So, I played FO1 and FO2 when I was a teenager and I loved them both. I also loved playing X-COM. They were all very difficult and had me reloading pretty frequently.

I do not recall ever replaying any of them. I'm sure that was partly due to my temperment at the time, but I think another big reason is just that I didn't enjoy them as much as I do FO3 and NV.

I tried to play FO1 on Steam right before FO3 came out. I left the vault, died on my way out of the cave filled with rats, reloaded, made it out, made my way to a city, (Necropolis I think) got in trouble by touching something that apparently the ghouls didn't want me to touch, got killed (probably the 9th time for the game that took about 45 mintues) and I quit. I couldn't take it anymore. The game was designed to run on a 486 or less right? Why was everything taking forever? I'd click a spot to go to, and the little animation would take forever to get there. I was running a dual core, 3 ghz machine with more ram than I'd ever dreamed of back when FO1 came out and a videocard that had not yet been conceived or dreamt of. Why was it as slow as it was back then?
I couldn't "get into" my character because I had no understanding of why my actions were having such negative consequences. Everything was slow, which is fine for Chess, but not for a one player game where I am not building an empire. In Civ, I have to make decisions, tons of them, across a turn. I get why that should be slow. This shouldn't be.

Another note. I have nothing against isometric gaming, though I think it would be hard to implement for the console and make fun. That said, I can't handle turn based RPG's anymore. Baldur's Gate et al, got it right when they made the action "pauseable" but combat was otherwise real-time.
The first time I played a RTS, I couldn't play for the life of me. I still can't. I don't like it. That said, turn-based RPG's, same thing now. I can't play it. I never enjoyed the final fantasy games, and one big reason was the turn based combat. As I said, I loved FO1 and 2. FO2 was hysterical, though it seemed to take away from it's believability. FO1 will remain a fond memory, but I can't go wandering past memory lane and into, "try it again road" because the gameplay just doesn't do anything for me.

Maybe I've been spoon fed for too long. But I like that games will tell me when someone's going to be pissed when I grab something. Maybe I'm lazy, but for me, having to reload often takes me out of the game, even if a load is fast.

I have not properly played FO1 or 2 in over 10 years now. I never did replay them, I'm not entirely sure why, though I played FO3 3 times, and will probably play FONV 4 or more times (on 2nd play-through now). I wonder if it was the fact that they were so slow.

I guess I just wonder, am I the only fan of the originals that can't play them now? Who prefers FO3 and NV?
On that note, I am definitely in the group that prefers NV over 3.

About the slow gameplay thing. Was your character actually running or walking everywhere? There's a Preferences screen in which you can adjust things to speed up (combat) gameplay. Just select Always Run and move the combat speed meter all the way to the right and gameplay will be significantly faster.

Me personally, I highly prefer FO 1 and 2. I played FO 3 extensively, but found out for myself that the things I liked the most about the originals, were not implemented well into 3 or even hardly noticeable as worthwhile. I liked the storytelling, the dark humor, the choice and consequence and the fact that if you made a certain decision it could come back at you much later in the game. These games didn't give you a warning because they wanted you to accept that you maybe have made a mistake or made you think about what would have happened if you chose a different path. In FO 3 the pinnacle of gameplay is exploration, the ability to go wherever you want and the 'total' freedom of following your quest or wander around doing whatever you please. For me, that wasn't what Fallout was about, so I played it through for 2 times and then put it aside. I can't touch it anymore, I'm turned off after about half an hour. That's the reason why I didn't buy NV, Beth has taken this franchise in a certain direction, and that direction is not one I feel comfortable with.

Its kinda like the old NES era games. Metroid and The Legend Of Zelda were some of my old favorites, but trying to play them now is a chore. Games were more unforgiving then, and making it to the end of them was a real challenge. Hell now you get an achievement for spelling you name right. Sometimes you just cant go home.

Yeah you're right I am so glad Bethesda completely changed the game. I have played both fallout and fallout 2 and as good as they were not only were they boring at times but it got really
frustrating. I mean I would die instantly in fast travel over and over and over. I don't want to be forced to attack something like in the old fallouts if I see a death claw and all I have is a spear I should
have the option to flee not just run away 5 steps . I like fallout 3 because its fun from beginning to end.

Being lazy and only reading the title: Cause Fallout 3 did not feel like a Fallout game.

Which just might have something to do with it having been made completely by "outsiders." While the precise makeup of the crews did vary, 1, 2, and New Vegas all had at least some overlap in who worked on it. 3 was done entirely by Bethesda folks who made it glaringly obvious they knew squat about Fallout aside from how to do a Fallout/Fallout 2 mash-up and try to call the recycled mess a plot. :shrug:

Because it's closer to the originals (which are great and way more entertaining than 3 or NV, IMO) storywise and by RPG elements.

I hear things like this said, but it must be my distance from the originals then. Because between the humor and the setting, I found what I had missed from FO1 and 2. I felt like Bethesda really had enjoyed the originals, had paid attention at least to the setting, and made it work well in a place they knew. Hell, I'm from the DC area, so seeing places I live near was awesome!
I agree that the plot wasn't great, in some ways was even laughable. But I was so drawn in by the setting, ambiance, and side stories, that it didn't bother me. Until I tried to play evil and found that that was virtually impossible. That was disappointing.

The general gameplay hasn't improved much from Fallout 3 (while it should've), but everything else has moved closer to the originals - themes, quality of writing, importance of skills/stats (though not enough), the setting and its internal consistency. These make a big difference.

Right. Yeah, I see where it lacked in RPG and in the story, the format grabbed me far more thorougly. That said, I still remember a line from FO2 that I still find amusing, but can't remember any off hand from FO3.

Fat guy in a retaurant, when clicked, "There's a skinny person inside me just *screaming* to get out! Serves him right, standing so close to the buffet table..."

:shrug: Different strokes? I never felt any closer to Fallout/Fallout 2 with 3 than "Well, they're trying like hell to mimic it." Perhaps they mimicked too closely? Too often I found msyelf mumbling in the back of my head, and predicting what was going to happen next. "Ah yes, 'Howdy stranger I'm the town sheriff.' How long before I have to save his ass from someone?" Then I chat with Burke, rat him out, and guess what? Yep- "Okay Killian, let me save you from Gizmo's thug...."

Then I ran into things like the *cough* "Brotherhood of Steel," or at least some band of bleeding-heart imposters in Power Armor claiming to be the BoS.

I dunno...it just felt more like..."a caricature of Fallout" to me.

There, you've proved it now. It's just been TOO long since I played them and my teenage brain simply didn't keep a lot of details in advlthood. I didn't remember anything about the BOS other than the fact that they went after tech and wore power armor. The fact that they were a$$h()les was completely forgotten. I didn't remember my lore, I had to reread the plot of the first. That's it then. My memory of the games just didn't keep. I don't know why. I remember StoneKeep with far more clarity, and I played that when it first came out, in 95 I think.

Maybe if I'd remembered the originals more clearly, or played them more recently, I wouldn't have enjoyed FO3 so much. But I didn't. So I enjoyed over 300 hours of Fallout mimicry, and I've enjoyed another 120 so far with a, "closer to the originals" simulacrum.

What annoyed me were the design of a lot of things.
Ranging from small like that vault doors are actually opened outwards not inwards, to that super mutants are not yellow ogres out for flesh.
I know that design artists should be allowed creativity but when they change a ton of things like that then everything just seems out of place.

You know I actually liked the new doors, I never got how they pushed themselves outwards in F and F2, I know in F3 they roll themselvs but you can see them getting pushed into place.

There is a reason for the mutants on the East coast being all yellow. It's because Vault-Tec couldn't get the same strain as the military of FEV. Also i think that the Vault doors from FO3 and NV were changed because the original vault doors were to bland they were all flat and grey with no colors or other marks of age. Also i think that the reason that the originals were harder was that no mater how good you as a player were your character was still limited by the turn based system.

Limited how, exactly?

The game was more pure RPG in that you had stats, and you "rolled". You succeeded, or you failed. Player's aiming skills had no bearing for instance. I think that's what was meant.

Yeah because more was based on character skill than player skill. Example: An expert FPS player would find New Vegas way too easy because he can hit targets at the edge of the distance limit with a pistol. In the original if your character wasn't built as a guns character you wouldn't be hitting the enemy constantly.

I don't know that that's quite accurate. I'm no FPS expert, but I have good aim, and with a 38 skill in guns, sometimes I hit those targets, and sometimes I repeatedly MISS. Just last night I was trying to hit a target that wasn't all that far away, and I could not for the life of me hit him. I had to get pretty close before I hit him. I've had that happen a fair amount. Not as bad as in FO1 or 2 though. In those, a 38 skill pretty well meant that no matter how close, you'll only hit 38% of the time, or so it felt.

For me its because Fallout 3 falls short in many ways. Its to black and white. Not really that advlt. The story just seems like a rehash of FO1 and FO2. No multiple endings that let me know what happens so my actions have no meaning. Story writting was not that great. I can become a god to fast. I am not that challenged because all enemies are not as good or equal to me. Many quests felt cut short. No traits no damage threshold which made power armour a joke.

True, but that has nothing to do with the turn-based system. It has everything to do with the RPG game mechanics which are, in this case, dependant on stats, calculations and a bit of luck.

While that does not require a turn based system, a FPS *does* depend on the players skills, ability, visual acquity, hand-eye coordination and reflexes. Which is why they implemented VATS, to help level that playing field a bit for those who were not great at FPS. I'm not bad, but by no means do I play COD against human foes or on Ultra-Hard (whatever the levels are). I'm fairly good with aim, though not the best with cover. My wife on the other hand tends to not aim as well as I do, so she LOVES VATS.

All the FPS stuff isn't good for stat based RPG's. Mainly because they either have very little effect on what your character can do, Or they hamper you so your character would under perform his abilites. AKA doesn't matter if you have max gun skills character wise if your no good at putting the cursor on enemies. Or like in Oblivion where you could play and beat the easy minigames and open up VH locks with only like 5 skill. Or Hit targets at a hundred miles away with a bow if you had 5 bow skill.

You also get the ridiculous "magic ammo" mechanic like you see now in OB FO3 and in NV. Where your skill determines the damage of the bullets/arrows. So some how if you get a perfect head shot with 25 skill you do less damage then some one with 100 skill even though your using the same gun and same ammo.

Because some people refuse to change, they changed from Turn Based to FPS and............ the flamewars back in 2008,,,,,, terrible terrible damage

Most fans of Fallout would be the first to tell you that graphics do not matter. Story and characters are what is important and they are right. I love the Originals and I love New Vegas.