There was no reason to believe otherwise throughout Fallout 3, or even 4 for that matter in spite Fridge Kid. It's all up to the writer's preference/convenience.Īs far as Bethesda themselves goes: It's pretty obvious the assumption was always that they needed *some* sustenance, possibly normal human levels thereof, until they wanted to write Fridge Kid. They possibly need drastically less than a normal human.
The only real answer at this point is to just say Ghoulsarewierdlol. ^ There's a ghoul town, Necropolis, in Fallout 1 that dies out if their water pump isn't repaired.