NV had 60k lines of recorded dialog for all NPCs in the game combined.

Fo4 has 13k just for the PC....

Yeah people don't understand how much 13k lines is. It is insane. And Todd Howard said in one interview "13k lines so far, they will record more". I mean that is commitment to voiced protagonist.

It wouldn't matter even if it were 200,000 lines for the protagonist. The fact that we only get two to three word summaries of those lines to choose from ruins it.

You saw the demo. There's no indication of the emotion your character is going to deliver their line with. There's also very little in terms of what each choice represents. GET FOOD? Really? That's an option? Are you commanding that NPC to get food? Intimidating them? Enslaving them? Oh, no, you're just politely accepting their offer to get you food. The [censored] is that?

They splurged all that time (over 2 years) and money on voice acting, but it seems like the actual dialogue choices were implemented in a matter of days.

First of all Codsworth is asking him as part of his protocol if he wants food. The Protagonist is shocked after coming out of the Vault 200 years after and not knowing what the world is like anymore or where his family is and he is like "Food, yeah sure." It is a reaction based on his state of mind, clinging to something familiar. Anyways that is one line of dialogue, and the dialogue tree did have relevant options in what we saw in the demo. Plus you don't know if that is the final version, maybe we will get full lines on the PC. You know, context to the story and all that fun stuff.

First of all they sold over 30 millions copies of Skyrim, so they got the money to do this without detracting it from any other part of the development. The lines would have been written anyway, they are just voiced now. Budget is budget no matter how you see it. They wouldn't have used any more money on any other aspect of the game. It is just silly how people attack this system without having played around with it to see how it actually works. 10 lines in the E3 demo is enough to convince you that the 12990 other lines are BS.

Emils still lead writer, I will remain skeptical that the dialoge will be good, no matter how much it is.

Fun fact Bethesda had more time to record dialogue for the PC than Obsidian had to develop Fallout: New Vegas.

That makes sense, Obsidian is a mercenary dev whose existence relied on turning out quick cash-in sequels to other people's products. Even Alpha Protocol was nothing more then a Mass Effect cash in.

They logically wouldn't have a lot of time.

Saddening but true, Fallout 4 will have approximately 13,000 lines dialogue, all of which are terrible

They sold 30 million copies of Skyrim.

Skyrim did not have a voiced protagonist.

Why does Fallout 4 need a voiced protagonist?

A Mass Effect cash in is a curious remark, especially considering the recent "advancements" in Fallout 4...

That is what you took from my post? Simple turning of the words on me? The 30 million gave them the oppurtunity to try something new and seeing as Fallout is not the same franchise as TES, they can now do something different. Is it what you want? No. Is it what they want to do? Yes. So we will see how it unfolds, we know almost nothing about the story or the dialogue except for 4 - 5 small dialogue wheels from an E3 demo and people are going amok with it. It is kind of funny.

Alpha Protocol played exactly like Mass Effect.

Fo4 does not.

I'm guessing you haven't actually played Alpha Protocol?

I wouldn't have cared if Alpha Protocol did flagrantly copy Mass Effects gameplay, the combat would have been better.

Alpha Protocol could have benefited from some of ME's companion commands... or companions in general.

Also you've played Fallout 4?

While on the case of Fallout 4, the dialogue system is flagrant rip-off of ME's.

The Fallout franchise has seen silent protagonists since it's inception. It's part of the Fallout franchise, just like the Brotherhood of Steel, Super Mutants, Ghouls, Enclave, etc.. It's what sets the franchise apart from other franchises out there.

Obviously Skyrim did extremely well, otherwise they wouldn't have been able to even develop the Fallout 4 that you saw at E3. And Skyrim had a silent protagonist. So why change that? Yeah, I get it, Skyrim is a TES game and Fallout 4 is a Fallout game.. but both share the idea that the PLAYER is supposed to be the protagonist. You're not supposed to be controlling a Commander Shephard or Geralt of Rivia, you're supposed to be immersing yourself in the game by making the character an extension of yourself.

How is that possible if the character doesn't sound the way I imagine it to sound? How is that possible if I don't even know what my character is going to say when I pick an option in the dialogue wheel?

Having a voiced protagonist works for many games, but it has no place in the Fallout franchise.

Why not? It doesn't need one, but then again there are lots of things Fo4 has that it doesn't need. Let them try something new instead of rehashing the same old silent protagonist routine again.

If it svcks, the older titles exist.

I have actually.

One of the worst and most buggy products Obsidian has ever released, which is saying something given their track record of broken and buggy releases.

Letting them try something new is great and all, but not when most other games do it and not when it doesn't fit in with the franchise. Do you really want to see a day when nearly every AAA title is nearly identical because every developer wants to cater to casual players who basically want the game to play itself for them?

Yea, 13K dialogue recorded really doesn't make me feel better about voiced protagonist, all it does it make me feel skeptical even more. I don't think this was the right direction for fallout and I hope bethesda never attempts it again.

People really don't like change, do they?

It's buggy, I'll gladly concede that and it was mediocre in a lot of aspects, but as a narrative experience it's better than pretty much any game (some exceptions obviously) IMO.

It's been a really talked about thing on the forums, a lot of people aren't all that happy about it.

Change is not good or bad. It depends solely on the situation.

Bethesda adding a voiced protagonist? Bad.
Bethesda adding more customization? Good.
Bethesda removing skills? Bad.
Bethesda allowing us to build settlements? Good.

See? It's not hard. Imagine Bethesda changing the Fallout franchise so that it's about linear games with a closed world and a set protagonist that we can't customize. That's change. Is it good change? No, it's obviously not. But there are people who want that. Do you think Bethesda should give it to them the same way they're giving a voiced protagonist to the Mass Effect/Witcher 3/Dragon Age: Inquisition crowd?

I found it to be ultimately generic and derivative spy stuff seen in basically every spy movie ever.

We will never agree anyway, and i am glad they included a voiced protagonist, but you have a good point so i will concede to that.

Don't let your disdain for a certain feature misguide you into believe that casuals control what devs do. We're not playing FO in the 90's - the amount of people playing games has exploded over the past 25 years.

Anyways, I welcome the addition. Having played TES from Morrowind onward and Fo3/FNV, it's refreshing to see and hear a character that talks for a change. It creates a more enjoyable experience for me, because even if I spend the first 30 minutes creating a backstory for my character I never make it deep into the game with that same backstory intact. It's forgotten.

Now, before you say that having a backstory matters for you and "many" others, I know. This is a point on which we'll never agree on and I'm ok with that. I can only encourage you to use the RP convention of pretending that your character is a "born again christian" after leaving the vault.