back in the day, i was a big fan of fallout's tongue-in-cheek references. things like the whale carcass in the wasteland...things that confused the bejeesus out of you, until you got the reference. i saw a perfect opportunity for one in Mothership Zeta...alas, it was not to be, and i lack the modding capabilities to make it so.

or am i the only one who wanted to see a Tardis on the mothership?

throw out your ideas for references, or give a shout-out to a gag you did notice, especially if it hasn't gotten the attention it deserves.

Personally, I *hated* that aspect of Fallout 2, found it completely atmosphere-destroying. But I didn't find the references in Fallout 3 to Planet Of The Apes, Philip K. dike, H.P. Lovecraft, Seinfeld, Full Metal Jacket etc. to be nearly as annoying, I dunno, I guess they were a touch subtler and better integrated into the wider wasteland.

My favourite gags:

I liked all the 'Saving Private Ryan' references in the Lyons Pride. The betting pool on Gallows real name, and the sniper's quote.. It really fleshed them out well, and gave them like-able personalities IMO.

a tardis would be awesome. not just on the mothership tho.

I lol'ed at the Terminator reference at the beginning of The Pitt. "Your clothes...give them to me...now."

I think that a lot of RL-3's quotes are hilarious (you're making me angry... you won't like me when I'm angry!). Can't wait to get BS, which is supposed to make him nearly indestructible.

The Tardis was actually done before. Fallout 1 had the Tardis as a special encounter... IIRC you find the motion detector near it.


Just curious... Why exactly? (I mean, yeah you mention that it was atmosphere-destroying... except that that was the intended atmosphere).

*On a side note: I think Fallout 2 was an unintentional mistake by the later developer's flawed view of the setting. :shrug:
While I liked some of the references (including the whale), I believe that anomalies like Brain and the talking scorpion break with Fallout's internal "logic" to the madness that you find.

Fallout terrified the bejeesus out of me. The music in particular. For what was, by the time a played it, a slice of retro gaming, it had an atmosphere of bleak terror that you could cut with a knife. I remember the first time I walked into one of the empty town ruins to poke around I had to leave about a minute later; the howling of a chill wind and a relentless ringing bell, it was so oppressive, it was too much (and a testament to how critical good audio can be). Fallout 2, on the other hand, didn't feel like a horrifying post-apocalyptic wasteland (the music wasn't as good, for a start...). Perhaps "atmosphere-destroying" was the wrong way to put it, rather the atmosphere created in the second game was nowhere near as all-consuming. I felt it lacked cohesion - now you're in Gangster town! now Samurai Town! - and the wild veering of tone bugged me. Playing the first game, I was there on the wastes; with the second, I was never anywhere except sat at my computer playing a fun but rather silly game, which felt like it had been written by a bunch of college students whose main concern was to cram in as many pop-culture references as they could. That sounds harsher than it's meant; Fallout 2 was fun for what it was, and the multiple approaches/significant replay value were commendable, but IMHO it's not as special a game as the first one (or the third). I know the mission statement was no longer 'survive in the wasteland', but 'thrive in the wasteland', but for me, basic survival, scraping by against all the odds, is the essence of the series, not driving around in a Back To The Future car with Doctor Who's cast-off pooch as a side-kick.

(I played 3, then picked up a cheap compilation and played the first two back-to-back, to give you an idea of where I'm coming from. Maybe if I'd've played the second game as a teenager I would've enjoyed it more, I dunno, but by the time I played it I found it really didn't match the hype it had garnered, whereas the first one did. Again, all IMHO of course.)

Fallout is my favorite of the three so far, (and for several of the reasons you mention).

Fallout 2 was finished in a rush (and has filler content). IMO they lost the magic when they lost the leads (designers).
The 2nd game just don't have the right setting IMO. (Fallout is my favorite, but if I had only one choice... I'd still have to pick #2, as its bigger, decent enough, and had the fixes Fallout desperately needed).