Hello

First off, these are my personal thoughts on Fallout 4 and I also have a few ideas. I hope you will discuss it with me.

Second, English is not my native language, grammatical mistakes and misspellings may occur, so bear with me.

Third, There will probably be a lot of negative sounding feedback but don't get me wrong, I like Fallout 4 and have spent over 600 hours in game. But I highly disagree with some of the design choices.

Fourth, It's a lot. Gonna put a guide for those who is interested.

1 Voiced Protagonist

2 Good and Evil?

3 Legendary enemies, items and combat

4 Thoughts on the world, exploration and looting

5 Respawn timer

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1 VOICED PROTAGONIST

The voiced protagonist, there is nothing wrong with the voice acting. I actually think it's pretty good. However, does a voiced protagonist add anything to a Fallout game?

To me it doesn't, a voiced protagonist does't enhance my experience in anyway and it doesn't feel more immersive. A silent character was not a problem, while a voiced character has a negative effect on replayability and story diversity.

I create a personal character and I set a few rules that I try to follow during my playthrough.

Example, I have played Skyrim many times, I have almost spent 2000 hours in Skyrim. I know a few exploits and how to get good gear early on etc. But I don't do all of that in a new playthrough. I semi-role play, which means I pretend to not know what's gonna happen, I know but my character doesn't know. This is the way Fallout and TES is meant to be played, by role playing, right? At least that was my impression of these games. You are rewarded from role playing.

From a role playing perspective a voiced protagonist limits my personal experience. Because my character is gonna answer in a way that I might not have done. I want to decide, in my mind how my character is gonna sound like and how he would answer and react. This I can't do with a shoehorned voiced on my personal character.

For example, in Witcher 3 you have a voiced protagonist, but you play as Geralt and Geralt is Geralt. You did not create Geralt from an character creation menu. He is a fixed character, your Fallout 4 character is not.

Therefore it's a limitation and does not really add anything to Fallout 4.

I also need to comment on the new dialog system. To have only four answers is of course also a limit. And to have this choose your answer in a wheel like way with the arrow keys, buttons on a controller or with the anolog stick is something I really dislike. Similar system was used in Mass effect and the later Dragon age games and is not necessary at all and I disliked that in those games too.

The simple dialog box is still the best, according to me. It wasn't anything wrong with it in previous Fallout games or TES, so why change it? What does it add to Fallout? Is it because they wanted to "modernize" the dialog system, because other developers use the dialog wheel like system in their games?

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2 GOOD AND EVIL?

The role playing aspect of playing as good or evil seems to be partly missing in Fallout 4. It's at least very difficult to be evil. And Because of this I got an idea.

You join with the Minutemen and starts to build settlements across the commonwealth. Now if I wanted to play as an evil character, I could join a group of raiders after awhile and betray Preston and the Minutemen.

And here is a way this could work.

You get the quest 'Out of the Fire' from Preston, the helping Finch farm and kill the Forged raiders quest or just stumble upon the location by exploring. Instead of killing the Forged you could choose join them and raid, and takeover Finch farm and start a war against the Minutemen. And start building settlements with raiders and looters instead of farmers and minutemen. And to spice things up, perhaps use slaves to gather crops?

Now you are an evil character so you wouldn't wanna take orders from a raider chieftain, you want to be the chief so after a few quests and events you could challenge the current chief to fight to the death, and if you defeat him you become the chief. This could also be a continuing thing with you being challenged by your raider settlers for the position of chieftain.

You would also need a second in command that gives you quests much like Preston. A raider Preston that also could be a companion.

Other raiders would still be hostile because you would be a rival. And from now on your settlements could be attacked by the minutemen and the Forged raiders faction quest would be to get to the castle and destroy the last of the minutemen and Preston, and from there, sort of take over the entire commonwealth.

I also had an idea with Strong. As far as I know Strong doesn't have a personal quest? After you complete the 'Curtain Call' quest, that is. The same idea as above but after you get Strong's maximum approval you could become a human super mutant chieftain. But i feel that would become a bit weird and complicated.

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3 LEGENDARY ENEMIES, ITEMS AND COMBAT

I like it but, instead of just have a red star and the word Legendary on a normal enemy, Bethesda could have made the Legendary enemies look different, given them more distinct physical characteristics. A Legendary Raider could be bigger than the other raiders and give them some mutations, like massive muscles that made their skin tear open in places or just have an extra long and large arm which would be good for a legendary using a melee weapon. Could be a raider who is in a state of being Ghoul-ified but not fully a Ghoul or just have a huge misshaped spine with a hunchback.

A two-headed super mutat or behemoth. A super mutant with a missing limb and is scared allover his body. A very tall Ghoul with razor nails or filled with blisters that explodes with radiated blood.

Gunners with mechanical junk arms or legs (Like Furiosa in Mad Max Fury Road). A radroach who is big as a yao guai.

Something more than just a red star and the name Legendary.

Legendary weapons is a fun idea but I really think a lot of the effects are overpowered so I don't use them much. But it's really noting bad I can say about it. Some of the effects could be more modest, if that makes any sense?

Some effects could be locked to a certain weapon or the fire rate, semi auto and fully auto. Like the wounding effect that cause 25 points of bleed damage per hit, that could be locked to a semi auto or cause 25 points every 10th hit.

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4 THOUGHTS ON THE WORLD, EXPLORATION AND LOOTING

The world of Fallout 4 is beautiful. Sometimes I just walk around and look at the environment. Did the same in previous Fallout games and the TES games.

But now that junk have a purpose, a rather important purpose for all the base builders. The encumbrance is a big problem. You are almost forced to use fast travel. For some that's not much of a problem but the people who don't want to fast travel have a real hard time with this. Me personally don't mind. If I get over encumbered I fast travel from Point A to Point B (B is my main base) and unload and fast travel back to Point A or nearest possible spot.

But of course you can get Virtibird pickups later in game that solves it. But it can be problematic for new players who don't want to fast travel and don't know about the vertibirds. Had this discussion with a guy and he did not want any spoilers so i did't mention the virtibirds, maybe I should have? He stopped playing for quite some time but he started again and is very happy about the vertibirds. The point is that if he stopped playing, others probably did as well and possibly didn't return to the game at all.

As a lootaholic I was too a bit bummed out by this and got tired of looting, because I knew that I would become over encumbered and had to fast travel again and again, I honestly thought that Bethesda didn't want me to explore their world without fast traveling, you truly miss out on so many things if you are using fast travel and are forced to after every building you loot. How could you prevent a thing like this? Vertibirds, yes but as I said they aren't available until later in game and how much later depends on the one who plays the game.

Some kind of taxi service much like the virtibirds but that you could get them early on by bildning something in your settlements, a gyrocopter pad? Perhaps that you could drop a package with junk and gear, and then send for a scavenger who will pick it up and deliver it to your base?

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5 RESPAWN TIMER

What's your thoughts on the respwan timer? I don't know how long it will take for enemies and loot to respawn but it seems to be only after 24 hours in game and sometimes longer, is it on a random timer? Like enemies could repopulate any time during so and so many in game hours?

Example, I was on my way to Diamond City and came from the north on the bridge at the USS Riptide location, I think it's USS Riptide? And if you continue south you will soon come across a place with super mutants just outside Diamond City, they sometimes fights with the Diamond City guards.

I help the guards to kill the muties and loot them, enters Diamond City and turn in a quest, sell stuff etc. I head back out and taking the same rout heading towards the bridge and the muties had already respawned, I was only in Diamond City for maybe a 3-4 in game hours.

Another time, I did the same, killed and looted the muties and then went on for maybe two or three days and got back but the there was no muties this time.

Is the respawn timer broken or a bug?

I would like to have enemies and loot to respawn after a week or even longer. This is also related to the encumbrance issue. If enemies and loot respawn too fast then I will be over encumbered very fast, again.

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I hope someone will read this and give me your thoughts on Fallout 4 and my own. Thank you!

1. I MUCH prefer the protagonist being able to speak, and I think the voice acting is fine. It's more immersive that way, and I feel there's WAY too much whining about it.

2. It does feel slanted toward playing a Samaritan, but I'm OK with that.

3. Legendary enemies and combat are fine, and well done, but I have to say, more often than not, I don't use Legendary items. Most of them seem to useless to me.

4. The world, exploring and looting are very good. Excellent job on this.

5. I find repsawn times to be just right, on both enemies and loot items.

I don't have a problem with the idea of having a voiced protagonist, but the execution was bad. There should be more, varied voices. Wizardry 8 did this close to two decades ago. I'm not particularly fond of the way "good and evil" were handled in this game. Particularly, it has never been done well in any Bethesda title, except for Morrowind, and that's only if you read into the plot. After replaying Fallout 2 a couple weeks ago, there were quite a few strengths I felt Bethesda could build upon, especially Fallout 2's ability to put you in very uncomfortable, moral situations. There is even one instance, that almost took me out of the game. Even though I was roleplaying a slaver, I decided to rescue a child from them because the situation was kind of messed up to say the least.

I have no qualms with legendary enemies or weapons. They exist in some form in every RPG I've ever played. Exploration and looting were this game's high point. The team did an excellent job with the game world, as they typically do. That is their strength. I would like for them to making writing, characters, and branching plot-lines their strength too however.

Respawn times seem to be fine as well.

All in all, after playing this title, without paying much attention to the hype beforehand, I came away somewhat disappointed. The combat has been significantly revamped for the better. The character leveling system isn't all that bad either. The plot and questlines, however, are funny for all the wrong reasons. The characters are seemingly flat. I haven't really thought much of the game since completing it. That's a first for me in a Fallout game.

1 Female voice was great. I have no problem with it.

2 Not enough recognition for being evil... the main character is generally recognized as good person by all NPCs.

3 Little bit frustrating... because it`s simply random. But it helps prolonging game play hours, and early acquired weapons do get to be used to their full potentials.

4 Too many settlements, Not enough well built NPC cities. Overall not enough travel distance between one place to another.

Looting is actually pretty bad because they respawn too often in large quantity. I know its due to settlement system.. but DRUGs and AMMOs should not respawn.

5 I think it`s fine as it is now. Players at early stage of game won`t want too much respawning.

I also didn't see anything wrong with the voice acting, but I did feel it added a bit to the game. Was it necessary? No. But I did like the emotion in some of the lines and giving your character more of a personality in the lines you choose. Though I don't think it was perfect, far from it actually. I think that they should have had you sort of choose early on what type of voice acting/emotion/personality you wanted to go with kind of like how you chose you voice in the character creation in Saints Row4 but it actually affecting dialogue and not just giving you a different voice. I loved to hear the emotion from both voice actors once the main character was getting released from the cryo chamber, also my favorite thing to do was to take psycho and hear them say "Fing KILL!!!!!!!!!!!!!"...... I wish there were more of those type of lines more emotion throughout but that is probably really tough to do since your character can't always be acting emotional and it was there first attempt at it....

Also I agree it was hard to be evil and there probably should have been more evil things to do. I think you should have been able to join some of the raider type factions or been able to kill preston and rule over settlers in a ruthless gangster/mafia type of manner.

And to the rest I thought that weapons and exploring were fine honestly.. maybe improvements in melee/unarmed combat because that is my favorite style.. I have no opinion on enemy respawn, I thought it was fine though i guess, Wish there were more random encounters near civilized areas (specifically more deathclaws killing civilians and settlers to make the need to take defensive measures seem more necessary...so not like all those lame kidnappings but actual spooky middle of the night or in broad daylight body snatching by deathclaws and mutants)

1. First time through was fine with the voice, but it doesn't have much replay value when you say things the same way every time. A few voice variations would have been nice.

2. As someone else pointed out recognition for good/evil isn't there, fo4 is missing a reputation system imo.

3.I like the Idea of legendary enemies, but not legendary spawns. Legendary implies that that raider or gunner have earned a reputation, so legendary status should be reserved for one off enemies like Swann or the Forged leader. As for the loot I hate the "enchantment" style it has and that you can't break them down.

4.I enjoy the feel of the commonwealth, a little empty of non hostiles for my liking but that's preference I guess.

5. Respawn timer seems fine I just wish it were more random, for example if you clear out an area how about coming back in a week and seeing it being settled by a non-hostile group.

1. While I don't dislike the idea of a voiced protagonist, they could have picked a random intern and he would've done a better job. The real problem I have with the VP is that the choice seems to have limited dialogue options. I can be good or good with a bad attitude. I have reloaded many significant dialogue points and, regardless of what I say, they end the same way.

2. You said it well. My character is a loving father who misses his wife and wants to find the son he loves. I have no choice over any of this and it's reinforced with every main quest. F my son and his dead mother I don't care. I still can't move past the fact that my character is convinced his child is even alive (I was in cryosleep for 100+ years). I liked the options I had in NV and that role playing aspect is gone here.

3. I like legendary enemies, though I agree they should be different than non legs, but hate legendary items. I'm at a point where if the gun's not legendary, there's no point in picking it up. I loved that the cryogun was in the vault where cryotesting was being done and not found off of a legendary bloatfly, but the treasure hunting for weapons that were meaningful to the location found is not in F4. I remember finding the R&D site where they developed the Fatman, all the while thinking I can't wait to find this experimental Fatman I keep reading about in the terminals, but there was none. This kills immersion for me as I later found a legendary fatman off of a freaking ghoul (because reasons).

4. The world looks beautiful from the outside and exploring the wastelands of Boston is a real treat, but as soon as I go inside it's one of three interiors and I'm fighting one of three enemies (all of which are about as smart as a toaster).

5. There are only a couple areas where I've noticed that the enemies spawn too much (you named the worse).

The voice protagonist is way better then silent imo.

There could be more variation to the legendary effects and naturally the enemies could be a bit tweaked to maybe give multiple mutations which increases the pool for stronger prefixes and better weapons being dropped from them.

I actually was curious if you could join the forged, saying that they are a named raider group. Of course that's not the case, but I still think it's easy to be evil. Especially with the Minutemen, you can be a huge jerk, and Preston will ever know, thinking your helping people, when in reality they are your slaves. Mwahaha

Fallout 4 deals with the biggest moral issue of any Bethesda game. Are synths that can feel and think for themselves any different from people? Do we have the right to enslave sentient beings that we create? Where do we draw the line (gen 1 vs 2 vs 3 synths)? I can't believe people don't understand or haven't thought of this kind of moral choice.

1. Voiced protaganist does add something to the game, I cracked out laughing when I heard my female character speak as the Silver Shroud. Never did that in any Bethesda game.

2. Yeah, it didn't quite pan out. The must failsafe way to keep your audience engaged is to have a compelling villian. For a litany of reasons, FO4 did not have that, in fact the "villian" was a mild mannered old dude in a sweater vest trying to save humanity... so yeah.

3. Yeah, magical/"legendary" Borderlands 2 weapons don't quite fit into the game, but must admit its still one of the more fun aspects of the game, trying to get the right legendary weapon/armor (svcks balls when you pick up a legendary hunter's boxing glove).

4. in my wildest hype fueled dreams i hoped for a mind-blowingingly huge open world, with like 100 major cities, and ten's of thousands of explorable locations, and no load screens, and fully destructible environments, but yeah, no that's not going to happen.

5. Bethy got it more or less right with the respawn timer. Jeez, just have to look at the snoozefest FO:NV was.

My thoughts on Legendary items: I have mixed impressions.

One of my go-to weapons is a Legendary Plasma-Infused Assault Rifle; its only special ability is that it does additional plasma damage with every shot. But that made it far and away my best rifle. I keep upgrading and upgrading this rifle, stripping mods off every new assault rifle I capture. One day it will be The Ultimate Assault Rifle!

Another is a prototype laser found in a certain location, that has nothing special about it except that you never have to reload it- it has "unlimited potential". Its ammo capacity is exactly equal to the number of fusion charges you own at the time. It was set up as a sniper rifle, but I changed the sight to a reflex, so I got a close-combat rifle with max damage and seemingly infinite ammo.

But then again, there's the Enraging Pistol. What's this thing good for? "The target is enraged on a critical hit." I want my target dead on a critical hit.

So, some legendary items don't seem so legendary after all.