How does everyone else feel about this? I'm kind of bummed you can't build a relationship with a particular faction and be bad with another. I wonder what this means for the game.

says who?

it mean nothing, bc joining one faction probably will close another. Nothing new here.

For starters, Fallout never had joinable factions. NV had sides you could support, but you never actually joined those sides.

HOWEVER... The achievements confirm that there actually are three joinable factions: Minutemen, Railroad and BoS (not sure if they are mutually exclusive). So I am not sure how correct your spoiler is.

You can join factions, at least. You just don't have a tab, at least I don't think you have a tab, indicating your reputation with them. Factions and the faction system are, seemingly, pretty much like Skyrim now.

This. U still have factions but there isnt a level. seriously on Fallout NV feel more like a MMO faction system and i didnt like it much.

Another thing I'm glad is gone.

Just saw on my timeline there was no faction system indicating rep and etc wouldn't be there. Sorry if that's wrong. Just would be very bummed if it turns out you just interact individually and one has no effect on the other.

Not true. In the first Fallout, Fallout 3, and New Vegas you could join the Brotherhood of Steel. You could also join the Slaver, NCR Rangers, and any of the New Reno families in Fallout 2. And of course, the Kings in New Vegas. You could technically count becoming a citizen of Vault City in Fallout 2 is similar to joining them.

well here we can still technically join factions, what they remove, is the level of reputation.

So we can do the equivalent of joining the Dark Brotherhood, assassinating the Emperor, and then joining the Empire side in the civil war?

Nice.

The Empire-side hired the assassination so there is nothing strange there. Empire-side in CW is fight for the Empire, not for one Emperor.

I hope we wouldn't be able to get all the join faction achievements in one playthrough. I really like the idea of a skyrim system.

^This. I can still support the Empire but not its Emperor, since the Emperor might not have the Empire's interest at heart or might improve the Empire were he dead. As in Mede II's case.

yes, sadly, its looks like its just 4 degrees, from enemy neutral, friendly ally.

One nice thing in Oblivion was the reputation web.

yeah i not so sure i agree with u, on Single player game i hate grinding for faction to unlock cool stuff.

Nothing wrong with short and sweet and too the point.

In New Vegas I got a rank with the NCR that was...Well-Meaning Mischeif Maker or something like that, and I was all "What does this mean exactly?" I mean, the NCR wasn't shooting at me. I could still pick up NCR quests. So what did this status with them entail exactly?

Nah, I prefer to cut and true Enemy-Neutral-Friendly-Ally scale. It's a simple enough system to allow for enough complexity without convoluting the narrative.

*sigh*

The more I learn, the more dumbed down it sounds. I hope that I am wrong, but fear that I am right.

And you could become a citizen in many different ways. Very high speech, passing their citizen test in flying colors if your stats were high enough, forging your citizenship, doing their dirtywork and something else I probably don't remember. So many choices in such an old game. Is it too much to ask for such things?

Then you should read more: there are three joinable factions (http://fallout.wikia.com/wiki/Fallout_4_achievements_and_trophies and achievements hint that maybe Institute could be supported. With that said, last two games did not have joinable factions either so if you did not have a problem with that, I don't see where would the problem be if FO4 did not have joinable factions (which it does have). Can you even dumb down something that was not there?

My personal concerns about this is fact maybe you have to join or be friends with one of the three. All three are somewhat the most annoying people ever for me. Brotherhood uggg I hate them, that hypocrisy. The railroad they are anti human. A group that doesn't have an issue to let people make slaves slaughter people in his face but if a machine is slightly damaged they made an underground movement for them. I prefer saving real people first. An. Minutemen I don't know why but Preston Garvey luck so posh and snob also I am not American so the references are meh I don't care. My hope since 2008 was I will joining The Institute, it will be so cool. And now my dream laying broken on the carpet

well u playing the main story, i have the same problem during NV, i didnt want to join NV or NCR or Legion. But u are force to choose one.

Faction system didn't really matter much

As far as the Institute goes, some of the achievements suggest that the MQ might branch into an anti-Institute and pro-Institute paths after the quest Reunions.

Also, where did you hear that Railroad is anti-human? Is that from some leak because in FO3 they were against human slavery as well.