You forgot to add that the ending for Vault 101 was a pathetic excuse for a joke.


But yes, good game, yet sorely lacking on certain fronts.

8/10, my opinion.

You guys sure are generous, I'd give this a 7/10. It's average, the flaws really hold it back from being something stellar.

I"ll try to stay on point. It's kinda weird being one of the better behaved commenters in a thread like this. (insert smiley here)

Andale, I haven't figured out. How old is that town? Several generations for sure - but is several "three or four" or "all the way back to the Great War"? As for Big Town, there's always a "Big Town". Every batch of exiled Little Lamplighters founds their own Big Town. The current Big Town can't have been around for very long - most of the residents are contemporaries from Little Lamplight. Some of them also know Sticky - so they are in their twenties at the latest. That makes Big Town on the order of five years old. I suppose that those of us that hate the snotty jerks in Little Lamplight have the consolation that once they've been sent out to the Wasteland, their lives end up being pretty brutal and short.

Water. People in the Capital Wasteland drink out of the Potomac - or whatever the nearby source is - like a water tower. And they get irradiated. Those that have the resources get some of those rads removed, others end up begging for purified water outside the major settlements, the rest die. Actually, for some reason, all the sinks and water fountains seem to still have good water supply - that I can't explain. Regardless - the point is that for the majority of wastelanders, the water they drink is that irradiated stuff.

Im not bickering with you, so far I've seen you sit on the fence and not really get involved.

Surprisingly I have actually got a better reception here than I did at NMA. But I feel one reason is because most of the points I made have already been exhaustively discussed there. And yes, I have tried to be as honest and open minded as possible. It seems I am between two opposite camps of love and hatred for this game, and nothing in the middle is tolerated. This isn't marmite we are talking about, its a game.



The whole game could have bene done without Vault 101. It seems it was just included to add to that ''Fallout Feel'' that you were born and raised in a Vault, blah blah blah. I still don't understand how James got in to that vault. But nevermind.



Haha, your civility is welcome.

I didn't know Big Town shifted. I just always thought it was in the same place and was the dumpster of Little Lamplight.

Yeah thats what I guessed about the water. Seeing as its the ONLY source of water in the whole place and people are managing to live there, then I suppose they HAVE to deal with the radiation. As for the water in toilets, fire hydrants, water towers, and so on, it ties in with one of my ''inconsistency'' points that like foodstuffs on shelves, its another one of those things that would have vanished long long ago but somehow still exists there after 200 years. 5 Years post war this game would have been perfect.

Just to clarify, I don't know if Big Town shifts locations, it may always end up in the place that it is - in fact, that's more likely than not. I'm just saying that the current crop of Big Town'ers are from a certain batch of Little Lamplighters. Most, if not all, of them are in a very narrow age range. There's no previous generation or next generation. My interpretation of the Big Town-Little Lamplight connection is basically what you stated - that Big Town is the dumpster of Little Lamplight - so while the makeshift walls and various buildings may have been around for awhile, the actual town itself - as in the population of the place, has probably only been there for a few years.

That to me is a very dark town. It's a place where Little Lamplighters go to die. It's entire history is based on myths told by young children to each other, to console them about being exiled from their home. And those myths are all lies. And there's no actual history of the place outside of that, since no one survives there long enough to pass on stories. Maybe that changes with the influence of a High Karma Lone Wanderer, rescuing some of their captives and serving as an example of survival - but as of the time the game takes place, it has all appearances of a place where a cohort of Little Lamplighters arrive every few years, and are then slaughtered by their neighbors.

I'll agree with Waster of the Ranges about Little Lamplight/ Big Town. To me, that series of events is one of the more interesting I came across in Fallout 3. It is pretty dark when you come right down to it. And it does seem like each new batch of Big Town settlers comes to the place expecting a wonderful paradise and instead finds a ghost town populated by the ghosts of previous exiles. That's one settlement where I think it makes sense to only see a very low population - it's not supposed to represent a thriving community, but one constantly teetering on the brink of extinction.

They also went to some lengths to explain the situation for the most part. There's at least some thought given to the logistics of how Little Lamplight maintains itself, for example (with the fungus, etc.) I did miss an explanation of their history my first time through, though I've gathered some of that background info from the forums.

I would have liked some more details to drag up about the places history (and just who are providing this constant source of children) but that goes for a lot of Fallout 3 in general. They give... adequate background info on many things, but I would very much like it if they'd gone further with many of these things. (Given, I could levy the same criticism against Fallout 1 and 2, but I think it's still a valid concern.)

-Water, I dont think its a stretch to say that the water pipes of the city could have stayed in relative usuable condition after the War, and maybe the Water Plants were automated, however I think for the game itself the fact that you could instantly heal to full health using a faucet was a poor choice, since it was very rare that you actually had to worry about radiation poisoning

-Big Town- This place seemed to have only recently come under atack by the supermutants etc, so it would make sense that only the populace at its relative peak would have remained in the town the rest now reside in vault 87 or Paradise Falls

-Relative lack of people, I think that when you come out of the Vault in a sense DC is on its last legs most of the settlements have been over run by the raiders, mutants, yao guai outside of Megaton and Rivet City everything else is dying, also DC is probably more irradiated then anywhere else as it would have been the primary target for the Chinese

My biggest beefs are:

The Enclave seems to be poorly fleshed out, on one hand it seems like they are there to genuinely save the waste land, on one hand want to scourge it of all life and on another there to just kill everyone for no particular reason

Lack of anything new, as far as I can tell the Commonwealth/BoS outcasts is the only really new concept or plot tool in the game, everything else I had seen before in previous games and the Commonwealth is never explained though I assume it has something to do with Pennsylvania and the Institue is the whats left of the Franklin institute?

They want to save the wasteland by scourging it of all mutant life. Big brother knows best.




I took the institute as MIT, and Zimmer is exactly what I would expect from some place like that many years after the war. They are high tech, but they have apparently isolated themselves.

OK, so I added a pretty major point I had forgotten about in ''The Good''

Also added links to the poem ''There will come soft rains'' and the short story ''I have no mouth and I must scream''.

Tell me what you think.

Thanks.

Yeah, Fallout 3 has some really good references tucked away in it. There was http://www.gamesas.com/index.php?showtopic=938585 about it a while ago, and new ones keep popping up. A lot of the stuff posted is like "ooh I found the Alien Blaster!!!" but some of is things like - Arkansas in Minefield, or the Death of Marat.

That is indeed a nice thread. There are some 'deep' elements in Fallout 3. You do have to look to find them. But I do miss the old days where most of the revelations were through text. Off course, like I said in the new point, Beth managed tu pull off a lot of good 'visual' moments too.

I have to hand it to you. This is one of actually the best reviews I have read of Fallout 3.

It does not fit into the run of the mill "This game svcks! It's not Fallout! It's Oblivion with guns!"

nor does it fit into the

"This game rocks and if you disagree or critique one little thing you svck."

Thanks for the read.

http://i44.tinypic.com/10f9g0l.jpg

Why does this forum not allow images? ><

My personal opinion.

The goods:

1) The content of individual quests is decent and plausible (this doesn't include the main-quest, I'll get to that in awhile).

2) Being able to "fast-track" quests via speech skill checks or whatever is good, for players who generally want to play through the game quicker or whatever without having to go on an expedition worthy of an episode of "National Geographic Explorer"

3) Being able to not "fast-track" quests is good, for players like me who want to go on an expedition worth of an episode of "National Geographic Explorer"

4) NPC character development was good, with everyone having their own unique personalities and (in most cases) back-stories. A lot of them have personal agendas they are trying to fullfill, grudges against other NPCs, etc. Even "vanilla" NPCs like raiders, robots, super-mutants, fire-ants, Deathclaws, and Yao Gui have their origins explained (of course, most of the stories - robots aside - defualt to radiation or virus-related mutations - but hey, at least they bothered to give back-stories)

5) Wide variety of unique weapons and armor

6) Plenty of places to explore

The bads:

1) The individual side-quests are not, in any way, tied to the main quest, and vice-versa.

2) The main quest is too short, simple, and the final 30 minutes of it go from being comically easy to then coming to an ending that gives the impression that about 1 hour of thought was put into the possible outcomes (all of which can be accessed by simple actions in the last 30 seconds of play). The outcomes that DO exist are completely unimpressive and only result in a few minor changes to a brief slideshow and narrative, prior to the dev credits rolling.

3) The "all roads lead to the same ending" design of the main quest, which, in no way, makes you account of your actions up to that point in the game - that was terrible. Even RPG games made as early as around 1990 were able to generate some variance on the outcome of the climactic end of the game, based on your actions substantially earlier in the game on side-quests, etc. I would have thought that they could have provided some widely varying endings to this game (even if there were only a few of them), based on your actions earlier on in the main quest, and your actions in dealing with particular factions.

4) The karma system is too simple. If I steal enough coffee cups, I'm considered just as bad as somebody who blew Megaton off the map. Of course, everyone has a different system of morals, but this game basically says that if you commit enough petty theft, you're just as bad as someone who engages in wholesale massacre and cannibalism of the victims.

5) The character-development was either simplified to appease a wider player-base, or there was just a lack of development time spent on character development. One SPECIAL stat modifies your damage with one particular area of combat, and every other type of combat is affected entirely by skill points. Another SPECIAL stat affects your chance to critically hit targets, but critical hits are hardly required to "win" battles. One SPECIAL stat boosts your chances on speech checks. Other than that, SPECIAL has no bearing on types of weapons you can effectively use (or even use at all), and skill points basically trump SPECIAL for ALL actions in the game. You can have 1 point in intelligence and still max out your pertinent skill points simply by finding books and bobbleheads. It sort of makes your character not feel like you had to put any brains into developing it for the role you wanted to play. The impact of SPECIAL on your skill-levels is basically non-existent.

6) You can earn waaay too much money waaay too easily. For me, this meant that I could have a MOUNTAIN of stimpaks readily available to use at any time. I never had ammunition problems.

7) Once you get to a later character level and have so many caps, the incentive to actually go exploring locations for loot tends to drop like a rock. Yeah, there are a couple of special pieces of apparell to be found, and even more special weapons to be found, but none of them feel like they have a major determining factor in your ability to handle combat or other situations throughout the game.

8) For characters that do a lot of exploring, they purposefully have to hop-scotch around built-in game mechanics (mainly, stat-boosting clothing, skill books, and bobbleheads) or they will find that they are good at "everything" with a single character, which tends to limit replayability.



Still, despite all my gripes, I like the game. I just think it didn't deserve a score of like 94% from PC Gamer. I'm glad I bought it, but the "oohs" and "aahs" in the review industry make me think it's out of touch with the expecation of fans of the RPG genre (and the devs obviously "dumbed down" the RPG aspects intentionally, or simply didn't spend enough time on them).

I don't they should be. Would a side quest of someone sending you to look for their lost brother/mom/sister/wife etc have to be tied to the main quest? No. That's why they are side quests.

Back in the days I used to tabletop D&D there were plenty of sidequests I remember that had nothing to do with the main quest.

Some of them certainly could have had a bit more to do with the core struggles of the Main Quest, though. Like being sent in to help stop the Enclave's advance (or help with it, if you wanted to go the other way.) Or going out in search of technically-minded people to help with Project Purity. Or helping a town deal with their radiations sickness, etc. If the primary conflict of the game is so epic and worthwhile, then adding some sidequests to help drive that point home could only serve to strengthen that. Not everthing would have to do with the core struggle of the Main Quest, but adding in stuff that would reinforce those major points would certainly be a good thing, I'd think.

Not only that, but just side quests dealing with the central thematic elements of the Main Quest would reinforce those ideas. For one, it's important in terms of simple good storytelling to have a clear ideas as to just what the core theme of the game is. For Fallout 3, I don't know what that would be. If you're pitching a story or movie to an editor or producer, it's important to be able to condense your story down to a single sentence, and to be able to convey the primary thrust of your story with one word. For Fallout 3, it's... Sacrifice, maybe?

Whatever it is, you can have many of your side quests dealing with themes along the same lines. If sacrifice, and what you're willing to give up for your ideals, is the central theme of the Main Quest, then the Side Quests are a very useful source for supporting those ideas.

I liked the intro. :sadvaultboy:

I didn't say they ALL should be tied to the main quest. Having said that, why not simple things? One example is Liberty Prime. Why not a side quest to go get parts or find scientific minds to fix the "power problem" which is repeatedly mentioned during the main quest, only to be miraculously "fixed" in the final sequences (despite dialogue between NPCs that indicates otherwise, lol). I mean, the guy says it isn't combat ready, and then it proceeds to walk over everything the enclave can throw at it, to the extent that you don't even need to have your weapon at the ready for the entire sequence.

I'm not saying they ALL should have had some bearing on the main quest, but it would have been nice to have optional endings, based on previous actions in the game (a system which was present even in PC games that are approaching the age of 20 years).

Actually yeah. I've played enough RPGs over the years to get a bit of a sixth sense for when I come across something that's later going to develop into a sideplot. Reading about Liberty Prime and the work being done on him - my first thought was "great, finally a chance to make use of my Science skill for something other than hacking terminals." I thought surely that was going to lead into some sort of quest to help fix him up or something, and it was something I was looking forward to actually.

To then run into the last part of the game and find out he's been miraculously patched together was a bit of a suprise for me. That had all the bells and whistles of something that was going to require some player interaction and then nothing actually came of it. I still wonder if possibly they had something planned and just ran out of time, or what?

Beats me. The entire main quest felt, to me, like they "ran out of time". The linearity and comparative brevity of the whole thing just felt...out of place, with the rest of the game's content.

They had big plans for Liberty Prime but had to settle for an end game battle. Some Beth guy said that in an interview.

Yeah, some of the skills are utterly useless in Fallout 3. Science applies only to hacking terminals. In Fallout 2 (not sure about 1), you could see a progression in the way you spoke to people regarding certain topics depending on whether your science skillw as high enough.

Can you imagine in Fallout 3, if 'fixing' Liberty Prime with a high enough science skills (and im talking like 100%) made him the way he actually is in-game, but by not fixing it, he became really really slow, easy to kill, with underpowered weapons and so on?

That would have rewarded 'Geeks' who invested in science, probably at the expense of combat skills, making the end-game significantly easier and more rewarding for them. However, those who have invested heavily in combat skills would probably not need Liberty Prime (as indeed I did not) to complete the mission anyway.

These are all missed opportunities that arise from the watering down of the SPECIAL system and of the skills.