I don't have a problem with the presentation or the abbreviated choices ... I usually have a pretty good idea what the options mean. My problem with the dialogue is that all too often your choice doesn't matter. Whether nice, sarcastic or rude you end up pretty much in the same place. Only in stark choices like 'help us, not them' or the colored speech checks does what you choose seem to have any impact.

The system itself is fine, as far as I'm concerned. The way it's been implemented leaves a lot to be desired. I'm not one of those who bashes Bethesda while singing praises to Obsidian, but there are things Obsidian does better. If they made a game using this exact same dialogue system with the exact same presentation I bet they would get completely different results. And I say that as a Bethesda fan ... just one who knows their strengths and their weaknesses.

I agree and disagree with this. I 100% agree that the dialogue system is lacking and needs (has already gotten) a revamp with mods. The part I disagree with is being 'locked' out of a conversation line once you go through it once. I always found it out of place to just be able to keep going through the same dialogue in order to get an option I wanted when talking to an NPC. "Oh that's not what I wanted them to do, lemme talk to them again and choose another dialogue option" Why should the NPC have the same conversation with me and now end with a different outcome? Maybe it's just me but I've always found that particularly odd. And it's in a number of games

I can get behind most of this, too, although I actually kind of like that most dialog options don't have an impact outside of that conversation unless it's patently obvious they will. It means I can pick whatever I want to say without really worrying too much about drastically changing the game or getting cut off from some content. In some RPGs I feel like there are "right" and "wrong" dialog options for each conversation, and that changes the way I approach dialog.

edit: to be clear I have no real problem with Fallout 4's dialog system (and I f'ing love that you can look away and do whatever you want during conversations), but New Vegas still has the best dialog options of any Fallout game. When people say Fallout 1 & 2 had good dialog, though, I have no idea what they're talking about. I really don't like the dialog in those games.

i agree with u have 0 problem understanding what my character will said from what i read from the 4 option, and i love that i can move away from dialogues.

But i will love to see more options on dialogues.

I say its a fricking masterpiece!

Compared with Fallout New Vegas, sure replay and roleplaying is limited.

I don't really see how it's any different from BGS other games like Fallout 3 or Skyrim though...

I've completed it, put about 58 hours into the 1st play through and discovered a majority of the map, if not almost all of it. I'm playing my second play through because my first one got deleted. I'd say I'm having as much if not more fun this time around. Its more fun actually knowing what I'm doing in my opinion.

Unfortunately sometimes you can't tell if a question is just one of the answers or an exposition that will return you back you your regular choices. You can miss some nice lore that way.

You're forgetting the fact that in those four choices you're often times left with only one or two choices. I've seen on several (not saying it's most or even many) times I'm left with one choice that's been [barely] rephrased four different times to force the player to 1.) walk away entirely or 2.) be forced into it.

The dialogue system hiding the choices is merely one part of the problem. Some other parts of the equation include, but are not limited to, lack of choice, presentation of choices and the dialogue itself. It appears to have more choices than Fallout 3 in terms of the main factions, but compared to New Vegas...

As I said before, it seems like they snipped bits and pieces of other games and genres, tossed it together and called it Fallout 4. I will say they took the right step in terms of art and their cast of voice actors though.

Edit: I almost forgot, but prior to release there were several threads about map size. I remember that several members, myself included, were worried about the water being wasted space like the mountains in Skyrim or the water in GTAV, but I was told to be quiet on the matter because it added a new element of exploration.

I've attempted exploring the waters, but am having a great deal of difficulty with how dark and murky the water is. Is it wasted space like I assumed it would be? Or are there a great deal of quests and locations hidden beneath the water like I was told there would be (not by Bethesda)?

In NV and 3 there was still level caps(the dlcs should never have raised them imo,but w/e) though,and maxing out skills and stats was a lot harder to do,you had to plan it out.In this game it's just easy to get everything up,making the comment i replied to about being able to choose your builds with 4,mean little in the grand scheme of things.

What i'm getting at is,there should be a hard cap on levels,skills,perks or whatever you have in the game to improve a character,so you can't just become some kinda demigod(even mistakenly)and it adds value to the path you go down,making that choice mean a lot more...there is no do-over,you have to commit to it.

Where i am coming from,that kind of system always added replay value for me,i am a wizard first time,then i replay to become a sword wielder.I'm nearing the end of fallout 4 and despite it still being a very good game i have no urge to restart it,something is missing here and the ease of the levelling and perk system is definitely one of the things i can pinpoint.Dialogue and voiced protaginist is probably another,as the game has went on i've come to see how limiting that has become to roleplaying the char i want to be.

.I actually feel the opposite but that's me.

this is a very good point...I've played uncharted 2 at least 15 times...but I don't think I could force myself to play witcher 3 again(I did enjoy it however)

I'm betting that I will stay interested enough to play characters to play through each faction. I've never been let down by a Bethesda game since Morrowind and I have been having a blast so far.

Another clickbait article to be honest. I can think of quite a few different ways to replay the game and I have seen others do it as well. You can have at least four characters without stretching your own disbelief and without using mods (and made easily by focusing them on one choosable faction). With mods or if you like letting your imagination replace some parts of what you see and hear, you have many more different combinations of characters.

In regards to Elder Scrolls I would argue the dialogue system is innovative step forward given that in Skyrim you just clicked one answer responses with no variation.

Perhaps this dialogue system will be further improved upon for greater variation and more meaningful choice/consquence in the next ES title.

Eh, in FO3, once you had the lv30 cap, you didn't need to plan anything out anymore. There were far more skill points than you needed to 100 everything. (Well, unless you tanked your Int, I suppose). And it had those silly perks like "make all the stats 9". I do agree with you that FO3 didn't need the level cap increase.

Also, not sure how easy it will be to "get everything up" in FO4.... I've been playing around 85 hours (longer than my first FO3 character), and I'm just level 37. It'd be a long, long slog to perk out everything, let alone just maxing out all the stats.

The article pretty much expresses my disappointments with the game (though I think building the settlements was fun and would enjoy more of that). I don't understand why they felt the need to change so much. Why focus mainly on combat, PC voiceover, and crafting and pretty much throw choices, roleplaying, variety of sidequests and dialogue out the window? Do that many players only care about combat, graphics, and not having to read anything? Why are BioWare and Bethesda each tossing aside the things they were always good at to focus on becoming the other?

I don't see how it's any different than any of the Bethesda games that I've played since Daggerfall. You start out with a beginning story and then you are set out into the world. Daggerfall you left a dungeon. Morrowind you stepped off of a boat. Oblivion out of a dungeon. Skyrim a dragon shows up as your'e to be exectuted. Fallout 3 you're looking for your dad. Fallout 4 you're looking for your kid.

And everyone of them had repetitive dialogue. FO4 just happens to be audio.

It's all the same.

There are no quests underwater that have been found yet. Same with locations. Wasted opportunity.

I am definitely of the mindset of, solid game, meh Fallout game. Don't get me wrong I AM enjoying it. Its a vast improvement over 3 in many respects, which I wasn't a huge fan of except for The Pitt and Point Lookout. So thats good for me personally I suppose.

The dialogue and voice acting for at least the male character are rubbish.

The minute men quests, while locations are cool, are all..go here kill x radiant quest-bleh.

I am not a fan of the pretty much reversal of the story of 3 either.

As far as replay, this is my second character, didn't get very far with my first before I deleted him..dont think this is a game where I will be replaying different characters since everything boils down to -shoot everything in the face.

Yea where do you see any differences? It's not like they removed skill checks in dialog and skill interraction with environment, SPECIAL, high/low int dialog, not like 90% of its quests lead to the exact same result no matter what you pick and not like all the dialog choices feel like you RP the same character every time with slightly more rude/gentle versions. Riiight?

'You're always going to be a Shaun-hunting mother or father. When Bethesda added a voice and simple dialogue wheel to the protagonist, they unintentionally made it so that your character, even if mechanically different in each playthrough, is ultimately the same character conceptually.

[...]

Sure, you started out growing up in a vault, and you had a father who was a part of the main quest, but the game didn't really tell you how to feel about that subject, and you could easily get distracted along the way without your own character reminding you about your overarching goal of hunting down your father.'

Exactly!

And yet, while that is true, I feel that Fallout 4, with the constraints, is much more about you and your development. It's said that great art is often inspired by it's constraints and in the same way, I myself and others have noticed that with the constraints of parenthood and a connection with the military has challenged us in our roleplay more than the nondescript courier whom is much more living other people's stories.

I feel that in New Vegas, we were much more engaged with the questgivers than we were with our own place in the world. That is not to say that that is a bad thing, but I definitely noticed the creative constraints of being a questing adventurer more then, than I do being a father with an undescribed military background.

Nate could be anything from a navigator to a sniper to a mechanic. Nora could literally be anyone who happens to have a law degree. Having a degree in law does not neccesarily mean that you are practicing. Nora could be a housewife, a detective, a fellow military officer.

A courier is just that; a courier. A hired help that travels across the wasteland. That doesn't explain the motivations of the character, though.

If Nate has had a military connection of any description, this could give him any number of motivations related to that background. Perhaps he was conscripted. Perhaps he's resentful because military life wasn't what he had been promised. Perhaps he loved being in the military and is self-conscious that perhaps he enjoyed killing as much as he enjoyed the comradery.

Nora having a law degree can mean that she thinks that she is above the law as long as she knows how to talk herself out of it. Perhaps Nora believes the law is absolute and she was a public defender. Perhaps she was a news reporter and she thought what she did was right, but in the end, she was just trying to make a name for herself.

The constraints are really fairly mild and in the past, we have seen examples that constraints do not prevent us from roleplaying, but in fact encourage us. See the JRPG genre, see The Witcher, see The Wolf Among Us, see Telltale's The Walking Dead, see Dragon Age: Origins variations. In none of the before-mentioned you start as a blank-slate, you start with what you have been given. Sometimes, you even have the luxury of being able to choose one in a set of origins that have been predefined. However, they are often cited as being great games in which players immerse themselves.

I think that Fallout 4 chose a very clever background story that, while set, still provides a wide enough frame where-in you can create your own story. In Fallout New Vegas, you are pretty much just the hired help and only the hired help. You can think of reasons why you are helping, but that doesn't take away that YOU are the device by which NPCs deliver their stories, rather than the NPCs being the device by which you deliver your own story. Shaun is a device, but it's not his story. Mr. House is a character and it's the courier that is his story device.

In New Vegas, I just feel like a loose cannon and an unguided projectile. In Fallout 4, I feel like a survivor with his own struggles. In Fallout 4, I feel like the story is about me, as the player, growing as an advlt being thrown in an advlt world. In Fallout New Vegas, I feel like the story is a commentary on the web of technology, regardless of where my position in that web happens to be. In New Vegas, I can maneuver myself in a position where I am in charge of that web of technology and just remove it as an issue altogether, but in Fallout 4, the problem I face is perpetual.

That is why I think Fallout 4 is the better roleplaying game. It's constraints are mild and the stage has been set for me to walk, but it's a story about me facing the damage done by things that will never be fully under my control, whereas in New Vegas, it's a story about NPCs facing the damage I have the power to withold or repair or unleash in checks and balances. I am the Pandora's Box in New Vegas, but in 4, I am the one that's cursed with Pandora. The former I find to be much more engaging; it appeals to my sense of responsibility.

Its more or less a recycled version of F3 with somewhat updated graphics and few changes here and there ......... hell! even 90% of radio songs are the same.

Although I must admit 'settlement building' is a new addition to the franchise but its not an original idea and the game does a very poor job of explaining its mechanics ..............

This again I don't understand. If you want a hard cap, make it. Choose not to develop those skills you think should be capped and leave it at that. Why do so many people lament the openness of the game? Why are people clamoring about "you can become a demigod"? See that word "can". It doesn't say "must". If you feel developing your character to the limits the game lets you is too much, simply don't do it. Heck, it is even easier in this game than 3 or NV since you have to manually level up as opposed to being forced. Don't spend those perk points. Problem solved.

Or is it a lack of self control that is the problem?