Fallout 4: The Real Boston Behind the Commonwealth

A nuclear war in 2077 sends the family into Vault 111. Frozen in cryogenic pods, the family sleeps; the spouse is killed and baby Shaun is taken. The Sole Survivor wakes 210 years later, on 23 October 2287, and climbs out into the Commonwealth. Vault 111 and Sanctuary Hills are invented, so the pin marks Minute Man National Historical Park, the preserved battlefield countryside beside Concord, where the Revolutionary War's first engagements were fought.

Location precision: Vault 111 and Sanctuary Hills are fictional; the pin marks Minute Man National Historical Park beside Concord for orientation only.

Visitor guidance: The park is north-west of Boston, with trails around Concord and Lexington.

Concord is the first real town the Sole Survivor reaches. At Codsworth's suggestion the player goes there and meets Dogmeat, a dog, and Preston Garvey, a member of the revived Minutemen militia. The real Concord is where British troops marched from Boston on 19 April 1775 to seize a cache of arms; the battles that followed at Lexington and Concord were the first military engagements of the Revolutionary War.

Location precision: The game names Concord but no real address; the pin marks the town centre.

Visitor guidance: Concord is north-west of Boston, and its town centre is easy to walk.

Diamond City is a settlement built inside Fenway Park, and it is where the main story starts to bite. There the Sole Survivor learns that the Institute kidnaps people and replaces them with synths, and the investigation leads to the synth detective Nick Valentine and to Kellogg, the man who killed the player's spouse. In the real Fenway Park, the Boston Red Sox have played since 1912, making it the oldest active ballpark in Major League Baseball.

Visitor guidance: Fenway Park is in Boston; check the Red Sox schedule before visiting.

Goodneighbor is the game's seedy town, built over part of Scollay Square. Its mayor is John Hancock, whose seat of power is the Old State House. That building, completed in 1713, is Boston's oldest surviving public building, a National Historic Landmark on the Freedom Trail. Real Scollay Square was demolished and rebuilt as Government Center, so the game keeps a district the city erased.

Location precision: Goodneighbor condenses Scollay Square and the Old State House; the pin marks the square, now Government Center.

Visitor guidance: Government Center now occupies the site; the Old State House is nearby.

Old North Church is the game's best-hidden stop. The Freedom Trail leads the player through Boston to the church, where the Railroad, one of the four factions and a rescuer of synths, keeps its headquarters in the crypt. In the game the church stands abandoned. The real church, built in 1723, is the oldest standing church in Boston. On 18 April 1775 Paul Revere had lanterns hung in its steeple to warn Charlestown of British troop movements; Longfellow's poem later tied the church to the phrase "one if by land, and two if by sea".

Visitor guidance: The church is in the North End, on the Freedom Trail.

The Institute is the heart of the main story: a hidden society underground, descended from the pre-war Commonwealth Institute of Technology — MIT under another name. The Sole Survivor learns the only way in is teleportation, builds a device, and steps through. Inside, the director is revealed to be Shaun, the baby taken from Vault 111, now an old man. The real MIT is a private research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts, its campus running more than a mile along the Charles River.

Location precision: The Institute is a fictional underground city; the pin marks MIT, the real Cambridge campus it grew from.

Visitor guidance: MIT's campus is in Cambridge along the Charles River and can be walked.

The Castle is the Minutemen's base: in the game it shares its site with the real Fort Independence, though the size and layout are not an exact replica. The Minutemen send the player, as their general, back to retake the pre-war fort. Fort Independence is a granite bastion that defended Boston harbor, one of the oldest continuously fortified sites of English origin in the United States; a first fort called The Castle stood here in 1634, and the granite fort was built between 1833 and 1851. It is now a state park.

Location precision: The Castle keeps Fort Independence's site but not its exact size or layout; the pin marks the real fort.

Visitor guidance: Fort Independence is on Castle Island; the site is a state park open to the public.

In Fallout 4 the frigate gets a science-fiction retrofit: the game's trailer shows the USS Constitution stranded on top of buildings, with NASA-style parts added. The real Constitution, launched in 1797, is the oldest naval vessel still afloat. She is usually berthed at Pier 1 of the former Charlestown Navy Yard, at one end of the Freedom Trail, and is open to visitors year round with free tours.

Visitor guidance: The ship is at Pier 1 in the Charlestown Navy Yard; tours are free.

Bunker Hill is the last stop on the Freedom Trail, and in Fallout 4 it is a fortified town. The monument is damaged; a settlement of traders crowds around the obelisk behind ramshackle walls. The real monument is a 221-foot granite obelisk on Monument Square, erected between 1825 and 1843, and it commemorates the Battle of Bunker Hill of 17 June 1775, a major battle of the Revolutionary War.

Visitor guidance: The monument is on Monument Square in Charlestown, at the end of the Freedom Trail.