I think what we're mostly talking about here, in regards to the difficulty slider - is that we'd like to see something where the harder difficulty levels not only make the game harder, but add in some of the "hard-core" game mechanics that some of us are wanting (Attributes that function closer to the original Fallout games, ammo and meds having weight, etc.)

The idea is that it could possibly be a win/win situation for everyone. For myself, setting the game on Very Hard still doesn't bring what some of what I'd like to see implemented into the game - it just makes enemies harder to kill. This isn't because I consider myself "1337" or "better" than any other gamers - it's just that for me, setting the difficulty higher doesn't make me enjoy the game any better (and that's not to say that I don't enjoy the game - quite the opposite, in fact.)

If the diff slider added in some of the more "hard-core" game elements that were lost in the translation from Fallout 2 to Fallout 3, then those who didn't like those mechanics could play at the normal difficulty (or even hard difficulty - reserving "very hard" for all the extra features and more complicated considerations) and those who did want those things in the game, could select the higher difficulty levels. Best of both worlds, the way I see it.

Would it? Where would the resources required to implement this be taken form? zIf I were a developer, and someone asked for this, the first thing I would think of is why should we do this when we know it's going to be the first aspect of the game to be modded, and besides, it's impossible to please everyone. If you are on a PC, use the mods for the same reason anyone uses mods: To make the game better suited to your individual tastes. If you are not on a PC, you can SIMULATE the same thing by using only ammo you capture from defeated mobs or scavanged. Same with food or stimpacks. You don't need to BUY anything in this game.

I bet Bethesda would consider implementing some more "hardcoe" elements if a petition was taken up...but maybe not. It would seem to me that they made the game this way for a reason, and as far as I can tell every Fallout has been this way: starts out tough and half-way through it's the opposite of tough. Hard to complain when it keeps happening that way, eh?


I'd like to see a MMO version of Fallout, where the difficulty is totally dependent on what other players are doing at any given time. I don't think I'd leave my house for weeks!

I would say adjust what the settings stand for in easy to hard, or have several bars that deal with ratios, say have one bar that changes the difference between mobs numbers , then Hp, then have a slider for item drops. but that won't ever happen so I guess we will have to see what they do to tweak it.

I'm not much of a programmer, but I notice that using the console to give myself the scavenger perk sets a global variable. I assume that setting that variable lower would reduce the amount of scavenging available.

But that requires the PC version.

I wonder how many people, percentage wise, who play on consoles really want such flexibility.

Well, I think the general concensus is that it would be hard to do. Still, I'd like it. It's up to the Devs to decide what's worth doing - I don't think any of us can really say how much they're going to be interested in biting off for the next installment of the series. Or how much resources they're going to devote to various things.

I will say, that the nice thing about doing a sequel is that a lot of your work is already done for you (given, Todd has a philosophy that every sequel should be a chance to go back to the drawing board - but even then there's a lot of stuff you're going to end up carrying over, at least as compared to jump-starting a whole new game series - which is effectively what they did for Fallout 3.)

Working on adding something like this would be a lot of work, but likely less so than trying to do it all the first time around. Surely, adding in a "hard-core" mode to the difficulty slider would alleviate a lot of the criticisms levelled at the game. Is this was just about any other game, I'd say it wouldn't be necessary. But considering Fallout 3 is sort of drawing together two very different types of gamers (Interplay and Bethesda are both very good game studios - but with very different philosophies on game design) this might not be such a terrible idea.

Obviously, certain functions are best relegated to the modding community - but it wouldn't necessarily be such a bad idea to have the professionals work some of it into the core game, as well (more complex ruleset, weighted ammo, etc.) I wouldn't want this difficulty option to do anything like take out "magic" clothing, or get rid of the mini-games, just add some stuff that I miss from the older games - most other things are better left to mods. But some things you just can't mod in as easily, because of the way the core game is balanced.

Certainly, there's the matter of whether it's worth the effort (whether it would sell enough extra copies for the work put in) but again - that's up to the Developers. I don't really have any say in that aspect of it. I just think it would be neat.

I think this would finaly kill the series and turn it to [censored]. Same feel I get out of people talking about making STALKER a MMO.

Interplay is apparently at work on a Fallout MMO, codenamed V13 I think.

Totally agree with the OP. They should implement a Survival Mode, or make Very Hard actually very hard.

There's no reason why it can't do both though. Instead of difficulty settings that don't work like we have now we could have a realism setting.


As Bethesda seems to have been dragged into this trend of dumbing down its games I'd like their next game, whether it be Fallout or Elder Scrolls, to actually have a sense of challenge. This kind of goes in with what the OP said, I never felt threatened in Fallout 3 because I had a powerful weapon, great armour and a near limitless supply of ammunition and meds to keep me going, a game where there is absolutely no chance of failure becomes very boring for me after a while and the increased xp gain from upping the difficulty in Fallout 3 actually served to make the game easier rather than more difficult. Hopefully Bethesda will have learned these lessons (and others that don't apply to this thread) from Fallout 3 and make their subsequent games better because of it.

Exactly! You are in control of how hard/easy you want it to be. Just start a quest with no stimpacks and only minimal ammo/weapons and pick up only what you need along the way.

Well, there is a reason we don't see both yet. These games take so long and have so much programming already it would seem as though there's not much left. They do the best they can with what they have while they have it, so when new technology appears they CAN appeal to the hardcoe gamer and people like me at the same time. Expect Fallout 5 to be this way for PS4 and XBox 72000000. It will happen, but it'll take a while.

I found it interesting to start a quest naked with no weapons or ammo, and looting my way into triumph.

To stay on topic of what I'd really like to see in the next FO:

More join-able factions. The possibility to form alliances with Raider clans, for instance - especially if I'm evil.
Karma (like Reputation used to) has more effects when dealing with people. Good people are less likely to help/provide information if you are Evil, and vice versa.
Chems have more serious drawbacks, and addiction is something to really worry about!
Allow Chems, equipment, Perks, to raise a stat above the cap of 10. 10 should be the maximum normal that is attainable. But your STR, PER, INT, whatever, can be boosted beyond that artificially - either temporarily (chems; Night Person; Power Armor); or Permanently (Perk; equipment - as long as it is worn).
Radiation is harder to get rid of - RadAway is rare and precious!
Companions have a broader range of options in terms of: how aggressive/defensive, as well as ranged, melee, or support.

Make it harder to have multiple skills at such high levels of competency! Give us an incentive to choose 1 Perk over another. The whole reason for something like the "One-Hander" Perk in the old F0's was because, while you would suffer with two-handed weapons, it increased your attack ability with single-handed weapons significantly above what you could otherwise have without taking it!

I can agree with this, but I also fail to see a simple understanding here... As you said, Fallout 1& 2 went for a certain audience, Fallout 3 does not target that audience; Yet it is situated as a direct sequel to a game that drew a different kind of audience .

Secondly... (the real puzzler)
Why is that wider audience interested in Fallout at all? It all appears like there are folks that love the idea of Fallout but don't actually like it; preferring instead, something else dressed up to look like it.... Is it not like choosing California rolls instead of Sushi, or better yet.... Is it not exactly like preferring spiced Pollock fish dressed up as [imitation] "crab meat", over the real thing. I mean [to me] its just like someone saying "Oh I love crab!", and then finding out that they don't know what a real crab is, won't touch one when offered, and consider the shell to much of a hindrance.
~They like what they want to consider as crab. (The bad part comes when the fisheries decide that imitaion sells just as well, but takes less work to produce, and summarily end the availability of any kind of crab but fake). :sadvaultboy:

I'd like to see more settlements and the some type of faction system that the player could enter (not like the guild system in Oblivion). I would also like a greater ability to interact with the exisiting communities. We go to Big Town, we save Big Town, we can move in to Big Town if we want. That kind of thing.

The problem with FO3 as it stands is the game stops moving forward by Level 13 or 14;. The character is done. Most of the quests are completed and he/she is pretty much mature. There is some tweaking to be done and some of the perks left are great to get, but he/she doesn't really need them to finish the game. By the time I get the Grim Reaper's Sprint I never need it. What haven't I done? Sure I can roam the Wastes and dress up NPCs and kill people with shopping carts, but what new thing haven't I done? There is no epic battle that I haven't done at least once before that I need a full tank of AP points to win.

I pretty much agree with the majority of the people here. Now that I think about it, a crippled limb always would be a pain... but maybe they could implement it in FO4 to a point where it's exciting. At the very least, I want the day time to be expanded, and food and water necessary for survival. I really just want it to be more of a survival game.

Yup, see:

http://fallout.wikia.com/wiki/Fallout_Online_FAQ

That's cute. I don't accept that FO3 as an imitation, or fundamentally inferior to FO2, but rather different. Some aspects are better, some are worse. Much is different. Understand that some folks are disappointed, and that's unfortunate. However, nothing can be done about it now.

Back to what I'd like to see in FO4:

Aside from RP mechanic improvement which we have discussed at length, I'd like to see:
-Ability to place and arrange objects.
-Multiple player placed map markers.
-Separate armor pieces.
-A larger selection of weapons, including primitive weapons.
-A larger selection of mobs.

A comment about FO3 and FO4:

This is my opinion only. Seems to me that when they started FO3, they went about proving that the concept of Beth making a Fallout game would work financially. That is, the game appears minimal in some areas. I'm hoping that in FO4, those light areas (Dialogue, types of mobs, types of weapons, etc) will be raised to the level of completeness of the rest of the game.

I'm so tired of some people making excuses and trying to pull down good ideas. For what reasons I don't know. What I'm getting from these types are #1 let's take it easy on the devs/don't want to overburden them with such things which may or may not actually be that difficult to implement (but hey let's er on the side of nay saying and say it's just too hard for those pro devs to do...).#2 quit complaining and self restrict (the ever present favorite). #3 mod the game your self (gee that's a great idea except I'm not a pro modder so I can't handcraft the game to my desires).

How bout simple toggle boxes? Is that too infringing? Is that too much to ask? Little toggle boxes? weighted ammo *on/off* water to survive *on/off* etc etc etc. I do believe games have done that before without going bankrupt. Ah but I'm sure I'm missing some reason(s) why this can't be done *awaits comments how this isn't possible and would take too much time for poor beleaguered devs to cater to such a small number of people who actually want such as thing and the time is better spent elsewhere* And around and around...

I just don think that a lot of people understand that time and money are limited resources. Any time and money you spend on a feature reduces the time and money you can spend on other features. Even if it took 10 man hours to implement multiple sliders, that's 10 man hours that are lost to any other purpose.

It's not that I argue that sliders aren't useful...I'd like to ahve them myself, but the reason they aren't available is that the devs decided to use the resources elsewhere.

So, if you don't have these sliders, you can either find other ways to tweak the game for yourself, or try to carry on.

Well toggle boxes aren't needed! You just make the game harder yourself!. If you have too much ammo, set an arbitrary limit and stick to it, make your character have to drink and eat every now and then or you intentionally injure yourself. If combat is too easy, well, play with one hand behind your back.

In all seriousness, aside from the big things like a better SPECIAL, better dialogue, deeper factions and towns..I'd like for some cheesy things to get iced. One, weightless ammo needs to go, or better yet, any item that can be used by the PC has to have a weight (maybe not notes, fluff is always nice). Accessing your inventory in combat should be a risky thing to do- no more insta-pause and maybe make it eat up AP. I'd like to see flavour text for the weapons, guns and other stuff that you collect - such a minor thing and it's not in there. Also, a change to the old armour system, so it uses DR instead of just raw armour to mitigate damage, that'd help PA actually seem like what it is in the lore.

Ok I give up. I know of other games which have multiple selectable realism/difficulty settings and you can individually select which ones you want or not and also sometimes add functionality in new patches but I'll just stop and save my breath/time. Well anyway F3 was somewhat amusing for a short while (course it could be far more than that but hey let's not reach for the stars am I right? That might drain resources better spent elsewhere...where this 'elsewhere' is is anyones guess).....I'll probably remove it soon from my HD since I don't have the time to invest to try and figure out how to mod it to my liking and go back to my old favorite game (which is a funnily a conversion mod based on a game I wouldn't buy or play otherwise in its native form).

Only you can make that decision for yourself. Personally, I don't ahve any problems self regulating in an RPG as I consider that part of roleplay, but I do understand that "roleplay" means different things to different people.

I should point out there there are a couple of very good mods out there that totally revamp gameplay and may come close to what you are looking for in terms of making the game more difficult. It only takes a few minutes to download and install these mods, and i know of at least one (Fook, I think, but maybe not...I don't use them) that is modular, so you can choose what to make more difficult, etc. You can go to the Mods section of this forum and check them out.

My own thoughts on self-regulating (setting an arbitrary limit on how much ammo I carry, when to use stims, etc:) I can do this, and that's one possible solution. Myself, I exercise enough self-control in real life - I don't find that fun thing to do in a videogame. That's just me. Not to mention that doing something like that is also consistently reminding me that I'm adapting the game to suit my own preferences, which means that there's an element of the game that I'm not all that content with.

Self-regulating is a solution, but I absolutely do not see it as the perfect solution to all my woes. If we're talking about changes I'd like to see, then what's going to be up there on my own list of priorities are changes so that I don't feel the need to arbitrarily change how I approach the game to get my maximum enjoyment out of it. My idea of a "perfect" game is one that I can play without any mods, and in the manner it was designed to be played.

If I'm expected to drastically change how I approach a game - 9 times out of 10 I just won't buy that game, and instead choose something that caters more towards my own preferences. If this were just about any other game, that would be my solution instead of limiting how much I carry with me. My problem here is that I want to play Fallout 3 and the hypothetical Fallout 4. I actually very much like this game despite some fundamental misgivings I have with it.

But if we're talking about things I'd like to see changed to make the game better (based on my own preferences) then very high on that list are going to be changes so that I don't have to arbitrarily limit myself, or use a boat-load of mods, to get full enjoyment out of it.