Anybody else feel like there were some pretty big opportunities missed with the Institute faction ending? First off, I was incredibly pissed that there was absolutely no way to play this making choices I would have made in any sort of reality. Specifically, the worst crime here was when your son orders you to murder all of your friends in the railroad. I had done MOST of the railroad quests at that point and Deacon was at idol level with me as a companion (Valentine being my second favorite) there was no way I was ever going to be OK with killing them, but if you like the institute there is absolutely no other option. Either you murder everyone in the institute, or you kill most of your friends in the railroad. Or you just quit playing the game and go do something else.

Seriously, Bethesda? In real life I would have said something like "Shaun, it's pretty clear that I'm extremely important to you so if you want me around here you're going to have to let my friends live.", or even the option of just going to the Railroad and being like "the institute ordered me to kill you, get the eff out of here and make sure I can't find you again" or something to that effect. Instead I have to slaughter SOMEONE I like in cold blood, either it's the entire effing institute or it's my buddies beneath the church.

Begrudgingly I finally gave in and blew away as few people from the railroad as I could and still get the "quest complete" thing, then I find out by big reward is my son's dying words being a big fat "good job buddy! aaaacckkkkk". Then... not much. Considering I was just told over and over how I was being promoted to director of the institute and that was going to be this big dramatic thing, boy was the reaction ever super tepid. Could I go around and change the direction of the institute at all at that point? Nope. Still churning out the synths by the truckload. What about all that other cool technology that sonny boy had canned for his own personal reasons that I kinda liked the idea of? Could I start those projects back up? Could I maybe support the minutemen at least with some cool tech? Nope and nope.

So my big reward for killing my buddies is that I get to aimlessly roam the sterile halls wearing my son's lab coat and hearing the same 10 lines being repeated to me by everyone for eternity. Pretty underwhelming, Bethesda!

The Institute and the Railroad have opposite views, they can not live in harmony. They'd gun you down if they knew you were part of the Institute.

Yeah, those factions are about as opposite as you can get. I was disappointed that the Institute ending was so short. Second playthrough and my son is getting 2 to the chest and 1 to the head.

The Railroad exists to save Synths and destroy the Institute and all of its members hate the Institute from the bottom of their souls. It would make no sense for BoS, RR or Institute factions to ever get along. Their ideologies and/or situations make it so they have no choice but to destroy the other two.

Minutemen can survive everything because they are not ideologically or politically opposed to any factions, not to mention they are under the Sole Survivor's control if they matter. Thus it makes sense they survive.

You can say it, and Shaun decides he can't trust you with the Institute. If this was an option, when you returned to the Institute you would find everyone dead because Desdemonda is smart enough to attack them while their armies are busy fighting the Synth. Then they would attack the traitor, you, and you would have to kill them all. Soyour decision would result in death of both.

Railroad can, and will, attack the Institute when it is most vulnerable. And Shaun knows it. He know someone is smuggling the Synths out and that this person might be preparing an uprising. And seeing as all factions accomplish all but their final quest without you, you can bet that Z1-14 is awaiting with his armed Synths. The only exception might be if you completed "Plugging a Leak" quest, but it is unavailable for anyone who joined the Railroad

Shaun explains it all nicely to you: he is sorry he needs you to do this, but the Railroad has become too dangerous recently (mainly thanks to you). it is a tough decision, but a leader must make it.

And no, you can't convince the Railroad. They may like you, but they will just see you as being mislead by the Institute. They would lie and attack during Institute Vs. BoS battle. They wouldn't let this opportunity pass.

That's because Beth did not implement any special post-MQ quests into the game. Maybe they will release a DLC that allows all factions to get some more juice to them, but until then all they can do is give hints for each faction.

And hints that it can be reformed are numerous: you can become the Director while openly promoting your stances (including openly saving those Synths in Bunker Hill), you can say whatever you wanton he radio, Piper will make an article on your making them better, etc. It is far more likely than reforming BoS.

The BoS and Institute are the only ones with large routes. Minutemen have only two quests related to Act 3 of MQ while the Railroad are few quests put atop the Institute's route (to the point that getting banished from the Institute fails the Railroad route).

To be fair, you can all headcanon most of that.

The Institute ending is you are now ruler of the Commonwealth.

The story has to end somewhere.

Maybe in an Expansion you can address some of that.

If it helps you with the Railroad, you can go to the Railroad after you get the Mass Fusion Device thing planted up and find out the Railroad's plan is to BLOW UP THE INSTITUTE.

That actually goes a long way to convincing me their slavery solution is worse than me, Synth John Brown, is willing to tolerate.

Albeit, I also just roleplayed the BoS killing the Railroad.

It's the biggest flaw with the game. No way to win with just one faction while not making everyone else an enemy. Minutemen are a faction but they're the only neutral guys. Thing is, that logic is meaningless if we then get stuck with "Join this faction, the other guys that could be left alone must be wiped out". It would have been better if we was given the option to NOT do that and let that choice or lack of it affect the ending for multiple endings. Obviously still oppose one other faction, but let us decide on the others. Geez! And that's another very weak point with this game. Only two endings. And it hardly even counts as two because it's basically a case of "Institute. Cut nuke blast. War never changes" or "Anyone else. Nuke blast. War never changes" and what happened in the rest of the world didn't matter. And yea, "forced killing" is also a bummer because it's forced on the player. Whereas in other Beth games we can at least go "Get the F out of here." Even if they say no and fight you anyway (And there better be at least a charisma check to get them to walk off) at least we gave them a heads up.

Seriously, where's my ending where I get to see how my actions affected every location I been too?

Eh, really?

I thought it was good showing the theme of the game that fanaticism destroys the world.

Just like the Chinese vs. the Enclave destroyed the Old World.

No one willing to compromise or back down.

That should be how things should turn out be default. But it should also be open to being changed by the actions the player makes. And it should naturally be difficult to do. We play games to feel in control. If I wanted to just watch a film with a moral behind it I'd watch TV. And we do have to keep in mind that the key letters in this game are RPG. The very letters that imply we should have the most control in a game like this. Especially when there's things like choice and different outcomes. The games weakest point in terms of dialog (A different one liner comment regardless of choice with the rest always being the same 99% of the time), let alone factions.

Sure, they're CURRENTLY directly opposed, but the railroad's main goal is to save synths - I'm the director of the freaking institute now, feels like I'd be in a good place to save some damn synths. I feel like the option of "go into hiding, give me some time to some positive changes at the institute with my new title" doesn't exist.

It seems like the game gave you the impression that both sides were irrational zealots with a single ideology with no hope for rational discourse. Apparently it was supposed to do this and I just missed it as I never got that impression until that moment.

Thank you for your well framed and well thought out reply, though, it did go some way toward making me feel a little better about the ending.

While I agree, I also point out it didn't hurt my enjoyment too much to have an actual difficult decision of who I hurt the least.

I do think the game could have used a better series of discussions.

There's like half, at the most, the "What is X" and "Could you explain Y" options from Fallout 3 and New Vegas.

But why be forced to hurt anyone at all? Or rather, why not be allowed to consider it further after the first step and automatically being forced to kill people when you might want to change your mind when presented with a new image? I'm tired of being forced to shoot everything I see at this point. Enemies? Sure. People that I could have at least warned or pull a double spy/turncoat with because I was just told to kill them? When someone says "The Railroad have to be dealt with" what methods that are used are unknown. And once those methods are known you can't change your mind. Despite having very good reason too. It's happened far too many times with far too many factions. Shoot on sight with the brootherhood. Seeing Shaun on his deathbed and wanting to, at the very least, no longer blow him up with the place. Seeing my companion shoot the scientists I specifically said I'd spare (Gee, even when I have the option I'm noped). The list goes on.

I just want more of a say as to how involved I am when it comes to how far I'm willing to go. And I should have the option to go "Nope. I get to decide if I want to switch sides at this point when presented with this new information". Even if you have to choose between the two at those points, at least you're getting a choice at those points. Seeing Brootherhood shoot on sight with Railroad? At the very least we should get to decide if we let the Railroad leave if we wanted. Perhaps by killing the other Brootherhood on site to ensure secrecy and let them run away without the others knowing. Just tell Maxson you was the soul survivor.

Seriously, The doc was on the floor. Not dead, just wondered. I shouldn't have to commit cold blooded murder if I don't want too. No matter the faction. Yes, he had a pistol. But it's still murder because he knows he's no match against me whatsoever. That's why they have grunts that should be doing it for you. But for some reason the other Brootherhood there didn't want to finish him on the ground. What mad logic is this?

I guess for me, Fallout 3 and Fallout: New Vegas were very clear cut morally. You had good options and bad options with only one in-between (House) as well as a big question mark (Independent). For me, I like the Fallout universe when it's not a straight fantasy but a dark fantasy. That there's no good solutions and you do your best to make the world a better place as best you can.

I felt that fit wiith the Sole Survivor even if I didn't want it for every Fallout game.

Making peace might be good but I felt the tragedy of a bunch of good people fighting to the death added to the story than detracted from it.

That's not a flaw, but subjective dislike. Many would consider "making everyone happy" to be a lame, lame storsytelling which completely kills the Choice&Consequence and symbolically doesn't represent the ugly side of war.

No, they shouldn't have. That would not be choice, but "You failed to save everyone, you svck lol!"

It is two endigns to the story of Sole Survivor, whose story is that of family.

It is four endings on global aspect.

Why would the rest of the world matter?

You are not forced. You can just go away and let them fight one against another while you do your thing.

But if you join a political faction, you have joined a political faction and not a social club.

Unless you can explain how these factions could ever make peace, a peaceful resolution doesn't make any sense. And none of these three can make peace. You don't even need to play the game to know this. A lot of us understood that long before the game was released.

And a lot of us like it because it makes the choice much, much harder. If I know I can make everyone happy, I will manage it. There is no game I did not manage to get the best ending because the choice in that case becomes straightforward: there is only one choice, and if you look well enough you find it.

And that makes the choice for some of us extremely boring.

Diamond City gets occupied by the Synth in Institute ending and the BoS in BoS ending, flags included. Patrols of Minutemen, Synths or boS also walk around the Commonwealth and attack those they dislike.

You can also turn a shack into a prosperous village that can slaughter supermutant attackers in matters of seconds. You can't get better than that.

Again, subjective opinion. If a story is about achieving a perfect ending with great effort, it will be about it.

If the story is about tragedy and bitter decisions, it will be about it.

Beth made FO3 about saving the world and creating a happy ending. As per their traditions, they went for something completely else with FO4.

FO3 is a story of a messiah (or antichrist). FO4 is, in everything, a tragedy. FO5 will be, again, something else.

And in all cases, someone will whine about it not being what they want.

And I always find myself arguing with everyone because only so few of us can respect variety in storytelling styles.

Railroad knows you are the Director's successor. Z1-14 knows what you are. And they are all smart people.

And none of them came to you and said to consider this option. They want the Institute to fall.

Because this will make it certain that their fight is over. That Institute can help Commonwealth is not interesting: the Railroad made it clear that they consider the people of Commownwealth to be rotten.

Shaun, ironically, did seem to have considered it. But in the end he decided it was too dangerous, especially when they became so large. Keeping the Institute safe is his primary mission and he won't risk it.

The BoS and Railroad are, and that's their primary problem.

The Institute isn't, but they are too paranoid and immoral.

The Minutemen are cool with anything, but they lack competence.

See, that's the thing. I felt like I had much more control in those games. And that I had more of a decision as to how far into things I was or not. Even when I messed up with the White Gloves or the Khan, Caesar was even nice enough to say "Right. You really messed up. But I'm going to give you another chance. Just don't do it again." And if I wanted to switch at any time? Great, I could do that!

Didn't feel as in control in 3 but at least I didn't feel as forced because it was more clear cut as to who was good and bad. It's not clear here. Therefor, more choice needed with the option to switch being presented needed more. At least for me. NV, despite "seeming" black and white, was actually very grey. Or at least I saw it very grey when I started to think of "Ok, the Legion are just following things their own way". NCR are no better to me. I see them both with pros and cons that balance out.

It mattered in 3 when you nuked a city (I think we got to see it in the ending). Pretty sure we could see a whole lot of stuff affected. It mattered in NV when you went to every nook and cranny. It matters in 2 when you went to New Reno and Broken HIlls. I could go on. But if you even need to ask that in a open world RPG game (a whole world) then I'm going to stop taking you seriously.

Nope.

I'm not whining about Skyrim or NV. Or even 3. Sure, they have their flaws, but nothing I can overly fault in terms of choice/decisions/should I get to decide or not. Can't overly fault 1 or 2 or Oblivion or Morrowind either. And I can actually praise Skyrim in this area. As well as NV.

I think this is false. Don't we get to decide if we want to purge the world with the FEV virus and getting stuck in the chamber either way? In regards to the Broken Steel DLC I do have to admit it was rather one sided. But the Enclave were never grey (Unfortunately). Some people also support what the Enclave do. Therefor not "happy" for them. I'm personally opposed.

Riiiiight. Well, you realize this isn't really a "side" area, right? It's pretty much the one main area in the game (outside of factions. And Goodneighbor is more it's smaller brother). Now if it was about how that village of Atom place was wiped out or not and wherever that nuke stockpile was obtained peacefully or not... I can see endings of "Atom continues to thrive" and "Atom, despite worshiping the glow, are no more and will never be able to worship the nuke that just went off".

To be fair, I think each questline has one specifically devoted to making you want to switch before you do.

* Betraying Paladin Danse for the BOS

* Betraying Patriot in the Institute for the Railroad

* Killing a bunch of Synths at Bunker Hill for the Institute

* I got nothing for the Minutemen.

And I messed at Bunker Hill by saving the Synths and Shaun said it was fine, just don't do it again. And in NV there is a point where you can't switch anymore while the faction is still friendly to you (in FO4 you can't switch once you become enemies) so that is contradictory. Heck, how do NCR and Legion know about Yes-Man while House doesn't is still a mystery to me...

You also couldn't do decisions that were contradictory. For example, Obsidian cut out the option to persuade House to let the BoS live because House would never go with it. you could persuade BoS to ally with NCR, but only if certain Elder was still in power. The other Elder was the type of person that could not be reasoned with. You also couldn't persuade all the Enclave to support the Legion because some of them would never do it. You could persuade nobody to spare Mr. House.

So you still had choices that could not be made. Sure, Vegas had more of them but that story was about countries warring against one another and they are more flexible. FO4's factions are not countries and the conflict is due to conflicting ideologies that can't compromise. Again, different story that requires different choice to give to the player.

So again, it is complaint about the type of story that each game is trying to be and a belief that they must all be the same because "screw other people's tastes or variety". The ones who want happy endings and ones who want evil endings are never going to be satisfied with this game.

Akul - I get that you clearly loved this game and are fully a Bethesda apologist at this point but all I'm saying is that the option to not be a balls out cold-blooded murderer is seriously missing from most of the quest lines. It's been put forth a number of times that this specific fallout doesn't have the depth of character to allow you to be a "sympathetic" individual in any way, and I see that as a failing. Yes, you must kill to survive in the wasteland, but I would argue (at least in this very specific case) that there was room for a little gray area. To force everything into black-or-white kill everyone on this side or kill everyone on that side is not great storytelling, it's just forcing you down an A or B questline to make things simpler for the developers.

And please, don't let that statement make you think I have ANYTHING against the Bethesda developers, I love these effing games and I spent 100 hours on this one because I effing love everything about F4, I'm just saying I'm really disappointed that the "gray area" options were so few and far between. If, however, ALLOWING those kinds of choices forced F4 to be released 1, even 2 years later? Would I still argue for their inclusion? Probably not. i want me some Fallout.

As I said before - The Mainstory svcks in Fallout 4. The Institute, Kellog and Shaun make no sense. A good roleplaygame would have let you influence the Actions of each faction. Like the Institute let the Synths go who want to go, because not all Synths want to go an are unhappy in the Institute or changing the Brooherhoods mind about Synths afte Paladin Danse Quest.

As a writer, avid reader, and a gamer, I find the Institute ending to be distasteful at best, offensively bad at worst. Shaun constantly tells you the Institute is misunderstood, yet you can't call [censored] on this and bring up massacres like University Point and ask how one can misunderstand that.

Why am I also told I am now the leader, ordered to attend a directorate meeting without Shaun where I reinforce the idea of peaceful solutions, only to be ordered to slaughter everybody in the Railroad, and then blow up an airport killing countless soldiers who are just following orders and trying to make the world a better place the only way they know how?

The main story is really bad if you follow the Institute. I am seriously disappointed given how much I enjoyed all the storylines in Skyrim (except for the part where I have to sell my soul to a Daedra to kill the insignificant speck that is Mercer Frey). The choices you make do not matter, you send out a message of peace on the radio (I chose to, anyway) then are forced to start slaughtering people with no way to pursue a peaceful resolution.

Somebody mentioned earlier in the thread that having a please everybody ending would be lame, and I disagree wholeheartedly. This is supposed to be a roleplaying game, where the story goes along with MY choices and desires, yet I am forced to do things my character would simply never do given all their choices and actions leading up to that point.

A true roleplaying game would allow a please everybody ending, just as it would also allow a slaughter everybody ending, and multiple variations in between. Let's say I refuse to join the BoS, but I join the Railroad, I create a peace treaty between the Institute and the Railroad to deal with the BoS cos they're crazy, and if I make the right choices throughout the main storyline, I can make the peace between those two factions permanent. Or, let's say I decide the Railroad and Institute are as bad as each other, so I join BoS, why can't I have them ally with the Minutemen and train them to be better soldiers, arming them with better tech and more efficient means of protecting and rebuilding the Commonwealth.

The choices are binary and meaningless, the main story isn't nearly as fulfilling as doing sidequests and helping the minutemen etc.

All in all I appreciate what Bethesda does with this game, and have enjoyed playing it. With that said I feel like there is no real choice at the end, and hear me out on this. Yes you get to gameplay physically choose who to side with, however if you spend a minute to think about it there is one pretty clear cut faction you can ultimately replace by yourself by killing them making them null and void and the obvious choice. I'm talking about the railroad.
They exist to save any free thinking synth that wants to leave the institute, if you side with the institute your son politely orders you to kill them, but after that he dies and makes you head honcho of the institute so now theoretically you can give care packages to any synth wanting to leave. On top of that in earlier dialogue it is pretty much stated that the railroad is basically almost wiped out anyways, which put me in a "meh I don't really need them anymore anyways" position
As for the BOS, they are a bunch of combat trained Hitlers so I felt like they had it coming since they have been trying to kill everything else on the planet for a couple decades anyways...I suppose if you are looking for the evil option they would be the closest.
I do wish there was a go live in the mole rat vault (think it's 81 cant be bothered looking it up at the moment) option because I literally just got done with this nuking each other and solving nothing option, granted I was frozen for most of it.
Hardest decision for me was how my new husband Hancock was going to fit into all this, bc he is the only one I actually care about, I would sooo take him up on the turning me ghoul to make this a long term thing if it was an actual choice in the game.
Like I said before I have enjoyed this game and figuring out all the new mechanics, but the ending didn't feel natural for my character in any way after everyone praising me for all the good I have done there is no way my character would just be like "yeah you're right I did like them, but they gotta go." Or "hey son I was so worried about you, but I gotta shoot you in the face/nuke your underground lab city" and it felt like I wasn't playing an rpg anymore but a on loose tracks video game.

Edit: notice I say theoretically, I'm aware it doesn't let you free the synths but I'm desperately trying to convince myself that's where it ends bc otherwise the immersion is completely broken for me.

A "please everyone" ending would have been horrible. Let's examine why.

1. It doesn't make sense within the context of the story. A new guy suddenly comes along, and, in a few weeks, convinces three ideological opposed extremist factions to cooperate? Come on. The Railroad is pro-synth freedom. The Institute RELIES on synths for slave labor. The Brotherhood wants to exterminate all Synths. These views cannot be reconciled. Allowing the player to do so would be nonsensical wish fulfillment.

2. When you have a clear "best ending", it removes any sense of real choice and consequence. Choices aren't really choices if there's a clear "best one", since every person will strive to achieve that.

3. It removes any sense of moral ambiguity. If everyone can get along in the end, why worry about who's right?

Roleplaying isn't about creating whatever story you want. It's about creating a character in a world, and sometimes, just like in our real world, our hands are tied.