When I got to level 30 in NV, I took the explorer perk, as is my wont, and was delighted to see my pip-boy map light up with a mosaic of undiscovered locales. This delight soon faded, however, when I began to explore said locales. for all I found were boarded-up farmsteads, pokey little caves and single-room interiors with nothing more interesting inside than a few bits of food or ammo. In the end, I gave up on visiting all these undicovered locations, and decided to just get the main quest over and done with instead. I found this all to be thoroughly dissapointing. I've since started a second playthrough, but I've barely left Goodsprings and already I'm thinking "I just can't be bothered with this". Hopefully this is just the fatigue that comes from playing a lot of a game in a short space of time, and after taking a break and playing something of a different genre entirely I shall be able to return to New Vegas and enjoy it anew. I hope so. I do marvel at the people who've already completed multiple playthroughs already though.

(The lack of audio diaries etc. bummed me out too OP, but I attribute this to the game being made on a lower budget than 3, so I don't hold it against Obsidian. The relative lack of reading material, on the other hand...)

Look at it this way, FO3 has the whole 50s Sci-Fi B Movie theme going.
Characters in those movies were that one-dimensional. That's part of the charm of those movies.
The NPCs in Fallout 3 only add to the theme of the game and in that respect they were perfectly designed.

This.

Those NPC's that I named, and many others, I all felt like they served a purpose to the world and the story. Perhaps they could be broken down into simply archetypes, but the fact is they served their roles and were successful for what they were meant to be.

I haven't really encountered much of anyone thus far that's really anything more than a plot device to push the story forward. The doctor that finds you and patches you up, the small town hunter / explorer who guides you through the tutorial, the doctor who's portrayed as incompetent for nothing more than a punchline, and a bunch of interchangeable NPC's.

The characters in this game simply put don't really add any life into the world for me. Compared to Fallout 3, the world from the characters to the environment is incredibly bland.

I acknowledge the fact that I'm not very deep into the game yet, and that could certainly change as I play through the game more and encounter more and more NPC's, but in my mind it's rather telling that I was recognizing the life and character of the Fallout 3 world from the moment I fired the game up, and in Fallout: New Vegas I haven't seen anything that stands out.

Hmm, so should I consider NV as a Gladiator-esque epic movie with a high budget?

Eh, yeah - except they missed the subtlety of the franchise's already-established retro-futurism and brought it so over the top that it was being crammed down your throat as if to say "SEE EVERYBODY THESE PEOPLE ARE LIKE THEY ARE FROM THE 50's SEE?!"

What happened? Bethesda gave a developer that doesn't make horrible, horrible stories a chance. If you seriously think that the Fallout 3 storyline is better than New Vegas, you haven't got an ounce of taste.

I don't think Fallout 3 was over the top about it at all. I think that New Vegas is so subtle that I can't even tell there is a retro 50's theme.

I thought in the other thread you were trying to convince me that you weren't arrogant and condescending...

Nearly every NPC is dressed and acting like they came from a Leave it to Beaver episode and you're telling me it wasn't over the top? But then, since you haven't played the first two games you wouldn't know the difference, would you?

Nah, I am arrogant and condescending. Though it depends on context, I'm being arrogant here because the OP is just ridiculous. In the other thread I was making an argument and addressing counter arguments, not being overtly insulting or dismissive (like I am being here) because the opposition wasn't quite as ludicrous.

An opinion can't be ludicrous, and if other opinions bother you so much to the point that you feel justified in being insulting, condescending and arrogant, the perhaps you need to step away from the message boards and take some time for yourself for self reflection and self improvement.

Yes, an opinion can be ludicrous. I'll demonstrate: My opinion is that you are wrong, and you need to respect that and reflect upon how poor your character must be for disagreeing with me. And worse, insulting me over it! Perhaps you should take some time for reflection and improvement. Or at least get over the holier-than-thou white knight complex you have going on.

Sorry for the snarkiness, can't help myself sometimes. If you think every opinion is equally valid regarding art, do you ever read reviews? Do you put any stock in the contents? What if you read a positive review of Superman 64 (one of the worst games of all time), and based upon that positive review you wasted 50 dollars? I suspect you would be pissed off, because the review was wrong. How does that gel with your opinion that it's all subjective, in this hypothetical? The opinion of the reviewer is, after all, his subjective view and to him the game might be the best time he's had since injecting glow stick goo into his veins*, but objectively the game is awful.

The story of Fallout 3 is just as obviously awful, and if you don't think so.. fine, don't think so. I'm not going to go into another back and forth debate on the difference between objective and subjective. Note that I'm not saying that Fallout 3 as a game is awful, here, as people have misunderstood. I am stating that the story, characters, and dialogue are massively flawed. The game excels in almost every aspect other than the story and characters, however, so the game can still be great despite the problems.


*Don't actually do that, it will kill you dead.

Edit: Upon rereading the original post, I think I just got trolled pretty hard. A pretty well crafted piece of trolling, though, so I have to give some props for effort.

I admire Pandabearparade's courage in conveying a concept that not many people seem to grasp: not all opinions are equal or valid, and many times, an opinion can be malformed or just plain wrong.

I don't pay attention to reviews for anything, period. Because it's just what you said - subjective. I experience something for myself and form my own opinion of it based upon my own personal criteria of what I find to be good and bad. Anyone who would spend their money on a product based solely on a review of someone else deserves to lose that money and have it wasted. Learn to form your own opinions instead of relying on someone else to form it for you.

Oh yes, such "courage" it must have taken to say "I'm right and you're wrong" and inaccurately throw around terms like "objective" to deter any arguments against him.

It's so courageous to put your fingers in your ears and say "BLAH BLAH BLAH I CAN'T HEAR YOU BECAUSE I'M OBJECTIVELY RIGHT AND YOUR LUDICROUS OPINION IS WRONG!! BLAH BLAH BLAH!!!!"

He's such a courageous man, let's get him a medal, stat.

Like I said in the other topic, your own thought process is what's causing this. You're putting words in our mouths that we never said. You're only seeing things that you -want- to see, not what's actually there.

Wow, did I say that? My memory must be getting really, really bad. Either that or you built up a straw man and gave it a severe beating.

That's exactly what you've been doing. You've been doing nothing but talking about how the only correct opinion is the opinion that states that Fallout: New Vegas is the better written game with the better written story. You've called opposing opinions ridiculous, and admittedly created a thread to "ridicule" those who thought that Fallout 3 had the better story. You've been throwing the "objective" card around as though somehow you have any more credibility to proclaim what opinion is "correct" and "objective" than anyone else in these forums. I'm not making anything up or seeing what I want to see. You've specifically stated those things, and even admitted to being "arrogant and condescending".

Yes you are.

So these things weren't said?







Hint: http://www.gamesas.com/index.php?/topic/1134313-new-vegasfallout-3/page__view__findpost__p__16602955

So he never said a differing opinion from his was "wrong"?



Hint: http://www.gamesas.com/index.php?/topic/1134313-new-vegasfallout-3/page__view__findpost__p__16638612

Those are just a couple examples, there's plenty more where that came from, but I don't want to go through all of this guy's posts the past couple days.

But you're right. I'm just making all this stuff up. He's never had an arrogant or condescending attitude towards people who disagree with him.

We've already established that opinions can be malformed and wrong.




Sometimes arrogance is necessary when dealing with people who won't listen to reason.

No, we haven't. You, and Panda and Whiskey Rose have "established" that within your own minds to satisfy your superiority complex and give yourselves a false sense of credibility that you guys are the only ones who have a valid opinion. It's impossible to debate and have discussion with someone when they are 100% against listening to any opposing viewpoint. All you've done is give yourselves a false justification to being elitist snobs.



I listen to reason plenty. I don't listen to elitist arrogance and insulting behavior.

The simple fact is that you don't know enough about the series history. You lack the proper knowledge and research required to argue. Thus, any opinion you have on it comes out malformed.

Actually, most of what I'm discussing isn't about "opinion" as I'm not discussing what the better "game" is most of the time (its so obvious what I think that I don't feel it needs to even be mentioned in my posts) but about incontestable facts like "That which comes first determines the measurement to which all subsequent things can be measured against." So if the developers of Fallout 1 created the Brotherhood of Steel, they get to say what the BOS is all about. Any changes made to this original design will be considered a retcon, which is normally perceived as cheap, lazy and/or bad.

Closed for review

Edit: Reviewed and this is not re-opening.