In the next game, I want you to have to scrounge more. It seemed I always had [censored] loads of ammo and stimpacks mid-way through the game... I want it to be where I have like 10 .32 rounds, and a broken hunting rifle, and several broken limbs. THAT'S what Bethesda said the game would be like. Now, I liked FO3 alot, but the next one should be more like a real post apocalyptic setting.

I personally do not want this. Well, not that much at least. A lot of hard-core gamers want more intensive and realistic gameplay but casual gamers, like myself, want something that i can relax for 30mins and just play, without having to constantely try to scrounge up items or ammo. I don't like looking in every small area, considering most of the time, if i did that, i would only get through like 1 region before I had to leave.

That's one thing I was curious about before the game was released - was how far they were going to go with this stuff. Like I was sort of hoping that stimpaks would be rare enough that food and water would be the primary source of healing through most of the game (meaning that balancing your radiation and health levels would be more important.)

The original games had this problem, too - about halfway through you pretty much have all the gear you're ever going to need.

One thing I'd like to see, sort of along the same lines, is a compelling way to implement crippled limbs. As it stands, I'm only ever crippled for the amount of time it takes me to realize I have been crippled and go into my inventory menu for some stims. But trying to run around with two crippled legs for a long time might get annoying as well. I don't know what they should do in regards to this, but I'd like to see something where being crippled actually means more than "it's time for another stimpak" without leading to making the game annoying as well.

Kind of the same thing with scrounging - I'd like to see a tighter balancing act in the game. But I also don't know what the best way to do that would be without leading to needless aggravation, as well.

You can always not pick up the stimpacks/ammo to make the game harder.

The thing is, this sort of difficulty/realism would make many people dislike the game as well, so implementing such stuff might be a double-edged sword.

XFO has a part of it that deals with this... Also has fook compatibility

Mods. Mods are the reason why most hard core gamers gather around the PC while the casual head to console. Not a universal rule but for the most part it holds some water.

How about simply making difficulty settings affect also things other than combat?

That was a flagrant use of common sense. You should be ashamed of yourself for being so offensive.

I mean....that would make sense



But why should we be forced to resort to mods? Couldn't we have a scavenger mode, like some games have an ironman mode? It would just disable fast travel, reduce the availablity of ammo and meds, and give ammo weight.

It's win win! The casuals have their hand holding version, and the challenge starved get their 'omfg survival is serious business!' version.

Throw in a "Classic SPECIAL" mode, then I would be content, rulewise.

I would like to see the difficulty slider do more than just change HP/Damage values around. I think there actually is a compelling case to be made for adding some of these "hard-core" gameplay elements into the higher difficulty levels.

It's obviously a broad generalization, and it's not like I have any scientific studies to back this up, but I would imagine that most of the players who want to play on the tougher difficulty levels are also those who want some of these more difficult mechanics.

Of course, the downside is that this would make the game harder for the devs to balance out. (A lot more variables to take into account, for example - in the most extreme scenario it would almost be like making two different games at once.)

My big worry is that this concept of tying difficulty sliders to game mechanics could mean that I'd get left out in the lurch. For example, I enjoy the "magic" clothing, quest compasses and mini-games - even though I would also like to see ammo weight, more lasting crippling effects, and an improved usage of Attributes. Tying everything to one knob could lead myself to a situation where "normall" doesn't have enough of what I'm looking for, and the next step up could at the same time take away many of the things I enjoy. (This is why I don't use a lot of mods to be found around here - as many of them are a bit too inclusive - ie, changes I like combined with other things I dislike.)

You could just have a whole ton of gameplay options in the settings screen, but the potential pitfall there is that if you give too much control over to the player, you could end up watering down the game too much. (For me, at least - too many options could would paint me a picture of a developer that wasn't confident enough about the game they're making to make some solid decisions.) At some level, I do think you have relegate some of these things to the modding community.

I'd like to see the difficulty slider affecting a wider range of things, with adding in game mechanics and playstyle considerations, changing the balancing of items to an extent, etc. My worry would be about a diff slider that takes away things already in the game.

You make more money off the casual gamer, this won't appeal to the casual gamer.

Theres always Viva Piniata...

I thought it was executed well, the first few levels for me, as I play on very hard, first 9 or so it was scrounge fest, raiding the SD mart stealing and scrounging but as you leveled and got tougher the game lifted as well, which is how I like to play RPG's in general less PA RPG's. But more of a chalange is always welcome

Oh and to the PC is hardcoe thing, as a rule, my comp svcks so as much as I would love to play Oblivion and FO3 with insane amounts of challenge, I cant. My processor PUSHES a heavily modded morrowind so its pretty bad.

See quote below

Brain functions active....common sense module at full power.

Yeah, you're right he does have quite the gall.


Didn't you see the comment above? *tsk tsk*


In conclusion I shall lament about what should be and would provide a solution for all but will most likely never be for reasons unknown to me. *cheers* *drinks my old stock ale to numb the maddening frustration*.

I actually agree with you both.

I'm a casual, hardcoe gamer.

I like what someone said about the difficulty slider affecting this aspect of game play, why not make everyone happy.

I thought the title of this thread was "Something I'd really like to see in the next FO" not "what will most likely be in the next Fallout."

Casual gamer =/= Can't handle a game/Little kid. (I don't know what that Viva thing is, but it really does not sound like the type of game i would get into very well.)
As i stated, i don't have much time on my hands and quite frankly if they made it harder to get ammo most newbie gamers would complain (And ask more questions on how to get it, we already have had quite a few posts asking where to get ammo, imagine if it was worse? Noooo!) and experienced but casual gamers would complain. The only real benefit would be for hardcoe gaming that of which is a lot less members than casual.
Many people don't like digging around in every single box looking for ammo and where is the fun if you can barely survive? It's more realistic, but realism doesn't even matter for the majority of gamers, and heck, your fighting giant super mutants and radscorpions while using stimpacs that automatically heal you, so right there it pretty much disables 'realistic.'




If possible, i would like that too. But it would be a very rough, and hard ride to get it implanted well.-Think of the work that would need to be done, ouch. It would definately be glitchy and make more cheating ways avaliable. I mean, before you open some containers lower the difficulty and bam, you get a ton of ammo than turn it back up. That's what i would do so i didn't need to worry about ammo, ashamed, i know.

I'm pretty sure it's possible. says who? Wait, they are getting paid right? *scratches head*. I didn't know game dev work was supposed to be easy... you get out what you put in I think just like any other thing pretty much.

Whatch you talkin bout Willis? (I'm drunkee a little please excuse my sarcasm (and detection of it) may not come off properly).

Casual gamers are not the only bloody source of money in the gaming industry!!!

Seriously, I hate that attitude! It's choking the creativity and challenge out of the gaming industry

Not every game has to be a blockbuster, not every game has to be on the top ten list. So long as you don't run up a huge budget, niche markets are a viable source of income.



Which is why some folks suggest more difficulty options so that those of us who WANT the challenge can HAVE it. As for potential for cheating, make it so that these choices can only be chosen

I would like to cook my radroach meat for once, i'm suprised that the lone wanderer is immune to raw meat

As far as the whole cheating thing - by temporarily turning down the difficulty to get more ammo or whatever, and then turn it back up later on, etc:

I don't really see the problem with that. You could do that in Fallout 1 and 2, if you found the combat to be too hard at times, and especially you could do that in Oblivion to an even greater extent. You can even do that in Fallout 3, temporarily turning down the difficulty for a time and then turning it back up.

There's a lot of potential to exploit something like that - but at the same time, it's a single-player game. If you bought the game, you can do whatever you like with it. If you have more fun playing that way, then more power to you. I'd do that in Oblivion on occasion - I'd be having trouble in particular section, so I'd turn the difficulty way down until I got out of the tight spot, and then shifted it back to something more suitable to my sensibilities.

If a player wants to even go so far as to mess around with the difficulty slider every five minutes - well, more power to them. Who am I to say that's the "wrong" way to play the game. And if the game allows that sort of play while also letting other players keep it where they want and not give in to the temptation - so much the better. It's a single-player game, exploit all you want as far as I'm concerned - it's not going to affect my play through the game.

The one biggest thing I fail to see is a simple understanding. Fallout and Fallout 2 reached a certain audience, one that enjoyed turn-based combat and more roleplaying. Fallout 3 on the other hand reaches out to such a larger audience due to the available FPS-style real-time combat, ease of understanding, and the immense immersive capabilities this game possesses. This allows Fallout 3 to appeal to a much larger demographic than 1 or 2, and definitely helps those of us who prefer console gaming over PC gaming. I happen to be a die hard FPS player/console user since the days of Nintendo (I was born the year a lot of Nintendo stuff became available-1985). Gaming is, after all, an industry. I credit Bethesda for making a GREAT Fallout game that seems to stay incredibly true to the Fallout universe while having such a large target audience and NOT selling out (IMO). They did a great deal of things right. We have to accept not everyone's going to be happy with it because it IS trying to appeal to such a diverse audience.

It would not be easy considering how easily you can move the slider. Each tweak would directly affect all these different elements. That's all i said, nothing about their jobs.




No, they aren't. But they are the most profitable and most numerous. Thus, why developers should focus a lot on them.
"Choices can only be chosen" - Sure, that would work. And it's not too hard to make a challenge. Max difficulty slider, remove HUD, only search in some boxes instead of looking in everything, don't loot bodies, only carry a few stimpacs at a time, and be evil so you clear out a lot of potentially helpful people, (General section, no spoilers of specific targets.) Wear armor that looks decent instead of strong defensive armor, Maybe even add in a RP aspect, dont increase intellect so much, don't get comprehension or intense training or that one that adds +3 skill points per level up. Use weapons with abundance of ammo but horrid damage, like 10MM sub or even just the pistol.
I don't know about you, but i think that would be VERY difficult.

I never nessecarily ment it was a bad thing - but i mentioned it because again, a lot of hardcoe gamers tend to use this as an argument also. Saying that you should not be able to turn down the slider because its realism and blahblah. Im sure you've heard it before, but now in this situation it's the exact same thing with even worse potential.



Yep. My thoughts exactly.

EDIT: Now ill be lying down, 1 here and i have classes at 6. So i won't be able to reply, maybe in a couple days.

My thought on the hardcoe and 1337 players: The slider is there for people like me versus people who are elite. If you consider yourself to BE an elite gamer (this isn't pointed in any particular direction) then the slider should hold absolutely no temptation whatsoever, set it on Very Hard (or whatever the most difficult is) and forget it.