Fallout 3 Q&A is up

Urizen · Post by **Urizen** » Fri Sep 14, 2007 10:27 pm

[ Game -> Update ] - News related to <a href="http://www.duckandcover.cx/archives.php ... ry=17">Top Story: Big Fallout 3 Updates</a> | More info on <a href="#Todd Howard">Person: Todd Howard</a> | More info on <a href="#Bethesda Softworks">Company: Bethesda Softworks</a> | More info on <a href="#Fallout 3">Game: Fallout 3</a>

The announced Fallout 3 <a target="_blank" href="http://www.bethsoft.com/bgsforums/index ... >Questions and Answers session</a> with Todd Howard is up on the <a target="_blank" href="http://www.bethsoft.com/bgsforums/index ... ">Official Forums</a>. Some quotes that may be of special interest to fans of the original series:<blockquote>
"Is unarmed combat in? If so, is it lethal or does it knockout your opponent? [Waterchip]
Yes, it’s in, and yes, it’s lethal. It’s a big part of the game, and as far as game balance, it’s our goal to make melee as viable as using guns in killing off enemies. It’s something we’re obviously still balancing, but I expect melee to be more “lethal”, as getting near an opponent can be more difficult, especially if they have a gun, but at the same time, you don’t have to worry about your ammo counts, so that’s an immediate benefit to melee."
"Is combat playable in the zoomed out third person ("almost iso") perspective and how will VATS work from it, meaning - will it zoom into FP or something else? [kaos] 

I’d have to say “no”. Combat’s not really playable when you zoom the camera all the way back and point it down. You can try, but it’s not meant to be played that way, because you still have to aim at the center of the screen, and at that point, the center is the ground. It’s playable from 1st and 3rd person, but closer-in over-the-shoulder 3rd person. Regarding VATS., it does zoom in on your target, from your eyes, so I guess you’d say it is a “1st person” view. So if you’re playing in 3rd person and enter VATS, you zoom in on the target, and when you’re done, it flips back to your 3rd person view. It happens pretty fast and it’s smooth. I kind of see VATS as its own view." "Will you have the written descriptions of items or just the visual? Granted, the visuals work just fine for me, but I loved the descriptions from the earlier Fallouts about how nasty the bed looks or whatever. Will there be something like our beloved text box anywhere in the main HUD? [anonymous] 
We just show the object name, like “nasty bed”, but in general, I think if we’re relying on text to describe how something looks, sounds, etc, then we screwed up not having that come across naturally with what the player is seeing. It annoys me whenever we have to resort to describing something like that, even in Oblivion, with, say a journal describing how I feel or what I am seeing…it should just happen naturally."</blockquote>Take a look at the <a target="_blank" href="http://www.bethsoft.com/bgsforums/index ... 135">whole thing</a>. It answers a few more questions, and it's a good read.

Thor Kaufman · Post by **Thor Kaufman** » Fri Sep 14, 2007 10:34 pm

Fallout 3 is going to be sooo awesoem

Post by **King of Creation** » Sat Sep 15, 2007 1:06 am

Why bother choosing questions if you're "not ready to talk about it" yet?

Caleb · Post by **Caleb** » Sat Sep 15, 2007 1:15 am

faction action/interaction

an amazing fragment[/quote]

Koki · Post by **Koki** » Sat Sep 15, 2007 8:52 am

exbawks

Briosafreak · Post by **Briosafreak** » Sat Sep 15, 2007 10:01 am

King of Creation wrote:Why bother choosing questions if you're "not ready to talk about it" yet?

Because we chose the questions, not Bethesda. In that sense he talked more than what I was expecting.

Thor Kaufman · Post by **Thor Kaufman** » Sat Sep 15, 2007 10:05 am

next time ask him more serious questions about his dicksize and stds

Urizen · Post by **Urizen** » Sat Sep 15, 2007 10:19 am

I think if we’re relying on text to describe how something looks, sounds, etc, then we screwed up not having that come across naturally with what the player is seeing.

ever heard of multimedia? it's when you use different media to reinforce each other. like if you have a scrapbook with pics in it, you can write something underneath a picture so people knows who's in it. sounds great, huh? but i guess if it were up to you, we wouldn't have books anymore either, just pages filled with 3D images.
todd, you suck. try reading a book some time, okay?

Briosafreak · Post by **Briosafreak** » Sat Sep 15, 2007 11:03 am

Thor Kaufman wrote:next time ask him more serious questions about his dicksize and stds

That's a deal

VasikkA · Post by **VasikkA** » Sat Sep 15, 2007 11:43 am

Urizen wrote:
I think if weâ€™re relying on text to describe how something looks, sounds, etc, then we screwed up not having that come across naturally with what the player is seeing.
ever heard of multimedia? it's when you use different media to reinforce each other. like if you have a scrapbook with pics in it, you can write something underneath a picture so people knows who's in it. sounds great, huh? but i guess if it were up to you, we wouldn't have books anymore either, just pages filled with 3D images.
todd, you suck. try reading a book some time, okay?

Because stimulating the player's imagination is so pre-gen. Why use words when you they can shoot some POLYGONS at you instead?

DaC-Sniper · Post by **DaC-Sniper** » Sat Sep 15, 2007 11:53 am

Emil Pagliarulo, the lead designer, does the bulk of the writing. I canâ€™t say enough good things about his stuff, itâ€™s fantastic. We both wanted to do a father/child thing very early on

Killzig · Post by **Killzig** » Sat Sep 15, 2007 1:26 pm

Thor Kaufman wrote:next time ask him more serious questions about his dicksize and stds

4in/herp

don't ask how I know.

//applies valtrex to face.

Urizen · Post by **Urizen** » Sat Sep 15, 2007 1:28 pm

also, feral ghouls ARE IN. i'm not kidding.

Amis · Post by **Amis** » Sat Sep 15, 2007 11:47 pm

um Todd Howard um Todd Howard we call him a coward

Post by **King of Creation** » Sun Sep 16, 2007 3:19 am

Briosafreak wrote:
King of Creation wrote:Why bother choosing questions if you're "not ready to talk about it" yet?
Because we chose the questions, not Bethesda. In that sense he talked more than what I was expecting.

Well they got a crap-ton of questions. They could have at least picked a bunch that they could fully explain. I'm sure there were enough.

popscythe · Post by **popscythe** » Sun Sep 16, 2007 10:19 am

King of Creation wrote:Well they got a crap-ton of questions. They could have at least picked a bunch that they could fully explain. I'm sure there were enough.

That's assuming that the content they have planned in the game is 1. longer than two hours. 2. more complicated than what we've already seen. Do not, I repeat do not be suprised if DC, megaton and an "end area" are 90% of the game in a "now that you've finished DC, you can go to megaton but beware adventurer, you can never come back!!!!" format.

So my answer to your question is that the interview covered absolutely everthing in fallout 3 besides listing the 37 npc's you can talk to and writing down their entire dialog tree, or an item list or something.

Briosafreak · Post by **Briosafreak** » Sun Sep 16, 2007 10:51 am

King of Creation wrote:
Briosafreak wrote:
King of Creation wrote:Why bother choosing questions if you're "not ready to talk about it" yet?
Because we chose the questions, not Bethesda. In that sense he talked more than what I was expecting.
Well they got a crap-ton of questions. They could have at least picked a bunch that they could fully explain. I'm sure there were enough.

Nah, they only got twenty questions, with five optional ones, chosen from the 100 or so available from the feedback on the community. Those twenty five were picked by Blintzer following the advice of a few others (Ausir, Brother None, me, etc).

VasikkA · Post by **VasikkA** » Sun Sep 16, 2007 2:09 pm

A bugger that they decided to include karma points, as an indicator of good/bad. I had hoped for the game to take a step away from such clear distinctions.

atoga · Post by **atoga** » Sun Sep 16, 2007 7:17 pm

VasikkA wrote:A bugger that they decided to include karma points, as an indicator of good/bad. I had hoped for the game to take a step away from such clear distinctions.

correct me if i'm wrong, but i got the impression they're including karma points which are specific to factions -- kind of like the regional reputations in fallout 2, which makes more sense than a big ole universal karma number.

presumably it would be impossible to have a high karma with all the factions in the game.

VasikkA · Post by **VasikkA** » Sun Sep 16, 2007 9:06 pm

Well, the GTA karma system is somewhat better than the one used in Fallout, but you'll ultimately end up doing quests for either good factions(BoS(which actually should be neutral, but Beth will presumably miss this)) or evil(Raiders, Slavers). I'd prefer more ambiguous and more indirect results of the player's actions than some queer +2 rep. Faction A and -2 rep. Faction B pop-ups upon completed quests. The whole faction concept reeks TES.