Black Isle's canceled Fallout 3 project, codenamed Van Buren, was to feature a highly modified version of the SPECIAL character system, made by J.E. Sawyer. Some of the changes, especially to the skills system, were quite controversial among Fallout fans. Bethesda's version of SPECIAL in Fallout 3 is something of a combination of the original SPECIAL, the Van Buren SPECIAL, as well as their own changes.