Ok, are you over the shock of the title? Now to the meat...No flame war needed just opinions as like an [censored] we all have one.

Ok, from a person that loves the franchise. And yes I never played FO1/2 nor Tactics etc....I'm a FO3 baby....My question is Settlements, why?

When I see features like this put into a game my brain immediately screams "Fluff Feature"!!! I'm not sure why the feature is even needed. To me it just seems like it's going to be a big mini game which really has zero to due with what the franchise means to "Me" (notice I said Me). Was it a feature that they slapped on to attract the Minecraft kiddies? Who was this feature supposed to be made for? Help me understand what this is supposed to be in the big scheme of things.

I can already see people just buying FO4 just for this feature and not even playing the core game lol. Now if settlements were gated and you could only acquire them after a certain % of the game was complete I'd get that. What's your opinion I'd like to know.

Keep it peaceful.....

Why not is my answer sure its fluff but its adds a whole layer to the game and its completely optional and is just more options for RPing.tod did say you have to do a quest to get the option to build a settlement.

I guess for me, it takes away from dev. time better spent on the core game. But yes it's optional and I'm sure some won't use it. I know I won't, but then again I might lol

Nah, to me it's all part of the experience.

I like the idea of building my own base of operations, running a little settlement. I doubt it'll be so involved I'll never set foot out of it. Gotta go find raw materials to make more stuff, make badass weapons and armor.

So...sadly don't agree with you Threedog.

I disagree, if nothing else I will build one as a sort of base of operations. My own personal fortress in the wastes.

Now you can actually help the Wasteland rebuild, instead of having other factions do it for you. Sounds like Fallout to me, and i want it. Hoping we can forge our own Faction aswell.

Lol, I can't wait for this feature. If you want to skip it, well that is your prerogative, I suppose.

I dunno about faction, but yeah I like the idea of creating my own community. My own trade hub. Not raiders, not rangers, not mercs, just a safe haven in the middle of hell while everything spirals into chaos as the story unfolds.

The spiteful side of me wants to say that people who kind of snub the settlement feature, are akin to the people in Skyrim who didn't like being put in positions of power: It took away from them being the demi-god hobo.

I plan on spending countless hours in post-apocalyptic Boston, and I can't wait for this feature.

There are a host of good solid reasons for settlements, and I'm glad that Bethesda has decided to include them in FO4.

flame war bait reported.

I think Todd Howard said it best in his presentation: the Fallout universe is almost by definition PERFECT for this kind of game mechanic. In a post-apocalyptic setting, set some years AFTER the "incidents", attempting to reconstruct civilization in some fashion seems almost a natural thing to do. While playing Fallout 3 and New Vegas (I played the others, except Tactics, but so long ago I remember nothing), the things that stuck in my mind were Megaton, Tenpenny Tower, Paradise Falls, Canterbury Commons, Republic Of Dave, Underworld, Big Town, Little Lamplight, Oasis and even Girdershade. The settlements, in other words, Seeing how different people tried to re-establish civilization.

In Fallout 3 we are on a single (main) mission that has large importance, true, but still boils down to one hero doing one task.... in New Vegas we're one hero manipulating three factions (at least) to ~sort of~ reconfigure the entire social structure of the area, but using existing resources (pick a faction). In Fallout 4, we're taking things one step farther and actively creating new settlements, tying them together, etc. Seems a natural progression.

The fact it's optional at all, to me, suggests that they recognize some people may not like that kind of content and just want to "$#@! some @^!# up" and making it optional is their concession to that kind of player. Not that the settlements are a concession to the Minecraft kiddies (never played it myself), but the other way around.

As an aside: "Minecraft kiddies".... you know, the entire "survive in procedural world & gather resources to build shelter/weapons/etc" genre has been growing by leaps & bounds. There's games in that style all over Steam (yes, many of them kinda crappy). Many of them quite violent (zombies, sharks, dinosaurs, zombie-shark-dinosaurs) and/or not-very-"kiddy".

So, yeah. It's kind of obvious at this point that a large fraction of "gamers" are into that kind of stuff.

Is it a "fluff" feature? Maybe, maybe not. But don't act like it's some tiny niche "kiddy" thing.

Nerfnow did a joke about the grittiness of the Minecraft world builder genre...

"This is billy. He's 10. He plays minecraft and likes building tiny castles and collecting diamonds."

"This is Billy at age 15. He's older now and wants a more mature Minecraft experience, with guns and being able to bash another players head in with a rock."

Ugh. Don't get me started on the whole multiplayer-"humans are the real evil" pvp thing.

You might have missed the threads in the forums when FO3 released. There were many people who wanted the chance to run trading caravans, or set up/build up the settlements and actually start "rebuilding" civilization. You run around gathering information for Moira's book, run into people who are starting to use the book to finally get a new start on things, but you, yourself could never do any of it. People made mods that let you do things like that; whether they worked well and improved the game or not was personal opinion. If the devs actually created the content that lets you build settlements, there shouldn't be any mod conflicts/building on the same worldspace/content that doesn't fit the game involved.

I'm still working on trying to accept the voiced protagonist thing. That bothers me a lot more than the "build a trade caravan hub/settlement".

I probably will build a settlement, or at the very least a fortress. Though my biggest hope is that I can drop turrets wherever in the world. Pesky raider nest, plop down a few turrets and let them get to work.

I agree with you, OP.

I don't care for the feature and I personally feel that the feature is out of place in a Fallout game. That said, it will be a feature I completely ignore. So, at least it won't interfere with the experience of those who don't like this feature. I am also open-minded though - I may change my opinion later.

Probably one of the main reasons this was added to the game was that the Devs looked at what the most popular mods were for Fallout 3, New Vegas, and Skyrim. Among those for FO3 and New Vegas is a mod called "Real Time Settler" as well as a mod called "Wasteland Defense". These mods (combined) allow players to build and defend their own settlements. Now, given that these are very popular mods in both FO3 and New Vegas, it is reasonable to conclude that such features are desired by a fair number of people. In addition, I am sure that they did additional focus group studies of potential FO4 players to see what features players would like to see, and this one came out on top. (I have been part of several such focus groups over the years).

There will *always* be features that one person, or another finds unnecessary, frivolous, or they just don't prefer. Breath holding, to me, is meh. It's kinda nice, but I can live without it. The thing is...they aren't making the game for YOU or ME. They are making the game for a lot of people. And if there is enough interest in a particular feature - such as settlement building, or breath holding, they see what they can do to put it in.

Personally, I am excited for settlement building! I can't wait to build up my settlements, get trade flowing, defend against raider attacks, creature attacks, maybe attacks from Deathclaws and organized groups like the Institute! And once modders get a hold of the modding tools, just imagine what they will do with it!

It's really not fluff since it fits so well in the Fallout universe. I think it will add a lot to the endgame, now we have something to do once we have build up a horde of caps and materials.

If Bethesda does this well, and I think they will, then I will take great pleasure in this feature. I'll probably build a group of interconnected fortresses, a la Brotherhood of Steel. My big hope is that I'll be able to invite the Brotherhood to garrison them, but I'm not expecting that either.

I am looking forward to this feature on different playthroughs. I'll have a character, Mayor McCheese, who will try to build his own empire of settlements to achieve his goals. My favorite character to play, The Man with No Name, will totally pass on settlements. To me the feature adds variety for different characters.

Id have to disagree, it is probably my most anticipated part of FO4. I love games that allow you to upgrade a home base, whether it is a ship in Mass Effect, or the base(s) in Assassins Creed. It really allows me to have a sense of accomplishment and shows that time really has passed. Plus, having a crafting feature != Minecraft, at all.

So nah, I can't wait until I can make an awesome home base and some outposts.

The OP seems to grasp that some players would buy the game just for the Settlement Building feature alone, so I'm confused as to why there needs to be an explanation of why it is in the game. Bethesda obviously wants to sell to those players as well as the Action / RPG and possibly even the FPS hardcoe gamers with this one. If they can pull off doing it all decently, we all win.

From what I've seen and believe Bethesda to be capable of, I'm cautiously optimistic they can pull it off and have no doubt that in areas they may fall a bit short, Modders will step in and improve / refine.

Oh yeah, the title is obvious Flamebait so while the OP says keep it peaceful, he led with a right-cross....

When I heard of this I said....cool but I remember Skyrim & I hope it's not like that game with its random vampire attacks everytime you fast travel, & a few other things i'm worried about like is this the only way to get a player home? are there still pre-set player homes in towns? will they attack while i'm gone? etc. but i'll fine out when fallout 4 comes out. I think its a cool feature that fits, I mean how do you think megaton got started or rivet city. but personally I may only use it once. I like to wander in fallout games & survive with what I care carry & a settlement for me would tie my character/characters down alittle.