Unveiling the Hidden Purpose of Fallout Vaults by Co-Creator.
Tim Cain, co-creator of the Fallout series, has revealed that the true purpose of the vaults was to help scientists figure out how humans might survive interstellar travel. The idea was conceived after Fallout 1 came out in 1997. The head of the Enclave and the US government hatched a plan to build a starship that would take "our best and brightest" to a distant solar system in the hope of colonising a suitable planet. The starship would have to be multi-generational, and Vault-Tec thought it could use the vaults to figure out the technology that would get the job done.