excursion that starts and ends in Goodsprings. Its ‘Fallout: New Vegas’ Mojave Wasteland Bus Tour, $80 per person, takes place on November 16.

What the museum didn’t mention in its press release is that Vegas Specialty Tours, proprietor of the Vegas Mob Tour, already runs its own Goodsprings Fallout Bus Tour, four days a week, for $159.95 per person.

In addition, Meetups regularly convene at the Pioneer Saloon, which also holds its own official annual fan celebration.

Goodsprings, Nev. is to “Fallout: New Vegas” fans what Liverpool, England is to Beatles fans.

Goodsprings Eternal

Men gather in front of the Pioneer Saloon for a photo circa 1915-1930. Other than an ATM and a jukebox, it’s easy to imagine the Pioneer as it was on opening day. During the colder months, it’s still heated by a wood-burning stove. (Image: UNLV Special Collections)

Goodsprings is a mountain town of about 250 residents named for Joseph Good, who once owned a cattle ranch in the area.

In addition to the Pioneer, which opened in 1913, the town also boasts its own 100-year-old general store, schoolhouse, church, jail, and cemetery.

Founded in 1856 by Mormon settlers who established what is believed to be the oldest underground mine in Nevada, Goodsprings eventually yielded $25 million in lead and zinc ore.

Pretty much the only remarkable thing about Goodsprings is its ability to serve as such a bright beacon of tourism right next to one of the (literally) brightest beacons of tourism in the world.

The Pioneer isn’t even the oldest bar in Nevada. That would be the Genoa Bar and Saloon in Genoa, Nev., established in 1853.

Before “Fallout” came calling, the Pioneer was used as a filming location for TV’s “The Twilight Zone” and “The Misfits,” for the 1998 Johnny Depp movie “Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas,” and for 2005’s “Miss Congeniality 2” starring Sandra Bullock.

It had a much bigger moment on the world stage long ago, but it wasn’t a happy one. That national tragedy is memorialized today by a room inside the bar featuring black-and-white photos, memorabilia, and a hunk of mangled plane wreckage on the wall.

Clark Gable and Carole Lombard were the world’s most popular celebrity couple from 1936 through 1942. (Image: Wikimedia Commons)

For three days in January 1942, the Pioneer played host to a despondent Clark Gable. It’s where the A-list movie star waited for news of the fate of his wife, fellow A-lister Carole Lombard. He didn’t get the news he prayed for, though.

Lombard perished when TWA Flight 3 crashed into nearby Potosi Mountain. She had been advised to take a train back to LA due to dicey weather and wartime concerns. But, eager to get home after a grueling war bond tour of the Midwest, Lombard booked the flight to save time.

The crash, which sent the world’s press scurrying to the Pioneer for information and access to Gable, also claimed the life of Lombard’s mother and 15 US Army soldiers.

How Goodsprings Got Game

The reason “Fallout: New Vegas” has stoked new pop-cultural interest in the saloon, and its surroundings, is because Goodsprings is the emotional heart of the video game, which takes place after a nuclear war has destroyed most of Earth.

Though key action scenes are set on the Strip and at Hoover Dam, the saloon is where players get introduced to the world of the post-nuclear Mojave.

More importantly, it’s where they meet the only purely good characters in the game. The residents of Goodsprings provide unconditional support while players learn their role — as a courier embroiled in a power struggle among warning mafiosos, tribal governments, and a tech billionaire with his own designs.

We get people in here every day because of that video game,” Stephen Staats, the Pioneer’s owner, told the Las Vegas Sun in 2021, the year he bought the saloon for $1.5 million from its previous owner, real-estate agent Noel Sheckells.

“We had a 21-year-old fly in from Philadelphia to celebrate his birthday here just because of the game,” Staats noted. “He said it was his dream to visit.”