So I'm asking here rather than the FO3 forum since FO4 is my first FO and I'd like some perspective from you folks that have played them all:

I love FO4- I have an embarrassing amount of time tied up in it and have played it almost exclusively since launch- right up until my 4 month-old PS4 just bricked with the flashing blue light of doom. The 'fix-me" box for the console is still on the way from Sony to send it back for service, so I figure best case, I'm around 2-3 weeks out from having a working PS4 back again.

Rather than doing something productive with my life, I'm tempted to boot the PS3 back up and go pick up a copy of FO3. Looks like I can get the GOTY with all the DLC bundled for $15-20.

Having only played FO4, I'm curious-

*What was better/worse about 3 vs. 4 in your opinion?

*Was 3 just as big a time-sink as 4 has been for most folks?

I was almost ready to start a new plathru in FO4 anyways (and I may not have a choice- can't recover any saved game data and I'm not holding my breath that it will come back with the data on the HD intact), so there's some appeal to me to spending several months in 3 and firing FO4 back up after the DLC and further patches and console mods are out.

*Should I do New Vegas fist ... or after.... or at all?

Really don't know anything about New Vegas and where it falls on the FO spectrum.

Look forward to hearing your opinions-

Curious as to the responses. I recently purchased FONV for $5...

I would recommend skipping Fallout 3 and going straight to Fallout New Vegas. The world design was better, the writing was fantastic as well. The NPC's were actually interesting instead of just relying on character gimmicks. And the world actually felt populated and alive.

Fallout 3 was basically just one vast, empty realm of grey earth with dead trees and monsters. And the story was bland. It wasn't terrible but the writing was on par with that of Oblivion's main quest (the one where you, the hero don't do a damn thing to save the day or fight the super demon trying to take over the world, and instead just leave it to an annoying NPC).

My recommendation is to do FO3 first. I think you will find that having some FO3 in your back pocket when you play FONV will add a little bit to it. (not a lot, but some).

I disagree with skipping FO3. Why?! It is Fallout! It has some elements that are connected with FO4, as well.

I say play 'em all!

Well, FO 3 wasn't a time sink for me at all, I managed to play through the game once lol. It's a good game, but it just didn't engage me like NV or Fallout 4. it really pales in comparison to Fallout 4. Now Fallout NV, I played for over 700 hours. It has a high re-play value, because there are different paths to take and the ending is completely different each time.

And remember, your actions have true consequences in the Mojave...

I also feel that Fallout NV is a more mature game, with some interesting political agendas. I just love traveling across the Mojave. Make sure you get all 4 DLCs as well and then play them in this order:

Honest Hearts

Old World Blues

Dead Money

Lonesome Road

I usually make my way to the Northern Passage around lvl 10, since you can pick up some nice gear in Honest Hearts.

Either way, NV is one of my top 5 favorite games of all times. Lonesome Road affected me so much, I even wrote a fan fic about its main character and I've NEVER written any fan fic LOL

I enjoyed both Fallout 3 and Fallout: New Vegas, but for different reasons. I enjoyed the action in 3 more, but I enjoyed the writing more in NV. Both have good points and bad, and both are worth playing.

Since there are no real references to New Vegas in Fallout 4, I'd suggest playing Fallout 3 first, and if you still have time before you get your system back, then tackle New Vegas.

NV was my introduction to the series, but I was constantly getting pwned by Cazadores and other creatures because I assumed wrongly that creatures would level with me, as they do in Oblivion, when in fact they are specific to regions.

Anyway, I was a huge Elder Scrolls fan before I discovered FO, by my cousin was the other way around and he recommend playing FO3 first. What I found doing that was that I developed a good feel for the world and its various kinds of inhabitants, so that when I then went back to NV I knew better what I was doing and that game would go on to become one of my favourite ever. Why? Because it's an all-around richer experience, with a whole lot more crafting options (than FO3) in particular.

Some things to note, though, in terms of gameplay differences with FO4:

No sprinting.

In FO3, no true iron sighting, either, though this is in NV.

No timed quests, and nobody but nobody will give you a quest without you initiating a conversation with them first.

You can acquire personal living/storage spaces, but don't expect anything like the FO4 settlement system.

Lots of other things, but the one final thing I will say is that NV does not perform as well on the PS3 as it does on the Xbox, especially late in the game when the save files have gotten up around 9-10 MB.

Personally I do Dead Money as soon as I can because, yeah, "the hardest part is letting go." You know what I'm talking about.

Now, I do agree with you there. It would be fun for a new Fallout player to go back in time, so to speak, and experience like Lyon's Brotherhood and check out all those references to the Capital Wasteland.

After I played NV, I wanted to learn about the past of the various factions and actually bought and played Fallout 1 and 2.

Ain't that the truth!? Although, when it comes to DM, I have no problem letting that one go...

Sprinting is a leveled perk. I played all the Fallout 3D games without ever using VATS and iron sights works fine, as do scoped weapons. Now the shooter part is not nearly as good as F4.

I don't understand what you're saying. There's no sprinting in either FO3 or NV -- by which I mean, the ability to expend action points to run faster than the fastest you can go just by pushing forward on a joystick (or R on your keyboard, I guess, but the OP said he was on PS3, thus), which was only introduced by BGS in Skyrim (where sprinting drains Stamina).

There is a perk in NV (Travel Light) that increases your max speed by 10%, but that isn't what I was referring to.

There's also no iron sights in FO3, though scopes work as you'd expect. Everything else is essentially hip firing.

Do play F3 and NV, they both stand up today as great games.

Better in 3 than 4? Hard to say, I liked having more settlements in F3 to interact with but I enjoy building my own in F4. Gunplay is better in F4 but F3 had better random encounters. F3 you dont have to follow a dog for a whole mission but you do have to follow a dippy scientist (Maddison Lee who is also in F4) for a bit. In both F3 and F4 your father/son respectively is at best a moron and worst a bit of a git. What can I say, its very subjective but I love both games.

Big a time sink? Definately. F4 is going to eclipse my F3 total play time though I was playing F3 a few weeks before F4 came out so its definately as addictve.

Do F:NV after, its actually a more linear experience but it hides it well and still has plenty to do. I prefer the game mechanics of F:NV but the story of F3 if that makes sense.

Enjoy the Capital Wasteland and Nevada, they are both great games.

Are there any aspects of FO3/NV that are still just broken as all hell even after all these years that I should just outright avoid, like the current state of level 4 merchants in FO4?

Fallout 3 was my introduction to the series and I found it an amazing game. I'm sort of jealous of you. You get to experience the intro for the first time. Out of everything I liked about FO3, its intro sticks out the most in my mind. I had no idea what to expect from the game or the world it was set in. And seeing it all for the first time was amazing.

Now none of this bothers me as I love current and old generation games. But the controls and graphics are dated. This bothers some people but again, not me. I still play Nintendo games.

Playing FO 3 now after so much time in FO4 will bring to life for you back stories or things you heard about. The whole BoS from the Capital Wasteland thing. MacCready when he was mayor of Little Lamp. (or little light) And of course the best wasteland DJ of all time.

Only thing that comes to mind is what I said about NV specifically on the PS3 -- once the save files are large enough, the game can start to experience some seriously brutal framerate drops. I mean, even just turning around can seem to take forever. It also kinds of comes and goes, which adds to the frustration because, like a standard issue CTD, you can never predict it.

This has never happened to me on my 360 version, I'm pleased to say, but it is why I bought an Xbox One to play FO4 on (I prefer Macs for my general computing needs and thus don't have a PC that can play the latest generation of BGS games).

Man it is so weird how these games hit everyone differently. I thought fo3 was much better than NV and fo4. I played fo3 for over 1600 hrs and 11 different characters. NV could barely hold my attention, except for house and the khans it was a yawnfest to me. Fo4 has been ok but I'm somewhat biased as my experience w fo4 has been VERY buggy. Much more buggy than fo3 or NV. Id play fo3 over either of the other 2 hands down, no contest.

Totally. FO4 "wins" for me on the settlement options alone, though I'm not going to pretend the learning curve there isn't preposterously steep, and yeah, the game is definitely buggier than the other two on balance in its current state. I also really don't think much of the Preston Garvey experiment, and it won't surprise me in the least when we get news of a Fallout MMO, which my initial feelings on the prefixed-based leveling system for creatures and mods for armour and weapons were that they were there to prepare us for the eventual MMO, much the same way that settlement management was introduced in Fallout Shelter to prepare us for FO4 (or so I imagine).

Personally I love Fallout 3 and I would definitely recommend going back and playing it. It'll give you some background on a few characters and factions you've met in Fallout 4. NV had good writing, but I didn't enjoy it as much as 3. The exploration was not as good, and the Mojave wasteland felt very lifeless--you can wander across the whole map and not have any random encounters, so it was less fun to just strike out in a random direction and see what you could find. FO3 has a more similar tone to FO4, so it might feel more natural as a follow-up to playing FO4.

3 is, imo, the 2nd best Fallout game, period. It may be a bit lacking story wise, but once you get the "find your dad" thing out of the way, it picks up nicely. Expect to use VATS much more often, as the gun play is a little rough, but it has some very fun and interesting quests and locations, like Andale (Annandale in rl) and The Republic of Dave.


Itso best to play NV after you tackle 3, as it will feel more natural afterwards. It is alot more buggy and less on the exploration aspect as enemies are regional, unlike 3's leveled enemies. NV has some great characters and my favorite quests besides The Silver Shroud, Come Fly With Me. Not gonna spoil that beauty.

You get a bit better accuracy even with pistols by using the sights. You may be right about sprint. My F3 game is modded a lot.

If you really, really love 4, I'd play FO3 before NV as it's much more like it. In 3 you get the same nuked city ruins surrounded by wasteland. You also get a more dense world that your free to explore as you wish. With new Vegas it's mostly empty desert, and the practically undamaged Vegas . you also can't just wander out into the desert, as you'll get dead very quickly and very easily. New Vegas is a lot more talking and a lot less action than fo3. If that's your thing, play it first. But otherwise, you'll probably be happier with three. The main quest in 3 is pretty weak, but it has some really good side quests.