I don't pick New Vegas over FO3 simply because New Vegas has Devs from Black Isle. I love Fallout Tactics and it was made by Micro Forté. I like it even though its not an RPG. It was sold as a tactical squad base game. Even Tactics has sings of progress (takes place before FO2).

The completely destroyed setting of FO3 with no progress what so ever after 200 years is just one reason I don't enjoy it as much as the other fallouts.

People that can do facial surgery and work on project purty but no one figured out a currency system that works? No farms or laws and governments that involve more then one settlement. No trees or plants growing anywhere but Oasis. Why no trees and plants after 200 years?

Your point? Shady Sands was built with a geck, in almost, what? 150 years since it's founding, Shady Sands, now NCR, already had a headstart. Why is manufacturing a uniform so bad? Does it ruin that cliche hollywood image of post-apocalypse? Progress has to be made at some point. :shrug:

Only people that seem to "debate" the "post-nuclearness" have not even played FO1 or FO2. If they had they would see that even in FO1 there was a working economy. Laws and governments. Can get locked up in Junktown for stealing. People telling you to put weapons away. FO2 had NCR rangers and uniforms. People mining gold for the new economy. Gold NCR coins. Larger caravns both FO1 and FO2. Gun Runners were building guns in FO1. Shi were very advanced in FO2 maybe more so then Enclave. Trees and plants all over the place and people Farming in both games.

Like I have been saying many times FO3 is not the one and only Fallout. Don't get mad at people for seeing beyond FO3 and New Vegas and looking at the series as a whole.

If you want someone to be upset with be upset with Bethesda for setting the game 200 years after the Great War.

(Red part I added it)

These two things dont help the rift in opinion either. Honestly, Im firm in the belief progress will always be made, and Obsidian did a fine job portraying this in New Vegas.

Of course not. There was no REASON to. F1 & F2 where set much closer to the holocaust. F3, because of the bad decision to move the timeline forward 200 years, SHOULD have generated debate on the "post-nuclearness" but the game world was implausible and broken in relation to the premise of the game (F2 had more progress than F3 even though it was set much earlier).

Between the time line and the fact that the Mojave was not hit by the nukes, having a green irradiated game world with people wallowing in their mud huts and misery would have been even sillier than the FO3 game world.

I suppose we should scrap the whole idea of giving a definition of "post-apocalyptic" and instead consider: do we want a Fallout game to be set in an atmosphere of desolation and end of humanity, or do we want it to be set in an atmosphere of rebuilding and crafting of an alternate surreal society?
Both themes are actually excellent: the twisted new society, and the lack of any society. They are both themes that can bring a strong metaphorical value. Both Fallout 3 and New Vegas contain some satyre of our own world.

So it's all a matter of personal preference. We can't say if one atmosphere is better than the other. I can say that I definitely prefer the atmosphere of Fallout 3, and others can say they like the atmosphere of New Vegas, but that's all.

Due to my personal preferences, I'd hope for Fallout 4 to feel as barren and lawless as Fallout 3 was, but that's it. We should stop making comparisons on what is "the true spirit of Fallout" because that's not the point.

Well put. Smart idea to scrap the whole semantics debate.

As far as "which is preferable", I like the feel of both atmospheres. I don't really feel the need to choose because I HAVE both games. I already did the Capitol Wasteland and am glad they didn't rehash the same thing with New Vegas.


As long as the content, choices, moral ambiguity, story, ability to create your own backstory PLAUSIBLY, dialogue quality, voice acting, believablility of the relationships in the game world, consequences of your actions etc are on the quality level of FONV, they can have whatever atmosphere they want for FO4. It can take place on a damn ship off the coast of Samoa for all I care. I find the decor of the game world and how much loot I find in the dungeons to be quite secondary to the aforementioned more substantial (in my opinion) elements.

So yeah, I'm fine with FO4 feeling " as barren and lawless as Fallout 3 was" as long as Bethesda can find a way to have it MAKE SENSE this time.

One way could be to break their stupid "It haz 2 move forward. bliviongate: " crap and setting it in 2083-2150.

I have a feeling Bethesda already has an idea for FO4. Going back in the time line will mess up their plans. BoS and Enclave were not in the East around 2083-2150. So if they were to go back in time and still be in the East alot of people would say "Where is the BoS/Enclave?" If they add them just as many people will say "Why are the BoS/Enlcave Enclave there?! :swear:"

FO4 if it is to be in the East should have some trees not contributed to Harold. People farming and just have a better currency system. Show some people building. I can exept they are slower then the West but not stuck in the mud doing nothing for 200 years.

And get rid of caps as currency, seriously, when did caps go universal?
And no Jet either... Come up with new drugs and maybe even have a creepy little pervert who created one of them on the east-coast as well.

Agreed. Jet was cured.

Remember when Jet was also bad for you?

FO2 Jet

Immediate:
+2 Action Points
+1 Strength
+1 Perception
After 5 Minutes:
-4 Action Points
-4 Strength
-4 Perception
After 24 Hours:
+2 Action Points
+3 Strength
+3 Perception


FO3 Jet

effects: Immediate:
+30 Action Points
addiction: Jet addiction


Bottle Caps should be changed but I doubt it. Maybe if we see the Commonwealth they will have the same effect on the area as the Water Merchants. Therefore money would be worth more IE better economy.

I am not asking for the East to be as advanced as the West but its been two hundred years things in the East should be at least at the level the west was at during FO1 (84 after great war).

I believe people are only complaining in comparison to Fallout 3. And plenty of people complained about Fallout 3 not making much sense in comparison to 1 and 2.

As for manufacturing. Happened in Fallout 1 and 2. Gun Runners in 1, mines indication of it in 2.

How the jet reached to the East Coast anyways???

Oh wait, Bethesda Magicka

Lol...so, taking ideas wholesale from another source and updating the graphics and gameplay is creation of a series now? Ok. All hail Barack Obama, Creator of Democracy! Hooray!

Really dated and poorly made? Dated, yes. Poorly made? You know what other game is poorly made? Chess. Terrible graphics! Doesn't even compare to teh Halo 3, y'all.


I agree, it is a matter of preference. As I said before, Obsidian had no choice but to build the setting they did due to the fact that their setting already had a history, and given Bethesda's "200 years later and must continue forward" doctrine doing anything else would have been dropping a big giant steaming fudgebaby on the setting and canon. That said, I do think that FO3 drew from FO1 and FO2 mainly, along with Hollywood stereotypes of what a post-apoc setting should be like. NV continued a natural progression from the already-established lore. Keep in mind, though, that eventually humans will rebuild in one form or another. It's what we do. Anything else would be silly.

Like I said, I think it's a good thing that we can have both, and I'd like to see both settings continue to be represented in the series. My biggest problem with FO3's setting is that I couldn't believe it. I'd love to see the East Coast setting continue to evolve, but I'd also like to see Bethesda take a page out of Obsidian's book and add more continuity and follow-through to their setting instead of creating a huge map full of attractions that aren't connected and don't make a lot of sense when taken together as a whole.

Actually, real post-nuclearness of Fallout series ended after first game. FO2 was more similar to FO:NV than to the orginal, you got well developed trade, farming,faction rivalry and real currency there. NCR was most powerful and power hungry and wanted to take over everything. It was also set 80 years after FO1, and 160 after nuclear war. So you are blaming wrong game for "deviation from true path", FO:NV is just logical continuation of FO2.

It's the "special case" of it all that's the problem.

And yes, compared to the Capitol Wasteland, the entirety of New Vegas is operating remarkably well, to the extent that the real action is political and not the daily struggle to survive.

My concept of PA was articulated by FO3, which I thought was more in tune with my perceptions then FO1. FO2 was much worse, and NV is even more so.

So, in FO:NV we have:

Bandits on the roads.
dangerous animals in the hills.
Two (and more) heavily armed factions fighting for resources, one being organized military, one being a warlord with megalomania, and a warlord with a little well armed fiefdom.
Limited resources in terms of power and water.
Crumbling infrastructure, crumbling buildings, and the only items being produced are weapons.
And there are a bunch of weapons.

Sounds like any number of mismanaged African nations in various states of chaos and civil war.


In FO3, we also have much of this, but the warring factions are themselves fighting for survival, and no one controls anything. The whole place is dangerous, and people are living in rubble and under tin roofs in so much disrepair that one can see the sky from inside. One gets the feeling that it all could be swept away in an instant...that there is no society, and therefore no politics, and the biggest concern on everyone's minds is how to avoid being slaughtered by whatever is making that noise around the corner.

That's true in a way, but it was extremely inconsistent and oftentimes lacked depth or justification. It was fine if you didn't think about it and just let the well-drawn environments evoke post-apocy feelings, but at its worst it didn't make sense...even a little. :shrug:

I agree that NV doesn't convey the Hollywood PA stereotype to a great degree, but it's not meant to. It's set in a region that - many years before the events of NV - was already shown to have the beginnings of organized civilization.

At any rate, it's all opinion. The recently-destroyed world concept a la FO1 and FO3 is great. We all love it...we've been loving it since the '70's. Thing is, eventually people rebuild. It's going to happen. What then? Series over, or do you turn it into a post-modern fantasy setting like FO2 and NV? How long can people live in rubble eating 200+ year old canned goods that realistically would have been gone a loooooooong time ago? When is it time to let go of the preconceived post-apoc notion and let the series move on? Would somehow killing off the NCR and Legion "fix" it?

And that would have been a great story... set at most three decades after the actual war!

The fact is that these things move forward and even Fallout 1 had a society that function a lot better than what Fallout 3 did. Farms, trading towns, caravans, gun production. If you're going to be moving forward in time, you should accept that it therefore can't keep having the ruined ramp-shackle feeling, like nothing ever happens or changes.
I agree, though that we are near the limit of where the timeline can move forward and still be very post-apocalyptic.

IMPORTANT:
I DO NOT care about this so-called "hollywood sterotype". I care about how the game just doesn't make sense in terms of post-apocalypse, AND post-post apocalypse. I could even get on board with the post-post nuclear type, but this game has an illogical split between the two types.

Why do so many post-nuclear type things exist in a post-post-nuclear game?
Cannibalism, Survival Skill, non-working cars, melee/unarmed skill, Water etc

Cannibalism
Why would I choose to eat people when there is an ABUNDANCE of food in the mojave? This should be a moral choice - like crap, I can never find food, I could just get this perk to make things easier. Instead it's just a gamey choice- you do it for fun more or less.

Survival SKill
Why would I choose to scavenge when i could just get a high barter skill and buy everything I need. There's really no point to this skill. I never feel like I'm just trying to survive.

Melee/Unarmed
Why bother choosing a skill that saves ammo when there is an ABUNDANCE of ammo and working guns (ya all those M16s, carbines, and pistols work PERFECTLY after 200 years).

Non-working cars
So there's all these scientists that make robots, connections to satelites, energy weapons etc etc, but no one can fix a stinkin car? Sure I can understand why they didn't work in F1, F3 - but why after 200 years is there a totally working strip w/ securitrons (much more complex technology than cars) but NO CARS WORK?

Water.
What is the deal with water? NV is set in a desert AND nuclear wasteland, but you can get water EVERYWHERE. IMO Lead Belly should be a MUST HAVE type perk. I want to be grounging around every irradiated toilet/puddle for a sip of water. Or hand over 50 caps for some bottled water. Again survival skill would've been great here, but no, it's worthless.


Etc.
Just ask yourself as your going through the game, Does this make any sort of logical sense (in terms of the game universe, I'm not talking about realism, just the linear problems in this game). You will stop playing very shortly.

Challenge
Lastly, because F:NV is so abundant with everything - guns, food, water etc etc there really is no challenge. My characters are all Rush to the strip, make a bunch of caps, buy everythign I need.
Certainaly, I could "choose" to have a harder route, but that's ridiculous from a game stand point - I'm not going to purposely choose a harder way just because. I want to be CHALLENGED by the game itself, with the decisions I make. Instead, everything is basically just a gamey choice there's little/no challenge involved.

hardcoe is so pointless because of the abundance of food water. I REALLY WANTED to SURVIVE, instead, just get a high barter skill, or "gamble" and cha-ching! you've got everythign you need. hardcoe mode is just a matter of buying a bunch of water, and hotkeying and mashing the hotkey whenever the H20 indicator comes up. and occasionaly eating some food.

So you would rather have New Vegas 2x the cardboard cutout of Fallout 3 it already is? Yeah that wouldn't get old quick.


Hmmm, why WOULD post nuclear type things exist in a post-nuclear world? Fun fact, no matter if the world went back into the glamourous Pre-War world it used to be before 10/23/2077, it'd still be 'post-nuclear'. 'post-post' does not exist as a term.


Because some people were likely raised on human flesh, and like Chauncy says, some people can't get rid of their basic impulse for human flesh, no matter how fancy the clothes a man dons, a man is still an animal, we're just high up on the control chain.


Because some people like to scavenge. I do, why in the hell would I pay 200 caps for a gun if I can find it in a building for free?


It's called personal preference. Don't like it? Don't use it.


You know that 'post apocalypse feel' you droll on about longing for? Well that's what it is.


I dunno, perhaps it's that giant concrete tub stopper in the game. IE Hoover Dam. When you're in hardcoe mode not EVERYONE remembers to store up on pure water.



Not really, you're just mad because this game isnt a cliche Mad Max post apocalypse game. U mad bro?


Challenge vs Grinding. Rushing and pushing through it all for the sake of doing it just proves you're doing everything in your power to break the game. :shrug:


Can't argue about hardcoe, seeing as I don't play babysitter mode.

Win

I'm not trying to be argumentative here, but this post just blew my mind. Almost everything you said about NV is how I feel about FO3. The idea that NV is somehow less logical than FO3 is something I cannot seem to wrap my head around. :blink: Seriously, wow.


Because not everywhere is as well-off as the places near the Strip, and as the Colonel mentioned there are people that aren't too far removed from barbarism despite their current positions. Besides, there was a lot more food in the Capital Wasteland and there was also cannibalism. I get the feeling that if they actually made food scarce there would be more people complaining about being forced to scavenge instead of shooting teh lazerz pew pew.


Again, lazerz pew pew. Still left the option in for folks that want to role-play.


There was a lot more ammo available in FO3 and the economies were even more liberal. As far as the weapons, some of them are newly-made, and people that are skilled with weapon maintenance can fix and clean old guns, you know. Not that hard to imagine.


First of all, how do we know that there aren't any working cars anywhere? Besides, there aren't many roads suitable for cars, and even less fuel available. Do you have any idea what kind of resources are required to maintain cars and roads? The NCR is nowhere close to being to that point in their development.


Pew pew!


NV takes greater pains to be convincing than just about any game I've played in years. What are you complaining about? Do you really want a reality simulator?


I somewhat agree with this, but in my experience FO3 was much, MUCH worse in this regard.


Pew!

Win. TKO.

Hyper Combo Finish!

Falcon punch!!! :rofl: