Fallout: New Vegas

mexicola

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JMeganSnow said:
I got much more of a "sandbox world" feel from playing Gothic 1 and 2 than from any Bethesda game to date. The "world" in Gothic is smaller, but it's highly involuted so you don't have to travel very far in order to find something. There are many interesting things to mess around with.

I'm curious to try Risen and Arcanis (Gothic 4) if I ever have the time/money.

Edit: Gothic also has no fast-travel until quite late in the game, when they start having you run all over the place in order to finish off main-plot quests. The teleport system actually feels like a reward you earned instead of a gimmick for lazy gamers.
I agree with this, Gothic 2 (along with the expansion) is my favourite open world RPG by far, I spent so much time in there... And if you are wondering about Risen it's a Gothic game in all but lore and setting. It's happening on a kind of fantasy Mediterranean island and while the premise isn't as great as being a prisoner in a strange penal colony back in Gothic, any fan of the series will most likely enjoy it.
 

thebreadbinman

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You mentioned in your Saboteur review that you didn't like the parts where you had to drive all the way from one side of the map to the other. Now, although the Saboteur world that is Paris wasn't the most amazing and immersive game ever, it did have interesting visuals and free-running as an alternative to driving a car, so you can't then complain when a MASSIVE game offers the chance to move from one part to another that would take around 3 hours real time in a matter of seconds, you can't complain that it 'takes away from the immersion'. Be honest, if you had to treck for hours just to do a mission that turns out is pointless, you'd be pretty damn pissed off and stop playing that game...
 

Tiamat666

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summerof2010 said:
Tiamat666 said:
...why just not use it?
Because the game would take forever. The point isn't that there shouldn't be fast travel, it's that the fast travel system should allow you to make detours and take in the scenery. It's about creating the illusion of a huge, vibrant, believable world, while still addressing the practical problem of needing to get to the actual content. It could be better -- that's all I'm saying.
Okay. You're right. I get it now.

But if you're a good roleplayer, you should be able to compensate for that limitation in your mind. Such as in taking an ingame walk to the "Wasteland Taxi Service" and "buying a cab".

But who am I fooling... I also prefer Morrowinds game-integrated travel system to Oblivions.
 

TheMadDoctorsCat

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NEW RULE: THERE SHOULD NEVER BE RANDOM ENCOUNTERS IN ANY SANDBOX RPG EVER.

Ok so you're playing Fallout 3, and you want to explore the lavish landscape and find all kinds of cool stuff that you couldn't find before, and perhaps battle some raiders and stuff. And EVERY THIRTY GODDAMN SECONDS you get attacked by a bug or an ant or a scorpion or something. They pose zero threat, all they do is use up your ammo and your weapon maintenance level (which is much more important in the Fallout universe anyway, you'll end up with enough ammo to kill half a dozen Ant Queens before you've reached level five, but you can't stop your weapons from degrading). What the hell are you supposed to be playing, rent-o-kill man??!!!

Besides random encounters being an annoying chore, they take the fun out of exploration. How about having a lot of specific encounters that require tactics and strategy to work out? A large raider den, for example? Something where you have to work out to snipe the first raider from a distance, then run-and-gun his friend before the others catch on, before luring the rest into a landmine or two?

And a final point - random encounters make it imperative to level up your combat skills as quickly as possible. What if I don't want to play a combat-oriented character?

(Corollary rule: you should never be able to fast-travel into a monster respawn point.)
 

008Zulu_v1legacy

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Oblivion and Fallout 3 are nice to play, but they are not fun to play. When you have to constantly worry about the game randomly crashing and freezing it kinda sucks all the fun out of it.

Since New Vegas, reportedly, has these same issues I don't really see how it could be fun.
 

spider-dork

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I have to agree 100% I couldn't begin to count the times I said to myself, while playing Fallout, something along the lines of "damn it I need something to get where I am going quicker." Fast travel not only killed immersion it also made the game a lot less fun overall. If I actually could have progressed my way to a destination on some vehicle then I probably wouldn't have felt so bored when it came to completing missions. Hell I would definitely have traded an accurate "driving sim" just to see my character riding something and going fast.
 

captain underpants

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Bang on as usual. Fast traveling, yes. Teleporting - no, or at least limited. TBH one of the things I dislike about the missions in games like GTA is all the goddamn commuting.

If you're scratching around for something to review, and/or something in a new genre, I reccomend simulators. They're light on story, but big on immersion. I suggest this one for starters http://www.landwirtschafts-simulator.de/
 

Michael O'Hair

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Jul 29, 2010
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From the article:
Yahtzee Croshaw said:
If you went out of your way in Oblivion you could acquire a horse, but Fallout 3 just leaves you to hike.
A free horse could be obtained during the first quest right out of the prison sewer. Fast travel to the priory, talk to the monks, acquire free horse. Is that really considered out of the way? Looking back at the Oblivion critique, the lack of environment variety was mentioned; the same forested area copied and pasted all over the world map. Forests, a snow-covered mountainous area, and fields of wheat in the countryside were enough. Environs missing probably included a desert, a jungle, and the surface of a moon. I'm under the impression that Oblivion was played for about an hour, consisting of leaving the sewers and talking to the brain-dead NPCs for half of that time. The New Vegas critique seems to have gone further since Vegas proper was entered, but I'm under the impression that some of these games weren't even played for a significant amount of time with which to verify every assumed flaw. Should Zero Punctuation be renamed to First Impressions? Why do things half-assed?
 

Meatstorm

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I thought Fallout(s) had plenty of details to add up the immersion, but they could always do better.

And when it comes to the fast travel i agree completely as it kills the adventure part. In games like fallout and oblivion one aspect of the game (for me at least) is to go and have an adventure to some random direction that i've never been to. It should give player a feeling of discovery, Finding somethings you didn't even know existed in the game. Fast travel just takes it away as everything is at your reach from where ever you are. (like in oblivion)

I think morrowind did better than newer bethesda games when it comes to real adventuring as you could travel between town with ships, mages guilds and siltstriders but they were on certain towns only and they had limited routes available. The point isn't that it should be as difficult as it was in morrowind to actually find the route, but instead players ability to go instantly from where ever he wants to where ever he wants instantly should be if not outright removed then discouraged.

Mages should make somewhat exception as its kinda their thing.
 

RockyMotion

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Oct 28, 2010
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Loved the Wizard of Oz reference. Now I think of it, having some magic shoes which would take you flying anywhere in a matter of seconds/minutes would be so more awesome than just teleporting.
I didn't hate the teleporting in Oblivion because it easily saves time and trouble (if so, I would just ignore it), but rather because the scenario was so dull that it compelled me to fast travel. I loved my initial hours with that game, but now I barely can get myself to play it because of that.
 

haaxist

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Sep 21, 2009
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Misho- said:
HankMan said:
If they had added a motorcycle for fast travel you could role-play as Mad Max. Now THAT would be an awesome game!
You sir, are a genius, that would be awesome! Making your own cars out of scrap material would certainly nail down the futuristic post apocaliptic feeling... Something like Rage or something, that would be awesome indeed and more chances to specialize and role-play in Hardcore Mode i.e. finding a constant supply of gas for your car/motorcycle.
Yes, it would also give people something to do with their ridiculously high repair skills. I mean, you can put together and make better a laser gatling gun, but you can't put a new transmission and some new wheels on a motorcycle?

Also, yes, the fast-travel is a bit of an immersion-breaker. The only saving grace it has is that you can't fast-travel until you've found the place, which means you're going to be exploring the world one way or another.

Funny story about fast-travel: I'd dressed up as one of Caeser's Legion so I could get into Cottonwood Cove for a bit of quest-related mischief. Anyways, after I was done, I fast-traveled to a different location, that was affiliated with the NRC. Apparently they're shoot first, realize we fucked up royally later. Luckily, the auto-save hadn't auto-saved after the fast-travel, so I was able to complete my quest without being caught in some sort of paradox of die, reload, die again, rinse, wash, and repeat.
 

Netrigan

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Terminate421 said:
He got me to laugh the moment he tried to play grand theft auto as a law abiding citizen.
I'm currently playing GTA III for the first time and it's funny how suicidally idiotic all of the drivers in Liberty City are. Once I was just driving around, attempting to follow traffic laws and witnessed three crashes in two minutes. Makes those missions where you have to transport a car without crashing across town incredibly hard. If cars aren't careening into you for no reason, pedestrians have this odd habit of jumping in front of your car if you wander a bit too closely to the sidewalk. I've actually had cop cars swerve into me... then suddenly it's my fault.
 

cheese_wizington

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Aug 16, 2009
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or napalm a school building and pour the ashes of the children over their erect, twitching knobs for sexual release.

What, the ****...

Anyway, please don't just puss out of reviewing Black Ops by saying it's more of the same. It is, but at the same time, it isn't.
 

Dora

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Jul 13, 2009
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I have actually so little self restraint that I remember downloading a mod for Oblivion that flat-out disabled fast-travel. I always start out intended to go everywhere on foot, 'cause, you know, my magical fantasy/post apocalyptic experience is more "realistic" that way, but within an hour of unlocking two locations I'm blinking all over the place. The terrain is just too damn boring. Oddly enough, I didn't have this problem in Red Dead Redemption... maybe because as much as the travel frustrated me, I was also apparently TOO LAZY to stop and pitch a campfire so I could get the option to fast travel. I think it's the ease with with the option is accessed that determines how likely I am to use it. MEH.

I actually really liked the New Vegas "review". It was just so different from what I was expecting, and it's cool that he can still have fun with his work. I giggled way too much at the nice couple who allowed him to drink out of their toilet.
 

microwaviblerabbit

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Apr 20, 2009
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Netrigan said:
The use of the fast-travel system is often a clue to how much I'm enjoying a game.

In Red Dead Redemption, I only rarely used it... usually only when the game was sending me all the way to the other side of the map for some bullshit quest or in the event I just needed to buy an item not readily available in the town I was in.

I constantly used the taxi in GTA IV because driving around simply wasn't fun. Between the twitchy car handling and the occasionally protracted police chases that could stem from a simple fender bender, I took taxis virtually everywhere... which seriously spoiled the illusion when you're taking a cab to a hospital shoot-out.

Saints Row didn't have a fast travel system (apart from taking advantage of the save game function), but I never missed it. Getting from Point A to Point B was always fun and I knew any cops I acquired on the way over could be easily ditched on the other end (simple vehicular fun & games rarely got me over a one-star wanted level).

As of yet, I've not sunk my teeth into Fallout 3 (beyond getting to the Wal-Mart stand-in) and a lot of that is simple game pacing, but also trying to figure out exactly what sort of skills I should invest in early in the game, since they give me about five billion options and I have only the vaguest notion what half of them would be useful for. So far, I've not built up the enthusiasm to overcome this immersion hurdle, so I play around with games that have a faster in to, not only the action, but the point as well.
Saints Row 2 did have a fast travel system - the taxis. I ended up using it for specific things, mainly going to the airport and 'borrowing' planes. Though this was kinda because I am terrible at flying and each flight ended in a fiery death. This did add to immersion because you had to call the taxis first - plus they were disabled during missions.
 

HaraDaya

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I learned that not having fast travel was a good thing in Far Cry 2. People need to learn to enjoy the hike to the objective. It's sort of a build up to the climax of the mission. Games of course need to make the hike interesting, which is were Fallout New Vegas falls a little short. Both because you run what feels like so goddamn slow, and because it's mostly just huge open wastes.