“Let's be careful. No human being would possibly pile books this way.”— Robert Joseph MacCready
The Boston Public Library is a location within Boston in 2287.
Background
The nation's second-largest library, the Boston Public Library was home to many books and historical records. They offered lectures, readings, and recitals, in addition to art and architectural tours.[1] Books could be loaned out, and then returned to any book return machine in the Greater Boston Area. Upon the return of an overdue book, five tokens would be awarded, which could then be used to redeem a prize.
Layout
The library is O-shaped with an open patio in the center. The whole place is inhabited by protectrons and MKI turrets. It is also filled with super mutants of varying strengths depending on level. A booby trap with a three-grenade bouquet can be found inside near the entrance connected to the library from Copley Station. There is also a tripwire and single grenade bouquet at the back entrance (with the intercom). The Sole Survivor's actions can trigger additional waves of super mutants to attack the library's defences.
Notable loot
- Intelligence bobblehead - In the mechanical room (northwestern side of building, 2nd floor, room has a closed but unlocked door on approach). On the large computer.
- Stealth Boy and bottlecap mine - In the supply room off the northern room that contains the Intelligence bobblehead behind a master locked door.
- The key can be found in the previous room in the northeast corner next to a terminal.
- Massachusetts Surgical Journal issue #8 - Only obtained as a prize from the book return terminal in the southwest corner. Requires 50 book return tokens, equivalent to 10 overdue books. It's on the 2nd floor beside the entrance from Back Bay.
- Six overdue books:
- Three in the mechanical room , they're on the left side of the room upon entering near the two sleeping bags and army ammo container.
- One in the women's restroom in a stall.
- One in the main reading room on a shelf by the terminal (turn to 4 o'clock while facing it).
- Enter the building through Back Bay (western) entrance. Head down the hall directly in front of you, then through 1st hole in the wall on the left. Continue through this room through the doorway into the next room. The book is on the first desk you come to.
- Vault-Tec lunchbox on a table in the southwest room, near the overdue book machine (look right/east when facing the machine). Another lunchbox can be found in the underground station, in a baby carriage. One may wish to overturn the baby carriage as when the lunchbox is opened the prize may fall through the ground. Another lunchbox maybe found on the floor of the cafeteria to the left of the main entrance.
- Three overdue books - In a Pulowski Preservation shelter to the south east of the buildings exterior.
Related quests
- Public Knowledge - Clear out super mutants and return Daisy's book. The quest starts in Goodneighbor.
Notes
- An intercom can be found and interacted with outside the western entrance. By passing an easy persuasion check, the player character can enter the library without picking the lock. Doing so tricks the security system into thinking the player character is an employee, turning all protectrons and turrets friendly. Attacking a friendly protectron or turret will engage combat with that unit only. The persuasion check reveals the ID passcode is 123456 registering as Mr. Mayor.
- Bypassing the intercom (either by lockpicking the western door or entering via Copley Station) will have all protectrons be friendly, but all turrets hostile. The turrets' allegiance cannot be changed with Total Hack (although two of them can be shut down) which means they will be permanently hostile after this point; attacking a turret, or being detected by one, will cause all protectrons to become hostile too.
- If the Sole Survivor looks inside the storage trunk in the master-locked room at the north of the library, approximately 20 super mutants will begin to attack in multiple waves from the opposite entrance the player used (i.e. if you came in via Copley, the mutants will attack through the western door and vice versa). Characters wishing to avoid combat can simply ignore the aforementioned trunk, as it doesn't have particularly interesting loot.
- Triggering the super mutant attack when the turrets are hostile to you is likely to get very messy very quickly. The turrets will almost certainly pick you as a target should you decide to enter the fray, which means the protectrons will also be after you, which can make for quite a battle.
 | The following is based on Fallout 4 cut content. |
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- Curator Givens' terminal logs make mention of "compressing" data and implies that the player character can "help the cause" and seems to point to the large data computer where the bobblehead is, but no further clues are found. If you turn clipping off (tcl) and walk through the actual computer and wall, directly behind where the bobblehead is, you can actually find a terminal just floating in mid-air. For console players, using a jet pack you may fly upwards through the skylight and reach the terminal that way. Accessing it, it asks if you want to "compress data to holodisk, yes or no?" Selecting yes will update the player with experience and eject the "BPL Compressed Data" holodisk which can then be found under your misc. inventory section. The quest event ID is listed as "DN011 OverdueBooks," which has a stage of "0" and "1000." Stage "1000" gives you the disk and XP, and changes the terminal to say the data has been compressed. Whether the terminal being inaccessible was a level designer's oversight, or intentionally left out of the game is not known. It is also not known if the BPL compressed data holodisk has use elsewhere in the game at this time.
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- If accompanied by Cait she will ask "Where do you think they keep the dirty mags?" when entering the large room.
Appearances
Boston Public Library only appears in Fallout 4.
Behind the scenes
 | The following is based on unverified behind the scenes information and may be inaccurate. |
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The location appears to be based on the Boston Public Library McKim Building in Copley Square. The libraries share many architectural features, and the main hall looks nearly identical to the Bates Hall of the library.
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Bugs
You can get stuck inside the room in the bottom level after coming down the ramp. (The room connected to the open patio area) There's a room with junk piled in the door. You may enter it through the right hand side of the doorway. But can never leave without previous save reload.[verified]- The game can freeze while receiving the Surgical Journal. The book terminal will become unable to exit and you will have the Item Obtained overlay stuck on your screen indefinitely.[verified]
- Possible fix: Press the Enter key instead of the activate key.
