Did I mention (yeah, I did) it's quite jarring for me to read statements like this when people refer to "Fallout 3" as just "Fallout", without the number? Fallout 3 is Fallout 3, Fallout is the original. Or the series as a whole, but "Fallout seemed to be made with console gamers in mind" makes as much sense as "The Elder Scrolls seemed to be made with console gamers in mind". That is, not much.

Well, I've come to understand that what contributes to my sense of immersion in an RPG is not the same as what immerses other players in RPGs. VATS playbacks and the time compression of the fast travel don't pull me out of the game any more than slow motion in an action movie, or watching a dotted line travel across a map in Indiana Jones. To each their own, of course. But even as an old fan of Fallout who really wanted to play this current incarnation, I might not have checked it out were it not for some sort of mechanic that allowed me to "pause" the game, take stock of what's going on, and allow my character's combat skills to have some relevance in the game.

I don't do well in shooter-type games, in general - I find real-time combat like that to be quite frustrating at times (and it's what kept me from getting into Bioshock, as well.) In general, I'm more than willing to sacrifice "realism" in a game over functional game mechanics. I don't view the VATS system as my character actually having some magical ability to pause time, so much as an abstraction of the game mechanics.

Anyway - just wanted to provide another viewpoint to your suggestion to some degree. Because regardless of how many people might not want VATS or fast-travel in a future Fallout game, I might not buy the next one if they don't have those things.

That said, there might be some sort of middle ground to be found - where it doesn't spoil some players' sense of "immersion" and also provides other players with the crutches they require to make it through a real-time game without feeling overwhelmed or working against the system.

Personally, I think VATS is mediocre at best. I'm not sure what it was trying to accomplish. But I guess it gave Bethesda an opportunity to advertise those beautiful cinematic combat scenes whilst still being able to put the words "actual in-game footage" at the bottom. Makes sense then that VATS is pretty busted, as it was likely never intended for anything more.

I know some people aren't very FPS friendly, but I hardly think VATS is a good enough compromise for Fallout, let alone the non-shooters among us. It was just a free-shot-invulnerable initiative. At least that was it came off as to me. I can't see any element of strategy beyond "I can see that missile coming towards me, let's get indestructible".

VATS needs an overhaul, or it may aswell just become a pause-time initiative.

It's just fancy bullet time, though, isn't it? As a fan of bullet-time in games (which is what let me get through the Max Payne games without throwing my controller against the wall,) I don't mean that as a negative. But really, VATS is basically just a cinematic bullet time.

Sure, you take less damage while in those playbacks. It's my understanding that was because players were getting frustrated at dying during the playback and not being able to do anything about it. But does it really work as a cheat? You have to come back out of VATS at some point, and you're going to get shot up pretty good then. I sometimes see a couple bullets whizzing past me in the time during those playbacks, but I don't have the reflexes to time out how long a missile is going to take to reach me and use VATS to counteract the damage. I guess some people do?

Hey, as some sort of parallel to the tactical considerations of a turn-based mechanic, it doesn't even compare. But I can't see that as a negative, when that's not what it's supposed to do. If I hit the bullet time button in Max Payne, I'm going to drop a bunch of guys before they have time to respond. If I go into VATS, I might be able to do the same thing once I've levelled up enough. As your ability to hit anything in VATS is tied to your character's skills, I can't see it as cheating in any way.

I don't see why Fallout should suffer bullet-time in such a poorly implemented way. It's the one combat characteristic that emphasises character capability, yet it involves him/her becoming a sitting duck, and firing sporadically with thoughtless gaps between shots, with complete disregard to the surrounding environment.

I just don't agree it's even close to being a good compromise for breaking up combat, for whatever reason. But that's where I'll leave it.

Hey, I'm not saying it couldn't be improved, or that another approach that still does what's important to me isn't possible. I'm not going to sit here and disregard any proposals for improvement by just defending what's already there as "good enough for me."

I guess the real question lies in what VATS is supposed to do, and what purpose we'd like it to serve. And then working from there on how best to implement it. From my point of view, I need something that lets me pause real-time and get a sense of my situation, and from there to be able to pick my shots in a way that is more representative of my character's abilities and less about my own limited skill in shooter mechanics. (If I'm roleplaying a "Science-type" character who barely knows which end to point the barrel, then my own real-time skills would suffice. But if I'm roleplaying a skilled marksman, then I need some mechanic to allow me to properly portray that expertise, otherwise it breaks my own sense of "immersion.")

I'd also like it to show the effects of those actions I pick in a cinematic manner. I just think that's cool to watch. More varied gore, and the like would be better as well. As well as more varied death animations. (The next logical step would be to add in stuff like the old Fallouts - riddling people with bullets, blowing chunks out of them, etc - and all dependant on the type of weapon you're using. ie, a Shotgun blowing holes in people, machineguns riddling holes, bladed weapons slicing pieces off, etc.)

Anything that allows both of those priorities while expanding in other areas I'd likely be fine with, or at least consider as a possible improvement or for a possibility of a workable compromise. I think movin forward on the topic of VATS, however, needs a clear-cut list of what the priorities are going to be for it's (hypothetical) implementation.

One could say completely the same for turn-based combat. Fire a couple of shots, end turn, and stand/sit there like a salt pillar while enemies approach and/or fire away.

That's not exactly true, is it?

Turn-based works on the premise that all actions are actually taking place near simultaneously. The "time" between when you take your last shot of the turn, all your enemies do their actions for the round, and then it comes back to you is actually supposed to represent a matter of a few seconds. Each system has it's own way of resolving this, of course. Who goes first in a round only represents a fractional "upper hand" and being able to get your shot off a fraction of a second earlier than someone else who is acting "after" you. Movement during a turn represents movement that "realistically" is actually taking place throughout that entire turn.

It's an abstraction - thinking that a turn-based game is actually supposed to represent everyone waiting in an ordered manner for the other guy to finish running around is missing the point entirely.

VATS, on the other hand, takes place within a real-time mechanic. Your character actually is "just sitting there." You even see that represented during the playbacks. There is no compression of time or anything like that - what you see is exactly what is "really" happening during VATS.

Now, I don't have a problem with that - VATS is meant to represent a character taking aimed shots and doesn't represent his entire tactical array in any way. There's no reason to worry about the character running around in VATS or taking other actions - because it's only relevance is on aimed shots. Not much different than in an action movie when the protagonist pops out of cover and everything slows down while he aims.

I've come to prefer not using VATS.

I would personally like to see an area where there are varied environments. Regarding the world map FO3 had basically two. The barren wasteland part and the ruined DC part. Of course there's the vaults or the many underground sewer "dungeons" but everything tends to run together. I'm talking maybe a larger part of the map like Oasis, where it has regrown but for some inexplicable reason it wont affect the areas outside of it, a downtown section of a city with huuuuuge skyscraqers (I was really hoping for larger buildings in this game, maybe a settlement like the Pitt that uses walkways between large skyscraqers, only less dreary and maze-like), a flooded area of a city, etc. etc.

In short more variation. I mean even Oblivion had a frozen northern area, swampy southern area, foresty areas and plainsy areas.

Also I'd like to see a lot more factions and originality. New factions, not just BOS and Enclave *yaaawn* evil groups plotting for world dominance/eradication and their counterparts *yawn*... I'm talking more mercenary groups, more criminal organizations (Moriarty should have been in charge of a gang that competed against another gang for example, I really digged the New Reno stuff in FO2, except for the excessive porm stuff that got annoying) I was YEAARRRNINGGGGG for an assassination guild type of organization where you could just keep coming back for more and more contracts (but not like the Dark Brotherhood quests in Oblivion, they had an actual story behind them, I'm just talking like a contract agency type gang.).

And of course, finally, I would LOVE to see more and more and more ways of doing missions and things so as to stick with the Fallout spirit.

It tends to get old only having a few actual quests that are fun to repeat, but then only a couple of repeats.

End

Id love to see you take the role of an enclave member, maybe a special ops/scout sent into the wasteland.

I think it depends on how it's tuned/designed. That is, i can see power armor tuned to be heavily armored, improve strength. Ic an also see a sort of scout power armor which features light armor, but is tuned to increase speed of all movements. There could be partial exo-armor, used to assist using heavy eapons or to increase run speed. Possibilities are endless.

I didn't read the whole thread, just skimmed a bit, but I didn't see anything addressing my biggest issues with FO3. So, I'll do that.

In general -not just in Fallout 3- I find that evil characters in most RPGs these days that let you be 'evil' tend to get shafted into being what I like to call 'The Reluctant Savior.' In FO3, you can ignore the MQ, but that's not really 'evil.' Okay, so you gave Dad the finger and walked the other way, then what? You've got no option to side with the Enclave (though there is an infuriating part where it looks like it'll let you, but when you tell them what they want, they just kill you), you can't murder the BoS because their leader is 'Essential' (this Essential Character concept is another gripe I have with TES IV/FO3, but irrelevant at the moment. I'll get to that in a bit.), and ignoring the urgent facts won't let the Enclave take over. The game waits patiently for you to feel like saving the world.

I do not like this.

Sure, timed games are often equally maddening (sometimes moreso; anyone ever play Pikmin?), but you should be able to tell the game, 'No, I don't want to stop them, so quit waiting on me and just let them do their thing.' As it stands, you have to side with the 'good guys' (though you can have one last laugh at the end, but it doesn't matter for all that much in the long term), whether you like it or not. TES 4 (3, too, to a lesser extent) and Fable II did the same thing. You can be a jerk, maybe even downright evil in spots, but in the end, you gotta finish the fight for the good side if you want to finish it at all.

In Fallout 4, I'd like some options to be majorly evil. Sure, the whole Megaton thing was fun.. for a while. But there was nothing else big like that, was there? Raider factions remain eternally hostile with no chance to join them, I personally felt more like an outside contact in the Paradise Falls job rather than true part of the slaving operation, and [Broken Steel/MQ End spoiler]

I felt like I was just allowed to be a pain in the ass. I wasn't evil, I was an annoyance.

Now, I'm not asking for them to make the main quest with fifty or so endings depending on what you do, but a little bit of consequence would be nice. If you're Very Evil, you can just toss around some Purified Water and all your sins are forgiven eventually. Nobody cares that you, y'know, murdered everyone in Megaton, Rivet City and all the killable people in the Citadel. Three days pass and it's all peachy. Though I might be annoyed by it at the time, I think it's a perfectly reasonable consequence that when you got through and kill a pile of people in a city, those who remain will shoot you on sight. Forever.

Which brings me back to Essential Characters. Though I know it's not Fallout related directly, I feel the need to point out that TES III: Morrowind allowed you a choice in the matter. If you wanted to stab everyone in the world in the face, you could. If you happened to stab someone in the face that was needed in the business of saving the world from Dagoth Ur, it would politely tap you on the shoulder and inform you that you've buggered up. If you find that you really don't care about that issue, you can continue play on in the 'doomed world you have created.' However, the fact is that when I take the time to rampage through a fortress of Power Armored soldiers, I would really rather not find that a few of them merely have an allergic reaction to the plasma I pumped into their skulls and pass out for a token amount of time. If nothing else, it kills immersion.

So.. that's my two caps on the matter, and my two biggest gripes about Fallout 3.

EDIT: Don't get me wrong though, I love the game, bought all the DLC and will buy any more they make. I just think those two things make it a little less enjoyable for those who prefer the life of a wasteland deviant.

Ive read 75% of this thread so ill put my opinions in and leave it at that for my Bethesda to read this whole thing and make their own mind up.

This game has brought me back into RPG's so for that i thank them. Ive not played Fallout 1 or 2 so wont comment, and not played Oblivion also. Im from the UK so bare with me.

I think Fallout 4 could should have the following :

1 - Location/Setting
Somewhere with vast amounts of varied terrain. Its got to be big enough where it will take time to track across open spaces but also with the chances of finding cover through the odd lone Gas station etc. The location should have everything from built up cities with high rise buildings to a industrial district, airports etc. The idea of Rivet City was a great idea and something like that should be used again. An airforce base or military instillation would be good from the off. Yes there was the Citadel, but nothing else around until the last couple of main mission in FO3, and when BS popped up.

2 - Settlements/Buildings
The buildings should be more accessible. I realise it was 200 years from the fallout in FO3 but im sure with the amount of contact we all had in FO3 more buildings would have been available to loot and maybe use as out own settlement as FO3 really was lacking in that department IMO. I think there should be more settlements with groups to interact with and befriend / fight against dependant on Karma (which ill get to later). I think the the ability to help groups take back or create a settlement would be nice. And from that actually see it grow with the likes of timber buildings going up, tents caravans being moved in. With the wastes being desolate the use of ruined towns would be a good plan.

3 - Security/Military groups
It would be nice to find a few more groups available in the next episode of FO. Keeping the originals with additionals or maybe write the original military groups in as cameo's and bring in new groups to work as allies to these originals or as brand new stand alone groups, either way. Maybe the use of a makeshift security group/groups made from ex military or general, common a garden wastelanders would be good. make then up as platoons who travel around the wastes. For larger settlements maybe have their own security with outposts and high wall like Megaton had.

4 - Mercenaries
The use of more mercenaries would be good. A bit of history in the game to where they cam from etc. The choice to join, work with / against and betray would be good. The talon company were a great group to fight against but that was it. I thought there could have been more to them but unfortunatley there wasn't :banghead:

5 - Factions
I believe there was a nice mixture of factions in FO3. There could have been some more variations in the factions, with the use of different clothing and self made armour. I thought there could have been different gangs or raiders, with the ability ot fight amongst themselves for the right to be the bigger, the better raider party. With that the higher up the food chain in raiders the better weapons they'd have access to maybe. And maybe the use of children as scouts?

6 - weapons
I think it was a good variety of weapons available but, i do think the ability to add things like scopes with the use of scrap metal, milk bottles and bits of cloth from a teddybear would be good. Making your own silencer from teddybear fluff, tin cans etc would be a good idea as well. A plasma / laser based weapon along the lines of the missile launcher would be a nice touch.

7 - Player/ computer interaction
The interaction between charactures is good. but there should be more consequences and different lines to take with what you say to the computers charactures. Also once you've used a none useful piece of text. it should be removed from your choices. The amount of times ive had to scroll through the sentance choices to get what i wanted was very annoying.

8 - VATS
I thought this was great. Just needed a little tightening up when your low on vats. Also i think if there is a 0% chance of hitting a targets body part it should be removed from the VATS until it comes back into visibilty. I know it shows 0% on the screen if you link to it, but i feel the abiltiy to target that part should be removed is all ill comment on here as i thought this was a nice touch.

9 - Karma
I believe the abilty to have the choice all the way to the end of the game of being one or the other should of been available. I realise this throws a multitude of problems into the game but having 2 story lines of being one of the other would have been nice. The abilty to go against the BoS and side with the Enclave would have been fun. And the abilty to change as you can now in FO3 id like to stay. I liked the fact you can go through the spectrum of good to evil, but i would have liked consequences for this. And the ability to get hold of different hidden weapons if you side one way of the other.

10 - Transport
Would have liked transport. not necessarily to use but the abilty to get on and ride on would have been good. Surely in the 200 years that had passed, someone had made transport using old cars etc? Just a thought.

Well those were my idea's. Attack them all you want, im not fussed just wanted to get out what i thought FO4 should / might include just to make it more exciting and add more hours of play time to a already brilliant game. I hate it when a game finishes far to quickly after spending ?50 on it and it then sitting on the shelf for months after.

I agree with a lot that has been already said, such as a better S.P.E.C.I.A.L. system that actually affects gameplay, such as strength requirements, maybe give a perception bonus towards traps (stand out just a little better with high perception). Some people hate magic clothing, I don't mind the ones that can actually be justified, like perception on a hat, strength and rad resistance from power armour, and charisma (and related skills) getting a bonus on certain clothes because charisma is also about how people perceive you.

The big thing for me though would have to be the world and the story. I forget where, but someone mentioned getting away from the vaults as important to the origin of your character, I respectfully disagree, but I will say that I don't want to start in a vault that hasn't opened for 200+ years again. I think a better idea would be to start in a well established town that came from a control vault. This retains the vault as an origin, but not necessarily for you, as well as gives you the chance to receive some basic quests right away. With quests, it would be nice to have maybe 2 major quests in each town, not just one and then everyone suddenly becomes a boring automaton. Maybe add gossip for NPCs that could be based on small repeatable mini quests that you could do or even give a tip on a major quest (e.g. "Did you hear about Mary?" "Yeah, she's been having so many problems lately..." then you could go ask Mary what's wrong). Transportation, on the other hand, is something that should be based on the design of the world in Fallout 4, if the map is like Fallout 3 (really just 1 area) then a car wouldn't be necessary, but if you have a world set up like Mass Effect or the original Fallouts (several spread out areas) then I would say go for it.

I selected this part of your post because it seems to be the linch pin of the argument.

If you consider te reality of being evil in the real world, if you were known to be a mass murderer, very few people would be willing to even be seen with you. You would be hunted down, avoided, and even ignored by your evil brethren, unless they decided to kill you to geht the heat off of them. Being what I would call "game evil" IRL would not be fun. Real evil is evil done by someone who doesn't appear to be evil, Are we really sure she was the one who blew up Megaton? Are you sure he was the one who stole your assault rifle? Who saw her shoot the caravan vendor?

This "3 days and all is fine" goes a bit too far, in my opinion, but letting evil characters run amok is worse in terms of immersion.

I'm sure this has already been suggested, but assuming that not all Fallout games have to start in a vault, I would like the option to play as a Ghoul.

That could be an interesting idea as well. Different varieties of PA tailored to various applications. One thing I did enjoy in this Fallout was that I wasn't sort of shoehorned into being a Plasma Rifle-wielding, Power Armored dude regardless of how it fit the character. Nice to have options and all that. But on that same note, different types of PA would be a plus as well. I mean, even if my characters aren't someone I'd see as walking tanks, it might be interesting to see some different types out there.

Tailoring different Power Armor types to various archetypal builds could be kind of neat. A melee-based PA with extra power for the arm units, a sniper-based PA with an advanced helmet, etc. If we tied this to a sort of modular equipment setup anyways, or the ability to layer clothing and armor to an extent, you'd open up even more options. Say, a kind of base Power Armor that forms the framework for further upgrades - extra armor, more mobility, better helmet with neat things like scopes and night vision, etc. To fit the lore, you might have to put in a different faction than the Brotherhood/ Enclave, etc (since their Power Armor models are fairly thoroughly dilineated) to make that sort of thing available.

But people are asking for different factions the next time out anyway. Clues in FO3 seem to point towards the Commonwealth being one of these new factions. Since we already know they have some fairly advanced tech, it might not be too far out to imagine that they've come up with some different approaches to the Power Armor.

Good stuff.

One thing I've been thinking of (since I was already thinking of the Commonwealth) are cybernetics. It's already well within the realm of existing canon to allow cybernetic upgrades. I think that could be an interesting avenue for further character customization. I would like to see any major enhancements have some sort of opportunity cost associated with them, however. Otherwise you could run into problems with making the characters just a bit too powerful.

Considering we're dealing with a post-apocalyptic setting where we're using technology scavenged from a society that was much more advanced than what we have in the time the games take place (sort of essential if you're dealing with a post-apocalyptic setting - otherwise it's just sci-fi,) any upgrades your character would get would necessarily be of somewhat questionable quality. Tying cybernetic limbs and the like into the item degredation system would be a possible idea. Worrying about those cybernetic legs you got, keeping them in good condition and performing routine maintainence, might be an interesting tradeoff for all that super-fast running and superhuman jumps you're now pulling off.

Anyway, just an idea.

EDIT: Sorry, wrong thread.

There are several references to the brother hood of steel coming from the west coast I would love to see that expanded on. I think it would also be interesting to have a game based over seas in some European countries like England, France those areas. Just an idea, could be fun.

Just play Fallout 1 and 2, then.

*snickers*

1. Charisma affect role-playing aspects of the game.
2. More settlement quests; investigating, talking to people (Charisma used to get people to trust U with information), and combat quests (like caravan guard, or raider gang member? lots of possibilities.)
3. Weapon customization; it's fun to tinker with gun components to come up with unique wasteland guns.
4. bring back the Wanamingos.
5. Gambling

Hmm... More big explosions, because big explosions are nice...

The level 30 cap added from Broken Steel is nice, but the skill and perk system is a bit skewed.


You simply level up and max your skills too fast and too easily.

Couple of suggestions:

- For w/e level cap you wish to use, double or triple the current experience required to reach that cap (compared to our current level system). Quests should give FAR more experience, and monsters/people should give slightly less.

- Increase the skill cap to 300, but make all skills increases past 100 to have diminishing returns. If someone really wants to be an expert small gunsmen, they can but at the cost of not being able to raise other skills to a high point.

- Create more perks with more powerful effects, but with steeper requirements. (Ex: Animal Friend could require a CHA of 7+, but it would also affect a larger group of enemies like Deathclaws.)