I would have liked it if their 'V.A.T.S' had been a military upgrade to power armor, where the pipboy was directing the armor to correct the aim.
Since V.A.T.S. has no resemblance to what it seems a nod to in Fallout, and isn't explained; that would be a better way to to have implemented it IMO.

I could see that and instead of raising your arm a screen pops up via a HUD window in your Power Armor helmet... I also wish they allowed you to use what to me is obviously a helmet mounted flashlight for when I am underground in the Metro ruins.

Wishful thinking on my part now back to my Tabletop RPG work stating out all my nifty homebrew equipment.

This is more responses to this than I thought I would in this amount of time. I hope the Fallout production team looks at this while they work on the next installment of the series.

I'm pretty much the opposite in this. The in between spaces are half the reason I play these games. I love creeping along, wondering what those red blips in the distance are this time, hoping nothing sees me.

My biggest problem with map travel is that with map travel I have to have a destination in mind. With map travel I have to have a goal, a plan. I don't want to set a goal or destination. I play these games for the journey, not the destination. The journey is my destination! I just want to meander around aimlessly, not knowing where I'm going, not having any kind of plan in mind, just reacting to whatever I stumble upon.

That is also one problem I have with the old Fallout games. In those, whenever you travel any distance, you have to pick a place to go. I hate that. I just want to roam dagnammit. Don't tie me down to a destination.

Something I've thought might be interesting would be getting rid of the map altogether. Just trying to navigate by landmarks, with no map to refer to to show you exactly where you are. And getting hopelessly lost in the wasteland at times, with the sounds of who knows what approaching you. Now that could make for a really intense experience.

It's a valid preference ~to be sure... But Fallout is an RPG. When the overseer sends the Vault dweller out into the world, it is with a suggested destination, and an urgent ~even desperate~ mission. If you [personally] were on a family camping trip (with no cell phone), and were sent to go find a doctor as fast as possible... would you explore the riverbanks, and/or investigate a beaver dam; or would you run to the closest phone or park ranger?
In Fallout the PC has an urgent need for a machine part, and was given the location where one of those parts was known to exist... That's not a flaw in the game, the game doesn't care if the player wants to wander off and ignore their families peril. They can do that if they choose, but it just quits when the time is up; as one would expect... it even does that if you run out of time on the trip back with the part. (because that's what would happen.)

It's a valid preference to play the game however any player wishes ~but that does not mean that the game should be designed with that player in mind. That logic cuts both ways, and could apply to TES or anything else... Some players prefer deathmatching, others never want to be wrong ~ever; some players would like to contemplate their reactions to attackers ~over a drink and light snack; where the game pauses indefinitely while they investigate the statistics of one melee weapon over another.
*And some players want to be off the hook for any consequences; free to stray off randomly on a whim because it takes their fancy to do so... But if the game were made to accommodate that, then it's ruined for all the players who take it seriously and play within the situation. No consequences basically nullifies the weight of any decision they could make... this ruins an RPG for anyone not solely interested in the distraction of the environment it offers.

In Fallout specifically... the map was designed as a set of discrete locations [destinations], and it had a few abstracted areas to represent the vast ruined waste in between the principle locations. They could have made it stream cells one after the next as the PC walked from town to town, but there is not much point to it. The wasteland is barren waste, and not usually very interesting... To make it interesting, makes it not barren wasteland. So you had to pick your destination* because there really wasn't anywhere else of note to discover... and with it being such a dangerous place, who would wander aimless?

* Technically you didn't though. Fallout 1 & 2 actually did let you wander in any direction to any location visible on the map. Fallout 1 (not 2 ) did identify the terrain, and present the player with maps indicative of the terrain.

Hey now, I'm not saying I want no consequences for the choices I make, even though I do love straying off randomly on a whim. I'm not even against some quests having a clock ticking down till doom. But I want to be the one who decides when that clock starts ticking. I want to be the one who decides when a quest starts, if I choose to do that quest at all. I don't want any quests, even the main quest, foisted upon me.

This is one of Morrowind's strengths. The game lets you choose when to start the main quest. You can even abort it entirely by throwing away the letter to Caius Cosades. Now some might say that there should be more consequences for delaying or aborting the main quest. But as the intro says "Each event is preceded by prophecy. But without the hero, there is no event." So you see, the events of the main quest are utterly dependent on your actions "without the hero, there is no event". So it makes sense completely.

When I play games like Morrowind, Oblivion, Fallout 3, Fallout New Vegas, Skyrim, I am not playing them for the main quest. Out of those 5 games I've only ever completed the main quest of one of them, Fallout 3, and then only once. As far as I'm concerned I wouldn't mind if the games didn't even have a main quest line at all.

I'm not playing these games for the story they want to tell me. I'm playing these games for the story I make up for myself as I go along. And for the open world experience.

But on that note about open worlds.

Fallout 1 and 2 are not open world games. They were never conceived of as open world games. They are more story centered.

Perhaps I've judged them too harshly. Perhaps I've been unfair to them for not being something they were not designed to be, and started playing them with unfair expectations. Not unfair expectations technologically, or graphically. I got my start in gaming on Nintendo's Gameboy after all. And some of my favorite rpgs, like Dragon Quest, are older than Fallout 1.

But rather, unfair expectations of freedom to explore in an open world. I, and many others I suspect, have unfair expectations because both groups of games, 1 and 2, 3 and New Vegas, share the same title. And thus people naturally go in expecting them to at least be very similar to each other. This is true both for fans who started with the first 2, and with fans who started out with the last 2. Each is disappointed that the other games are not similar to what they know.

Many arguments could have been prevented if the latter 2 games had never been called Fallout. They could even take place in the same universe, either that or not take place in the same universe if they so choose, but rather one inspired by the Fallout universe. Just so long as they don't share the same title. Because the two groups of games do not share the same genre. 3 and New Vegas are open world games, 1 and 2 are not.

I would say that Fo1-Fo2 are RPG, FOT is tactical, Fo3 is Open-World and FONV is both Open-World and RPG, so the last one manage to make both groups together.

I just hope that tactical Fo fans won't stay forever on the sideline.

I wouldn't say that Fo3 isn't an RPG. It is a different sort of RPG certainly. But I still consider it a RPG. My personal definition for RPGs is that they are any game where I can put myself into the mind of who I am playing, thus turning myself into the role I am playing.

My personal definition is rather broad I admit. By my definition I can think of Tetris as a RPG if I want for example. My role is that of "I am the man who arranges the blocks", heh.

I only played FO3 and I do Indeed like the Pip-Boy design a lot too. I wouldn't mind if Bethesda teams up with Microsoft (+others) and make an actual Pip-Boy computer of some sort. Does different things but still basically the same idea, obviously. I don't want a real one which has a needle in me to keep track of my health and things like that... No. Just maybe a nice little touch screen computer type of deal?

The new I phone has a heartbeat monitor in it doesnt it? Anyway, I think it would be easy for them to simply make a pip boy otter box for the i phone. Looks like a pip boy but the screen is simply your i phone.

Maybe. Though we already begun the http://www.giantfreakinrobot.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/10/Pip.jpg... Just need to get it working more like an android device of some sort rather than using a copy of the in-game's set up stuff...

~Edit~

Just notice opening the link in a new window is not a good idea. Right-click copy link's location and paste that into an url box should take ya directly to the picture.

Theres some tech scanners and such at my work that could fit the bill, they are compact enough to fit on the side and fit on a belt pouch and look like the casing is made of a hard plastic or metal that gives its weight and bulk that should fit the art style of the technology of fallout.

Think of those brick like phones some people keep in open pouches nowadays. Add a few interface buttons at the bottom or sides and some sort of leather or canvas cover to secure it on a belt or provide some durability.

I was thinking earlier about a device for your pipboy that can translate languages while speaking to a NPC that can't speak English.

Do you guys have any ideas about modifications for pipboys you get while you go around the game.

It needs batteries to work

The translator could also be used for puzzle mini-games where you try to communicate with tribal villages.

it's like everyone wants to turn a pipboy into a smart phone, not knocking on the idea but it just a little too outside how fallout should be

Why?

Computer Auto-Hacking: As an alternate to skill based hacking. Requiring an item [special wire] that degrades. It should have a 100% chance, but be relatively rare. There should be less than enough to do all of the 100% locks, like 50%-75% total.

Health Management: Like the settings in Dragon Age that sets when to take a potion. Allows you to preset when to take a Stimpak, Rad-X, Radway, etc.

A Stealth-Boy Modification: Allows invisibility for ten seconds, sixty second cool down. [To be earned/found somewhere eventually.]

Why would they manufacture the pipboys with the ability to hack terminals... and forcibly give them to everyone in the vault?

Translation >

The pip-boy could be able to translate pre-war foreign languages, (no use in an english-speaking country), but not tribal languages born after the war. The device was built before.

Computer auto-hacking >

See Gizmo's post.

Health management>

The pip-boy already allow you to check your health, and even help you to inject stimpack.

But it isn't a chem factory. Otherwise, they would be no need for drug sellers in the wasteladn.

Stealth >

The stealth boy is self-sufficient.

On the other hand, i would like to separate inventory management, repair management, reputations, karma & FT from the Pip-boy.

Considering all the other function in past & present games fit with the device, it would be cool to separate things that don't fit with it, to remove the confusion between lore functions and not-lore functions.

Several ideas. One of which is a Pip-Boy that is made to go with Power Armor so that you don't have one bare hand. It always irritated me, as well that Pip-Boys are sealed to your arm and can not be removed, yet long-sleeved shirts often go under them. It seems like the shirt should be rolled up on that arm. Plus wouldn't anything radiation resistant be rendered completely useless by having a fingerless glove on your left hand? I digress, I think that you should be able to obtain different types of Pip-Boy, like a hand-held one for those that don't wish to wear it on their arm.

I really think that this was probably the original idea. If you look at the power armor left forearm, it seems to have an enclosure for the pipboy; but I can guess that that might have caused problems with clipping once animation became a factor.

http://i271.photobucket.com/albums/jj125/Gizmojunk/forearm.jpg

I figured it only made sense, since the American Military was expected to wear a Pip-Boy and they were the only ones to have access to Power Armor, originally, so naturally one would assume that they would be made to be compatible.

IMO, the Pip-boy can be weared on and weared off.

The only instance i see of a Pip-boy locked is the Gary one in Operation Anchorage.

It doesn't necessary means that it is locked for life, but that only the user can.

(not mentioning the not necessary canon status of Fo3 DLC)