It's been over four years since the last entry in the Fallout series - Fallout: New Vegas - was released. Nothing new in the series has surfaced since then, and four years is a long time. While Bethesda is known for taking their time when it comes to making games, it's still a bit much. During the meantime, Bethesda did release The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim, but it's just not the same experience as Fallout: trading the irradiated wasteland for frozen wilderness isn't what fans of Fallout were looking for. Unfortunately, fans of the franchise have been left in the dark, and with no word on a new game whatsoever, many began to worry that Bethesda was leaving Fallout behind.

However, that may not be the case after all: rumors have been circulating about a Fallout game set in Boston for years, and while all of those rumors have been debunked, players may finally have concrete evidence that the game is actually being made.

A trademark application for what appears to be a new Fallout game has surfaced on the German Patent and Trade Mark Office site. On Oct. 25, Bethesda applied for a trademark application for something called Fallout: Shadow of Boston, and the file is listed under 'Computer game discs; Downloadable computer game programs.' Judging from its classification, it seems that Bethesda may be getting ready to announce a new Fallout game.

Of course, the information should be taken with a grain of salt. While the listing certainly looks official, it doesn't necessarily guarantee that a new game is actually being made. As stated previously, rumors of a Fallout game set in the city of Boston have been circulating for years now, and each and every one of them was proven false. It certainly wouldn't be the first time that the studio has had to shut down rumors about a supposed new game.

That being said, the listing does look legitimate. The application is easily the closest fans have gotten to a new Fallout game in a long while, and with any luck, an announcement isn't far off. Fallout: Shadow of Boston, if it is real, is likely still a long ways off; it could still take years for the game to make it into players' hands. Still, an application like this is better than thinking the series is fading away into nothingness.

Photo: Bethesda Softworks