The Really Frustrating Thing About The Eddie Winter Quest Is That Fixing It To Create Both A Better Commentary

The really frustrating thing about the Eddie Winter quest is that fixing it to create both a better commentary on Nick Valentine whilst also tying it effectively into the larger world of Fallout 4 would be super easy, barely an inconvenience. The fix itself is right there, in the game, in the dialogue, and nobody at Bethesda seemed to notice.

Nick tells Sole that Eddie didn’t want to be placed on ice, instead opting for a severe radiation treatment which ghoulified him before the bombs fell. This is stupid for two reasons: the first is that nobody knew ghoulification was a thing prior to the war so it comes across as completely random; and the second is that it just seems like a bloody weird risk for a gangster who liked everything in his life to be controlled to take. Eddie’s a no-nonsense guy when you run into him; there was no way he’d be like “sure mad science person, hit me with the good green stuff” without assurances it would 100000% work. In comparison cryosleep is a far safer alternative and was even on the cultural mind in the 2070′s with Silver Shroud having a character who was themselves cryofrozen appear in the show, and what happened to Bradberton. 

So keep the quest as it is, but substitute ghoulification for cryosleep. And then throw a spanner in the works: you find the bunker, Eddie is in there, but the timer on his cryopod didn’t work and he’s still asleep. Utterly defenseless. All Nick has to do is turn the pod off and hey presto, no more Eddie Winter! And maybe Nick’s even all hell-bent on doing it, talking about how Eddie deserves it and how it will help him finally separate Real Boy Nick from Metal Puppet Nick and avenge Jenny until he suddenly comes to his senses and realises who he is monologuing to: 

The Sole Survivor of Vault 111. His friend. A person he cares about, who had to sit and watch helplessly from a cryopod as their spouse was murdered and their kid stolen. By asking Sole for help he is forcing them to relive a very recent, very raw trauma. Not only that, in this particular replay he is Kellogg. The dead mercenary he recently had plugged into his own brain. Uh oh: new identity crisis. If he does this, is it him doing this or Kellogg doing it or even original Nick wanting it done? He can’t fully trust himself so he puts the decision into Sole’s hands.

Asshole Sole: encourage Nick to do it. He does so, and ultimately finds it not only unsatisfying but also starts to harbour guilt over the whole thing and never fully heals from it. You don’t get his Close to Metal perk because you haven’t actually helped him; he’s worse off than he was before, and he has nobody to blame but himself. 

Paragon Sole: yeah no you’re not letting him do this - either because of your own trauma, because you believe it’s wrong to kill an unarmed person, or because you know it won’t help Nick. You encourage him to leave Eddie to his eternal slumber and instead go to the spot where Jenny was murdered to place a Hubflower where she fell in tribute (there’s a bush growing right next to it in-game). You do get the perk, and Nick is healed. Well. On the path to it, at any rate. 

This is how I headcanon it all, anyway. That story had so much potential and the gangster out of time angle landed for me (did Eddie really think he could just go back upstairs and take over the world lmao Hancock would have stabbed him two seconds after he waltzed into Goodneighbour), but then we just got. Bang bang I am no longer mentally ill (lie).