It just seems like with every passing game they keep getting easier and easier and keep removing more and more rpg elements, we don't want fallout 8 to be like 5 guns and no level system and a liner world, there catering to the lowest dumbest gamers and that makes the game less appealing for its more dedicated fans.

Ah, yes, the 'dumb' argument. It's getting pretty tiring now.

I'm a fan of the originals, but I also like Bethesda's versions, I especially like what the did with the perk system in 4. So, what does that make me?

Bethesda was never going to make their games in the mold of the originals, get over it.

Change is bad m'kay.

I'm an old guy, and I've been playing a long time. From my perspective, the games get better and better in many ways, but like the world in general, tends to lose (or perhaps just change) some flavor as we go. Better or worse? I don't know. Instead of worrying about what we got in FO4 instead of comparing it with previous stuff, perhaps it's just as well to say what we want from a game.

Myself, I want to be entertained. I want to be challenged (without being overwhelmed), I want an open world where I can (within reason) do as I please. I want a game world environment that offers a variety of flavors in content where I can have immersion containing romance, adventure, excitement, danger, but each of these things primarily "on demand" rather than stuffed down my throat. Oh, and great graphics is a major plus.

Does FO4 give me all that I want? Oh, hell no! ...but it does go a long way towards it. Am I happy with FO4? Yes, and I'll be happier after the GECK or CS or whatever comes out and real mods start rolling in. Do I like FO4 better than FO3 or FONV? I dunno, does it matter? My all-time favorite game is/was Morrowind, but I haven't played it in a couple of years. If I try to go back, it may not be all that I remember... I prefer to look forward to what's coming than to dwell on where I've been.

I'm with Deven on this one. I played FO when it first came out in '97.

I'm also enjoying my time in FO4 so far...

Edit: Now get off my lawn.

In my opinion its rather like the situation with the Fable (or the Dragon age or Mass Effect) games, Bethesda have for me produced a bigger but more streamlined version with their second game (leaving NV to one side) and now they will either bring thing back they shouldn't have removed, build on their new system or streamline it some more in which case they are in danger of creating a fable 3 like experience and over streamlining the game.

I doubt they will go that route, not least because as Fable showed its a good way to practically kill off a series of games since practically no one seemed to be calling for a more simplified game. So in my opinion, its what the next TES game is like that might give me cause for concern for future Fallout games.

So for me, despite being a fan of the originals, I'm not one of those feeling such negativity to Fallout 4 (quite the opposite really), but I can understand the worry that Bethesda will follow the well travelled path towards over streamlined games that tends to either kill off a series or make them so bland an experience that I just decide to skip future instalments.

I'm 54 and have been gaming for a long time. Seems to me most of those who complain are the younger players.


Those of us who have been gaming for a few decades have seen more changes in gaming than we can count.

On top of that, many of us started with tabletop D&D. We can pretend, we.can make believe, and we can roleplay in these games without the game doing it for us.


Those who have been gaming for just a few years and think Bethesda started with Morrowind are the ones you need to point your finger at.


Granted, there are a few old schoolers that think they sound special when comparing this game to FO1, but they still listen to 70s and 80s music so their opinions don't really matter.

If making a game in the mold of the originals is asking for options, and choice and consequences, fun quests with multiple methods of completion, being able to join various groups and gangs, then why can't BGS do that stuff(which is just options) and do it in their engine? I can give example.

FO 2: The Den is the first majority settlement with lots of quests(Klamath is more the intro area). In the Den you get quests like collect money from Fred, which if you let him keep some you get a reward later in the game down the line from Fred(who gets rich because you let him keep some money). While just an easy little quest, it shows how doing A results in large rewards down the line, and by large rewards it is 2000 bucks and a bunch of Energy Weapon ammo.

Then, you can work for a gang. Shocker, you actually get to work for a gang?!?!!? BGS should take notes here, eh? First mission is to find out what in the church, which you can do either with speech OR STR check. Wow, you mean something other than just Charisma? No way.

Then you get permission for a gang war, find out the gangs weakness, and now it is time to fight the gang war. But wait, while you can just keep on helping the original side you have been helping, you CAN run to the other gang and tell them, double crossing the original gang and completing the quest like that. No way!!! this takes waaay too much thought and programming and resources!! impossible in 2015!!

Now lets get Vic! In order to talk to Vic you can: Pass Charisma/Speech. Bribe. Be dumb(yep a dumb options), become a slaver, have high Science, have high repair, sneak and pick the lock. 6 options to get to Vic. Wait, actually 7, because you can kill all the slavers as an option as well. Wow, 7 options for one quest. OMG Inconceivable!!

I could go on and on, list quest after quest that offers variably completion methods for various character builds which result in various paths and outcomes, good, evil, smart, from the straight forward to the more involved like becoming Captain of The Guard in Vault City, and on and on I could list quest after quest that offers this. Well over 100 documented quests in FO 2, and many others that are unmarked (killing the slavers for example nets a very nice reward and is not a marked quest).

This, is what I expect in a FO game. This, is what Fallout games are about, not just Charisma checks and killing and killing and killing and killing(which you can do as well, plenty of killing can be accomplished in FO 2, caves with 30 deathclaws for example).

Now, why in 2015 is this so hard to do? I can give a crap if it turn based, iso, whatever. Don't care. I have no problem with 1st person, fully 3d open world etc etc. But why on earth can the quest not be so involved and take into account all of this stuff?

Oh.. and FO 2 was released 1 year after FO 1. In one year, they accomplished all of that.

If FO 4 had quests and options like that(joining gangs, joining slavers, multiple methods of quest completion etc, etc, etc, etc) I would give it 10/10.

Because it's 'kewl' to be negative, and forums attract this mindset.
Go to any MMO forum and you'll struggle to avoid those that apparently feel the game is the worst thing and yet pay for a subscription and waste their time on the forums.

Fallout 1+2 were of their day. Fun games but I never found them to have the replayability factor or deep roleplaying that many seem to hark back to. I think they just have rose tinted memories.

For me personally it is Bethesda's "love" of retconning and ignoring established lore on a whim that always infuriates me with their franchises. Fallout had plenty of really good lore before Beth bought them but they decided to white wash most of it in Fallout 3 to "remove" as much of the original Fallout as they could get away with. Not a single character in the BoS wore the T-51 PA, the Enclave PA was retconned to look way less Fallout-esque and unique, both Lasers and Plasma got changed quite drastically.


Not all of these changes were inherently bad but the fact that they did them just because they wanted this old franchise to look like their style is blasphemous. None of this gets into the massive streamlining they do to every franchise or their incapability of doing simple bug-testing prior to release but it is always my biggest gripe.


Point being that the games get Objectively more streamlined every iteration under Beth's watch but the lore (the very core of what makes an IP survive) is what really suffers. However admittedly there are some who don't even play the games but merely seem to exist for the sole purpose of bashing Bethesda, while on the other side some exist merely to stroke Beth's ego (the term for these people is a censored word on this forum for a reason). The trick is to find the balance, find the good and the bad and try to make the next one better...or just throw everything out the window and refute logic because everyone is gonna buy the damn game regardless

I've been playing games since the 80's and I much prefer the new FO's. They are far from perfect but neither were the old ones

I'll be 36 pretty soon. I played Fallout 1 and 2 when it came out. They were far from perfect, but they were better in a lot of ways, here is why:

1) Your SPECIAL stats mattered more. I could easily beat Fallout 3/4 on hard with 2 in every SPECIAL stat. They honestly don't matter much. I could not beat Fallout 2 with 2 in each stat, at least not without using some kind of loop hole or exploit. You needed some strength to use weapons, perception to hit, int for conversation/hacking/figuring out computers, charisma to have a party bigger then 1, etc.

2) Its geared to the lowest common person. The dumbest, laziest types of gamer. You do ONE quest for the BoS and you get a suit of T60 PA? what the F&^%!? its insane. I could list examples but that one is enough. Yes, you COULD rush the PA in Fallout 2, but only if you had played before, 1st time through you would have no clue how to d it and get it mid-late game.

3) Weapon balancing is terrible, 8 damage for the minigun and 10 for a .45 SMG? It wasnt perfect in Fallout 2 (I remember AP ammo was broken, 14mm pistol svcked) but it was better then this.

4) Game is just too easy overall. I had to mod for hours and hours plus download other peoples mods to get enjoyable gameplay.

Mainly my gripe is before you needed to try a little bit, now everything is super easy and just handed to you.

I wud say theres multiple reasons:

-first one being people looking trough rose-tinted glasses when they are rembering things they liked many years ago(basicly only rembering the good parts and forgetting the bad ones)

-second one is that some people dislike the changes Bethesda made to Fallout universe in general(because it has def become a different game just still in same setting/lore)

My personal opinion is that Fallout 4 is a good action RPG which has a potential to become great one once mods/DLCs/patches are done, i personlay do like the game but it sure does have its flaws as well hopefully most of them will be fixed as time passes.

I'm 23 and before FO3 I had only tried the earlier games a little, but having played them much more since, I have to admit that they were better RPGs than the new games. I won't compare them from gameplay perspective as they're just too different, but story and RP wise the original games were much better.

I'm sitting in a bus and close to my stop so I can't give a deeper anolysis of my opinion but point is, it's not just the "old" gamers on a nostalgia trip who complain of things being better in the past.

It's that way with every genre in life. I see it a lot with fans of music. When their favorite band becomes successful they accuse them of losing their way or becoming sell outs because the masses enjoy them.


Same thing with games.

you need to move on, fallout 3 and 4 are superior games to both fallout 1,2 and NV, there is probably never going to be another black isle/obsidian fallout ever again and partly due the the intense hate toward bethesda especially after they extended the olive branch to obsidain by letting them make a fallout game and all its done is make an even bigger problem in the fallout gaming community, so just keep playing NV and the original fallouts and have fun with that cause its probably the end of the line for obsidian and fallout and rightly so, i'm tired of the "bethesda doens't make real fallout games" comments over and over ,its getting really old.

Here some more examples of spirit that FO 4 lacks, with more examples from FO 2.

With the proper special stats you can become a porm Star. You can become a prizefighter(you can even cheat with plated gloves) and be crowned The Champ, which NPCs in the world will recognize you and you get little bonuses from them. You can gamble(in many multiple locations). You can become a Made man for a mob family. You can do multiple assassinations in the game. You can be a town Deputy doing law work. You can join a gang, you can join slavers(and do quests for them).

Now, this may not seem like much, but it is all options that gives FLAVOR and personality to the world, and all of it is absent in FO 4, even though: There is a cage fighting location in the game, which could have been an option that you fought in. There is a race track, which could have been a location that you can gamble(you would think Diamond City and Goodneighbor would of had gambling, too). There are Gangster families, which you cannot join.

When is removing options a good thing? It is always better to improve upon them and offer more, new choices, instead of stripping them away. It used to be killing stuff was an option as well, and now it the main focus of the game.

When Skyrim was first released, people who played Morrowind and Oblivion complained about it. The most common complaint was that Skyrim was "dumbed down".

I think in FO4's case, most of it is 50% Nostalgia and 50% the game isn't being made by the same company that started it.

+1

What I love about Bethesda's games is the sandbox. They've created a place for us where we can create our own stories and roleplay, and the main quests are optional. I enjoy reading the stories of what people's characters are doing in the earlier Bethesda games even years after they were first released, and I look forward to the same in Fallout 4.

Because they were so story-based, I played through them, loved them, but then they went on the shelf until the day came where I would want to "reread" them after having forgotten enough of the storyline for it to seem somewhat new again. Good as they were, and having wanted them to go on for longer, they definitely didn't have the long-lasting, never-ending replayability of Bethesda's Fallout or TES games that I have played for hundreds of hours each and still going. I actually replayed Fallout Tactics more than Fallout 1 and 2 and even remember attempting to mod my own levels. Now I don't have to use an editor to create things because I can do it right in the game.

i still complain about skyrim. i never thought it was dumbed down though, just very boring.

i think it's really unfair and rude to devalue other people's opinions. hell, i'm a bethesda fan and love both fo:3 and fo:4, but i don't think the people complaining about them and preferring the older games/NV are complaining just because they can. it's completely okay to disagree with each other without feeling offended.

It's not getting old because it's true.

The best example that you actually can make a briliant RPG game with open world is Witcher 3.

When I was questing in W3 I was actually smiling, laugthing, sad, frighten, happy, hell I was bit depressed after ending the Baron quest. These are the moments which I will remember and which makes game epic.

The same variety of feelings which was with me when I was playing F2.

In F4 there are no that kind of moments. Everything is bland, repetetive, simplified, "streamlined".

I don't mind the first person shooter. I even like the changes done in this aspect comparing to f3 and NV but, why the HELL bethesda thinks that dialogues, questing, mechanics and story needs to be so simple?

We really could have both, great shooter and great RPG.

Another opportunity wasted...

evlbastrd, reading your posts make me feel like re-experiencing Fallout 2 one more time!

I've been a huge fan of the Fallout games since Fallout 1, and I personally enjoy Fallout 4 a lot - the exploration is amazing, and they improved combat by crazy amounts. The way I see it, Bethesda made great Fallout exploration games. I do agree that it feels like there are less choices to make in Fallout 4 though.

To each their own, I think Fallout New Vegas is a better game than all the other Fallout games, with 2 being a very close second. I'm expecting Fallout 4 to make a serious run for it's money when there are more mods to play around with though

Nice bait, OP! 8/8

It's amusing how many alleged middle-aged men who feel the need to share their exact age appear every time age (or just the original Fallouts) is mentioned.

Having prejudice and comparing it to older entries in the series is perfectly justified, because it claims to be part of the series and successor to those games. If it was called The Elder Scrolls: Boston, it would be more precise, but people would still compare it to Skyrim, Oblivion, and Morrowind. Possibly even earlier entries.

Without a doubt BGS is great at exploration. Which is why it boggles me they don't work on their weaknesses, which is quests and options. We shouldn't need mods to fix it. There are less options than Skyrim, when is this trend going to end? Are we eventually going to get a game with 0 quests and just exporation?