The company that published Fallout went public at $5.50 a share. Interplay, run by founder Brian Fargo out of Irvine, California, made PC games with a following: Battle Chess, Descent, Earthworm Jim, Star Trek: Starfleet Academy. Its role-playing division, Black Isle Studios, had just released Fallout. Its prospectus opened with a slogan, "By gamers. For gamers." By June 1998 the company needed the money to pay down debt.

Fargo's Studio

Brian Fargo founded Interplay in 1983 and ran it as chief executive from the start. The company built and published games for PCs and consoles, and it licensed its games to online services such as America Online. Universal Studios became a major investor and held two seats on the board. Interplay's hits earned it a strong name with players. Its spending on new games kept it short of cash.

Selling the Wasteland

Interplay priced 5 million shares at $5.50 in June 1998 and listed on Nasdaq as IPLY. It used the money to repay debt. Losses continued, and France's Titus Interactive took control in 2001. Fargo left the next year. In 2007 Interplay sold the Fallout franchise to Bethesda Softworks. The company shrank to a small rights holder and stopped filing reports with the SEC in 2014.

Cover: The Chess Players, William Henry Fox Talbot. Art Institute of Chicago, public domain. Chosen for chess players (Battle Chess).