The Top 7... stupid plans for world conquest

The plan: To use nuclear war and viral toxins to clean up humanity. As the long-time shadow government of the USA, the Enclave had masterminded all manner of dodgy backroom dealings since before the great war. When the bombs fell, it decided to use the worldwide nuking as a fresh start. The plan was to fly to a new planet, and the nation's vault dwellers were to be unwitting guinea pigs for the various conditions the chosen space travellers would face.

When the space idea fell through, things changed. Thereplacement plan was to adapt the rediscovered FEV virus (created by the military before the war and responsible for the Super Mutants) into a toxin with which to wipe out all irradiated citizens of the USA and create a new world order of pure humans. Pure vault dwellers were used in the experiments to perfect the toxin.

The problem: In Fallout’s world, wiping out all contaminated people in the USA means wiping out all people in the USA. Thus, had the Enclave’s plan succeeded, it would have found itself with one hell of a lot of empty space to clean up, fix and rebuild, and no-one around to help. A problem exacerbated given that it had wiped out a good proportion of the country’s ‘clean’ humans during its experiments to create the virus in the first place.

And besides, exactly how long would the Enclaveremain pure once it had moved back into a blasted desert world baked by nuclear Armageddon for two centuries?

2. Street Fighter IV

Seth’s self-improvement regime

The plan: With the global Shadoloo crime syndicate in tatters following M. Bison’s defeat in Street Fighter II, Seth, one of Bison’s would-bereplacement bodies, took overthe organisation'sweapons division with the intention of reinvigorating thegroup's previous underworld dominance and nefarious schemes. His method? Organise a new World Warrior tournament and copy the abilities of the challengers in order to make himself the ultimate fighter.

The problem: So, assuming his plan had succeeded, what would Seth really have achieved? Being a hard bastard? Great.That kind of intimidation might work in the playground, butwhen trying to establish yourempire's icy grip upon global freedom? Not so much. What does he think will happen? The collectivepolitical and military mightof the worldwill quake in fear at the sight of a guy who's a bit handy in a pub carkpark scrap?

Kung fu is one thing. Kung nuke is another thing altogether.

David Houghton
Long-time GR+ writer Dave has been gaming with immense dedication ever since he failed dismally at some '80s arcade racer on a childhood day at the seaside (due to being too small to reach the controls without help). These days he's an enigmatic blend of beard-stroking narrative discussion and hard-hitting Psycho Crushers.