The Official Fallout 3 Thread.

[Bulletinmybrain]

It's released coming friday in Europe, where I live. I upgraded my computer especially for Fallout (and of course other games too, but primarily Fallout)

It comes out tommorow in the U.S.

 

[crowTrobot]

I've never played the original Fallouts, and I hated Oblivion, but I am very excited for FO3. Frankly I'm interested because it looks like a fun FPSRPG in an interesting universe with some great use of incongruous music. Besides, aimlessly exploring a ruined dystopian city is more interesting to me than aimlessly exploring Generic Fantasy Land #900000.

A question for the more familiar, though: If Fallout is set hundreds of years in the future, and the nuclear apocalypse itself doesn't take place until a long while from now, then why is the pre-disaster future semi-reverted to a 1950's America feel?

 

[Ophiuchus]

I fail to see what's wrong with that, apart from possibly the change of target audience. I loved Oblivion, adding guns will add a different side to the experience but if it's anywhere near as good, I'll be happily calling it my favourite game of the year.

What did you love about Oblivion? Tell me. Because I couldn't even get through it. Weak shallow quests. Same voice actors over and over again. Blank repetitive environments. Was there even a single plot twist? So tell me, what was the appeal again?

Weak shallow quests: some, but there's plenty of deeper quests if you play it for long enough.
Same voice actors over and over again: really don't care.
Blank repetitive environments: possibly in caves and dungeons but the outside world, not so much.

...and no, there's probably not a plot twist, but does there have to be one?

Long story short, can't someone just like a game without being forced to analyse and justify it? Aside from the fact that it provided a bloody good distraction from real-life drama, I just thought it was entertaining and I don't see why I should have to justify it any further.

 

[JayCro]

I wish people would stop with the "It's Oblivion with guns" argument. I don't see how that can be said when the games are based in entirely different universes. Oblivion with guns would be just that, running around a medieval town blowing up people and demons with your nuke launcher. Whereas Fallout is a different world that has it's own history, people and so on.

That seems a weak refutation. You're familiar with the term GTA clone. By your definition that term would have been invalid to use just because the setting was different each time. I don't follow.

You're missing the point. Maybe you didn't read my entire post.

Lets say for arguments sake Blizzard was making Fallout 3. Would people say it's Diablo with guns? Probably. That is exactly why that argument means nothing to me.

People are only calling Fallout 3 "Oblivion with guns" because it is developed by Bethesda-the same company that made Oblivion. Those GTA clones you speak of are not developed by Rockstar so it is a valid argument to call them clones.

I can put it in another way if you like. If I were to develop Fallout 3 there would be none of this "Oblivion with guns" crap because I had nothing to do with making Oblivion.

Hope that clears everything up.

 

[ThaBenMan]

A question for the more familiar, though: If Fallout is set hundreds of years in the future, and the nuclear apocalypse itself doesn't take place until a long while from now, then why is the pre-disaster future semi-reverted to a 1950's America feel?

It's just for style really, even if it doesn't really make sense. I believe the term is "retro-futurism". Maybe it could be rationalized as an alternate universe where the 50's style outlasted the actual 1950's?

Picked up my copy at the midnight release, collector's edition. I LOVE the Vault Boy bobblehead, just as I expected, and the art book is really cool as well. I'll try the game out tomorrow, really looking forward to it!

 

[mintsauce]

10 out of 10 from Eurogamer, that's a pretty decent recommendation in my book. Lunchbox on Friday

 

[waffletaco]

I was thinking about getting the LE just for that lunchbox and bobblehead, but I'm broke from fable 2 and I need to save money for snowboarding this winter :X

Fallout 3 is just fantastic. What kind of characters are you guys going to make? I decided to make a smooth talking hacker/tinkerer. (cha and int speech and science/repair) It's just loads of fun.

 

[Chartist]

No. Yahtzee is right.

A review is a subjective thing, Yahtzee is an amusingly angry man but that doesn't make him the voice of God. The fact that your opinions of something coincide does not make either of you 'right'.

Oh and I'm very excited about fallout 3 it looks awesome

 

[neoman10]

Its funny, I live in D.C. and the news in freaking out over how the game takes place here

 

[JayCro]

Pre-order arrives in 3 days. Yes, I'm in Australia. Cannot wait.

What kind of characters are you guys going to make?

Think I'll go with a goody-two-shoes specializing in small guns, speech and repair. Not sure how the stat system is going to work this time around but my favourite/easiest build in the originals was strength of 5, agility 9 and the rest varying from 6-8. With the gifted and finesse traits.

I can't be evil on my first run through...

 

[Bocca]

I'm gonna try the dirty ways first and see if its any good and I got high hopes. If it ends up good I'm gonna buy it on the XBOX 360. I have play'd the original games and they are bloody awesome. People complain its too hard but you know what I say? YOUR WUSSIES!

What character I'm gonna make right? Well, like in all roleplaying games the meaning is to make your character just like your self. Me personally am very strong but my agility and endurance are average. My luck is good and I'm intellingt so I'm like a good shooting but slow and a good talker and trader. Thats it really.

 

[JMeganSnow]

I don't want to play a game that I can win just by virtue of turning it on and playing it.

This game, I have yet to encounter.

The thing that soured me on Fallout and Fallout II was the fact that EVERY fight was this long-drawn-out miserable resource-chewing grind. Sometimes I'd luck out and my character would get reasonable gear early on . . . and sometimes I wouldn't. It didn't help in 2 that by the time I actually got to the point where I was feeling semi-proficient, I started getting "you're running out of time!!!!!!!!" messages. I was like, what the hell? I've only seen three cities already and you're telling me I'm taking too long?! Screw that, I don't need deadline pressure out of a video game.

I prefer games that become interspersed with easy moments later on so you feel like you're getting somewhere or at least that you can relax a bit. If the game is *so* hard that 20 hours in you're *still* inching your way across boards for fear of aggro-ing too many giant radioactive rats at once, then I'm going to go do something else. The ability to kill people in new and exciting ways doesn't really interest me as a gamer, because the killing is just a means to an end.

Too many options in a computer game can also be a game-killer for me because it discourages exploration. Sure, it was nice finding that stash of ammo in that one area. And then I went to the next area and wound up in a pitched battle. Then a week and a half later I get to the next town and I find out that those were the resistance fighters and I'd just helped out the evil town boss. Now there's no possibility of solving the problem in this town peacefully. Oops. (Not a specific example, I just made that up.)

This may be a result of the fact that I don't like playing with more than one saved game. For me, Fallout and Fallout II were tedious and full of too many "I didn't want to do that!!" moments.

I'm planning to get Fallout 3 when I can afford it. I enjoyed Oblivion despite its flaws and I thought the *concept* of the original games was awesome, so I'm looking forward to a reduction in tedium and hair-pulling.

P.S. Has anyone that played the original games played Arcanum or Lionheart? Both games were made on a similar *plan* to Fallout (although Lionheart was a flop). What did you think of *those* games? I actually preferred Arcanum to Fallout, but it may not have helped that I played it first. Nostalgia games can be a letdown if you've already played a more modern version.

 

[Rankao]

I pre-ordered it, and will be arriving on Thursday. I'm almost tempted to spend $35 to double the ability of my graphics card (SLI)

 

[GenHellspawn]

I don't want to play a game that I can win just by virtue of turning it on and playing it.

This game, I have yet to encounter.

The thing that soured me on Fallout and Fallout II was the fact that EVERY fight was this long-drawn-out miserable resource-chewing grind. Sometimes I'd luck out and my character would get reasonable gear early on . . . and sometimes I wouldn't. It didn't help in 2 that by the time I actually got to the point where I was feeling semi-proficient, I started getting "you're running out of time!!!!!!!!" messages. I was like, what the hell? I've only seen three cities already and you're telling me I'm taking too long?! Screw that, I don't need deadline pressure out of a video game.

You can let them die and continue on, if that's anything.

 

[JMeganSnow]

It's something, but if you don't *want* to let them die you have no choice but to go all the way back to the beginning and start over, because you know you don't have enough time left to fix it.

 

[DYin01]

Fallout 3 has a portable nuke launcher.

With that in mind I pre-ordered this game in a second.

Didn't Jak 3 have that too?

I don't recall that...

Yeah, the Peace Makers 2nd modification - the Super Nova.

True, but Fallout's 'BFG' shoots fucking nukes. NUKES! Bite size nukes, but nontheless, NUKES!

There's a BFG9000 sort of weapon in every game nowadays.