After destroying the charts on the App Store, Bethesda’s free-to-play game Fallout Shelter is now out on Android. Which means it’s also available on PC, if you’re willing to jump through some hoops.
As this guide by Ian over at PC Review explains, all you need to do is download an Android emulator — in this case Bluestacks — install it and then head over to Google Play from within the virtual environment.
If you don’t have a Google account, you’ll need to cook one up to get access to the market. Otherwise, it’s a straightforward process — find the game, grab it and play.
Seeing as the game was designed with mobile devices in mind, you should have no problems running it on any PC made in the last 400 years. Unfortunately, if you’re still cranking out Excel spreadsheets on a stone tablet, you’re out of luck.
Everyone else though, enjoy re-populating the wasteland on your desktop!
Play Fallout Shelter on PC [PC Review]
Comments
31 responses to “You Can Get Fallout Shelter Running On Your PC”
I was hoping they’d surprise us with a Windows Store version when Windows 10 was released. =(
I know right, I think they should also, so many people would get it.
Windows phone… Please…
🙁
Actually, I was (very much!) looking forward to a/the new Windows 10 phone (never had one, was ready to buy) & then Micro$oft pulled out another disastrous OS (spyware, logging, password sharing, updates) & that was – pretty much – that. :-/
Never (!) going to install it, except in a VM somewhere -perhaps- and it’s such a shame… Their (hidden) agenda(s) are still, only, advancing the deepening of their pockets and cornering markets – instead of bringing something nice and cool (and new), for people to have and use; dang it.
I think is is pretty alarmist and misinformed, man.
There’s no spyware, all of the privacy concerns people had were at disproportionate reactions to (mostly) identical stuff that google and apple have been doing for ages. At worst they were completely wrong. Like the password sharing and key logging. It doesn’t happen. At least, not in the way that people are making out.
Windows 10 is a huge step up over 8, which was a good (but sometimes weird) step up over 7. Mobile is unfinished but shaping up really nicely. You’re doing yourself a disservice by not switching to it.
Yeah, well… Turns out that you were (pretty much) right!.. But, not exactly. 🙂 🙂
Bought the Lumia 550, about a month ago; & all is well, after TWO HOURS of turning off all of the spyware (it’s still there, running; only, it doesn’t display the info on the screen – when it’s “disabled”. Tricky Ricky). ;$
Anywho, after updating, upgrading, installing (full) offline update – using teh Micro$oft desktop app(s), there remains a problem… Turning the screen back on, I am constantly greeted by a message which has got a random time of going-away; which, just, stands on a black background – not letting me use the phone: “Resuming…”
Been like that, from the very first day, when I bought it. If I leave various components in the background, it’s possible to use the task manager to access them – after swiping down, to open All settings.
^^ That is, if the phone doesn’t randomly restart – like it, just, has: while I’m typing this (happens, virtually, all of the time); & all of the functions get closed – and become unavailable to scroll-through by holding-down the back arrow.
However, besides it being almost completely useless & the source of daily frustrations, it’s not a bad phone… That is, forgetting the fact that they had used a cheap screen (TFT, instead of AMOLED or whatever), cheap cameras, speaker & cheap everything to build it.
Yeah, it’s totally terrible and there’s more. The applications, in the Store: they are all FAKE (lol). This was so unbelievable to me, as it’s the first time that I -ever- see it. For example, WinZIP that is used to compress files & had been built-into Windows (7), is not only NOT THERE – but, it’s replaced by 10 other programs with completely fake, made-up names (like a con, amazing, lolz!). “8 Zip”, “8 Zip Lite”, instead of 7-Zip which we all know; then, “Opener” & “Pocket Extractor” – and no WinZIP, no WinRAR, nothing. What’s wrong with these people, LOL! xD
Oh & btw., here’s the (nightmare) screenshot – of mine: http://i.imgur.com/az4Ifbj.png
Don’t hold your breath. The US right wing agenda pushing device known as the Windows phone which is brought to you and completely compromised by Bing no matter what settings you choose (MSN News IS Bing and vice versa and the entire malware mess is invasively FOX Fiction) is not interested in entertainment but in brainwashing. Exceedingly few apps are available for the device and fewer still are planned. The phone itself is created for the target audience; exceedingly simple with few creative options and no bells and whistles to trouble empty little minds with. I don’t miss mine one BIT!
Therein lies the problem… “No matter what settings you choose”. Not only are the Window$ phone options /settings SO limited, the options to be free from them -often- aren’t even offered; & when they are, they either don’t matter – or, aren’t -even- applied, heh.
The Store will NOT allow the installation of Adblock Plus, on Opera Mini – like it is possible to do on Android. You CANNOT be free from the Micro$oft agenda, no matter what you do. I had bought the phone, to try something different; & it’s money down the drain, totally, unfortunately. :f
^^ Firefox will probably (?!) never get made, for the Micro$oft phone – I’m guessing they’re giving Mozilla money, not to make it; because everyone would install add-ons in order to block all of ads, to be able to conserve their data plan & save their money, right! xD
(Not possible to root it, because nobody cares to make a custom ROM for a cheap model… Can’t install a firewall, to combat the ads – background processes and monitoring /reporting applications; not able to overwrite the ‘hosts’ file, even… Nothing, I’m totally stuck with using the phone EXACTLY how they wanted me to use it – and in no other way, possible.)
They never make anything good for the stone486 anymore………..
At least you’ll always have Chip’s Challenge.
That is gold
HAH speak of the devil, I just got it up and running.
I also don’t like BlueStacks very much (first try using it)
– It will install to program files whether you like it or not (you get to select the folder for app saves etc)
– The install option “Application Communications” is not explained, you need to google it to find out what it does – http://www.bluestacks.com/terms-and-privacy.html
– The application will automatically start as windows starts, no official options to turn that off.
– It uses up soo much RAM! If you open up a web browser WITHIN the BlueStacks application and close it again, it doesn’t release the RAM it took to display the web page. You need to restart the BlueStacks application for it to release it.
You should be able to take it out of startup processes if it’s starting when Windows does manually?
Just go into Control panel and search for ‘Startup’. From there, click “See which processes stat up automatically when you start windows” (click that) and disable Blue Stacks.
Using an android browser inside an android emulator is going to be hectic on your ram, you’re running a virtual machine, then inside that trying to browse the net. Good luck! You’re far better off alt-tabbing out and using your standard browser anyhow. Or if like me on a multi monitor system just having your browser on monitor 2.
You can do the whole msconfig thing in Windows, but as far as I know there’s no official option where it’s a setting on the actual application, kinda like how you can go into Steam’s options and select yes or no in regards to autostart.
Edit: With the RAM issue, it doesn’t seem to release it after the application has closed. For example, if I were to run a Windows virtual machine and open up a web browser inside that, RAM will be gradually filled up. However, when I exit that application, the RAM gets released. With BlueStacks, that doesn’t happen. I open any application, it takes up RAM, if I close that application (or even uninstall it afterwards) It still sits in the RAM, and the only time the RAM gets released is when you “power off” BlueStacks. I can’t tell if it’s BlueStacks OR if this is just how android OS work in general.
personally I check the startup tab in msconfig on a weekly basis, as there are a lot of programs you wouldn’t even know are running at startup that probably aren’t needed.
It is a very valid criticism though, it certainly wouldn’t give me much trust in the program if it blatantly puts itself in startup with no clear option to stop it; makes it feel like some PUA like SpeedUpMyPC2015 or whatevs.
msconfig is neat, but Piriform’s CCleaner is *better* and its Slim version, ofc. (https://www.piriform.com/ccleaner/builds)
^^ Btw., gonna give BlueStacks a whirl, because -both- the Oracle VM VirtualBox and teh VMPlayer are lagging, terribly, w/Android… Haven’t been able to solve that issue, although my b0x is strong enough: has hardware virtualization & works fine w/everything else. :f
You could always just root it, or find one of the old beta versions floating around the internet; these don’t have GamePop – Which does all the plaging of unwanted apps.
Alternatively, by the pro version; that’s what it is ultimately asking you to pay money (a monthly subscription) in exchange for the non-exposure to unwanted apps.
btw, these old versions are running the same major release of Android: KitKat (4.4.2 and 4.4.4 for the newer GamePop versions)
Download CCleaner..u dont have to clean anything..but in the start up tab of it..gives u the option to turn things off so they dont start up when comp does..ccleaner is safe..I have it on all my comps and my phone..is a great cleaner too…
I installed Bluestacks for Android emulation on a laptop of mine and had no end of Chrome extensions being installed because of it.
Once I finally was able to uninstall it, the extensions stopped installing themselves.
Genymotion & VirtualBox works well too. You will need to install gapps like usual once you pick a android rom.
Am I the only one who was severely underwhelmed by this game when it finally came to android?
I kept thinking to myself, “You know what would make this game perfect? A fast forward button, free updates like Minecraft implements, the ability to link up with friends and raid/help their vault, and no microtransactions”
But I remembered that I was playing a phone/tablet game, and it was designed from the very beginning to be like this.
To me it felt like a this war of mine clone that wasn’t fleshed out, I would have preferred it to be sold for $5-10 and be more like a traditional game instead of a mobile click game that keeps pushing alerts to keep clicking. But I guess you are right this is what it was designed for.
I wouldn’t stress too much about getting it work on your PC, you will only play it for 30 mins then be bored. There isn’t too much depth here and the resource collection is quite needy… but not in a fun way.
Personally, mobile gaming really is sh1t, all based around time walls and microtransactions, so it’s always really quite dull. Bring on Fallout 4!
What would have made the game interesting would have been some exploring of the Wasteland, rather then just send someone out, then recall….
You *can*, but why would you want to?
Bigger screen, easier to grab the right dweller. Touch screens still don’t work that well for those of us that have thick fingers.
maybe you can fastforward the clock on the pc version to trick it so you don’t need to wait 6 hours from child birth to adulthood.? !
This War of Mine game is so much better for the PC and no need to download any emulator.
I’ve been playing it on Andy (http://www.andyroid.net/) because I used Bluestacks on my laptop and, in addition to being a pain to adjust to, it caused system problems CCleaner couldn’t remove that only disappeared after a factory reset.
Yea, but – you can, sort of, get used to the graphics /resolution; it’s not THAT bad. :DD
*Bluestacks
great! now release a version for the majority of pc users… you know, the non-windows-10 windows version.