Yes.

The ramifications of their actions can lead to a surprise; especially if they cannot anticipate it.

**That is unless all surprise is ruined by expressly foreshadowing the ramifications; making it impossible not to anticipate them.

In Fallout, a new player can find the water chip and take it home to save their people...

This wasn't necessarily an evil intent... but it was them disabling a functioning water purifier.

To be honest, I've play FO3 and FONV so many times, I just skip the texts to get to the options. You only really need to go through the dialogue a few times if you've played the game a lot. And I think that's what Pete was going for...

I'm with you on that thought. All I know I haven't played FO4 yet, but it seems a few already have played it, apparently as it seems, to them, this game svcks.

That sentence shocked me coming from someone who is paid to work on Fallout.

Not wanting to follow the dialogs is like not wanting to play at all on these kinds of games.

What? No...the player had the option to repair the system so Necropolis could get clean water without needing the chip. It was expressly stated by the ghoul residents that taking the water chip would [censored] them over without an operating water pump.

Welcome to the internet.

Absolutely. I understand the comment to mean that you don't end up like in Dragon Age: Origins where if you wanted your character to end up with Alistair you effectively had to game the system by finding out from your friends the precise way to answer completely unrelated questions in order to put your character on that path. I had to replay fifteen hours of the game to get to that point, too. That to me isn't "playing a game", that's needless timewasting.


That's a plot twist - a completely different situation in my book. Plenty of Bethesda games have plot twists.

One comment I haven't seen raised is that Pete will have already played the game about 50 times by now. I mean, who only plays the game once? They're designed for multiple replays, which means multiple times of hearing the same piece of dialogue over and over. Even if the dialogue is Shakespearean in its elegance, you are going to reach the point where you think, "Yeah, yeah, you want me to retrieve the box. Enough already!" and skip it. That's a pretty basic feature in any game, let alone one you've already played before, so I really don't understand why people would assume that it's any reflection on the quality of the dialogue.

It's been implied at least once or twice in this thread...but even then people need something to bust out their pitchforks.

I feel that Skyrim should've had "Get to the point, already!" dialogue options. It's not that I'm impatient, it's just NPCs tend to go on and on while putting you on the railroad.

NV was better in that regard, although the first conversation in OWB is too long.

There are plenty of dialogue trees in games that already allow skipping:

• Sure, tell me more...
• Give me the highlights...
• Enough! Taste my shotgun...

This mechanism makes for better game-play.

I have a hard time seeing it that way. Basically it was an isolated choice, one that didn't matter until after you had completed the game. The player either discovered the chip and took it home, discovered it and realized necropolis would die without it; or was told they would by the ghouls that were afraid the PC would take the chip and leave them to die of thirst.

Either they found the parts and fixed the pump, were told about the pump ~looked for the parts then fixed it; or chose not to fix it (whether or not the found the parts)... or they missed the pumps entirely and had no use for the parts if they found them.



I think the vault dweller showing the Lieutenant where Vault 13 was, was a plot twist; one that ended the game on the spot.


Yes they have the option, but they have to know about it. It is possible not to know about it, and take the chip.

Another example: Originally there was an option to hire a water caravan to deliver enough water for [1000?] people in the vault for three months... That's what? 90,000 gallons? Lets say half that. 45,000 gallons of water making a bee-line for a concealed vault in the mountains. In the original game, this alerted the Master's army, who were (of course) looking for vaults. It gave them more time to hold out (having water), but it cut short the time before the vault was found out; and invaded.

There's nothing to misinterpret. If he only mentioned Bethesda, there'd be doubt if he thinks their dialogues are poor or he just prefers action to dialogues in general. But he followed with Naughty Dog and now everything's clear. I just don't know why he decided to remind the media just how bad his company's writing is... Everyone knows it, but c'mon, thats not something you want to advertise.

Well...we all know that the only thing that can make Fallout 4 disappointing is it's writing.

But i really expect them to learn something about writing from Obsidian with their New Vegas.

If it won't improve, i will be surprised and frustrated.

FO4 will be disappointing to me if the PC is an empty shell; (much like the power armor itself). If all the PC is in the game is player-placeholder, then I don't see any roleplaying opportunities coming from that. I see what highly reminds me of https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TMPkCKgeguQ in more ways than is comfortable.

I think this sums it up nicely.

What, really? I enjoyed every second of it, too funny to skip.

And he also said that he's "playing other stuff" and wanting to skip their dialogue, too. That while playing other games (not FO3 or 4), his desire to skip the dialogue makes him miss the FO4 feature that just lets him walk away from a convo. So, not just Beth games.

(Also, aren't Naughty Dog games, like Uncharted, very "cinematic" and linear? With small casts of major characters that you get to know/connect with via the cutscenes/etc? So a much more focused kind of storytelling than Beth's - and many other companies' - non-linear, wander around and have relatively static interactions, style of gameplay? If that's the case, I can definitely see ND games having an advantage vs. the ADD gamer, even if Beth's dialogue was written better. Much more like "playing a movie".....)

edit: I mean, I've never played a ND game (except for a short Uncharted demo), but I do know that I find the conversations in, oh, Mass Effect, to be much more "dynamic" than the ones in OB/SK/FO3. Because they're little "scenes", with camera angles, and the characters moving around the room & interacting with things, etc. Little bits of drama, rather than just a dialogue box and a talking head. (And also, again, because they're in a more coherent, organized story....) So, sure - they're both "talk to NPC, pick dialogue options", but they're very different kinds of experiences. So I can definitely see different kinds of gamers being more or less enthralled by the different styles - I know that the "I want to play MY character"/anti-voice crew certainly prefer the less cinematic approach because it limits their freedom/imagination/etc.)

I've played both Arena and Daggerfall extensively, and that is not what I took from those games. They're open-ended RPGs, the focus on implementing a very large interactive world for the player to discover. The fact that they're games have a few flaws doesn't take away from that, but they are flaws nonetheless.

You're trying to downsize the scope of their games to make it unimportant to discuss those flaws relating to writing and dialog, and it simply makes no sense. Every game has flaws.

As for the rest, you could be right lol. I mean you might be, I really don't know. All I'm saying is that it does confirm what I see as a trend in their games, but if I'm wrong, and I hope I am, then more the merrier.

Too long for 20 minute play sessions.

I can wander out a bit in Oblivion and Skyrim, or play a Spyro level in that time.

I'm not really getting that impression at least from this thread, seems like a pretty civil discussion here.

20 minute play sessions? You mean that you play only 20 minutes every time you open a game?

For once I actually agree with you

I have, and I can't recall a single choice that didn't have an obvious outcome.

>Take the water chip without repairing the pump = Necropolis dies of dehydration.
>Take the water chip while repairing the water pump = They survive and do fine.

>Save Tandi = Shady prospers and eventually becomes the NCR.
>Don't save Tandi = Aredesh leads Shady.
>Get both killed = Without leadership the town eventually gets destroyed by raiders.

>Killian takes control of Junktown = place becomes fair and safe.
>Let Gizmo take control = He becomes a power hoarding ass.

>Kill the raiders = They stop messing with people.
>Don't kill the raiders = They terrorize people for years to come.

>Tell people to deliver water to your Vaullt = people find out about it faster.

Seriously, all of these are by the book, stock standard, RPG outcomes. Fallout 2 was even worse about it in cases like New Reno's gang war.

Sometimes that's all some people get the chance for. A quick go while waiting for dinner, before heading out somewhere etc.

Sometimes, I can't just sit and play for hours on end.

The pain that is real life.

Usually in those moments I go into these forums or watch some YouTube videos. But hey, that's me.