I get that a lot of you guys who are classic fans adore the lore of this game but I mean seriously why the hell do so many of you put beth down for their writing. I for one actually really enjoyed the games writing and design and imagination that went into it.

I enjoyed the BOS and the enclave. Just because it was not exact lore does not mean it's an utter disgrace. I am sorry to say this but I really don't think that NV writing was any better than FO3's.

I for one prefer FO3.

If it was not thanks to beth you guys would not even get the chance to play fallout again, Unless you want to play FO 1,2 with it's graphics :/. Thanks to beth you guys got to play FO:NV because the brought the franchise back to life!

You guys moan that the enclave and BOS were even in the game but it was a great idea to introduce them to players who started playing with FO3! It gave us a feel of the fallout world.

A lot of you classic fans want the game to be pure rpg, well it wont work anymore because times have changed and people like different things. If it was that much of a bad game (FO3) then it would never of sold as many units as it did nor would it have got as many DL's for it's DLC.

So to you beth I say keep up the great writing, Keep to your style of game play and please make fallout 4 like 3 but with new ideas and updated graphics.

Also to those who say it's not beths game, well it is because they brought the rights to it. Obd would never of been able to make another fallout game if it was not thanks to beth.

If you guys are that bothered then how about you stick to your FO1,2?

Please don't throw us all in one pot - Some of us classic fans like FO3, and defend it (even if the other games are superior IMHO)

True, but there needs to be an amount of respect for the lore. As for that writing charge - Huh? There are examples all around... Its good to see that Obsidian have inherited one of BI's greatest skills, the ability to make a location a compelling chartacer and story (like the Glow was in Fo1, and the vaults shown in new vegas one, especially the sacrifice vault

Good for you.

This is often stated, and often proven to be a load of tosh. Bethesda was the highest bidder, they were not the only one. IIRC Activision put in a bid with the intention of Troika to develop, amongst others. There's also the game we can't mention here.

The Enclave and the BOS aren't the fallout world though. The BOS is a minor faction in FO1 and 2, and the Enclave doesnt appear in FO1 at all, in FO2 they're almost a generic bad guy. If you wanted to get a better "feel" for the fallout world, factions like NCR, The Reno Families and Vault City would have been better choices. The BOS you meet in Fallout 3 aren't even the BOS, they've been disneyafied into a holy order of good guys - and before anyone accuses me of any bias here, you'll find me defending Elder Lyons' choice to help the wastelanders in other threads.

I agree with you on the first point, I think a pure RPG as an A-Grade title with an A-Grade budget is a hard sell these days; However as Telltale have proven it is possible for Genres to come back from the dead (albeit as B-Grade titles) - Sam & Max, Monkey Island and Back to the Future Adventure games.

As for the second, more new ideas would have been a good start. Recycling the Enclave was a really bad idea.


I've already addressed that point - the rumours that Fallout 3 would have never have been made without Bethesda are just that, rumours.

Your last sentance invalidates the good points you've made - you should have left it off.

We put Beth down for their writing because their writing is sub par for the most part. Fairness has nothing to do with it.

If you think Bethesda's writing is good, defend it. Explain why it's good, instead of just stating that you like it. Elucidate on its depth, or its wonderful characters (snerk), or on its worldbuilding, or on any aspect of writing in Fallout 3.

Don't just say "I liked it" because that's as worthless as me saying "I disliked it."

Spoiler: I didn't really dislike Fallout 3. It was pretty good, in fact, and it has several things it does well. Writing, however, is most assuredly not one of these things that it does well.



Enjoying something does not mean that something is good.

Case in Point: I enjoyed Daikatana.



You do realize that there were other companies bidding on the Fallout name, yes? And that without Beth, someone else would've picked up the name?

I can't say what kind of "Fallout 3" we'd have gotten if bethesda was bought out the day before they bought Fallout, but it's not like Beth was the only one out to buy the name.



The problem wasn't that the Brotherhood and Enclave were in the game, it's how they were in the game. That is to say, there was no thought given to why they were in the game. This is symptomatic of the bigger problem, really: The world of Fallout 3 simply did not make sense. It was inherently contradictory.

Clean water was ultrarare, yet people could apparently subsist by begging it. Clean water was ultrarare, yet your first house came with a free robot that could give you five bottles of purified water per day. Tenpenny tower is a settlement of rich people with no means of support. Megaton is a settlement built of scrap metal around a live atomic bomb when there's perfectly livable town nearby.

Burke wants you to blow up the Megaton bomb without even making sure you won't turn him in. Meanwhile, Lucas Simms apparently has a magic karma detector, because he comments on how good or bad you "seem" (read: karma) immediately.

The Enclave not being able to mass purify water when they've got high tech energy weapons and power armor is just another symptom of Bethesda's poor worldbuilding.

It's not an isolated thing here. It's woven throughout the entire game of Fallout 3.



Funny, people are still buying Fallout 1 and 2. Will they continue to do so for Fallout 3, more than a decade after it was released? Perhaps, but I'm dubious. Particularly when they've got New Vegas, which contains almost all of the good parts of Fallout 3 while improving on its flaws, and importing some of the best parts of Fallout 1 and 2.



That logic doesn't really work. It's an appeal to popularity. Fact is that a bad game with excellent marketing can sell in very large quantities. For instance: Halo 2.



What great writing was there in Fallout 3, exactly? I can tick off a small number of things that seemed well written to me, but I'd like the chance to hear your opinion.



Except there were other companies in the bidding for Fallout rights. Bioware was one, IIRC.

Bethesda's writing in my opinion was as said before sub-par. However their effort into the gameworld was unbelievibly immersive, so if the creators of Fallout and the designers of Bethesda were to create a game in cooperation, we would truly have a unique game.

Because I could have done better in 10th grade.

Fallout 3's writing is certainly weak but when taken into context, it's still believable enough as it relates to the main character. However, while Fallout 3 struggled I don't find Bethesda at large to be notoriously bad writers. There were a few quest chains in Oblivion I thought were great.

Bethesda is capable of awesome writing; just take a look at Morrowind which is the weirdest awesomest fantasy RPG on the market.
They're also capable of making blockbuster generic good vs. evil games like Oblivion and Fallout 3.

(Fallout 1, 2, Tactics, 3, and New Vegas fan.)
(Bethesda Fan.)
(Bibliophile/Word Junkie.)



Someone said that if we thought Bethesda's writing was good... defend it.

Well, here's my defense:


Bethesda used to have EXCELLENT writing. Once upon a time, I might even have put them at the front of the list as far as my favorite storytellers went. From Arena to Morrowind, despite the often juvenile quality of some of the in-game written material, the story itself was always one which was entertaining and easy to get into, or avoid, depending on prerogative.

They crafted worlds, and fiction and lore within those worlds, and enraptured their fans in a universe which had not only expansive breadth... but also remarkably immersive depth.

There will always be critics of these games, claiming otherwise... most falsely... others simply not sharing in the opinion of this humble man... but still the case remains that the games were popular because they made the player feel as if they could explore and wander and discover things. Dungeons, relics, ancient evil monsters from which there is no conceivable escape.

They wove all of the classic RPG-style gameplay experience in with their particular brand of fantasy fiction.

What we got in return, was The Elder Scrolls. A series of games which were largely popular with fans of the genre due to the strong story-driven gameplay in conjunction with the sheer amount of crap to actually -do-. One could play the older games for hours... indefinitely even... and not get bored. Even though the randomized dungeon experience grew somewhat tedious, there have been mods created both for Morrowind -and- Oblivion that allowed for the (not dynamic creation, I don't think... but at the very least Construction-Set) creation of similar random dungeon mods.

Obviously, the old concepts were popular.


But alas, the 'Next Generation' came... and all importance on storytelling and creativity went out the window.

Like all disenfranchised young people, the boys and girls of the Next Generation gaming community were loud and obnoxious and sniveling. But unlike the previous generation... which had grown up in a period of time where QUALITY goods were more important than ECONOMICAL and FLASHY... the next generation had been exposed to the NEW reality of commercial advertisemant.

Media... ironically enough... killed the written word.

From the time the first movies came out, people wanted to SEE their books in action. The intellectuals and the scholarly and the educated all ENJOYED reading. They had all been taught the JOYS of a good book and expert wordsmithing. The Next Generation is comprised of groups that can barely SPEAK in words larger than two syllables, much less read or spell. .. people who think the only reason there ever is to read is to learn things (which they resent)... and the largely un-washed masses whom fall between the cracks of learning.

It's not really THEIR fault that companies care more about money than their craft.

It's a sign of our 'disposable times'. Humans seem to have forgotten the meaning of quality.


Look around you, and ask yourself: Do I see anything I would say is of 'great quality' around me?

If so... share!


At any rate, the point comes down to this: Bethesda isn't INCAPABLE of writing.

Parts of the Fallout 3 story were actually GOOD! I -loved- the having a family part. Dad and me, finishing the work my mother lived and died for? That's pretty heavy [censored]. It has all the MAKINGS of a perfectly SOUND and ENJOYABLE storytelling experience. Had it been done right, folks might be saying:

"And really, just the coolest part, is that you start this game off being BORN... and throughout the rest of the first part of the game, you and Dad find yourselves fleeing the vault in an attempt to finish what your mother and father started twenty years ago (or more, most likely.)

Where it goes wrong, is its implementation.

Why? Because in the grand scheme of things that Bethesda needed to get done... writing an engrossing story probably ranks right in there above lunch breaks, trips to the bathroom, and changing the paper towel dispenser.


So in defense: Bethesda isn't doing anything that the rest of the market is going to be doing soon enough... they're caving in to the pressures of the market... and right now, the market is ripe for FLASHY, WATERED-DOWN games which cater to the greatest common denominator.

What that means is, rather than getting a quality game... we get a game which overstretches itself in too many directions to truly do any one of them justice.


It's no excuse.

But it is the sad truth about the gaming industry.

To begin with, a lot of this stuff is subjective. I like Reese's Peanut Butter Cups. I think they're good, in my opinion. I can't stand Eggs Benedict, however. But my dislike doesn't mean that (objectively) it's a "bad" breakfast choice. Anyway, not a whole lot seems to be left unsaid, but to add my own two cents:

I didn't particularly dislike Bethesda's writing in Fallout 3. But it didn't exactly blow me away, either. Every company has their own strengths and weaknesses, etc. Bethesda makes incredibly well-realized worlds, with lots of detail (and which tend to make Bioware's games look spartan in comparison.) But they don't have Ubisoft's knack with animation, and they aren't the best dialog writers I've ever come across, either.

:thumbsup:

Yeah, like was said - Bethesda was simply the highest bidder. There's a common misconception that the franchise was lying dormant and forgotten for decades until Bethesda happened by and decided to revive it. But regardless - it's not much of an argument. To illustrate -

I'm a huge Firefly fan. I just love that show (not that huge a fan of Joss Whedon's other shows - and I've tried to like them on the same level, but I just can't...) I'd love that show to return some day (though I've made peace with the reality that'll never happen, at this point.) But that doesn't mean that I'd consider any return of the franchise to be a good thing. I mean, what if they replaced Nathan Fillion with Barney the Dinosaur, and decided the show should be about competing for the Annual Geese-Juggling championships? It'd be "back," but it wouldn't be a show I'd like. "New" doesn't inherently equate to "good."

There's a good point here, I think. A major purpose of Fallout 3 was to introduce a new audience to the franchise (kind of in the same way Batman Begins started all over with Batman's origins - even though it was like, what, the 7th Batman film by then?) So a lot of the classic tropes were certainly going to need to be re-introduced. They decided to call it Fallout "3," but it really served as a kind of a reboot.

Doesn't mean I have to like it. (Or that it's true - that's, unfortunately, quite a statement to have to prove.) I like what I like. If everyone stopped eating Reese's Cups - it doesn't mean I'd like them any less. And, of course - "bad" is subjective. Sales are objective. Just because some people are critical, doesn't mean much more than that. I'm not that big a fan of the Halo series (just not my cup of tea -) but I'm not going to like it more just because it's a hugely popular franchise.

A lot of people probably are. :shrug: Myself, I found enough things to like in Fallout 3 to have enjoyed playing it - but it still wasn't everything I would have wanted from a new Fallout game. But it's still just an opinion.

Bah I have chilled out now and had time to reflect and read other peoples topics and posts.

One post I read summed it up really well "fallout 3 is Bethesda game and new Vegas is obsidian". Now this to me actually really does make a lot of sense.

Sitting down and thinking, The quests in NV are actually quite deep and well told. I didn't actually like the legion as the opposing force in NV but that is just purely opinion.

What I really liked about beth was the world they created, It really did feel like it was a post war era. I loved the amount of exploring you could do. I enjoyed traveling to all the places they created. The hidden bunkers, the giant cooperation building left over. So many places to explore and so many hidden secrets about factions that were left behind. The whole liberty prime experience IMO was brilliant. I did enjoy the story and side quests in FO.

I like the whole pre-war tech style where you have hidden agendas. I enjoyed all the designs like the power armor,buildings and just the whole open feel the DC wasteland had.

In NV they did let you get to know factions more in depth and understand them more.

I don't think its fair to put either one down because they both have their strength and weakness.

It wouldn't surprise me if in the coming years you will basically have a Bethesda fallout game released and then an obsidian released game and so on.

Just to nitpick, but it's stated that the scrap metal town was built to capitalize on the environmental protection the crater offered.

Just to clarify one point:

The robotic butler actually had to wait a week or two to give you any new water after you depleted his condensers, IIRC. So that, at least, was not in fact nonsensical.

Of course Fallout 3 wouldn't follow FO 1 and 2's canon, because its set across the whole other side of the country. Dips.

I agree with the OP and all i really have to say is, just ignore the half dozen or so people you see here on the forum wallowing in their hatred of FO3 and wishing it was still 1997. You, me, and the other millions of FO3 fans can look forward to the next installment (soon as they do TES V first of course ).

Wow, couldn't agree with that more. Nicely put. I enjoyed FO3, enjoyed Oblivion, and enjoyed NV, but I wouldn't call any of them literary masterpieces.

The industry as a whole is really in a rut of mediocrity right now. Keeping my fingers crossed TES V goes above and beyond.

Well, if it improves on Fallout 3 as much as Fallout 3 improved on Oblivion... :nod:

Personally, I find the Enclave and BoS in FO3 canonically fine. The Enclave doesn't take any actions out of step with what the FO2 Enclave would do, and the Lyons Brotherhood is functionally its own organization at this point; I don't see any canon issues here.

Also, ever consider the fact that Tenpenny simply could not stand the fact that there was another settlement to rival his own nearby? The guy is pretty much proven to be an evil bigot, looking for logic in his motives isn't exactly always going to bear fruit. That's like looking for logic in the Joker's actions, for example. Sometimes villains do completely nonsensical and unnecessary stuff simply because they feel like it. Tenpenny could be mentally unhinged, deranged, etc; we really don't know.

It's hardly like Tenpenny's going to let you know his innermost emotions, plans, and motives, after all.

I see the argument about Megaton being built around a live nuclear bomb as "illogical", "nonsensical", or just downright "stupid" a lot.I think people tend to forgot the setting of the Fallout universe when it comes to this quaint little town. While it would be stupid for anyone from today's world to do such a thing, this is a society based on a 1950's 'SCIENCE!' retro-future. Before the war, people had nuclear bombs parked in their garages. They irradiated their food to preserve freshness. It's illogical by our standards, but fits right in with 1950's sci-fi.

I also rather enjoyed the Brotherhood of Steel and Enclave in FO3. It was a bit of nostalgia having grown up with the very first games. But things have changed. The Brotherhood would definitely sent teams out East to recover old technology. The capitol likely had the best of the best before the bombs fell. I see no problem with Elder Lyon's choice to help the people of the wasteland. He was idealistic and far from the influence of the stricter Elder's back West. The Enclave simply homed in on Eden's signal after Richardson died.

It's all there, you just have to be willing and open to some new ideas.

Very well stated. As we can no doubt all agree, applying modern logic to a lot of the stuff in the Fallout games is...er...difficult.

Yeah, personally I didn't see much "wrong," canonically-speaking, with Fallout 3. BoS were a bit more on the "boy scout" side of things - but they did explain how that happened (ie, they weren't, technically, the Brotherhood of Steel...) That's a trend that goes back quite a ways - pretty much every game after Fallout 2 tried to push the BoS into more of a "hero" role than they were originally intended (ie, Fallout: Tactics, and Fallout: BoS - where in both cases that's who you played as, IIRC.)

And while it was a bit of a stretch having the Enclave in Fallout 3 - I think there were viable reasons for them to make an appearance there. And they, specifically, didn't do anything that I thought was particularly out-of-character. The only "real" canon issue was that they were still in existence at all, after the events of Fallout 2. If we overlook that, I think it's perfectly reasonable that the Enclave would be interested in seizing control of what had been, after all, the Capitol of Pre-War America...

But yeah - I think Megaton, and it's associated quest, was there more or less for the "wow" factor. I don't really have a problem with that - but there is a reason that was one of the first things revealed about the game, pre-release; and why it was a large factor in it's pre-release hype. I mean, it's pretty obvious that the genesis for that town came from "how can we show off the game, and give players a choice on whether or not to blow up an entire town with a nuclear bomb?" They added in supporting details (to help it "make more sense") after the fact.

In other words, I think it's pretty obvious that Megaton's purpose in the game is to... "be really neat." It's not like they were methodically charting the logical progression of a specific sequence of events in a scientific manner, and arrived at that end result. The idea was to have a town built around an undetonated bomb that the player could choose to blow up - any reasons for it to make sense were added after that concept, for purposes of suspension of disbelief.

But, like I said - none of that really bothered me. There's still some issues I have the underlying framework of the game mechanics, however. Which were improved in Fallout: New Vegas, but still aren't to the level of refinement that I'd like to see in an RPG.

Does Fallout 2 specify that the entirety of the Enclave was contained at Navarro and the Oil Rig? If not, then there isn't even really a canon issue with the Enclave being on the East Coast, as it would make sense for them to go to the "secondary HQ" installation after the fall of the Oil Rig.

From ED-E's recordings it sounds more like the Enclave had separate groups operating on both sides of the country, they mention an outpost that it got to before making to New Vegas too.

*Raspy Voice*



Thats Destruction, not "Serevely Wounded", Not even "Decimated". Destruction.

Just because some narrative at the end of the game says they were destroyed means every single man in the entire Enclave was standing in one of two places at the exact same time? Now that's the concept that's hard to believe. That sentence even contradicts the game itself, as Tandi and those that followed her were titled "President".

For all intents and purposes the Enclave was wiped out, at least as far as the Core regions were concerned. That's all the end game summaries really cover. It's ridiculous to believe such a group didn't have members in other places.

Except in the Fallout world, particularly the post-nuclear war Fallout world people are well aware of the hazards of radiation. They would certainly grasp the hazards of settling around a nuclear bomb.



Why would the Brotherhood have sent teams out East to recover old technology? Remember the Glow? The Brotherhood knew it was full of some pretty advanced tech and didn't seem very interested in exploring it or even searching for the mutineers who did attempt to loot it against orders. Instead they turned it into a death sentence for annoying outsiders. Remember Mariposa? The Brotherhood actually came from there, knew it to be pretty safe and advanced (at least before the Master moved in) and never sent anyone back to scrounge the tech there. Remember their response to the Enclave, a faction with the most advanced technology they had ever seen? They sent like three guys in a few tiny bunkers to keep on eye on the situation. The Brotherhood was always far more focused on preserving technology than risking much acquiring it. Yet we're supposed to believe that this same Brotherhood decided to send a major expedition across the entire country, the vast majority of which is unexplored and potentially incredibly dangerous just to check an area they had absolutely no information on beyond that it used to be the capitol and *might* have some nice tech? It's a thoroughly ridiculous concept and what's more it's a unnecessary concept since the Brotherhood in D.C. is nothing like the actual Brotherhood of Steel. In short Bethesda imported a faction in an incredibly stupid manner to fill a role that they didn't even fit.

That's the problem. Not that I have to open myself up to new ideas but that I have to unnecessarily accept very stupid ideas.