Fallout 3: Your thoughts
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Devil_Starr666
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Ok I have just about finished the game (in the very end of the last quest) so I think I am ready to correct my previous thoughts… I still think the game is fun and enjoyable but I have definitely changed my earlier assessment. At the time I had about 20-40 hours in so I figured I knew the game pretty well by then. Now however I would have to disagree.
(Currently I have about 200+ hours in playtime)
What is still good
• Ambiance is still there, the background of this game I feel is still Fallout
• Enjoyable and fun when using VATS
• Open ended you can go anywhere and do just about anything
• Repair skill is now very rewarding
• Music seems to fit game and is enjoyable, nice variety between the enclave station, GNR and the classical station
• Size of world feels mostly right, possibly even too big.
• The world around you is interesting to look at and for the most part nearly any location can reveal or give something.
• Combat is probably one area where with VATS that is possible they did something better than the originals.
The game is still fun and enjoyable. No matter what the game does TRY to be true to the series while it does take it in a completely different direction. Yes I know many think that’s impossible but I don’t. Now let’s talk about what makes this game fall short.
Issues\Bugs\bad things
• Unexplained and consistent instability, game can just crash at any time. Sometimes it will just crash in starting the game. (and I just built my system this year it should be able to handle the game)
• During the scene with dad inside the Jefferson Memorial when the Enclave guy shoots the female scientist it will give a nice little animation where you get to see blood splatter coming from the wound. Unfortunately this animation didn’t stop once she was dead and on the ground, it kept running all the way through the whole scene. And in the air as if she was still standing there.
• NPC (team) characters who go off on their own and get killed, Disappearing NPC’s, NPC’s who fall into unreachable areas.
• Broken quests like the “head of state� quest that requires quite a bit of messing with just to work right.
• Breakdancing dead folks: In some cases a dead body will begin to fly, twitch, and “dance�. In one case A mutant I shot at the Lincoln memorial breakdanced all the way from the steps to half way down the pool. Once they stopped backward motion they continued their breakdancing forever just inside the pool.
• Items, NPC’s stuck in objects. Many many items get stuck or lost inside of other objects. I have also lost one quest to NPC’s being stuck inside rocks or walls. (those quest, the boy was inside a stone and would not move or contact)
• Poor stats on armor and weapons. Little difference between using combat armor and power armor, plasma rifle less useful than Lincoln rifle.
• Poor use of Explosive skill
• Poorly conceived and too short main story line.
• Some areas with no real purpose other than to give you an XP mill or just to fill out the map.
• Illogical dialog, poor story telling. Being able to convince the president to give up just by telling them. “its not right what you are doing�
• Floating NPC’s Characters who move off the ground without walking
• Floating items. Items on shelves but not laying on them.
• Hovering items. Pick up one item on a shelf and it makes all the remaining items jump up and begin to hover in air.
• Poor camera angles. Sometimes the Vats slow-mo will focus on a wall or a close up of a body part that has nothing to do with the action.
• PC (player character) getting suck in walls behind objects. Sometimes this happens when a trap detonates and it throws you into a wall or inside an object.
• Vanishing enemy: This can happen in the middle of combat. I have seen mutants who I was shooting at in Vats take hits and when I left vats they where there for a second and then vanished. They didn’t move they just disappeared. If I shoot at the same location I won’t hit them. But in a few seconds they will show back up for me to kill.
• Objects dropping from the sky. I don’t know why exactly but things seem to be falling from the sky a lot in this game. Especially dead bodies of folks I killed the last time I visited a location dropping from the sky the next time I arrive there.
The way I see it this game has two main problems that really take it from Great game to just an good game.
The lack of a good editor: The game has many areas that are just not fully designed or developed. The game has areas of little or no importance that feel thrown in.
Not enough attention to story\plot and the theme behind them.
In conclusion I would say this game is in reality about 80% complete. I think it could have been delayed another 4 months just fixing the bugs, but it could also have used another a few months working out the dialog issues and poor story. So honestly this game is about another development year away from being a true sequel to the likes of Fallout 1 or 2. Yes Fallout 2 had the same problems with being shipped with loads of bugs but that game had much more polish on its story and plot than this game. Had this game not had half its locations (many of which are filler anyway) I think most folks would have been much more angry saying it was mostly incomplete. However I can’t say this wasn’t an honest attempt at a sequel. I give Bethesda credit they made a game that is very fun DESPITE its flaws and perhaps with enough mods it can reach the level of Fallout 2. As it stands now it’s an interesting fun game that will be forgotten in days after folks quit playing it. Not at all how Fallout should be remembered.
(Currently I have about 200+ hours in playtime)
What is still good
• Ambiance is still there, the background of this game I feel is still Fallout
• Enjoyable and fun when using VATS
• Open ended you can go anywhere and do just about anything
• Repair skill is now very rewarding
• Music seems to fit game and is enjoyable, nice variety between the enclave station, GNR and the classical station
• Size of world feels mostly right, possibly even too big.
• The world around you is interesting to look at and for the most part nearly any location can reveal or give something.
• Combat is probably one area where with VATS that is possible they did something better than the originals.
The game is still fun and enjoyable. No matter what the game does TRY to be true to the series while it does take it in a completely different direction. Yes I know many think that’s impossible but I don’t. Now let’s talk about what makes this game fall short.
Issues\Bugs\bad things
• Unexplained and consistent instability, game can just crash at any time. Sometimes it will just crash in starting the game. (and I just built my system this year it should be able to handle the game)
• During the scene with dad inside the Jefferson Memorial when the Enclave guy shoots the female scientist it will give a nice little animation where you get to see blood splatter coming from the wound. Unfortunately this animation didn’t stop once she was dead and on the ground, it kept running all the way through the whole scene. And in the air as if she was still standing there.
• NPC (team) characters who go off on their own and get killed, Disappearing NPC’s, NPC’s who fall into unreachable areas.
• Broken quests like the “head of state� quest that requires quite a bit of messing with just to work right.
• Breakdancing dead folks: In some cases a dead body will begin to fly, twitch, and “dance�. In one case A mutant I shot at the Lincoln memorial breakdanced all the way from the steps to half way down the pool. Once they stopped backward motion they continued their breakdancing forever just inside the pool.
• Items, NPC’s stuck in objects. Many many items get stuck or lost inside of other objects. I have also lost one quest to NPC’s being stuck inside rocks or walls. (those quest, the boy was inside a stone and would not move or contact)
• Poor stats on armor and weapons. Little difference between using combat armor and power armor, plasma rifle less useful than Lincoln rifle.
• Poor use of Explosive skill
• Poorly conceived and too short main story line.
• Some areas with no real purpose other than to give you an XP mill or just to fill out the map.
• Illogical dialog, poor story telling. Being able to convince the president to give up just by telling them. “its not right what you are doing�
• Floating NPC’s Characters who move off the ground without walking
• Floating items. Items on shelves but not laying on them.
• Hovering items. Pick up one item on a shelf and it makes all the remaining items jump up and begin to hover in air.
• Poor camera angles. Sometimes the Vats slow-mo will focus on a wall or a close up of a body part that has nothing to do with the action.
• PC (player character) getting suck in walls behind objects. Sometimes this happens when a trap detonates and it throws you into a wall or inside an object.
• Vanishing enemy: This can happen in the middle of combat. I have seen mutants who I was shooting at in Vats take hits and when I left vats they where there for a second and then vanished. They didn’t move they just disappeared. If I shoot at the same location I won’t hit them. But in a few seconds they will show back up for me to kill.
• Objects dropping from the sky. I don’t know why exactly but things seem to be falling from the sky a lot in this game. Especially dead bodies of folks I killed the last time I visited a location dropping from the sky the next time I arrive there.
The way I see it this game has two main problems that really take it from Great game to just an good game.
The lack of a good editor: The game has many areas that are just not fully designed or developed. The game has areas of little or no importance that feel thrown in.
Not enough attention to story\plot and the theme behind them.
In conclusion I would say this game is in reality about 80% complete. I think it could have been delayed another 4 months just fixing the bugs, but it could also have used another a few months working out the dialog issues and poor story. So honestly this game is about another development year away from being a true sequel to the likes of Fallout 1 or 2. Yes Fallout 2 had the same problems with being shipped with loads of bugs but that game had much more polish on its story and plot than this game. Had this game not had half its locations (many of which are filler anyway) I think most folks would have been much more angry saying it was mostly incomplete. However I can’t say this wasn’t an honest attempt at a sequel. I give Bethesda credit they made a game that is very fun DESPITE its flaws and perhaps with enough mods it can reach the level of Fallout 2. As it stands now it’s an interesting fun game that will be forgotten in days after folks quit playing it. Not at all how Fallout should be remembered.
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entertainer
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Amis wrote:Have you ever played the originals? Seriously now... Have you? HUH PUNK?!?
Yes I have played both games more times that i could possibly count. Both when they were orginally sold and nearly every year since.
I usually end up playing both at least once or twice a year. Mostly because they are still the best 2 games on PC ever made hands down.
entertainer wrote:lolwatmcdonis wrote:Combat is probably one area where with VATS that is possible they did something better than the originals.
Dont get me wrong I enjoyed combat in the orginials but with I dont think combat was Fallout's (1 and 2) greatest strength. That always was in its story and ability to be such a rich enviroment for different experiences.
Fallout 3 takes this to a first person view which in my opinion is a better way of showing combat. VATS helps to make that combat more than just quick aiming and gunning.
• Ambiance is still there, the background of this game I feel is still Falloutmcdonis wrote:
• Enjoyable and fun when using VATS
---So far there's been maybe 20 fights I've done without VATS - I think VATS is the only thing that makes FO3 tolerable for me as far as combat goes.
• Open ended you can go anywhere and do just about anything
---This is the only thing I've ever really liked about Bethesda, or sandbox games in general - I have always been that guy who wanted to get 100% on any RPG I've ever played, and finding all the little easter egg places has always been a big part of that.
• Music seems to fit game and is enjoyable, nice variety between the enclave station, GNR and the classical station
---the radio, you mean? The ambiant (spl?) music is usually pretty terrible, but I like the old songs they play on your Pipboy radio.
• Size of world feels mostly right, possibly even too big.
---I'd have to disagree, because half of the stuff is just filler.
(quick edit - just read below - seems we agree...sort of.)
Issues\Bugs\bad things
• Unexplained and consistent instability, game can just crash at any time. Sometimes it will just crash in starting the game. (and I just built my system this year it should be able to handle the game)
---I'm playing on the 360 and three times in about 40 hours of gameplay, maybe 50 my Box has frozen up and I have to restart it - thank goodness for autosaving...also, I finally had a sound issue last night where the sound just stopped working completely - took me five minutes or so to realize it wasn't any wires or my TV
• Broken quests like the “head of state� quest that requires quite a bit of messing with just to work right.
---Haven't had this issue yet with any missions - keeping my fingers crossed.
• Breakdancing dead folks
--Nuff said - funny the first dozen or so times, then I just think about poor design.
• Poor stats on armor and weapons. Little difference between using combat armor and power armor,
---I completely agree when it comes to armor - I've noticed almost no difference no matter what kind of armor I'm using...ever. The weapons I disagree though - in fact, I think the damage differences make no sense half the time. My 10mm pistol has about as much effect as a laser pistol, laser rifle, hunting rifle - the only three guns I've really really liked are the combat shotgun, plasma rifle, and 10mm submachine gun - I haven't used heavy weapons at all my first playthrough though.
• Poorly conceived and too short main story line.
• Some areas with no real purpose other than to give you an XP mill or just to fill out the map.
• Illogical dialog, poor story telling. Being able to convince the president to give up just by telling them. “its not right what you are doing�
• PC (player character) getting suck in walls behind objects. Sometimes this happens when a trap detonates and it throws you into a wall or inside an object.
---This just happened last night outside of Fort Constantine - luckily I got out somehow - happened after I got hit with a rocket.
• Objects dropping from the sky. I don’t know why exactly but things seem to be falling from the sky a lot in this game. Especially dead bodies of folks I killed the last time I visited a location dropping from the sky the next time I arrive there.
This kept happening in one spot with a deathclaw - when I'd walk towards him he flew into the air until I passed him, then he's run at me from behind. Didn't matter how long I waited for him to come down since I reloaded a few times to see what happened...
The lack of a good editor: The game has many areas that are just not fully designed or developed. The game has areas of little or no importance that feel thrown in.
Not enough attention to story\plot and the theme behind them.
Yep I am refering to the radio, I hardly notice the ambient music. I dont listen to the songs long (usually just in some towns and while I am in my home) That is probably why I dont get burned out on them. I Like to turn it off when I know I am going to be exploring or doing combat.cazsim83 wrote:• Music seems to fit game and is enjoyable, nice variety between the enclave station, GNR and the classical stationmcdonis wrote:
---the radio, you mean? The ambiant (spl?) music is usually pretty terrible, but I like the old songs they play on your Pipboy radio.
• Size of world feels mostly right, possibly even too big.
---I'd have to disagree, because half of the stuff is just filler.
(quick edit - just read below - seems we agree...sort of.)
Yeah I could kind of understand your confusion by my comments about the size of the game world. What I think they do right is that it does feel like it takes a long time to get to places if you walk from one end of the map to the other. So the distances map wise are probably right. I was afraid that they would screw that part up so it took a second to walk from one end of DC to the other. Its still compressed (especially when you consider where some of the places represent). But when it counts it feels like a fallout type DC. When you are walking on the Mall its believeable as to scale.
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Wolfman Walt
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Devil_Starr666
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SenisterDenister
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johnnygothisgun
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First time I saw something like that it was amazingly jarring. I would have thought nothing else could surprise me, and behold. Half the time it looks like high pressure liquid spray caught in some high-speed winds. Impossible winds.mcdonis wrote: Unfortunately this animation didn’t stop once she was dead and on the ground, it kept running all the way through the whole scene. And in the air as if she was still standing there.
I still enjoy critical laser death. The Star Trek FPSs did it better*, but whatever.
*and like 8 years ago o_O. That is called progress.
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King of Creation
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My copy of Fallout 3 finally arrived after being sent to Thailand and then rerouted again. Installed with no problems, started up with no problems, and now playing with little to no problems. It runs pretty slow on my laptop, but I'm surprised it's running at all considering it doesn't meet the minimum requirements.
I only just got out of the vault and killed some raiders and found a mininuke in an old barn when I accidentally walked off a cliff and died because of the poor frame rate. So then it reloaded to right when I got out of the vault. At that point, I decided to quit and write up these initial thoughts.
As for initial thoughts: What everyone says about the npcs is definitely true. They are lifeless. Their mouths might move when they speak, but the talking heads in Fallout and Fallout 2 had more animation than these people do. They're just robots. Liam Neeson wouldn't even look at me. He kept staring up at the ceiling anytime I would talk to him.
Also, the voice actors are terrible...there's no one with character in their voice. They all just sound like toilet paper commercial actors.
I don't know if i should really comment the technical aspects of the game, because my computer doesn't meet the minimum requirements...actually, it does except for RAM. I have vista 32 with a gig of ram, but min is 2 gigs. Whatever. It's very choppy and some clipping issues, whether those are the result of the game being buggy or my computer, I don't know. Luckily, it only crashes when I exit the program (so far).
As far as gameplay, it's a bit to combatty for me. It's an rpg/shooter so far, definitely not an rpg. The dialogue is mostly terrible, and it's definitely dumbed down. Like a lot of you are saying, there is no need to say "xxxxx xx xx <lie>". We're not 5 years old, we know it's a lie. Also, it's breaking the 4th wall and detracting from immersion. On the same note, saying you need need a lockpick skill of 100 to pick a door is also stupid. We don't need to be hand held the whole time.
Anyways, I'll write more later and start working on an official review.
I only just got out of the vault and killed some raiders and found a mininuke in an old barn when I accidentally walked off a cliff and died because of the poor frame rate. So then it reloaded to right when I got out of the vault. At that point, I decided to quit and write up these initial thoughts.
As for initial thoughts: What everyone says about the npcs is definitely true. They are lifeless. Their mouths might move when they speak, but the talking heads in Fallout and Fallout 2 had more animation than these people do. They're just robots. Liam Neeson wouldn't even look at me. He kept staring up at the ceiling anytime I would talk to him.
Also, the voice actors are terrible...there's no one with character in their voice. They all just sound like toilet paper commercial actors.
I don't know if i should really comment the technical aspects of the game, because my computer doesn't meet the minimum requirements...actually, it does except for RAM. I have vista 32 with a gig of ram, but min is 2 gigs. Whatever. It's very choppy and some clipping issues, whether those are the result of the game being buggy or my computer, I don't know. Luckily, it only crashes when I exit the program (so far).
As far as gameplay, it's a bit to combatty for me. It's an rpg/shooter so far, definitely not an rpg. The dialogue is mostly terrible, and it's definitely dumbed down. Like a lot of you are saying, there is no need to say "xxxxx xx xx <lie>". We're not 5 years old, we know it's a lie. Also, it's breaking the 4th wall and detracting from immersion. On the same note, saying you need need a lockpick skill of 100 to pick a door is also stupid. We don't need to be hand held the whole time.
Anyways, I'll write more later and start working on an official review.
<a href="http://www.duckandcover.cx">Duck and Cover: THE Site for all of your Fallout needs since 1998</a>
This shit is really par for the bethesda course. Those fuckers have been trying to make an RPG that requires absolutely no knowledge of what a role playing game is or what various statistics represent for years and have been mostly successful with the Elder Scrolls franchise, but taking that formula and applying it to a game that was considered to be intelligent among it's peers is sure to displease. Unless of course you either a. enjoy a role playing game that is more like a movie with interactive action and a choice of lines for the main character than a role playing game or b. have not experienced a role playing game that requires one think.King of Creation wrote:Also, it's breaking the 4th wall and detracting from immersion.
Unfortunately for us, we're absolutely fucked out of getting a quality Fallout game now and for all time. Any mmorpg is going to fucking suck (simply because they're not an actual role playing game) and Bethesda hasn't made a single game in their history that wasn't shooting for the highest sales = lowest mental requirements formula and will not in the future, if the regression that they called sequels in Oblivion and Fallout 3 are any indication.
Let us raise our glasses high gentlemen, the dream is truly dead.
Whatever happened to Brian Fargo redoing Wasteland?
"I've decided that if positive affirmations can "cure cancer" then negative affirmations can cause cancer. Chant with me: Fuck you and Die, Todd Howard. Fuck you and Die, Todd Howard. Fuck you and Die, Todd Howard."
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King of Creation
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That didn't last long. Crashed when I was talking to the sheriff in megaton.King of Creation wrote:... and now playing with little to no problems.
...
Luckily, it only crashes when I exit the program (so far).
<a href="http://www.duckandcover.cx">Duck and Cover: THE Site for all of your Fallout needs since 1998</a>
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Devil_Starr666
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Well put.King of Creation wrote: As for initial thoughts: What everyone says about the npcs is definitely true. They are lifeless. Their mouths might move when they speak, but the talking heads in Fallout and Fallout 2 had more animation than these people do. They're just robots. Liam Neeson wouldn't even look at me. He kept staring up at the ceiling anytime I would talk to him.
Also, the voice actors are terrible...there's no one with character in their voice. They all just sound like toilet paper commercial actors.
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Kashluk
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King of Creation
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What's annoying for me is the fact that VATS makes combat harder because the framerate drops to shit and almost freezes everytime.
Also, I absolutely hate the Enclave radio station. If I hear Dixieland one more time, my head will explode.
Also, I absolutely hate the Enclave radio station. If I hear Dixieland one more time, my head will explode.
<a href="http://www.duckandcover.cx">Duck and Cover: THE Site for all of your Fallout needs since 1998</a>
