One major point I can agree with that you made is that the interface is awfully complicated for those of us who don't or can't read the manual. It took me at least half an hour to figure everything out, but after that I really never had any problems.
As for the combat, there was very little strategy in my game for the first few hours, at least. Around the time I got to The Den, specifically, when I was fighting the leader of the slavers with the help of Sulik, things got difficult. I only had a low-grade pistol and Sulik's sledgehammer at that point, so it was hell breaking in and even worse breaking out. It was also a lot of fun, and I felt great shooting the last slaver in the dick until he died to celebrate.
I had my character designed pretty much the same way as you, also. I didn't run into many problems with that. With the man at the end of the first dungeon, there was an option to convince him that you didn't have to fight, and in 90 % of the encounters after that, I had similar outs to conflicts.
I enjoyed it a lot. I guess it just comes down to taste. I tend to enjoy older games almost, if not just as much as current generation games. Even if you don't like it personally, I think most people should be able to appreciate Fallout and Fallout 2 for what they are. The emphasis of the game is really placed on setting and characters, and I think they did some really fantastic things with the games. And Tactics to a certain extent, I suppose.
One final note: I feel that age is mostly irrelevant here. I'm sixteen and I like it. I've met people in their twenties and thirties who hated it.
TL;DR: Oh well.