The Place Where Fallout Purists Whine

[Reddaye]

Eh, Brahmin are a source of milk don't cha know.

So are mole rats but I doubt you'd find their milk laying around in bombed out elementary schools. But that's not really a big deal. It's just the niggling little details that previous Fallouts usually covered that Bethesda didn't. Yeah, it's a pretty small thing to argue about, I'll agree. The game IS good...maybe not as good as the originals, but still good.

Here's another less than stellar review (72/100) that I think does a better job of pointing out the flaws of the game IMO.

Computer Games.ro

Just posting a few of these to get some discussion flowing. Good or bad.

[SeanDMan]

The Zero Punctuation review is also in.

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/vie...n/420-Fallout-3

Personally I'm shocked to read such a positive review from the NMA crew. You have to remember, what basically happened is that Bethesda bought a game that was designed to emulate table top roleplaying and turned it into a game that is designed to emulate System Shock esque levelling in a first person shooter. I would be incredibly pissed off if EA were to sell off the Madden franchise to Microsoft, and all of a sudden my beloved football game was a first person shooter where you happen to wear football armor. As much as the game is good, which I personally think it is, it breaks Fallout canon and setting in a lot of ways, and in keeping with the spirit of being a proper sequel, it fails to emulate and recreate either the setting or the gameplay experience of the originals, thus it is not a particularly good Fallout game. It's fucking fun, but it's not as good as it should be.

Edited November 20, 2008 by SeanDMan

[apsham]

I didn't follow development a lot, and I'm only starting to get really deep into the canon whereas before I just knew the storylines on top, but isn't this the reason why they've placed the game on the East coast instead of the West? I don't really see any big areas where canon is broken, it references the major events just as the other games have... and any major differences can be nailed down to both time and location, being away from the first two games. I think the quote says it all;

"We're not going to suddenly do a top-down isometric Baldur's Gate-style game, because that's not what we do well."

That's what Van Buren was going to be, in 2003. But when it got canceled, it was clear that there wasn't going to be another Fallout game... until Bethesda stepped in. Now of course, the first thing that got mentioned when I opposed the seemingly standard point of view was "Just because Bethesda..." but that's the thing, I'm not really a die hard fan of them. I enjoyed Oblivion, yeah, but I didn't think it was the be all, end all of video games. Frankly, a game that appeals to a lot of people and gets some interested in the older games... isn't THAT big of a problem for the diehards as far as I see it.

Also, I called Yahtzee pretty much having to take back everything he said about the game on his preview of it from the E3 video thing-a-ma-bob.

[Toe]

I like this game a lot. For the first 10 hours, it was amazing. But when you start seeing the same enemies over and over again in what is supposed to be a huge, living world, it gets annoying.

Still, this is a good game. I am currently playing through a second time as a bad guy.

[SeanDMan]

I didn't follow development a lot, and I'm only starting to get really deep into the canon whereas before I just knew the storylines on top, but isn't this the reason why they've placed the game on the East coast instead of the West?

It was pretty obvious that them setting the game on the East Coast was to allow them some artistic freedom with the setting, but what they did was take groups that formed and functioned isolated to the west coast and simply supplanted them a million miles away. There's no logic for the Brotherhood to be there, since they formed after surviving the atomic strikes in the Mariposa Millitary Base and bunkering down in Lost Hills, both cut off from Washington by the massive stretch of the country. Nor is there any logic to the Supermutants, since the FEV development was centered around West-Tek and Mariposa, and thus would confine the mutant population to where they were created, which would be the West Coast again. The Enclave makes sense, and Ghouls would be everywhere, but yeah, if you take away the Brotherhood, who have no business being in DC and no logical way to have arrived there, you take out a significant part of the Fallout 3 storyline. But they wanted the Brotherhood in and so they retconned, or just plain ignored logic.

I don't really see any big areas where canon is broken, it references the major events just as the other games have... and any major differences can be nailed down to both time and location, being away from the first two games.

But that's the thing, the time and location make it illogical for much of what exists there. Take, for example, this quote, based on dialog directly from Fallout 2;

Decline

After the defeat of the Master, the Brotherhood had become a shadow of its former self. No longer the sole custodian of advanced technology in the wasteland, the Brotherhood was struggling to find a new identity.

A group that is struggling to find a new identity doesn't suddenly reemerge is a Dominant powerhouse capable of traversing the majority of an entire country, establish a new stronghold, and become a dominant powergroup in the new societal architecture. The Brotherhood went from isolationist techmongerers, to a group in severe decline due to that exact policy, and then all of a sudden, only a few years later, they're running the Pentagon and ready for a full scale war again?

I think the quote says it all;

"We're not going to suddenly do a top-down isometric Baldur's Gate-style game, because that's not what we do well."

That's what Van Buren was going to be, in 2003. But when it got canceled, it was clear that there wasn't going to be another Fallout game... until Bethesda stepped in.

That's actually false. Bethesda were not the only bidders on Fallout; a lot of companies were interested in the license, Bethesda just had the most cash. The primary root of a lot of hostility from fans of the series comes from the fact that a lot of companies which were hiring formed Black Isles Studios members or were even run by former creators of the Fallout game also put in bids, but that those bids just didn't have the raw cash backing in order to get them made. Yes, that is the world we live in, but that doesn't mean anyone has to like it.

Now of course, the first thing that got mentioned when I opposed the seemingly standard point of view was "Just because Bethesda..." but that's the thing, I'm not really a die hard fan of them. I enjoyed Oblivion, yeah, but I didn't think it was the be all, end all of video games. Frankly, a game that appeals to a lot of people and gets some interested in the older games... isn't THAT big of a problem for the diehards as far as I see it.

That's just the thing. Saying that "This game appeals to a lot of people, what the fuck is your problem?" is an illogical argument. There's a large demographic on the internet interested in scatological videography, but that doesn't mean I have any interest in someone shitting on my face. Just because someone ELSE likes something doesn't mean I'm wrong to dislike it, or that my arguments or concerns are just me being difficult or nit picking. This game is good, but it has some legitimate flaws. Besides the errors in the setting, the writing is incredibly flat and bad, and VATS doesn't have enough animations to keep it from getting really old really fast. The game is a lot of fun, and I do like it, I am just disappointed in certain shortcomings that sap some of the amusement from it for me.

[Toe]

Your right about VATS too. It does get boring quickly after seeing someones head blown off the same way over and over again.

[apsham]

East Coast mutants

Spoiler: Click here to view

By 2257, the Super Mutants have appeared on the East Coast of the United States. These Super Mutants were created in the Evolutionary Experimentation Program, the experiment assigned to Vault 87. The modified strain of FEV which created these mutants resulted in a new strain of Super Mutants which, in addition to becoming senile, grow larger and stronger as they age. They are different as they are green-yellow in skin and less intelligent outside of combat they take prisoners to make more of them.

East Coast Brotherhood

http://fallout.wikia.com/wiki/Capital_Wast...erhood_of_Steel

Both are plausible, I mean come on. It's hardly like the Brotherhood have been able to do much in DC...

[Captain Kirk]

It's lucky a lot of you don't read GamesTM most of their reviews are the critisicms.

[SRN]

Fallout is enjoyable, and fun and entertaining and a great game, as an updated version of Oblivion and STALKER with VATS but certainly not as an actual Fallout game. Otherwise, I think SDM posted and said everything I had to say and thus I am just going to leave the rest on his shoulders.

Lazy, is it not?

[Reddaye]

Well I'm going to give Bethesda a bit of a break in regards to the Brotherhood of Steel heading to the East Coast. Although it goes against what's been established in previous games Van Buren was going to feature a group of BoS in Arizona who were formed to do some East Coast exploration. Obviously Van Buren doesn't exist so it's not canon; but Black Isle were seemingly thinking along those lines. Fuck, Black Isle planned on merging all the gun skills into one skill...now THAT is a bad idea.

My biggest problem is that Bethesda basically reused the storyline from the original two games and mashed them together. This wouldn't be so bad if they didn't rail road you along the main quest with practically no ability to diverge off the beaten path to maybe freshen things up. The whole thing is an improvement over Oblivion and Morrowind, but a far cry from the games that Fallout 3 takes it's name from. Sean D Man nailed it when he said that Bethesda moved the game to the East for a fresh start and then just ended up reusing old Fallout concepts that don't fit overly well.

I like Fallout 3 well enough. Easily in my top ten games released this year, but it just sucks to see the canon that Tim Cain and Black Isle labored over so much in the original game (that, according to some was ruined in the second game) have so many holes punched in it because of lazy writing. At least lazy in my opinion, which is far from the gospel. I was looking forward to Emil Pagliarulo heading things up after how good the Dark Brotherhood quest line in Oblivion was, and of course his work on the original Thief games.

Fuck knows it's better than Fallout: Brotherhood of Steel though.

[apsham]

This wouldn't be so bad if they didn't rail road you along the main quest with practically no ability to diverge off the beaten path to maybe freshen things up.

Did... did you even play.. Fallout 3?

[RoyWill Rumble]

Spoiler: Click here to view

Searching for the Declaration of Independence = pretty fucking cool.

[tristy]

Spoiler: Click here to view

Searching for the Declaration of Independence = pretty fucking cool.

I gave up on this and killed the bitch for her gun.

[Reddaye]

This wouldn't be so bad if they didn't rail road you along the main quest with practically no ability to diverge off the beaten path to maybe freshen things up.

Did... did you even play.. Fallout 3?

EDIT: I'll make my point more clear now that I read this back to myself...

Ultimately what I was trying to say was that no matter what you do in the storyline it doesn't diverge in any way until the very end of the game. In every situation the outcome is always going to be the same, and so you'll continue down the same basic storyline every single time.

Instead of offering a few different paths to the final showdown (different alliances, for example) you're basically forced along a linear story progression where your choices in (main) quests have no real bearing on the storyline at all. The particular choice you make during a conversation with Eden is a good example. No matter what you say with him the outcome will have NO effect on how the story moves forward...you're going down the exact same path no matter what. None of your choices in the story before the end of the game have any consequences at all on how the story moves forward.

Go play VtM: Bloodlines, or Arcanum (especially Arcanum) and you'll have a better perspective of what I mean. A single choice in either of those games can completely change the entire course of the rest of the main quest. Practically every situation has five different outcomes with equally as many ways to tackle them, never forcing you to pick the same allies every time. EVERY action has a consequence that is felt through the rest of the story.

Fallout 3 does a better job of not forcing you along like say Oblivion, but it still missed the boat on a few chances to make multiple playings of the storyline totally different experiences.

Edited November 21, 2008 by Drifter_2000

[Maxx]

How the hell does Oblivion force you along? I owned that game for 6 months and did two main story quests, never felt the need to do more. Different strokes I guess

Edited November 21, 2008 by Maxx

[apsham]

The game doesn't have an ending.. that's the way that I see it. You don't HAVE to finish the main story to feel fulfilled with this game, I've been talking with Kaney... and he has hours upon hours invented in this game, and he STILL hasn't reached the ending. I'm not sure if it's changed in the past few days, but the same goes with Ruki and LL. Of course, most people are going to choose to end it at some point or another, but even then the way that the game ends is either... well, I guess I shouldn't say anything about that, but it's not as if it's something that's going to see you let down. Anything at the end talks about your direct actions and your history, from there it's kind of blank as to what happens. Just because something isn't mentioned in the ending credits doesn't mean it effected the game.

All of the side shit I did, effected the game world in one way or another. I helped these people out, I killed these people, everything I did had a direct effect on the game world and that's really what I enjoyed. True, you can't kill SOME people but there's people in the game, who are important to certain aspects that you can get rid of... and that directly changes the game mechanics.

[Reddaye]

I'm just talking about the main quest here. The side quests are fine overall as far as I'm concerned. I meant the same thing when I was talking about Oblivion. Hell...Oblivion didn't even have different endings.

Not to derail things but in Oblivion the best examples I have are: you can't join Dagon's cult, can't join the Necromancers, can't join Blackwood company, the situation with LaChance ends the same way no matter what. There's no variation on how these stories play out...no matter what you do it all ends the same. The game FORCES you down one path in the stories and you can't diverge from it at all. Sure you can go fuck around in the woods but I'm talking about making choices in the story quests that actually changes the story to give you many different paths to take; making things more fresh for different playthroughs.

You can get sidetracked in these games...fuck knows I've spent hours just wandering around collecting scrap metal and sugar bombs. I'm just saying that the main storyline is the same every time you play...excluding the ending in Fallout 3's case. The way you tackle the main quests can be done in different ways but ultimately none of the decisions you make ie:

Spoiler: Click here to view

...talking Eden into deactivating itself...

...will make the story any different either way you decide to go. The choice in Megaton is a side quest...not a main quest. The choices made in the MAIN STORY quests do not alter the path of the storyline at all...it's the game story exactly every time you play.

Spoiler: Click here to view

- Dad dies.

- Brotherhood of Steel wins.

- Enclave loses.

- You join up with the Brotherhood after escaping Raven Rock.

- Super Mutants lose.

Maybe for the sake of making a cohesive story it's best that none of those particular variables change but it'd be nice if you could have more influence on how the story evolves throughout based on your actions and choices during the main quests.

Edited November 21, 2008 by Drifter_2000

[tristy]

I already know the ending from watching my friend play and helping him get through it on the PC version, so on my Xbox version, since I know I'm close to beating the main quest and then it's over, I'm just traveling around, trying to find missions to do and leveling up. Might as well, since I know how the game ends basically.

That said, though, Evergreen Mills or whatever it's called is a fucking stockpile of shit. My god. I spent 10 minutes just raiding one huge room.

[Summers]

Trouble on the Homefront = quality.

[Robsturgh]

The whole V.A.T.S gets tedious thing I can't really see as a valid argument to be honest, as its meant to be a tactical way to take enemies down and not a way to show off the games physics engine, at least in my mind. The shine of bloody mess and blowing someone's head into 30 different shards wore off within the first few hours, but I will never ever stop using it due to the fact that on the harder difficulties, it is impossible to handle this game as a raw FPS.

Can I just add, Deathclaws and Sentry Bots can suck my left and right nut respectively.