Something about the game has begun to bother me: as I get further in, I've realised there isn't a lot of scope to do more 'passive' or 'township' quests.

Beyond a couple of (fairly smallish) towns, pretty much every interesting location you come across is occupied by hostiles of some sort. There are very few places which actually have living, interesting NPCs.

The workshop settlement locations have zero personality and become a chore once you get beyond your first few. In previous games, these would have been villages with their own little people doing their thing, and usually an interesting backstory and quests, but now they're primarily populated by generic NPCs called "Settler" who are effectively drones, and an accompanying radiant quest to clear a dungeon of hostiles, rinse, repeat.

A couple have interesting backstory to their unlock quest, such as Finch Farm, but for the most part they're entirely forgettable.

Basically, the Commonwealth feels less like a lived-in world to me than previous titles. Thoughts?

The settlements as you say have taken the place of places like Oasis, Republic of Dave etc There are locations like the Race Track, Combat Zone that are not what they could have been. As much as I do lovethe game, there is a definate lack of quests that is for sure

Just 2 Towns and one Settlement with personality. This is one Reason why this Game is lacking with Quests. In that Point the North, West and South is just dead. The first Time when i heard of Quincy i just thought "cool, next Town" but ahh you know. So a Map big like Skyrim with just 2 Towns = cash grab.

Even in Damond City, there are very few quests really, it just becomes dead too

Agree with you OP. As much as some NPCs were bland in Skyrim, each of the towns had a unique feel to it with at least one (if not more) major quest tied to it with smaller ones also. The villages also offered the same thing in a smaller scale.

In Fallout I believe they've managed to make NPCs (except settlers, like you pointed) feel more alive and interesting, except there are few of them and not a lot of quests tied to them.

I understand it's the wasteland, but there definitely lacks "civilization". It does feel like they replaced proper villages and towns with the settlement options.

I didn't mind at first, but now I realize the game doesn't interest me as much as I was with Skyrim, and this might be a reason why.

Yes, trying out new innovative features that still need to find their legs is nothing more than a cash grab.

Cash grab because:

- those "innovative" Features feels unfinished

- only 2 Towns

- Lack of Quessts

- Lack of unique NPC's

- unoptimized Survival Difficult

- many Bugs, easy to Fix but ignored by Bethesda like Killshot Perk, same Bugs by Skyrim Release

Is there even one Mechanic in this Game without Bugs?

Well I have to agree. Just comparing all the quests (and factions) in Whiterun, to what's available in Diamond City shows that FO4 is VERY lacking.

I'm currently just messing around with my fourth character until the official patch is released (the one that's beta now). Beat the MQ and just wandering around finding new locations, collecting magazines and bobbleheads, and I have to admit while some of the locations can be interesting, the routine of "kill everything, loot boss chest, move on" is getting old. I literally feel like I'm following those Super Mutant Orders that you find.

KILL

LOOT

RETURN

Starting to feel like these orders are an 'inside joke' since it's about the only thing the player can actually do.

Yes, the settlement feature could use more polish and usability, that doesn't make it any less inovative.


Perhaps the two towns is a design choice to allow the player greater freedom in shaping the commonwealth. Although by two towns I assume you are purposely ignoring both Covonent and the Robotics Park?


I've seen several posts listing quests for FO4 and Skyrim and FO4 isn't as short as people make it out to be.


For your settlements yes, there is a lack of unique NPCs, but that blanket statement ignores the companions which are the most fleshed out Bethesda has done, unique quest givers and flavor NPCs


FO3 did not have a survival mode either. That was in New Vegas and even then it required mods to make it what most people bable about when they say survival mode.


Yes the killshot bug that they don't care about, which is obviously why they fixed it in the upcoming patch. Bethesda games have bugs, not because they don't care, but because their games are huge and have multiple options that make it difficult to catch all of them or see how they interact.

Hard Mode and Survival Mode is the same. Its just a Name there is no Survival at all lol. Survival Mode has just more Legendary Enemies in Comparison with hard Mode. FO3 had a Hard Mode? I guess yes or? So you cant count that as a Feature.

I dont have Problems with Buggy Games at all but there are many little Bugs and almost every Player knows them since Day 1 (Release). For me it looks like Betehsda never played his own Game or they intentionally ignored it and that is something Different as just having some Bugs. I talk about easy Bugs to Fix but a kind of Gamebreaking for the Players. Killshot Perk or Tina de Luca recruiting isnt working since Release just as an Example. Blocking NPC's or Subtitles dont change. Man i know those Problems since Skyrim. No Time to improve the Enginge? For what we pay so much Money then?

Early in the game when I was traveling in the NW area I already had the sinking feeling about the lack of memorable locations in this game, when I noticed the entire NW quarter of the map didn't have a single interesting NPC quest and mostly locations that were shooting galleries. Only outside of NW did I start seeing some interesting places, but they were fewer than I expected. The interesting locations I remember were mostly unpopulated ones (except for generic enemies): the school with the pink-skinned ghouls (can't remember the name), Dunwich Borers (a very large subterranean mine with a dark secret), Trinity Tower, The Freedom Trail. The memorable populated areas were the Institute, USS Constitution, Vault 81. Also, this game has too few vaults, unlike earlier games. With the settlements, we the players are essentially creating interesting locations for the game, instead of the developers. And settlement-building in its current form is sometimes too buggy to be enjoyable.

We do have friendly places yes, but as some posts ^, lacks of excitement and action, Piper has other opinion

Cheers,

-Klevs

On one hand, I am okay with what we do have in terms of towns and trading posts (I count four major towns and a lot of smaller places to trade and talk to people):

- Diamond City

- Goodneighbor

- Vault 81 (this is totally a town even if it's underground--it has shops, lots of unique NPCs, source of a lengthy quest and Companion; you can even get a permanent place to stay)

- Bunker Hill

- The Prydwen (technically a "base" but a "town" in that if you're allied with that faction, you can talk to unique NPCs, get quests, fix your gear, and trade.

- Covenant

- Abernathy Farm (named NPCs, source of a unique quest plus Radiant Quests if you're with the Minutemen, ability to trade with Connie)

- The Slog (named NPCs, source of a unique quest plus Radiant Quests if you're with the Minutemen, ability to trade with Deirdre)

- Finch Farm (named NPCs, source of a unique quest plus Radiant Quests if you're with the Minutemen, ability to trade with person who's name I'm forgetting)

- Warwick Farm (named NPCs, source of a unique quest plus Radiant Quests if you're with the Minutemen, ability to trade with June)

- Greygarden (named NPCs, source of a unique quest plus Radiant Quests if you're with the Minutemen, ability to trade with Mr. Brown)

- A number of small trading posts in Boston, east of Sunshine, and Drumlin Diner, plus a few I'm probably forgetting)

So I feel like I've got ample places to shop, meet people with names and stories, find quests, etc. while still having a world that feels appropriately somewhat empty and disconnected due to the Commonwealth's circumstances (there are fewer successful settlements and united societies because the Institute has been working actively for decades to sow discontent and fear amongst the populace to prevent them from being able to develop or grow so they can remain the Institute's source of easily captured guinea pigs).

On the other hand, I think it would have been better if there were fewer "generic" settlements, and even fewer settlements overall, but the ones you do get are more larger and more like Abernathy or one of the other farms--places that have named NPCs, unique quests, and stories, that you can expand and add trading posts, etc.--AND that this uniqueness would be expanded on (you can get more backstory, more quests, etc.). It would have been awesome if, say, Sunshine Co-Op still had some hippies living in it with Professor Goodfeels, etc.So that as you built things up, you felt like you were helping a small farm or settlement turn into a real town (which I think was the intent of the settlements, but it doesn't always feel that way).

Maybe DLC can help add to this.

(I am not comparing it to Skyrim because this game is not Skyrim nor an Elder Scrolls game.)

Covenant is really special but the others? Those are just Settlements with repitive Radiant Quests. So its Special for you because there are one or two unique NPC's? A Special Place should have unique NPC's and also 2 or 3 Different Quests and i dont mean Radiant Quests i mean Story Quest of some kind.

I never said anything was "special." To me they simply count as "real" towns or locations--and I am glad they are there for me to go to (but that doesn't lead to "specialness" per se). All of these places have named characters with at least some attempt, however vague, at personality and backstory (Connie mourns her daughter, Jake fights with his grandfather, Warwick's kids are glad his father is nicer than he used to be). All of them do have at least one unique quest you can do there only (I noted you can get Radiant quests via the minutemen as a separate feature), and you can get those quests by running into those settlements (you don't need to be part of the Minutemen/get a quest from Preston to do them). Finch Farm's is interesting because there's a few ways it can end depending on what you can decide to do and/or if you pass a number of Charisma checks. The one you get at the Slog (which is not the quest to gain it as a settlement) has some sweet backstory.

I think more SHOULD be done with them, hence the second part of my post, which you clipped out. I don't disagree with anyone that more SHOULD be done with various locations in Fallout 4. I think there should. However, the earlier posts complained about there not being many places with unique NPCs, quests, dialog, stories, or opportunities to trade, and some said there were "only 2." I listed all the places you can meet named NPCs, get unique quests, unique dialog, unique stories, and opportunities to trade. These places sum up to a lot more than two. Yes, a number of them have these things only in extremely limited supply. But they still exist. That is all.

F3 had the same problem. Megaton(maybe) or rivet city. Both are like a dozen npcs tops. Even new vegas was disappointingly small, once you get inside the walls it's three buildings.

I don't think he meant cash-grab, but more "bandwagoning".

Survival/base building games are currently very popular, and the feature seems a bit tacked on at the expense of actual interesting content.

I think the best would have been to have had our Megatons and Republic of Dave's, and simply had an expandable base or two. eg The Castle.

Being a base building game is not something that will ever have much depth in a game that isn't devoted to it.