I had always thought all of the DLC was already planned before release. But I have now been hearing that it was changed because fans didn't like the ending. This has come up a lot in ME3 talks. What is the true story? I had always thought Broken Steel was always a planned DLC

Then if it was in fact made because of fan demand. I could have sworn I also heard 5 DLC packs were always planned.

I think most DLC were planned, but Broken Steel was a response to fan feedback.

It was a response to some fans annoyance that the game ended.

Fallout games have always had an ending, Bethesda stayed true to that.

But Bethesda FANS were unfamiliar with endings and hated it, thus they produced Broken Steel. You can find a quote from Todd Howard saying how large the fan response was and how they'll never give their games an ending again.

I could have lived with an ending, if it had been one that made logical sense. I mean, consider:

LONE WANDERER: "Well, crap, the purifier control chamber is full of radiation. What do I do. Oh, I know. I'll have Fawkes start it. Radiation won't hurt him. Fawkes, can you start the purifier up?"

FAWKES: "Sorry. Your destiny lies within that chamber."

LW: "What the hell does that even mean. You go in, we all live. I go in, I die. Is it really that complicated. But fine. I'll have RL-3 do it. He's a robot, totally unaffected by radiation. RL-3, start the purifier. The code is..."

SGT. RL-3: "You ought to be ashamed of yourself. Go in and finish what your daddy started."

LW: "My daddy sacrificed Project Purity for my sake. Thenm he sacrificed his life to buy me escape time. Does he really want me to kill myself needlessly? But whatever. Charon, can you start..."

CHARON: "Nope."

LW: "You're a ghoul! That radiation is probably like a spa treatment for you. Why can't you..."

CHARON: "I have no good reason, as I'm sure you know. Now, are you going to start the purifier yourself, sacrifice your life meaninglessly, and end the game, or are you going to do something else, and still end the game?"

LW: "AAAARRRGHHHHHH!!!!!!"

And while we're on the subject, I didn't like the edited narration of the pre-BS ending.

RON PERLMAN: "It was only at the end of this long road that yadda yadda yadda... sacrifice. But the child refused to follow the example of the father..." what kind of BS is that? The child refused to unnecessarily kill himself. Since when was this is a BAD thing?

Yeah if you, a 19 year-old child, doesn't sacrifice himself for his father's work on the behalf of another army then your a selfish arsehole.

Here's Fallout 3's lead designer on the topic after Fallout 3's release in an interview:

All of the followers were implemented into the game fairly late in development, after the main story had already been nailed down. So, you know, we had the scene at the end of the game, with deadly radiation, and never really compensated for the fact that you could have a Supermutant, or Ghoul, or robot, who could possibly turn the purifier on for you. We'd only ever planned for you sending Sarah Lyons into the purifier, because we knew, from a story standpoint, that she'd definitely be in there with you.

What we could do -- and what we did ultimately do -- is cover that stuff in dialogue. You can ask those followers to go into the purifier, and they'll tell you why they won't. We felt that fit with their personalities, but really, they didn't "sell" that to the player in a single line of dialogue. So, in the end, the player's left with a, "Huh, why the hell can't they do it?!" sort of feeling.

So the story does kind of break down. But you know what? We knew that, and were OK with it, because the trade-off is, well, you get these cool followers to join you. You meet up with Fawkes near the end of the game, and it's true you can go right with him to the purifier. So we could've not had him there as a follower, and that would've solved the problem of him not going into the purifier -- because, at that point in development, that was the only fix we had time for. But we kept it, and players got him as a follower, and they seem to love adventuring him with. Gameplay trumped story, in that example -- as I believe it should have.

So if we'd planned better, we could've addressed that more satisfactorily. But considering how it all went down, I feel good about the decision we made there.

Easy fix: change what the chamber is full of from radiation to something that will kill a robot, a super mutant, or a ghoul. Maybe the panel will electrocute whatever it hits. Or incinerate, freeze, squash, drown, riddle with armor-piercing bullets, dissolve with acid, melt into goo, or blow into 50 million pieces.

This is my main beef with Bethesda.

But the ending was kinda dumb though.

It at-least had a theme, I'll give it that much, poorly executed and incredibly stupid and unfair (die for your father's and others work child) but it still was trying something; but now never again, there is no need for anything to have an ending because the people whom probably joined for a month to [censored] about the ending have all gone - because they aren't fans of Fallout.

Look at Skyrim, nothing [censored] changes in the game-world from either of the two main segments; these open ended games always leave the fans unwhelmed or disappointed but please the people who just like to go around killing the same thing over-and-over again and skip through all the "gay" dialouge and "[censored]" story. Why do I know so many of these people? It's not fair.

I'm fine with those endings as long as they make sense.
Fallout 1s did.

Did Fallout 2s have a game ending ending? I don't think it did, but I haven't played it in a while.

Fallout New Vegas did.

Anyway those endings are actully better because when the game ends you know your choices, or what you did had an impact in the game. You summed up and already said how I feel about games like Skyrim.

Fallout 2's technically didn't but I don't know why, there was some new dialouge in-places (a lot of it developer humour and non-canon) a lot of quests basically completed themselves and there was no other new content.

The only thing I can think of is that they were trying something new. Maybe they were seeing which type of ending the fans liked best. So they know which one to have in their next game which would have been Van Buren (Fallout 3).

Broken Steel literally breaks Fallout 3's plot line and therefore the game, so if it was planned out in advanced. It wasn't planned out very well.

No it certainly was not, and it definitely shows. Its a pity really, Broken Steel might have saved Fallout 3's storyline had it been done correctly.

It was really Bethesda's only TRUE dlc flaw with Fallout 3, every other DLC was planned and great, The Pitt and Point Lookout being my notable favorites.

The fans are annoying then because games end. Fallout isn't Elder Scrolls it's not always good just to give your fans what they want. Broken Steel is a crap DLC that breaks the game and the story they had it makes doing the evil ending pointless. I'll never understand why some people feel the need to keep going after the game is really over

Honestly i never had a problem with how the game ended as such but i did hate that there was no way to expand fallout 3 add more in form of expansion/DLC more content is always nice to a game you enjoy and the ending more or less blowed it out of the window so i was happy when broken steel came.

What I'm saying is that if it hadn't been for the presence of RADIATION-RESISTANT followers at the end, I would have had no problem whatsoever with calling it a game with the reactivation of Project Purity. Self-sacrifice is only noble when the only alternative is worse. Having Fawkes, RL-3, or Charon start the purifier is a far better alternative: the darn thing still starts, and no one winds up a pool of radioactive goo on the control room floor.

Lol I think vice versa I think bs was poor and ruined a decent stroy the mq had.
It's a disgrace bethesda crumble to the "fans" that probably don't know who bethesda are never mind the fact they crumbled full stop.

Mothership zeta doesn't count as a flaw? .

Of course it did. But IMO it made an already "not so great" storyline even worse.

Broken Steel could have made Fallout 3's writing better IMO by offering a chance to continue on with the Enclave. Thereby increasing player choice.

Well I didn't mind it at first as I did not really care about Fallout lore (Fallout 3 was my first Fallout game) but the way I see it is that it is a fun grind but I don't think it should be canon. I only keep it around for mods and Broke Steel is kept around because I love progression and change for the better.

This.....