That was a poor way to put it on my part.. I realize that they were outstanding games, I can't say much more about them as I haven't played the originals, I couldn't afford a computer let alone games when they were released.. I hope to get my hands on copies soon, from what I've seen of the gameplay footage I really want to play them..

On the other hand Bethesda knows that their style of game sells, They had captain Picard in oblivion, I'm sure they had a pretty good idea of how many copies they neded to sell at the time of release and then budgeted accordingly.. I don't think that they took as big of a leap as some may think, I have a feeling that their guys in marketing and accounting lined out a pretty solid budget for them based on projected initial sales.. I really think they new what they what they were getting into.. And by all accounts sales have exceeded projections from what I understand.. So it was obviously a pretty good business move..

I just needed to make an off topic post to say hello to a fellow Alaskan. Not many of us here. Hope things are treating you well down there in the tropics. :wave:

*now back to our regularly scheduled thread, sorry about going off topic and I do home the Princess doesn't hand me a warning for it.*

Hi there!!

It's been halfway sunny almosy all week here.. The snow is rapidly depleating, It's light outside till about 9:00 at night now, I really like this time of year, But I also like it at the end of summer when it's crisp and cold out and you can feel the change of the season..

I'll stop now I don't wanna get in trouble either..

I know. I don't dispute that. I was using it as a proxy to get people to see what some individuals feel about Fallout 3. It's no where near on the scale of the mockery that Shadowrun was, but I do believe that it fell far short of what it should have been, and particular a focus on putting cool things into the game was a factor in that IMO. I was just as mad at that retarded Shadowrun game. In Fallout 3's case, I'm mildly disappointed at the fact it didn't aspire to what it should have been in terms of the game mechanics and storyline. I will openly say I'm mad at Bethesda for some of their REASONS for the decisions they did make, however, but that's a different area of discussion. I don't mind cool stuff being put in, but don't do so at the sacrifice of the story and/or gameplay mechanics.



They might have if moronic CEOs weren't obsessed with chasing the next big fad, when they really weren't in a keen position to do so. That's one thing that is Bethesda strength: Sticking to THEIR model. They didn't attempt to drastically change the game itself for consoles, as much as other games did. They know their style of game design well.

I personally don't think that model was a good fit for Fallout 3, heh.

I still call "shenanigans" on that.

As I said: at least Fallout 3 is clearly trying to be an actual, full-fledged Fallout game. You're free to hold the opinion that it failed - miserably even - but you'd have to be lying, even to yourself, if you claimed that FO3 hadn't even tried to be a Fallout game.

And meanwhile, there's Shadowrun ... which never even tried to pretend to try to be an actual Shadowrun game.

Apples and Apricots, as far as the point you claim to have tried to make.

That's why I ended with "Granted, Fallout 3 wasn't THAT bad, but it illustrates why many people were not happy with the direction of Fallout 3."

Obviously, the levels of failure between the two is night and day. The idea was to establish a commonality using something that pretty much everyone would agree on. We both agree that the Shadowrun game in question was a horrible Shadowrun game. It had no right to be called that. It had potential, but the ball was dropped in a nearly inconceivable manner. I can't imagine there are many who would actually say it was a good Shadowrun game, if any. (I agree entirely, Shadowrun is demanding for a MMO format)

Take that feeling of frustration, and tone it down a great deal. Fallout 3 isn't bad necessarily, but the changes they made, well, there's a noticable number of folks that did not like the direction it took on several fronts.

For example, I felt the story wasn't handled seriously, and it feels very amaturish with it's dialogue. Also, I can't stand what they did to the ruleset. It's a similar feeling, if extremely lesser, that I felt over the Shadowrun game. That was the point I was making there, so that those who "can't understand why someone would feel that way about a game" could get an idea.

I've got a feeling that most people completely understand why you feel the way you do, Lord knows it's been talked about enough, I think that we oughta find you guys a new dead horse to beat on..
:hehe:

That being said, you have your opinion and it's completely valid, though IMO it's unrealistic to expect the new owners of the franchise to make a game that is the same as the originals, It's just not gonna happen, the new guy is gonna take it where he thinks it should go, and they can't be faulted for that, just like you can't be faulted for wanting a game that stays true to what you thought was the core of the game..

Apparently Lcars didn't lol.



Never said I wanted it to be the same. Don't think anyone is going to say the previous ones were perfect by any means, nor did they want for things to be exactly the same in their ideal Fallout 3.

What I did want was for the small level of quality when it came to dialogue, as I found the writing in the first two be excellent, and for SPECIAL to be largely untouched, save for whatever changes were needed for the format it would appear in. And I feel it did not deliver on either account. Just look at the premise of the Pitt for example. Cure for radiation? The more and more I think about it, they should've just said there was no radiation, and that all those rads were actually levels of infection of some sort. THAT way...the story actually kinda makes sense.

Curing radiation...sheesh! Radiation isn't a disease. You can treat the symptoms of radiation, but you don't "cure" radiation. I remember reading about the Pitt before it was released, and I was wondering about that.

And that's the sort of thing that lowers my opinion of the game. I have a ton of mods that brings the rules closer to what they should be, but it's ultimately a bandaid solution (although I do enjoy the game a lot more, now that I can't just soak up the hits like I was able to before. Level 18 with 94 hitpoints. Very challenging), but there's really nothing that will make the story 'better'.

You still don't get it.

Fallout 3 tried to be "a Fallout game" - it includes most of the central tropes of the prior games, and also tries very hard not to contradict previously-established lore. The level of Success or Failure in that attempt doesn't matter just at this moment.

Shadowrun did not try to be "a Shadowrun game" - it never even tried to reference the source material, beyond "orks" and "elves" - neither of which is presented in a way even remotely resembling that of the original setting. It never tried to incorporate even ONE of the central tropes of the Shadowrun franchise (a unique fusion of "cyberpunk dystopia" and "elves-and-dwarves fantasy", with a strong dash of "black ops" gameplay).

So, again:

Fallout three ---> TRIES to be Fallout.

Shadowrun --//-- DOES NOT TRY to be Shadowrun.

A parallel for Fallout would be if the game had been set in space ... without the '40's and '50's music ... without the retro-50's-futurism aesthetic ... without Vaults .. and had the Fallout label slapped on it only because it was a popular franchise. Or, picture BIOSHOCK ... but with Fallout slapped on it. "Hey, it's art-deco, and old fashioned music, right? In a ruined, post-bad-stuff place, right?"


Apples and Apricots.

EDIT TO ADD: which is not to say I don't understand that you dislike the particular way the franchise has been moved forward. And on some fronts, I even agree with you (SPECIAL has been weakened a bit too much for my tastes, for example). However, Shadowrun is IMO a particularly inappropriate choice to use for an anology - unlike Fallout, where the developers clearly TRIED to do right by the franchise (and again, leaving aside any valuation of success-or-failure in that attempt) ... with Shadowrun, clearly the developers just didn't care ... and maybe even consciously chose to disregard the source material.

The difference between the two runs far deeper than mere degree of failure ... the difference is at the very foundation of the games, the very attitude of the development teams involved. The games aren't in the same category in terms of "being true to the franchise", beause Shadowrun never even tried to be PART of that particular race ... so it doesn't matter how far short of the finish line they were. They weren't even on the starting line!

I was using an extreme to make a point. I wasn't comparing Fallout 3 to Shadowrun, not directly. I see what you're saying, but that's over complicating what I was saying, which was an effort to show to those who say they don't understand, TOO understand.

I was comparing the sense of disappointment. So...just nevermind. I know what I was trying to say, but clearly I was not able to communicate it accurately.

But one last bit I want to comment on, although it's not related to the point I was trying to make.



While the Shadowrun devs didn't care about the source material, Bethesda did something that's almost as unforgiveable, for an RPG at least, in my eyes.

They didn't seem to care about their own story. They were quoted in several different places about battles they didn't want to fight, about leaving things that clearly hurt their story so they could keep features in. That's probably one of the biggest reasons why I'm so annoyed at the story. For me, in an RPG, the plot is the driving force. It's the challenges the players must overcome. If that's left out to dry, the experience is lessened considerable. Clearly it varies from person to person, as some people said they liked the story, but for me, even if the story was fine for me, those comments still would anger me.

So I think developers for both the games in question are guilty of not caring, just in different areas, and in Shadowruns case, the effect was devastating. Fortunately for Fallout 3, it did not have that effect, as they at least wanted the feel of being in a wasteland in the game. The effect was specifically to the story.

Again, I want to stress this is not related to that failed point I was trying to make . Just something that came to my mind when I read your post.

Well I agree with you there, The writing could've been alot better, and there is without question tons that can be done to make a more believable world, I really hope some of this will be addressed in the next installment, They seem to do a better job in Oblivion at making a believable functioning world, and I think that the devs were a little out of their element in the fallout world, and may not have expected the game to be scrutinized as much as it is.. I heard T.H. in an interview say that he was really surprised at how many people play the game two, three, four times, and I have a feeling that they will pay more attention to character development, background and story structure.. At least I really hope so..

I've got a feeling that this little endeavor was a learning experience for those guys and I hope they are paying attention to these forums as there is a lot of good points made here.. In short I have faith that the next game will be more polished and not leave so many loose ends and plot holes, at least not such obvious ones... Hopefully they will have the stats and skills ironed out and working to serve more of a purpose as well.. That definately needs work...

But for their first game in this series I think they really did a helluva job, It's definately one of my favorite games to date.. As long as they move forward from here in a positive way it'll be a step in the right direction...

I remember that interview. Made me facepalm lol. Why WOULDN'T someone seek to playthrough a sandbox RPG repeatedly? Especially when choices are suppose to be paramount....

Hmm..

Actually, that didn't really occur to me. Despite being sandbox in nature....the quests up until now have been one sided for the most part. You really don't have any options in Bethesda's previous games, at least not in Oblivion (I always....grew disinterested when playing Morrowind for some reason. Never did finish it despite being one of the most interesting looking gameworlds, but it never felt like you had any real impact on the outcome)

In any case, back on replayablity, despite having little impact on the outcomes of the quests, I found that Oblivion and Morrowind had experienced a fair bit of replaying. So I got the impression that TH was being a bit...oblivious to that fact.

Neither am I; In fact, who here is? I never said or implied that an RPG MUST flawlessly emulate PnP ~I said that of (and still stand behind), of any game that was a Fallout sequel... a sequel ~its not needed for a spin-off. (Well... not usually ~in this case Fallout Vegas is the spin off, and Fallout 3 is called the sequel ~but it was mislabeled for marketing reasons, and I don't consider that as Opinion because F3 has nothing in common with the gameplay or goals of the original).

Indeed. Fallout went to #2 on the charts.

Mislabeled? You do realize Bethesda are the ones who make that decision, not you, right?

Fact of the matter is, it's a real genuine sequel, because the only people who have any actual say in the matter said so.

And that's the only reason anyone can come up with. :sadvaultboy:

Tell me... If Epic sold out to Atari and Atari later released a clone of Mech Warrior 3 and called it
"Gears of War 4"... Would you unquestioningly accept that as a sequel too? Sequels provide for past fans... The only reason to make a sequel, is to entice back the fans of the previous game ~not the previous "setting". Settings encompass multiple IP's ~Like all of the games done in the Forgotten Realms (of which there are RPG's, RTS's, interactive fiction and more). *Same goes with Warhammer and Warhammer 40k ~There's a bunch of dissimilar games in that setting. But Dawn of War 2 is not an FPS.

If it's convenient to the fan-base most appeased, I'm going with yes.

It's the only reason anyone should ever NEED.

Call it a poor sequel if you like; call it a bad sequel. Heck, even call it an abysmally horrid sequel if you wish. You're entitled to your opinion on the quality of the game (or lack thereof).

But, the designation of sequel, by the simple fact that it is in fact Fallout Three, is non-negotiable.


Apples and oranges, and pure unwarranted hyperbole to boot.

Even if the fanbase that loved Gears of War for its gameplay gets none of it in the "sequel"?

BoguS, Atari making a copy of their last Mechwarrior game and calling it the sequel to their newly acquired series is spot on!

Lawful Neutral indeed, :goodjob:

I'm not saying it isn't an injustice, but if you're on the right side of the fence, it's easier to say "well that's that" because you got what you wanted, regardless of what makes any logical sense.

So you accept http://i271.photobucket.com/albums/jj125/Gizmojunk/RGW2.jpg over a faithful [fitting] third in the series? :

Fallout 3 as is, would have not had any flak had it been pushed as an un-numbered spinoff or even a series reboot ~again not trying to be something its not.

I don't see as an injustice, I see it as being the same as a plumber fixing a car with putty and copper pipes.
He does what he knows, and not what needs done.

No of course I don't, remember who you're speaking to here Although, I'd take what's in that screenshot, over what FO3 is xD.

It probably wouldn't have had as much flak, but honestly, a third sequel was long overdue (if at all, lest it get into the wrong hands). And the hype associated with such a release, well lets say I was taken hook, line and sinker, as were many others.

It got flack long before anyone knew what the name would be so that isn't really true. Maybe true for you, but not for many.

That is like saying someone should not name their kid Robert E. Stonewall III because the kid turned out to be nothing like Robert E. Stonewall II. The parent gets to name their child anything they want and the kid and the world must live with that. Bethesda got to name this anything it pleased because they own it.

Sure, you don't have to like what they name their kid, but you can't really change it and now gamers the world over (many who didn't play the first two nor care to) call it Fallout and even leave out the 3 in the name. It worked and was a pretty smart move by Beth despite if we approve or not. I would dare say more approve of the name than don't. Maybe due to ignorance of the first two, but in the end...it just doesn't matter and going on about it won't change it. What is done...is done.

Yeah it's funny to see them call it that. They must be too stupid to notice, I guess, heh. It's done and over with, with regards to the name at least, but since when was that a major issue about this game ?

Unquestioningly? Nope, but I wouldn't reject it out of hand because of the name either, and I wouldn't make it my life's work to whine about it either. If the game is good enough for me, I'll play it, no matter who made it, where it came from, or how far away from the franchise original it goes. As far as Mechwarior goes, I'd like to see another one, and as long as it's a reasonable serious game, I'd probably buy it.

You should consider what happened to the Ultima series. Ultima Underworld, one of the first 3D first person "RPG" out there, and that spinoff was as dissimilar to the earlier Ultimas as FO3 is to the first two Fallouts. Oh well, we thought, it's not really an Ultima, is it. The next Ultima was a CONSOLE game made for PC, complete with JUMPING PUZZLES. You think you have something to cry about? FAllout 3 could ahe been made by SEGA, CAPCOM, SONY,
or any number of console companies who would love to turn a franchise like this into a console shooter. Could ahve been EA too, who could have killed the whole thing, like they did the Ultima franchise, because it wouldn't make ENOUGH profit.

You may not like what has happened, but it could have been much worse.

That could somehow be distantly related to the fact that it is the truth.

You can say that the Moon isn't made of cheese all you like, or debate whether or not it's a good moon, or good cheese for that matter, but the fact remains that the moon is made of cheese, and whether or not you like the moon doesn't change that.

In modern western society we have certain norms regarding ownership. If I write a song, then I decide what it's about, if I sell the rights for someone to write new lyrics for it, then that person decides what the new song is about.

If a company owns the right to make an official sequel to a game, then they are the ones who decide what to do with it, they own it, not you, and certainly not the people who developed the previous games.



So now you're trying to argue that sequels are only made for the fans of the earlier games?
What an odd viewpoint...

Anyway, if the scenario that you describe actually took place, I would naturally consider it to be an official sequel, because it would in fact be just that. I could also state that "The genuine sequel to XXX svcks", but that is a whole nother matter.



Eh...what? Says who?
Exactly who gave you the right to decide what the point of sequels is?

How about making a great game to attract other people than the most hardcoe zealots of the earlier games?



I don't quite see your point, are you seriously trying to make up a brand new definition of the concept "sequel" to glue together your house of cards?