I'm not trying to start a flame war. I genuinely want to enjoy this game but I repeatingly can't get into it.

I do love the roleplaying possibilities. I got far enough in one playthrough to see at some point I'd have to choose one of a few factions and my choices will make a large dent in the world. I love it.

BUT the combat is kinda clunky. I realize it's not a first person shooter but why give us iron sights and the illusion that I can precision aim if the end result is still going to end up with a roll of the dice? Example: I'm using a marksman rifle, zoomed in, aims settings on a stationary gang member. Nothing. I aim slight to the left and I end up with a critical hit. I've been puttings tons of points in my gun skill too.

My current predicament: To my left is mountains and Deathclaws. I'm not strong enough for those yet. To the my right a town with about five gangmembers in it. I have to face one of them. So I quicksave and hit the town. Five tries, five deaths. One is throwing grenades, one has a grenade launcher. I get slaughtered everytime. It doesn't help that it takes me a clip and a half to down just one gang member (with how many of those shots missing...?) so trying to take down five at once is impossible.

Another thing: exploration. The world is a sandbox. Not to the degree of the Elders Scrolls or Fallout 3 but a sandbox nonetheless. I don't mind having hard enemies in certain locations. Makes sense to me and it's better than Bethesda's new scaled enemies system. But why the invisibile walls? I've run across two already and I've stuck pretty close to the main quest and haven't made it to Vegas yet.

Am I doing something wrong? Am I missing something? I've played both original fallouts and loved them. It's not the story or the atmosphere that bothers me here. It's the sloppy gameplay. It's the sandbox that's not really a sandbox, just a lot of empty space and walking between quests. I want to like the game. Please help. And please don't flame.

EDIT: Also, I didn't enjoy Fallout 3 either. It felt like an Elder Scrolls game (obviously) but everything was brown and dead.

It's a game made by veterans of the original Fallout's but conforming to what Bethesda asked them too do. They said it had to be off the same engine and such as Fallout 3, have the same play-style, but they could do what they liked with the plot and setting (apparently an area where Bethesda gave them complete free-reign, apart from saying the same had to be set after Fallout 3 chronologically).

It's a game to play for it's plot and story and such more than it is exploration and the staples of Fallout 3 and Elder Scrolls.

Storyline, combat, and mods for me. Weapon mods and ammo types make the actual combat more interesting than in Fallout 3. And There's mods to improve both. Unfotunately there isn't that much figthing to go around in the default game, but the DLCs and mods help with that. The stroyline is solid and the many different ending possibilities (that does not just mean what of the main factions you support, but how you handle the minor ones too) give it a lot more replayablility than what Beth's games have.

The game kind of suffers from having to be made into Fallout 3's sandbox format, in that the world is pretty empty, but again, there's mods for that

for me what makes this game better than oblivion, skyrim, or fallout 3, is that wholesome 'rpgness' of the whole thing. Pursuasion through many different skill checks in the dialogue, expanisive player-character dialogue options, hgih quality and varied voice acting, the intriguing and well-written story. These are the things that make me love this game. The lackluster exploration [though personally I still find it very enjoyable] is the only negative I can conjure up.
Personally I really like the dice-roll combat mechanics, as it lends itself to creating a sense of character progression, like an rpg should. It is satisfying to see your character become proficient, and gradually miss much less [I was actually under the impression it was like that in the original falliuts too?]