Playing Fallout 1 for the first time: My first impressions.

I've just recently started playing Fallout 1 for the first time. I'm not very far into it, but here are my first impressions. I may post more upon completion, however long it takes.

First a background of my history playing RPGs in general, and Fallout games in particular. I've never played pen and paper RPGs, which I've heard this game is somewhat inspired from. Not because I don't want to, I might like it for all I know, but because I don't know anyone to play them with. I don't make friends easily, and am not very outgoing. If real life was based on the SPECIAL system my charisma would be 2 or 3. Anyway, I hadn't played any video games until my mid teens because we couldn't afford to, too expensive. The first system I had was Gameboy Color, me and my younger brother shared it. The first RPG we played was Pokémon blue. He played it first because it was a birthday present for him, then I had a turn when he finished. I loved it, and it was what inspired me to look for more. Then I bought Dragon Quest 1&2, and Dragon Quest Monsters, also on Gameboy color. I loved those too, and have played more games from that franchise since. Later I got a playstation and Nintendo 64, and played Final Fantasy 9, the first game from that series I've played, and the one I remember the most, I've never played 7, despite how large a fan base it apparently has. Also Chrono Trigger, probably my favorite RPG of all time. The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time, the first Zelda game, and first action RPG I've ever played. As well as other games on those systems, and later the playstation 2 as well. As I recall, it wasn't until I played Oblivion on the playstation 3 that I had played an RPG that wasn't from Japan. Not by design on my part, it just sort of happened that way. I liked, and still do play that game. Though it took me a while, and a few characters to really figure the game out, especially the character leveling system, eventually I got a handle of efficient leveling. That is something I think Fallouts 3 and New Vegas do much better, I hated having to bother with efficient leveling if I wanted to make my character as powerful as I could. Anyway, I later heard of Fallout 3, that it was similar to Oblivion, and that it was quite good. So I tried that and liked it a lot, still do. When New Vegas came out I got that too. It hasn't been until very recently, less than a year, that I started playing RPGs on computer. Something I've started doing specifically so I can use mods. So I haven't played any old computer exclusive RPGs until Fallout 1.

Anyway, my first impressions, remember as I've said I've not gotten very far yet.

The graphics don't bother me, nor the forced third person perspective, remember I got started on Gameboy color after all. Neither does turn based combat, though Fallout's version of that is a little different from most, though not all, Chrono Trigger for example, other turn based RPGs I've played. In Pokémon and the older Dragon Quest games, and many older RPGs you don't see your enemies until combat starts and you go to a battle screen. In this you fight in the same world space you walk around in, Chrono Trigger is similar in that way. This presents the opportunity for enemies farther away, which you hadn't seen, to get involved as well. In a way it feels like a hybrid between most turn based RPGs I've played and the newer Fallout games. Containing elements of both, but not the same as either one. This will take me some getting used to.

Something I'm not fond of is you have to use the map to travel between locations. You can stop anywhere, but once you walk outside the boundaries there you are back to the map. I would have preferred walking from place to place. While I don't abstain entirely from fast travel in the newer games, I usually prefer to walk. Unless I'm going back and forth in rapid succession, or had just suffered a crash and am impatient to get back to where I was. You can't do that in Fallout 1, unless I'm missing something. You have to use the map to go from place to place. It makes it harder for me to just roam about and explore. Which is what I do the most in the newer Fallout games. I hope Fallout 4 doesn't go back to that system from the first game. It would svck some of the fun out of it for me. I like having big world spaces to roam about in.

Anyway, these are my initial impressions.

It would have been cool. The developers for FO1 later made an RPG called Arcanum, and it did do it that way; but there are a couple things to consider. Fallout 1 was created for a computer that had 0.004% of the amount of RAM [computer memory] that's typical now; and it had to fit on one CD. The other thing to consider is the map. Have you noticed the scale of it? Have you watched the date while you travel on the map. Traveling can take days or weeks to get anywhere.

Arcanum did allow you to explore the whole way; but it could take hours to reach your destination; and there was not a lot worth spending those hours IMO.

These days space doesn't matter so much, and it's not 5-30 people doing it it's a office building full of people doing it. I would actually prefer it to revert to the older map system ~but with the http://s271.photobucket.com/user/Gizmojunk/media/NVEExport4_zps8803197b.mp4.html?sort=3&o=74. It's not impossible to make the map like Fallout was, and yet have it be fully explorable in realtime. The problem for some folks is that ... well what it depicts is an empty wasteland ~that's what's out there... a whole lot of nothing, rocks, and some desperate ~and dehydrated plants; with a few travelers and a few predators here and there... but possibly days or weeks apart. Sound like fun to explore in real time? You don't think that they couldn't have chained the maps together end to end to allow exploration from Shady Sands to the Hub (or to anywhere else)... but does that really sound like fun? The story was centered around a few specific locations and individuals ~and they weren't wandering out in the desert.

I want it because I want the new games to be able to situate any hostile or neutral encounter on the virtual map, in such a way that the landscape matches the implied terrain, and that the PC/Player can walk away from it [in Real-time, or using Map Travel]. Very much like Arcanum, but it could be done even better, and would allow for the vast scope of the original games, and even provide a use for vehicles. This method would have to be a mix of procedural in-between space, and the hand placed primary locations of the game.

IMO not every inch of the Earth should be pertinent to the main quest; and I'm not over-fond of completionist Exploration for it's own sake... I would just like the future Fallouts to have main content comparable with FO3 or New Vegas, and a vast expanse of whatever else they have time for via procedurals and Radiant, and hand tweaked special encounters on a large map that fully imparts the hassle and risk of uncharted travel across the great wastelands... as was seen in the rest of the series.

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**BTW, if you have played it this far, then I think you will really like it as you continue to play.

Something to know though: The AI has a technical reason for being stupid... and they couldn't fix it, there is a reason. But three important things to know about it are that the NPC party members (if you acquire any), cannot see your PC in combat ~they will shoot through your PC to hit their target. Don't stand between them and their target. Also, for the same reason, there is no way to trade with them without them wanting to sell you back your own stuff~ what you have to do is STEAL it from them. They are deliberately made to not care if you steal from them (so long as they are in your party) ~as a quick-fix.

And lastly... They will follow you closely if told to, but they might follow you into a corner... there is no way to force them to move out of your way [same reason]. Don't let them follow you into a tight space that you can't walk around them to leave.

** Oh... and a very mild spoiler; important [but still marked spoiler]