Well, time to derail the conversation again. I guess it's just too painful for you to acknowledge that Bethesda owns the rights to the Fallout IP, and I guess it was way too much to expect that you would understand that in a Fallout game, the iconic Fallout factions are going to appear. Or that Beth brought over the old factions in a sensible way. But let's address your statement - if only to further demonstrate how biased you are towards any game not named Fallout 3.

You are saying that FO2 has so many quests and stores that there is no way to compare them to FO3? Well, I didn't mention quests - but iamgomez did initially, so let's address that - if you count the tiny little individual Fed-Ex tasks as the same as say delivering Lucy West's letter - sure. IIRC, Ausir (by no means a FO3 really devoted fan like myself) looked at it and said that they were about the same - if you group the quests together in a meaningful way. Here's another way of looking at it - consider how long it takes to get through FO3's Side Quests... You can still be completeing (only marked) Side Quests in the same amount of time to play FO2 - without speed-running the PA and Bozar, and completing all the "main" Side Quests (ie. enough to get the hardest to achieve ending in the epilogue).

And stores? WTH?!? There's almost as many regularly spawning Scavenger Houses in FO3 as there are stores in FO2. You are right in that, when it comes to "stores" there is no contest between FO3 and FO2. Or FO3 and FO1, FO2, Tactics and BoS combined. In terms of variety and volume - Fallout 3 wins hands down. But that's okay - you can always go to the next "argument" - that you prefer Quality over Quantity. It's totally awesome when people cite this and provide no examples of why FO2 has higher Quality (in stores) than FO3. Partly because it's totally subjective, partly because the only way to make the argument not sound ludicrous is to be preaching to the "FO3 SUX" converted.

Is there any similarity? Sure - that's intended. Just like when . Those are specific references to the previous games. Yes, FO3 specifically references the previous games. But you called it a rip-off, a copy, an "aping" of the originals. Well, that's not true. There are huge, substantial differences in the story. Not the least of which is the very nature of the Enclave in FO3 - of a puppet figurehead going its own way (with added compexity considering what John Henry Eden is).

SM's I have to disagree with you on. I already explained why, but here it is again: The Pre-War US Gov commissioned West Tek to do the PVP and FEV Projects, projects which involved doing perverse experiments on the country's own citizens (i.e. "black ops" "disavow all knowledge" types of experiments). The Pre-War US Gov commissioned Vault-Tec to build the Vaults, which ended up being perverse experiments on her own citizens. FO3 takes place in the DC area, a region where the Pre-War US Gov has a fairly significant presence - a place where the Pre-War US Gov already has a few operations going on (or perhaps you didn't know that). There is nothing about the existence of an FEV vault in DC that "beggars the imagination".

On Harold, I agree. Harold on the East Coast is ridiculous. You want to eye-roll or facepalm the presence of Harold in FO3 - okay. I get that. But the rest of it is pretty weak tea to be considered criticisms of FO3.

Oh, and regarding stores and locations? Thanks for clarifying to me, just how much you've internalized the process of ignoring anything good in FO3 - because the amount of willful ignorance that's required to consider FO2 a "bigger" game than FO3 is staggering.

I really hope Bethesda dont...
Ide rather never play Van Burden, than have Bethesda ruin what it could have been.

Oh and Waster of the Ranges... Get off your High Horse, Fallout 3 nothing new or amazing.
The Graphics are pretty, well done... The Storyline is almost exactly the same as the Main Quest of Fallout two, except it has extra gay robots on the side.

The did not make a new enemy, nor a new evil objective for the original enemy.
The only new weapon is a "Noob Cannon" and thier only new faction added has no quests.
The Idea of a Brotherhood base being stranded from the main BOS is a Fallout Tactics idea.
The Idea of a Artificial Intellegent computer, also came from Fallout 2... Skynet ring any bells? Or fallout Tactics... Vault 0???
The "There are huge, substantial differences in the story." I do believe a figurement of your imagination.


Fallout 3 has stolen so many ideas from other Fallout games I DREAD to think what fallout 4 will be like... maybe it will steal ideas from already stolen Ideas of Fallout 3...

Its like eating fallout 1,2, Tactics and throwing them back up again... THEN EATING THE SICK (Except it looks pretty...)

The idea of an Artificially Intelligent computer goes back a long time - it's not "from FO2". Geez, Skynet? You want to use Skynet as an example of how FO2 is more original than FO3?

Am I being obstinate and belligerent? Yes I am. Here's why - the statements being made about FO3 (90% cribbed and cribbed badly) are just plain wrong. And now people are standing around pretending that they aren't. It's the Big Lie. You come up with something that isn't true, and then repeat the heck out of it until people start accepting it.

Example: it is now commonly accepted that FO3 had crappy voice acting - especially when compared to previous Fallouts. Why? I don't know - there's no definitive post showing all the awesome Voice Acting in previous games and all the crappy Voice Acting in FO3. In fact, last time people started putting up examples, there was an argument that the Introduction by the Overseer "doesn't count" as voice acting. But consider the two voices that follow you around the Capital Wasteland all the time - Three Dog and John Henry Eden. Personally, I think these two characters have great voice acting - and they are completely different from each other, showing that FO3 has at least some range in vocie. And - between the two of them, have about as many lines of dialog as ALL OF FO1! And yet, the standard line is FO3 = crappy voice acting, the best you can say for it is that it's better than Oblivion.

You seem too simple to understand that no explanation isn't the same as a really poor one, hence my eye-roll. As for iconic factions appearing in the game, heh, well you're pretty much amazed by the story in FO3 so not sure of your ability to judge this clearly, but I was under the impression that, initially, moving the game to DC was a way to start new, and not throw back in many things from the previous RPGs in an attempt to keep continuity (although in that case, we really should be out west, continuing the story in the California region). The BoS's appearance doesn't bother me, the way they're treated is a bit chuckle-worthy though. They've added nice and cute changes to the Enclave plot - apparently enough for you to think it's complex - but at the core, it's a re-hash of Fallout 2.

FO3 does not have many deep locations, sure it has way more than Fallout 2, but to what depth ? I've recently played through FO2 and found the locations to have more depth than any in FO3. Which I'd expect, given FO3 is a sandbox game for you people to do your disconnected-from-the-game fantasizing. The whole Vault-87 and FEV element was just a cheesy way to give us SMs, our Generic Orc Enemy for the game, sure you can make up something to fit it in, doesn't mean I have to buy it as believable. And it's not exactly original. You're still punching at a hyperbole, amusingly enough, while not 90%, there's definitely a good bit.



I thought one thing that was mentioned alot with regards to the dialogue, that no one at all seemed to get, was that quantity doesn't imply quality.



Well, not a hardcoe NMA fan, but I did grasp that. But I doubt all console people are so stupid that they can't figure out a robust SPECIAL or, more likely the worry, will not bother to learn it and throw a hissy fit about the game being "hard". Underestimating their audience by far.

Depth? Depends on your definition. Depends on how much you put into FO3.

Recently, on the Greatest Discovery's thread in general, Minefield was brought up. For some players, this is just a stop in the Survival Guide quest series - and a place to get a Sniper Rifle early in the game. For them, Minefield has very little depth (outside of things like dealing with the mines, dealing with a well-entrenched Sniper, taking advantage of better Sniping locations to Snipe the Sniper and a place to stash lewt since the containers don't respawn). But on that thread, someone mentioned finding the child's room with crutches in it - and the dead couple next door. This was moving, a story told just by stuff left in the rooms - an interesting one of a couple raising a disabled kid. This was as deep as my playthroughs of Minefield were. Then someone pointed out that you don't find the kid's body - and that the kid's room had crutches and cherry bombs - a very similar set of items to another location in Minefield. Very likely hinting who the kid grew up to be and filling in more of the story of the town. This is with just the arrangement of items in the location. Something I personally missed four times through the town.

I guess that counts as a location with "no depth".

Perhaps the reason Fallout 3 seems to lack depth to you, is because you are determined to see it that way.

Edit: re - Voice Acting. Are you saying that John Henry Eden and Three Dog are poorly Voice Acted? That the lines delivered by those two characters are examples of Quantity and not Quality? I hope not. I was just trying to point out that there is LOTS of good voice acting in FO3, and yet it's accepted that the quality of voice acting in FO3 is poor. To be honest, that is also the impression I get when I play the game. When I first looked at the cast of voice actors and saw how many names there were - I admit that I was surprised that there were that many of them.

Here's my theory: FO3's voice acting suffers from the problem that EVERYBODY talks to you. Sometimes it's just a random selection from four or five "can't talk now" phrases - ones that you can't respond to. So in a long playthrough where you clock up 60 hours or more, you might end up hearing the same line a hundred times. This gives the impression that the voice work on the game is slipshod - and perhaps that's justification enough to categorize it as such - but there is plenty of "Quality" voice work in FO3 as well. And it is a "Big Lie" to relegate the entirety of FO3's voice acting to the junk pile.

Edit again: The Greatest Discovery thread is actually in Cheats, Hints and Spoilers (where it belongs). The comment I was referring to is Post#65. Here's http://www.gamesas.com/index.php?showtopic=938585

So, you believe that's depth in a location as you can imagine what's going on and what happened ? If I applied that to Fallout 2, it'd be even more in its favour. It's a different type of game, I suppose, with a sanbox you'd expect it to be broad but not too deep.

Yes. It's a Role Playing Game. Some imagination is required.

Minefield has layers of depth, actually intended by the devs - actually written in. That's a location with depth. A large fraction of players will miss most of it, another group will miss some of it. Heck, there might be more to the story then has been listed out so far. That is one of the ways in which Fallout 3 thumbs it's nose at those who say it's totally shallow and only for brain-dead console kiddies. You actually have to look, and think about the locations in order to get the most out of them.

I missed that in Minefield I just met mines, a ruined place and the dude that gave me the sniper rifle, but from what you've shown me, its still nothing but you playing make-believe within the game world to create a backstory. Not really depth to allow people to imagine things within the game world, as you'll end up with three people thinking up different things for any given place. Maybe it's an innovative way for the developers to be lazy and not bother crafting a deep region. But if you think that's fine, Fallout 2 still has much more depth, as I can roam New Reno and imagine what the stories behind the junkies are. Fallout 2 had more in-depth locations than Fallout 3, not to say the latter is devoid of depth, I found the Germantown Police HQ to be an area with a good bit of depth, the holologs from the nurse at the aid station was well done.

Playing make-believe is what a Role-Playing Game is.

The point is that that story in Minefield - was intended. I'm not reading stuff into the game that isn't there - the devs specifically laid out those rooms with those items in that way for the purpose of leaving a story to discover. Are you saying that Minefield has no "depth" and is just some place to pick up a Sniper Rifle - and that all of that story - which is obviously intended to be there - "doesn't count"? Are you saying that having an NPC standing outside Minefield that you can talk to and who will give you the entire history of the town - is less "lazy" than the way Beth did it? I don't think I understand what you are saying.

Playing make-believe within a game world means that the game world has failed. I'm not convinced that you've discovered a story in Minefield, a crippled kid lived there, grew up to be Arkansas. Ok, and ? Anything else you'll have to make up for yourself, and someone else might make up something different, if so inclined as to make stuff up for a game world. They could have an NPC tell you about the area, although I doubt they'd put that much in a non-MQ area as it'd damage that sandbox feeling, or use a myriad of other ways to add depth to the region that doesn't require me to fantasize about the game world. Unless I should, in which case, WoW is an incredibly deep game with each location.



Well those two you mentioned are ok, if not mildly annoying - especially Eden (almost as bad as Isaacs' accent in BHD). But for the most part, the voice acting is sort of characterless - Dad and Amata spring to mind. Overall the voice acting was so-so at best, bad at worst, regardless of how many voice actors they had on board.

Point 1: I'm not saying that Minefield has as much depth as say Vault City-Gecko. I mean, that's a ridiculous comparison - you'r eright the Minefield story is basically about just the one guy. What I'm trying to say is that the locations in Fallout 3 have quite a bit of depth, and that a lot of people (myself included) miss out on bits of it. Anyways, just because the story isn't handed to you on a silver platter - that doesn't mean the story isn't there. The way Minefield is done, although it means not everybody is going to get it all, isn't "lazy sandbox" - it's what lies at the heart of RPGs. Well-realized world, characters with backstory, and that fit their environments - and more story unfloding as you play through the area.

Point 2: I thought Dad and Amata were pretty well done voices too. Not great, but not crappy. Amata is a teenaged girl, daughter of the Overseer. She's supposed to come off as a spoilt brat - kinda like Mila Kunis' character from that 70's show. She does that quite well. James is a naive idealist with dreams bigger than he is. Having lost Catherine, he's sort of set adrift - the meaning sapped out of his life, other than the Player. Really, the Player and his memories are all that's left of Catherine - that is until he discovers a way of bringing their lifelong project to fruition. I think Liam Neeson really managed to convey those personality traits in his characterization of James. Unfortunately, empathy and concern for Dad are driving forces to push the Player along the early parts of the MQ - and Dad doesn't really do this all that well.

Some voices are supposed to be grating. Consider Moira Brown - she gives you a bunch of small seemingly pointless tasks - so she's essentially your "boss from work". Her dialogue is incredibly perky and chipper. All of these things contribute to Moira being annoying. Because she is intended to be annoying. Bearing that in mind, it's hard to see how she could have been better voiced.

Are there some voices that are sub-par? I'm sure there are. But there really is an astounding amount of Quality voice acting in FO3 - it just doesn't seem that way.

I've greatly enjoyed the game, not the warts.



Nor would I or anybody else I've seen speaking on the subject. Not saying you're doing it necessarily but it seems a commonly used misconception, or strawman argument if you will.



Us "die-hards" have been howling since Bethesda picked the title up, that wouldn't be much of a change. Now I'm not saying it didn't make sense to include previous factions, I never said that. In fact I actually said it made sense for Bethesda to include them because they're such great iconic elements that Bethesda was right in putting them in their game to gain all the fans who'd never played (nor would they ever) the original games in the series. My major gripe is that with their inclusion of some of these factions and characters they basically rewrote them, reinterpreted them and in some cases broke canon in doing so...or at the very least stretched canon very thin. Secondly, they didn't come up with a whole heck of a lot on their own of any substance. Don't bring up the Talon or Regulators (even that name is from Fallout 2) because there's no interactive possibilities other than "shoot 'em up!"




Me too. I think those that see my critical posts tend to forget this. I never understood undying love for something you had no part in. Some of these Bethesda/Fallout 3 fans act like I'm criticizing their parents' child-raising skills when I bring up things I didn't like or feel could/should be improved upon for Fallout 4.



Complete agreement. I loved the android quest, hell, I even liked the Canterbury Commons quest because it reminded me of some ridiculous special encounter easter egg from the originals. If Bethesda can make Fallout 4 packed a bit more fully with those side-quests I'd be pretty excited. Speaking of text games, did anyone (I'm sure you did) complete the text game in the comic building? That was a touch of brilliance, imo. :tops:



Don't you think that enough people have been starved for long enough from games like this that the next one that's done potentially very well would sell potentionally like hot cakes? I wonder. The lack of a game like this for so long might transcend the whole "niche" market.



You have a really unpleasant way about you, you know that? It doesn't take long for you to get nasty and I don't get what you feel threatened by. Is it that I don't agree with you or is it that you feel the need to protect a company or game you like?



There is no quest in one single town as complex, lengthy or rewarding as the New Reno "bosses" quest. All the mini-quests that happen in-between, the scope of all these quests, and the many ways to accomplish all of the situations. I'm not talking mere numbers of fetch quests between Fallout 3 and Fallout 2 and saying, "yeah, about even." I'm saying there's not a single place in Fallout 3 that has as much quest depth or depth of character. I'm not talking about spawning stores or generic loot, I'm talking about places like "Renesco's" store. Even Renesco, a minor character in the scope of the game has a longer and more involved set of dialog than most important characters in Fallout 3.



I just did. Should I link you to it?



Is there a certain quota per day where you have to use that phrase and then I have to say "I'm not a part of that camp, I like the game quite a lot but I have issues with it and know that Fallout 4 could be better if those issues were addressed."???

Weren't the Regulators a mercenary faction in the Boneyard during the original Fallout as well?

Huh... it's been longer than I thought since I played that game, I guess. I didn't remember that.

Anyways, there seems to be a parallel conversation going on about lifting plot points and factions from the original Fallouts and copy/pasting them into Fallout 3.

I don't see this as a big deal. Fallout 3 is... Fallout. I don't see how you can blame the developers from using elements from the previous games. If there was nothing from the West Coast carried over to the current game, my argument would be that they might as well have just made their own retro-futuristic post-nuclear game instead of needing to call if "Fallout." I mean, I find it makes sense for the most powerful factions from Fallout 2 to be interested in finding out what remains of DC (... it was the seat of power for pre-War America after all.)

I also think they were possibly worried about changing too much all at once. Fallout 3 I see as something of a transitional piece, story-wise. Keep a lot the same, then once they're established they can take things further in Fallout 4.

There's also something about "depth" going on here. I see Fallout 1 and Fallout 3 achieving relatively the same amount with different qualities. Fallout 3 has a lot of locations (like as been brought up, Minefield) in that there's a lot of "depth" in the background to that location. Well... visually. It's still up to the player to fill in the details for the most part. Personally, I think they could have gone much farther with this element in Fallout 3. Fallout 1 and 2 (to possibly a greater extent) got it's depth from the interconnection of your actions, and the amount of quests you could find in every place you visited.

If we could combine both types of "depth" in Fallout 4, we'd have a definite winner. Fallout 3 everything is sort of disconnected. Stumble upon Minefield and you get the broad concepts of an underlying story, some interesting things happen, and that's it. You look around, go "hey neat," and then move on. If you had stumbled upon the same location in Fallout 2, you'd not have recieved that same storytelling element, but it would have opened a number of other quests, there would have been more to "do" in that area.

Yes, that's why I said "even the name is re-used".



Just out of curiousity, did you read what I just wrote a post ago addressing this subject? It doesn't seem as though you did.

Yes, well realized worlds, characters with backstories are elements of an RPG, Fallout 3 isn't devoid of this - if it did, heh, well the place would be pretty terrible. But the fact that you have to make up a story for the place, isn't depth, and is kind of lazy on the dev's end. No two people are going to come up with a story for the same place. I still assert that while Fallout 3 has more, not many of the places have the depth of the places in the earlier games, it is a sandbox game, so that does make sense, but doesn't change the fact of the matter.

As for the voice acting, I found Neeson's performance to be dull. Even when he's saying things that should have some emotional weight, he speaks them with this same neutral tone. Amata's reaction to my killing her father was underwhelming in the extreme, she delivers "What have you done?" the same way one would say "What's up?".

Yes, perhaps I've let myself become way too negative. I apologize for being so harsh and unpleasant.

To answer your questions:
I think I'm responding so vehemently because it seems to me that people are outright lying about Fallout 3. For example, you still haven't said that you don't think 90% of FO3 is cribbed and cribbed badly - just that it might be a bit of an exaggeration. Looking at the original post, it sure as heck doesn't seem like you meant it as an exaggeration. This part really gets at me because I believe that FO3 is one of the most original games that has been produced in a very long time.

As to the comparisons of FO2 to FO3, yes I would love to see a justification of "FO2 has more depth than FO3". In terms of dialogue? Yes, the dialogue trees in FO2 are significantly deeper than in FO3 - no doubt about it. But overall, on a per location basis? There is an awful lot of dialogue in FO3. You can talk to practically everybody.

Quests? The Roy Phillips-Tenpenny Questline is pretty deep, lengthy and invovled. Tranquility Lane, when not fast-tracked, is deep, lengthy and involved - and pretty sick. Other quests also have depth but aren't confined to single locations. Even Sierra's very simple collection Quest has a pair of optional goals, which add character and "depth" to it. From a purely gameplay (not RP) perspective, Moira Brown's WSG quest is as long as any from the previous games, nine separate tasks, each with it's own optional goal, most of which have non-standard methods of solution (like lying to Moira).

Fallout 2: "Vault 13 was supposed to be closed for 200 years as part of an Enclave experiment, this makes them perfect test subjects. The Enclave modified the Forced Evolutionary Virus into an airborne disease, designed to attack any living creatures with mutated DNA. With all genetic impurities removed, the Enclave (who remain protected from radiation) could take over. "

Fallout 3: "Eden briefly explains it as Autumn feeling Eden's methods were "too extreme" without going into detail, and most telling is the fact that Eden gives the Vault 101 Dweller, not Autumn, the directive to place the modified FEV into Project Purity (which would kill nearly every human or once-human being in the Capital Wasteland to "purify" it.)"

OH MY [censored] GOD... ORIGINALITY.....

Waster it is pointless arguing with you... Your rose glasses are glued to your arrogant eyes, you persevere to see brilliance where there is little to be admired.

I have to agree, the voice acting in Fallout 3 while not terrible... is merely average. Compare Colonel Autumn and President Eden to Richard Grey, President Richardson and Frank Horrigan from the first two games. Those antagonists had superb voice acting while Autumn and Eden felt lifeless to me. Eden's lifelessness is understandable I guess, but Autumn? For a guy who is "patriotic" he sure doesn't express much passion towards saving his country.

What? You mean I have to take it back because I said it was a bit of an exaggeration? My point still stands. If you took Fallouts 1 & 2 out of the game entirely you'd have a fairly interesting yet fairly generic post-apoc video game. How exactly do you perceive it as being original?



Apparently you wouldn't love to see any justifications because so far you ignore nearly everything I throw at you. I just gave you an example with New Reno. You ignored that. I'm not going to sit here and continue doing this with you, it's getting dull. Btw, talking to practically everybody in Fallout 3 usually equals "Oh hai, I am good!" in the depth department (and all because they had to spend more time with voice-acting than scripting or dialog editing).



I didn't say there weren't ANY deep quests in Fallout 3, I said there weren't MANY. Moira's stuff is cool because it forces you to explore areas of the map but you know as well as I do that they're nothing but fetch quests.

You are saying that FO3 has "stolen" FO2's storyline. Fine. You're right. Since Eden MODIFIED the FEV virus to kill all non-pure humans, it is therefore EXACTLY the same as FO2. Every part of that story is cribbed. (insert eye-roll)

Are they SIMILAR? Yes - that's a feature not a bug. It's a callback to the previous games - exactly like when . Did they "crib" the story? No, the stories are different. Geez, same mechanism - same goal, yeah that's similarity but it is by no means a "copied" story. That crazy Alcatraz movie with Nicholas Cage and Sean Connery - even takes place just off the coast of mainland California - with the deadly super-virus that will wipe out life? Look at all the similarities with FO2!!!!!

As to my eyes being blinded by rose-colored glasses - well yes, in part they are. I admitted to as much earlier in this thread. But at least I can still acknowledge that there's stuff in FO3 that needs improvement. Can you do the same for FO1/FO2?

Oh, and arrogant? Yes, I admit guilty to that one too. But I'm not the only one posting in this thread with that problem. Still, that's no excuse for bad behavior and I will try and rein in my jack-a**-itude.

Edit: Rain reign rein. Picking the right one can be a Paine pane pain

Part 1: Being able to admit a mistake is not a sign of weakness. Obviously "90% cribbed" isn't a fair assessment - just say so.

Part 2: I'm ignoring your points? Puh-leese - this from "Why do you like the writing? Oh well I'm totally going to ignore your response and then claim that you're the one ignoring me". Anyways, New Reno? Yes - lots of quests, a huge amount of variety in results, all tied together. I agree, this series of quests was brilliantly done - not particularly well suited to the FO2 universe (Mafioso with Lazzors!!!!) - but a great enough series of quests to make New Reno seem acceptable in the FO2 world. You'll note that I tried to address your point by listing out some of the deeper quests in FO3. That's a direct reply to what you stated - that's me addressing your point on New Reno's Quest depth. I'm not going to argue that New Reno's questlines weren't well done, or aren't deep and nuanced. Because that would be lying.

Part 3: Moira's quests aren't "fetch" quests. They are a bit of advanced tutorial and a bit of introuductory tour guiding - but they most certainly are not "fetch". They do quite a lot to introduce various game mechanics - and they have multiple solution paths. Set 1: Irradiate yourself is not "fetch" - the other two can be considered "fetch" under a fairly wide definition of fetch (which would essentially cover most of New Reno's quests). Set 2: Kill 'n' rats isn't fetch, but it isn't original (although it is pretty funny from a meta perspective), cripple yourself is definitely not "fetch", the other one can be considered...you know. Set 3: Arlington and Robco are very "fetch" like, but calling Rivet City history quest "fetch" is a bit of a stretch.

Edit: typo

Lazoors and Yakuza. Yakuza with those Japanese short swords, nonetheless.

Again, you see what you want to see. With a little effort, any game can be picked apart.

Kjarista, as much as we seem to agree on some things, I know that there are others where we probably have significant differences. My impression is that you are significantly more "hardcoe" than I am - that is less forgiving of silly breaks in continuity and the game world. I take it that you felt New Reno was too over-the-top for a hardcoe RPG like Fallout 2. Does the fact that the New Reno questlines - as praised by Aqualamb - are fantastically well designed mitigate the fact that your Post-Apocalyptic Tribal Chosen One becomes a Made Man for a crime family? Seriously, those quests increase in scale and complexity as you go, aren't just handed to you by a single quest giver - actually have mutually exclusive goals, and result in very different New Reno's depending on how you play them.

So, is having a really well designed quest series, with great gameplay enough to allow for something that is a bit of a break from the rest of the gameworld?