Because in other respects Fallout 4 is a realistic future simulation? No.

There are plenty of perks that are quite bonkers, a fancy tracking mechanic is one of the least of them .

As long as its not as obvious as the breadcrumb trail in Fable 3, then it shouldn't be a problem if done as an optional prompt aid and not a cursor. I personally found Fo3's map to be horribly vague in display, especially in subways and in buildings. Sometimes the path shown to follow went through walls or higher levels that made it confusing at times. It also never shown you where people or enemies were in the area either in case you needed to find a specific character or wanted to sneak around. Thus a lot of blind backtracking and dead-ends would end up happening for me the first time I played. Exploration for me isn't going in circles. There should at least give you a legend when you need it to scan areas. I was often using VATS as binoculars more so than a killing tool.

Edit: I don't want to be told where unknown areas are, I just want a better display and description of areas you are already wandering through.

You are talking about a machine being expected to track an indistinguishable target from an unknown starting point to an unknown destination, at an unknown distance. Roleplaying games are about what the PC is capable of doing in a given situation; that's why the player should not know anything that the PC doesn't. If it's their task to find someone, then they need to look for them. If they know where that person's home is, they can enter that into a machine and be directed there; just like a Garmin or other GPS, but no GPS will detect or track person that can't be distinguished from anyone else. If that person leaves their home on a walk, a machine is not going to track them in a city full of other people. The would need to have something on them to distinguish them... AND the machine or person would have to know what that is and look for it.

In Fallout 2, ~technically the Enclave could have tracked the PC, and known their plans by logging into the PC's pipboy... had they known they had one, and which one it was. They had access to the network.

I never once used VATs in the old games. I didn't like the whole 'stopping time' element of it. However, I do like the idea of slowing time instead.

I hope I'll be able to turn off map markers without mods, I'd rather sacrifice a perk for guidance should I ever need it (I don't think I will). Anyone else seen Nagidals attempted let's play of FONV? Starts out good and careful in very hard hardcoe, which I like, and don't want to use any help, which I also like. But o'boy does it become painful to watch... He complains about not being given information, when he actually did but wasn't paying attention. Finding his way in mazy areas became massively frustrating - for him and whoever watched that had some experience with FONV. In the end he gave up in frustration because he couldn't find his way into second part of New Vegas, and while he gave his frustration speech he was standing pretty close to the entrance Poor guy. I admire him for not looking the the markers, but I wish he had some other game mechanics that could point him in the right directions. Like what seems to be coming.

He's right in one thing though; FONV had no dialogue history system, and English isn't his native language. So if he missed out on something crucial, it was gone forever. Although I prefer Morrowinds method, that one became painful as well due bad explanations. If I could only have my own notes embedded into the game, it would solve a few issues.

Though at least they only did it 1 rank and not more

well people are still complaining about that 1 rank so imagine the outrage if they made it 5 ranks lol

Rank 1: The shortest path to your quest target is drawn on the ground in VATS.

Rank 2: Vault Boy says "Warmer, warmer, colder, colder, warmer, hot hot hot!" as you get closer to or farther from the quest target.

Rank 3: An ice cream cone appears in your inventory every time you reach a quest target.

Rank 4: +20% more damage to quest markers.

Rank 5: The quest target comes to you.

Rank 6: You become a quest marker

Rank 7 you win everyhing heres all the moneys and womens in fallout 4....or men.....or ghoul.

I liked the spell in the Elder Scrolls universe, but this just seems...wrong. It makes perfect sense for a magic user, but not for a regular old human.

So this is similar to the clairvoyance spell in Skyrim?

I don't have a problem with it at all.

I've played Skyrim for over 500 hours and not once did I use that spell.

People that want to use it can and those that don't can ignore it.

I guess am going to have to spend 5 points on this perk. I like rank 5 where the quest target comes to me may save me a lot of time

You know that was a joke and those are not real ranks (except the first one )?

yeah I know i was kidding too

I was checking a lot of screens and some videos, there isn't a marker in most of then, i can be wrong here but, VANS will be this pointer/marker that Fallout 3 and NV, also Skyrim have, not a "gps path" right?

No, you'll have quest markers without the perk. It doesn't show in all of the footage (they probably didn't have an active quest selected), but when it does show, it's a green solid square that sits above the compass bar, and sometimes there's a number above it to indicate distance.

You can see it in the pre-war part of the E3 demo when they're running to the vault, and if you watch the compass during the combat trailer, you can see it in some of the scenes. In one shot, it also has an up arrow above it, so it looks like there's also height difference indication.

VANS isn't a passive thing like quest markers, it is something you activate through VATS. All indications are that it is a line drawn on the ground showing you the path to your active quest target.

Because just like how some people prefer to tell you what you should do in your own bedroom some people prefer to tell you how to play your video games

Thanks for clarifying lefty =)

... what? an optional perk that gives you better directions is Bethesda telling us how to play our games?...

No the people who are complaining about an optional feature they don't have to use they demand and get upset because other people can

Would that line show up in combat? could be annoying.

The description says "The path to your closest quest target is displayed in V.A.T.S.", so probably whether or not you're in combat. You likely won't notice it too much when you've got slow-mo enemies to look at.

Could still be distracting especially if that line passes through the enemy

The only people who don't like it are the hardcoe elites. It's not enough for them that they can turn off this feature they do not want it to be a feature on anyone's game. They literally are the type where they literally want to sit next to you and tell you on how you must play the game exactly how they would