What does fallout 3 do better then fallout new vegas

[sonofliber]

F:NV > F3

if i want post apocalyptic atmosphere and horror, i play the stalker series (1000% better and more alive world even if it is glichy, and there you can go where ever you please), if i want a good story? i go play F:NV.

 

[Dogstile]

Honestly, I just like fallout 3 more because I could finish it (new vegas had so many bugs it wasn't even funny) and it actually felt like there was a world for me to explore. New Vegas seemed fucking barren in comparison, which is hilarious for a place that was left "mostly untouched".

 

[Syzygy23]

The love for Fallout 3 are from people who didn't enjoy the original series. Fallout 3, if anything, was a cash-grab more then a actual attempt to jump-start the series.

I loved both. Fallout 3 was a good game, even if it didn't have as much to offer as the original games.

I think my issue is that it isn't a Fallout game, it was a oblivion-with-guns-in-a-destroyed-50th-century-Washington-state game. Everyone can argue, night and day the differences between the two, but at the end of it the main difference is that New Vegas is a Fallout game and that Fallout 3 is a post-apocalyptic game.

Also, people are saying Fallout 3 had a better story? Both were shit and at least Fallout New Vegas gave you the option to be a dickweed scum.

Fallout 3 does "feeling like a game instead of an expansion packs" better.

But it pretty much rapes Fallout lore, world, factions, etc., in so many ways it isn't funny.

If you want a plot that actually has anything to do with Fallout, go play New Vegas.

If you just want to run around shooting shit in a game that is actually playable, play Fallout 3.

Nobody cares about Fallout pre-Bethesdafication, so raping the lore doesn't matter.

I believe that No Mutants Allowed wants to have a talk with this statement.

http://nma-fallout.com/

No mutants around is a dedicated Fallout series fansite that has been around forever. It has been, and continue to be, the lovers of everything fifties and apocalyptic even before Bethesda pretty much ruined the series.

If Bethesda ruined the series then why did I have so much Goddamn fun? I didn't even KNOW what fallout was until Bethesda made Fallout 3, and I've been PC-ing it up since '95.

 

[Kiste]

Atmoshpere- For the overall atmosphere F3 was "Survive in a post-apocalyptic wasteland" and NV was just "Survive in the desert with lots of friendly settlements"

Also, I hated how... civilized the Mojave was. It didn't seem like people trying desperately to survive in an oppressive and cruel world. Everything was about survival in Fallout 3.

This is actually what really bothered me about FO3. See, Fallout was never about "Survive in a post-apocalyptic wasteland". Fallout was about "Hey, there is a whole new world and civilization out there, let's explore it!". It just happens so that the world after the nuclear apocalypse turned out really weird...

Fallout was about LIFE after the apocalypse and not so much about crawling through abandoned subway tunnels while shooting up super mutants in the nuclear ruins of a city. That's why FO3 doesn't really resonate with fans of the original Fallout games: it's thematically just too different.

FO:NV, on the other hand, does a much, much, much better job at capturing the the spirit of the original Fallout games. It's also the game that actually continues the lore of the original Fallout games in a meaningful manner, while the story of FO3, uh, really seems to be completely inconsequential in the context of the Fallout universe.

FO3 feels more like a spin-off that maybe should have taken place a century or so before the events in FO1, because, as others have pointed out, the world in FO3 is far too broken and lifeless considering the fact that it takes place 200 years after the bombs fell. There's too little life and too little society and too little vegetation and too much radiation (FO:NV gets away with having little vegetation because it takes place in the desert).

Also, FN:NV is in a completly different league when it comes to writing. There are some things Bethesda does really well (e.g. creating nice open sandbox worlds) but writing is not one of them. In terms of story, dialogue and characters FO3 is simply outclassed by FN:NV and it's not even close. Bethesda games have always suffered from lame storylines, crappy dialogue, really weak characters and embarrassing attempts at humor (and Todd Howard, but that's a different issue). Obsidian, on the other hand, has some of the best and most imaginative writers in the industry. FO:NV has tons of memorable characters, factions and loctions.... FO3 has that guy in Megaton who looks like Chuck Norris and that giant talking robot.

Tl;dr: FO:NV is an actual Fallout game, FO3 is a thematicaly unconnected spin-off that uses Fallout-style artwork assets.

 

[Zoe Castillo]

--

 

[Tiswas]

I enjoyed the world of New Vegas more than Fallout 3. Kinda got sick of constant metro tunnels. But I enjoyed how free you were to go almost anywhere in 3. Not pretty much forced down to Primm, Nipton, Novac, Freeside in that order due to Cazadors and Deathclaws.

Saying that I loved NV's story and missions a lot more. I on remember 3 having about 20 missions or so in the game :/

Although I loved the randomness at times of 3. More Super Mutants (loved that area where you have to defend the kids from them. But most of all how anything could happen. For example. I once encountered a Deathclaw outside the Super Dupa Mart when I was starting the game. That save didn't last very long XD

 

[Aprilgold]

The love for Fallout 3 are from people who didn't enjoy the original series. Fallout 3, if anything, was a cash-grab more then a actual attempt to jump-start the series.

I loved both. Fallout 3 was a good game, even if it didn't have as much to offer as the original games.

I think my issue is that it isn't a Fallout game, it was a oblivion-with-guns-in-a-destroyed-50th-century-Washington-state game. Everyone can argue, night and day the differences between the two, but at the end of it the main difference is that New Vegas is a Fallout game and that Fallout 3 is a post-apocalyptic game.

Also, people are saying Fallout 3 had a better story? Both were shit and at least Fallout New Vegas gave you the option to be a dickweed scum.

Fallout 3 does "feeling like a game instead of an expansion packs" better.

But it pretty much rapes Fallout lore, world, factions, etc., in so many ways it isn't funny.

If you want a plot that actually has anything to do with Fallout, go play New Vegas.

If you just want to run around shooting shit in a game that is actually playable, play Fallout 3.

Nobody cares about Fallout pre-Bethesdafication, so raping the lore doesn't matter.

I believe that No Mutants Allowed wants to have a talk with this statement.

http://nma-fallout.com/

No mutants around is a dedicated Fallout series fansite that has been around forever. It has been, and continue to be, the lovers of everything fifties and apocalyptic even before Bethesda pretty much ruined the series.

If Bethesda ruined the series then why did I have so much Goddamn fun? I didn't even KNOW what fallout was until Bethesda made Fallout 3, and I've been PC-ing it up since '95.

Your experience and know-how =/= others experience and know how. Just because YOU didn't know about Fallout back then did not mean there weren't people who cared for it before 3.

Also, people are saying Fallout 3 had a better story? Both were shit and at least Fallout New Vegas gave you the option to be a dickweed scum.

This. Explain. Because as far as I read it, it's 1000% incorrect. You can be an evil-as-fuck scumbag in that game. Even the multiple endings allow you to be the biggest dickweed of the Wasteland even if the evil option did seem irrational.

If you were to say "New Vegas gave you the option to be neutral", I would still argue that it would be a very difficult task to do with the karma system being what it is but I would understand the point you're getting across a little better.

Here's your explanation, no matter what happens in the main story quests, you are forced to join up with the brother-hood of steel, you are yelled at, in the ending for not killing yourself and instead sending someone in there who can bloody survive it. The ending is always relatively the same and usually has the same outcome. There is about one major choice in Fallout 3, while New Vegas has 4 and then about six per story quest and any number of extra things that you can do to get a better ending.

Fallout 3 is pretty much the same game every time. You have to go to Megaton to go find your dad, then you have to go and help your dads research and then you have to join the brotherhood of steel. There are no actual choices, apart from one [poisoning the water] in the main story. My comment related more to the fact that there is no real choices in the main story and side-quest choices don't change a whole lot either in the Main story. In Fallout New Vegas, who you bring with you to the final level changes who they bring as a side-helper, who you chose to befriend like the Boomers or the Enclave Revenant will determine who helps you there. Joining the NCR, Legion or House or yourself will change and affect the entire rest of the game. In Fallout 3, this doesn't exactly exist.

I believe that No Mutants Allowed wants to have a talk with this statement.

http://nma-fallout.com/

No mutants around is a dedicated Fallout series fansite that has been around forever. It has been, and continue to be, the lovers of everything fifties and apocalyptic even before Bethesda pretty much ruined the series.

Lawl, referring to NMA doesn't really make Classic Fallout fans look very good. That site is a bastion of hatred and bile, with very little rationality.

And as for F3 'ruining the series', unless I'm much mistaken Bethesda did not break into people's houses and burn their copies of F1 & 2. In short, that part is typical internet hyperbolic bullshit.

I take people who post LAWL in their posts about as seriously as I take memes, as a giant wise-crack. So yes, your post was LAWL worthy.

 

[Niccolo]

Okay, so, this entire thread is nuts. The whole thing started off quite normally and then, well, yeah. There are people posting here with so much bile towards either FO3 or both games that I'd swear blind that their families were all butchered with a copy of the manual.

I mean, seriously. Holy goddamn hell.

I'll admit, my favourite argument is the one everyone's holding over the ridiculousness of FO3's story and how you can't irradiate water (Completely ignoring the fact that you can produce irradiated water - it's like you guys have never heard of dissolving stuff).

Bear in mind that this occurs in a world where:
1) Living zombies are totally plausible
2) Aforementioned zombies are immortal (or at least, more long-lived than anyone missing half his skin SHOULD be)
3) It's absolutely possible for a thousand people to live in an engineered hole in the ground for 50 years without killing each other (mostly).
4) It's also entirely possible for a huge organisation to install a hundred-odd massive vaults designed specifically to perform long-term experiments without absolutely anyone having a case of the morals.
5) There's a virus capable of generating huge piles of mass to put on your muscles - or giving you a tree to grow out of your head
6) Turning into either a big green hulk-lookalike or aforementioned zombie with various important internal parts laid bare makes you immune to radiation.

The entire world is fucking ludicrous already, morons. If you are seriously complaining about water being irradiated, then either ***** about every other scientific oddity in the series or go play a game with hard science in it. (Here's a clue: That rules out STALKER [Anomalies], Half-Life [Fucking everything], Fallout [See above], StarCraft [Zerg = practically impossible biologically], Deus Ex [Invisible and can still see? IMPOSSIBLE!] and, like, EVERY fantasy game)

Bethesda are not Interplay. They do not make games like Interplay. What they did was take a ridiculously old series and reinvented it a little.

And you know what? I goddamn love Fallout 3. It's fallout-y enough for me and I actually enjoyed the story for it's cliched, 1950's-esque beliefs about science. Regardless of the science behind it (And this is coming from an engineer, bear in mind! I know my science!) the story caught me up. New Vegas... well, not so much. The game played well (when it didn't cough up a lung or two) but frankly... it just didn't engage me as much.

 

[Kiste]

And you know what? I goddamn love Fallout 3. It's fallout-y enough for me and I actually enjoyed the story for it's cliched, 1950's-esque beliefs about science. Regardless of the science behind it (And this is coming from an engineer, bear in mind! I know my science!) the story caught me up. New Vegas... well, not so much. The game played well (when it didn't cough up a lung or two) but frankly... it just didn't engage me as much.

What story? Running through city ruins trying to find daddy while listening to the ramblings of a chiché radio DJ, enjoying the shitty Bethesda dialogue writing and encountering characters that are only memorable for being incredibly unmemorable?

Look, I get that people who don't really care about Fallout prefer FO3 for it's more somber post-apocalyptic atmosphere and the "survivalist" world design. That's not an opinion I share but it's something I can understand - but prefering FO3 (or any Bethesda game, for that matter) for its story is simply ludicrous.

FN:NV, if anything, has proven one thing: that we can have an open-world-style RPG with a good story, memorable characters, great dialogue, a comparably high degree of freedom of choice (with meaningful consequences!). This a major achievement in a sub-genre of RPGs that has been pretty much defined by Bethesda's and Piranha Byte's ineptitude in precisely these areas. FO:NV has shown us that we can expect more. And let's not forget about the utter triumph that is Old World Blues. Bethesda couldn't produce something like that even if their lives depended on it.

 

[Tanner The Monotone]

You can play after you beat the game in fallout 3

 

[Zenn3k]

Really, the only thing in my mind the FO3 did better was exploration.

You could just wander the Capitol Wasteland and find interesting things. NV didn't really have that, they had more set pieces, and a much more linear pathway to walk...there was very little to "explore"

 

[Kyber]

I liked FNV more than FO3, i think it was because in my case the world felt more open and colorful and fun, also the characters felt more varied, the story wasn't as good per say, but the world didn't feel as closed in as FO3.

 

[TheDrunkNinja]

Here's your explanation, no matter what happens in the main story quests, you are forced to join up with the brother-hood of steel, you are yelled at, in the ending for not killing yourself and instead sending someone in there who can bloody survive it. The ending is always relatively the same and usually has the same outcome. There is about one major choice in Fallout 3, while New Vegas has 4 and then about six per story quest and any number of extra things that you can do to get a better ending.

Fallout 3 is pretty much the same game every time. You have to go to Megaton to go find your dad, then you have to go and help your dads research and then you have to join the brotherhood of steel. There are no actual choices, apart from one [poisoning the water] in the main story. My comment related more to the fact that there is no real choices in the main story and side-quest choices don't change a whole lot either in the Main story. In Fallout New Vegas, who you bring with you to the final level changes who they bring as a side-helper, who you chose to befriend like the Boomers or the Enclave Revenant will determine who helps you there. Joining the NCR, Legion or House or yourself will change and affect the entire rest of the game. In Fallout 3, this doesn't exactly exist.

Yes yes, people have problems with the lack of diversity in the endings since all roads in the main quest lead to the same point. I get that. That's not what you said. I played the evilist fucking dickweed in Fallout 3. He was a psychopath who didn't have any regard for human life, thus didn't give a shit about his father or where he went. I only took the evil options for all the quests, which nearly all of them offered. I didn't do the main quest because it didn't line up with my character's motivations. I get that New Vegas has a much better planned and written main quest, but my point was, don't say there wasn't any choice to be an evil bastard in Fallout 3, because holy fucking shit there was. Unlike New Vegas, you don't have to do the main quest to get the full experience of the Capitol Wasteland.

Also, if we want to argue semantics, those faction quests were part of the main quest, just an optional part. Personally, the constant plot railroading in New Vegas only served to annoy the shit out of me. Like, what if I play a character that isn't interested in the political bullshit that goes on in New Vegas? A good two-thirds of the game's content would be missing. I mean, give me a goddamn choice as to whether or not I want to involve myself in other people's wars.

"Dammit Victor! Leave me the fuck alone! I don't want to chase after some bastard who already put two in my skull!"

I appreciate the hell out of the fact that I can be my own man in Fallout 3 and still have so much content to explore, devoid of the main quest entirely. That's just me, though. Obviously, you prefer a game with a more focused and centralized main plot that encompasses the whole of the game. I don't. I'm just happy that there's a Fallout game that thankfully doesn't do that and lets me role play the way I want to.

It's kind of funny. Fallout 3 sticks you with this very set backstory that leaves little to the imagination, but it's New Vegas, despite having a completely blankslate character, that railroads you along its plot with no chance to get off until you're already too far along anyway, while Fallout 3 just dumps you in the Capitol Wasteland with one possible direction and allows you to just wander and explore from there of your own volition.

 

[TheDrunkNinja]

Atmoshpere- For the overall atmosphere F3 was "Survive in a post-apocalyptic wasteland" and NV was just "Survive in the desert with lots of friendly settlements"

Also, I hated how... civilized the Mojave was. It didn't seem like people trying desperately to survive in an oppressive and cruel world. Everything was about survival in Fallout 3.

This is actually what really bothered me about FO3. See, Fallout was never about "Survive in a post-apocalyptic wasteland". Fallout was about "Hey, there is a whole new world and civilization out there, let's explore it!". It just happens so that the world after the nuclear apocalypse turned out really weird...

Fallout was about LIFE after the apocalypse and not so much about crawling through abandoned subway tunnels while shooting up super mutants in the nuclear ruins of a city. That's why FO3 doesn't really resonate with fans of the original Fallout games: it's thematically just too different.

FO:NV, on the other hand, does a much, much, much better job at capturing the the spirit of the original Fallout games. It's also the game that actually continues the lore of the original Fallout games in a meaningful manner, while the story of FO3, uh, really seems to be completely inconsequential in the context of the Fallout universe.

FO3 feels more like a spin-off that maybe should have taken place a century or so before the events in FO1, because, as others have pointed out, the world in FO3 is far too broken and lifeless considering the fact that it takes place 200 years after the bombs fell. There's too little life and too little society and too little vegetation and too much radiation (FO:NV gets away with having little vegetation because it takes place in the desert).

Also, FN:NV is in a completly different league when it comes to writing. There are some things Bethesda does really well (e.g. creating nice open sandbox worlds) but writing is not one of them. In terms of story, dialogue and characters FO3 is simply outclassed by FN:NV and it's not even close. Bethesda games have always suffered from lame storylines, crappy dialogue, really weak characters and embarrassing attempts at humor (and Todd Howard, but that's a different issue). Obsidian, on the other hand, has some of the best and most imaginative writers in the industry. FO:NV has tons of memorable characters, factions and loctions.... FO3 has that guy in Megaton who looks like Chuck Norris and that giant talking robot.

Tl;dr: FO:NV is an actual Fallout game, FO3 is a thematicaly unconnected spin-off that uses Fallout-style artwork assets.

It's very narrow-minded to assume that what you look for in a series or franchise is exactly what makes the series or franchise what it is. This is why I have a problem with the mindset that one game in a series is more or less true to something as vague and as uninterpretable as the "spirit" of the franchise. This entire subject is completely debatable on both sides, ultimately saying one game is better or worse because it is or isn't as "true to Fallout" than the other is based almost entirely in personal opinion and experience than it is on anything that's actually valid.

In other words, I disagree with you, but neither of us have anything concrete to back up what ultimately comes down to our preferences. I've already posted what I like so much more about Fallout 3 compared to New Vegas, but I don't need to use such an overused and vague argument that no one can actually dispute to just say why I like that game more. I like it because it resonates with me more. The same goes for you. That's all it is.

 

[Smeatza]

I felt railroaded to a much higher degree in Fallout 3.

Yes yes, people have problems with the lack of diversity in the endings since all roads in the main quest lead to the same point. I get that. That's not what you said. I played the evilist fucking dickweed in Fallout 3. He was a psychopath who didn't have any regard for human life, thus didn't give a shit about his father or where he went. I only took the evil options for all the quests, which nearly all of them offered. I didn't do the main quest because it didn't line up with my character's motivations. I get that New Vegas has a much better planned and written main quest, but my point was, don't say there wasn't any choice to be an evil bastard in Fallout 3, because holy fucking shit there was. Unlike New Vegas, you don't have to do the main quest to get the full experience of the Capitol Wasteland.

For myself there is a difference between doing evil acts and roleplaying as an evil character.
None of the evil options make any sense when tied with the lovely upbringing your character get's in their background story. Most of the evil options offer little to no profit or any other reason to do them short of being psychologically disturbed which adds nothing to the characterisation, and therefore the roleplaying.
The closest thing I can equate it to is Prototype, yeah you can do all these badass, awful things. But seen as there is no reason behind it or any real consequences, it adds little to the game.

Also, if we want to argue semantics, those faction quests were part of the main quest, just an optional part. Personally, the constant plot railroading in New Vegas only served to annoy the shit out of me. Like, what if I play a character that isn't interested in the political bullshit that goes on in New Vegas? A good two-thirds of the game's content would be missing. I mean, give me a goddamn choice as to whether or not I want to involve myself in other people's wars.

But the Mohave Wasteland is in the midst of a political struggle, it would make no sense for all political elements to disappear just because your character isn't interested. And yes a large portion of the game would be missing if you refused to interact with any political factions (which wouldn't make any sense from a role playing point of view but okay). But having a number of political factions you can support or fight against (depending on your choice) is much better than having one political faction you HAVE to support and one you HAVE to fight against.

"Dammit Victor! Leave me the fuck alone! I don't want to chase after some bastard who already put two in my skull!"

It would make no sense for Victor to leave you alone considering who he's working for. In any case you were happy to ignore the main quest in Fallout 3 so what's changed for New Vegas? At least New Vegas gives you the choice to kill and his boss without any quest prompting whatsoever.

I appreciate the hell out of the fact that I can be my own man in Fallout 3 and still have so much content to explore, devoid of the main quest entirely. That's just me, though. Obviously, you prefer a game with a more focused and centralized main plot that encompasses the whole of the game. I don't. I'm just happy that there's a Fallout game that thankfully doesn't do that and lets me role play the way I want to.

I can't really understand this. There isn't a set plot for New Vegas whereas there is for Fallout 3.
Instead of "you lived in a vault all your life, you mother wasn't there when you were young, your father was an outcast in the vault, the overseer is a suspicious fellow," and the several paragraphs I could write on Fallout 3's intro alone...
In New Vegas it's "You were shot in the face, your package was stolen, now go do what you want."
On top of that there is more choice and consequence in New Vegas causing the plot to branch even wider.
On top of that there are hardly any stupid restrictions on who you can kill in New Vegas so the plot branches even wider.

So while in Fallout 3 you are given the choice to follow the plot, or ignore it. In New Vegas you create your own, unique plot as you go along. Giving Fallout 3 a distinct feeling of linearity (in my opinion).

It's kind of funny. Fallout 3 sticks you with this very set backstory that leaves little to the imagination, but it's New Vegas, despite having a completely blankslate character, that railroads you along its plot with no chance to get off until you're already too far along anyway, while Fallout 3 just dumps you in the Capitol Wasteland with one possible direction and allows you to just wander and explore from there of your own volition.

See I got the complete opposite from both games. I felt forced along a linear path in Fallout 3, the quests didn't seem to have that many choices and consequences, and those that were seemed to have little to no effect. Most characters couldn't be killed unless you finished every quest that related to them (and sometimes not even then). The back story you were given was so extensive it made role playing as several different types of characters completely implausible. Every playthrough seems to yield the same results, regardless of the choices you make. And large sections of of the map were almost impossible to reach unless you had a quest marker guiding you there.

On the other hand New Vegas doesn't have a set plot and no two playthroughs ever seem to be the same. Almost every character can be killed regardless or importance to the plot or if they have quests to complete. Your choices often have visible and important consequences. Role playing is no problem at all with the minimal backstory. And from the very start of the game you can travel to almost anywhere on the map (there is only one area I am aware of you cannot visit at level 1).

What I find really interesting with Fallout 3 and Fallout: New Vegas is that fans of the prior tend to consider the latter too linear and fans of the latter tend to consider the prior too linear. But no matter how hard I try or how far I step back, I cannot see it from the Fallout 3 fan's point of view.

 

[doomspore98]

I have played over 100 hours of fallout 3. In my first 15 minutes of NV I had literally the entire lizard population that me and sunny were supposed to kill stuck in the stone. I just took pot shots at each one.

Fallout 3 has a better environment, music, and fewer glitches.
Fallout NV has a better story, and combat.

And the desert will never compare to ruined DC.

 

[cerebus23]

fonv also has way better characters, except maybe for boone, but then again i was never gung ho about the ncr any more than i was about legions punks, indepedant ftw.

fonv also added better crafting, better stuff in general, that bethesda copied for its skyrim game.

bottom line it seems to be the overall atmosphere that people liked about one of the other, excluding game mechanics, story, characters, i hated slumming thru sewers for hours on end in dc, i hated the quest markers often were just plain confusing when sewers were involved in fo3, but i grew tired of sewer diving long ago since many games force that almost required sewer stage on you.

but if you like streets that are mazes, tons of sewers then fo3 is the game for you.

if you like a open world, and you like the desert then nv is for you.

the major gripe about nv i will support, is the early jack of all trades stuff to get all the objectives done in the first town, but then again obsidian likes to make you choose how to solve stuff based on your build, and the choices you made creating your character, there are far more consequences in nv based on your actions and build.

fo3 and bethesda and all beth games really have no sense of choice or consequences for much of anything you do. be a thief, be a killer, be a mass murderer it is all good, at worse you will have to avoid a town for a week or two while all the npcs get amnesia.

fonv boundries can be solved by the console or cheats in general however if you do not want to be made to choose.

 

[TheDrunkNinja]

I felt railroaded to a much higher degree in Fallout 3.

This is what I mean by "railroading". Maybe your experience was different than mine, but that's how I felt in comparison to the two games.

For myself there is a difference between doing evil acts and roleplaying as an evil character.
None of the evil options make any sense when tied with the lovely upbringing your character get's in their background story. Most of the evil options offer little to no profit or any other reason to do them short of being psychologically disturbed which adds nothing to the characterisation, and therefore the roleplaying.
The closest thing I can equate it to is Prototype, yeah you can do all these badass, awful things. But seen as there is no reason behind it or any real consequences, it adds little to the game.

True, the evil options in Fallout 3 might have been dissatisfactory to your perception of what evil is, but that's a different debate entirely and not the point I was trying to make.

But the Mohave Wasteland is in the midst of a political struggle, it would make no sense for all political elements to disappear just because your character isn't interested. And yes a large portion of the game would be missing if you refused to interact with any political factions (which wouldn't make any sense from a role playing point of view but okay). But having a number of political factions you can support or fight against (depending on your choice) is much better than having one political faction you HAVE to support and one you HAVE to fight against.

You misunderstand me. I wasn't asking that the political elements of the main quest be removed. I'm saying that after I did it the first time, it no longer held any interest to me personally after I completed the full main quest, but then wanting to replay the game meant having to deal with the main quest no matter what I did. The main quest in New Vegas was fun the first time I played it, but when I wanted to have a new character who abstained from the political dealings of New Vegas, I found it to be either impossible or making me go through far too much effort for it to be fun anymore. I personally find issue with the main quest of New Vegas encompassing nearly the whole of the game, an aspect that was done completely opposite in Fallout 3 which leads me to like it all the more. I would never say one is objectively better than the other because that would be stupid and narrowminded because both games offer content and aspects that I'm glad to have experienced. I just find myself having a preference for one over the other for different reasons.

It would make no sense for Victor to leave you alone considering who he's working for. In any case you were happy to ignore the main quest in Fallout 3 so what's changed for New Vegas? At least New Vegas gives you the choice to kill and his boss without any quest prompting whatsoever.

No duh. That doesn't change the fact that I wish he would jump off a cliff so that I can get off this fucking linear plot railroad and just go to Jacobstown or Red Rock Canyon as soon as I leave Doc Mitchell's place. Just give me something so I don't have to play a character that has an irrational fear of towns as he runs at top speed past Primm and Nipton just so he can get to Nellis Airforce Base after looping around the fucking map. Here, this post explains why I find Fallout 3 to be more open and free than New Vegas ever could be. Hmmmm... I already posted that link, didn't I? Ah well.

I can't really understand this. There isn't a set plot for New Vegas whereas there is for Fallout 3.
Instead of "you lived in a vault all your life, you mother wasn't there when you were young, your father was an outcast in the vault, the overseer is a suspicious fellow," and the several paragraphs I could write on Fallout 3's intro alone...
In New Vegas it's "You were shot in the face, your package was stolen, now go do what you want."
On top of that there is more choice and consequence in New Vegas causing the plot to branch even wider.
On top of that there are hardly any stupid restrictions on who you can kill in New Vegas so the plot branches even wider.

So while in Fallout 3 you are given the choice to follow the plot, or ignore it. In New Vegas you create your own, unique plot as you go along. Giving Fallout 3 a distinct feeling of linearity (in my opinion).

It's kind of funny. Fallout 3 sticks you with this very set backstory that leaves little to the imagination, but it's New Vegas, despite having a completely blankslate character, that railroads you along its plot with no chance to get off until you're already too far along anyway, while Fallout 3 just dumps you in the Capitol Wasteland with one possible direction and allows you to just wander and explore from there of your own volition.

I kept the quote there since it kind of answers my feelings on the beginning 30 minutes of backstory in Fallout 3 compared to the blankslate you get in New Vegas.

This is my experience:

Fallout 3: That was a long tutorial. But apparently I have family I need to track down, though not immediately. Hmmm... Based on where I am on this map, I'm pretty much at the center of things. Eh, dad can wait. What's in this direction... Oh wow, crazy slavers and a town town full of mines! I wonder what else I can find around here...

New Vegas: Hm. Relatively quick tutorial, at least I'm out in the game now! Quicker than last time. Let's see what's around here. Huh, people seem to think I want to find the guy who shot me in the head who went south. I'll get to that later, let's see what's this way. Oh, mutant bugs killed me. Let me try going that way again. Nope, dead again, no way I'm going that way. Maybe I'll just go straight to New Vegas. Deathclaws killed me now. Great. Maybe I'll just go this way? No, there's an invisible wall. I guess I'll just go south like they said I should...

Now, for me, I create lots of different characters to try out new things and playstyles. From this point on, every time I create a new character in Fallout 3, I'll have to go through the damn tutorial again (unless you just use the automatic save it creates once you get to the door and create your character from there, good design choice for someone who wants to create a new character), open the vault door... and then be dropped right in the Capitol Wasteland. All directions possible from moment one.

Now, every time I create a new character in New Vegas, I go through the quick tutorial, then go in the direction the game wants me to go so that I can get on the plot of the main quest. What if I don't want to get on the main quest? Oh, well I'll just be running past all these plot specific areas for miles before I'm no longer physically confined to the main quest path, but that doesn't mean I'm not still confined. Running past Primm, Mojave Outpost, Nipton, Novac, Boulder City etc. would leave you completely under-leveled and under-equipped to deal with the more interesting areas of the game. Then you find that no matter where you move, that nearly whatever your character does goes back to the plot of the main quest.

Well, shit. There's no avoiding it. The game does almost anything it can to make you a part of the main plot of New Vegas. Which is perfectly fine. I like the main plot of New Vegas, but the game lacks what I like most about the new Fallout games. So yeah, it's very linear for an sandbox RPG and has a massive plot railroad, which does not resonate with me personally. It's different for you. What you like in these games is there in New Vegas, and my problem is inconsequential to you in a similar way that your problem with Fallout 3 is completely inconsequential to me. I'm not going to say that my game is better than yours though.

See I got the complete opposite from both games. I felt forced along a linear path in Fallout 3, the quests didn't seem to have that many choices and consequences, and those that were seemed to have little to no effect. Most characters couldn't be killed unless you finished every quest that related to them (and sometimes not even then). The back story you were given was so extensive it made role playing as several different types of characters completely implausible. Every playthrough seems to yield the same results, regardless of the choices you make. And large sections of of the map were almost impossible to reach unless you had a quest marker guiding you there.

On the other hand New Vegas doesn't have a set plot and no two playthroughs ever seem to be the same. Almost every character can be killed regardless or importance to the plot or if they have quests to complete. Your choices often have visible and important consequences. Role playing is no problem at all with the minimal backstory. And from the very start of the game you can travel to almost anywhere on the map (there is only one area I am aware of you cannot visit at level 1).

Hmmm... Well everything I wrote above seems to express my point of view on this, so I'll just leave it at that.

What I find really interesting with Fallout 3 and Fallout: New Vegas is that fans of the prior tend to consider the latter too linear and fans of the latter tend to consider the prior too linear. But no matter how hard I try or how far I step back, I cannot see it from the Fallout 3 fan's point of view.

That's just strange to me since I completely understand why some people favor New Vegas. My problem is that most of the time it seems to come at the expense of Fallout 3, and I find it sad that you can't seem to understand why I prefer it over New Vegas.

If you honestly desire to see this from my point of view, then the best way to do that is to not think about it from the position of someone who's already decided one is objectively better than the other, which I find to be the most common problem with people who advocate your position. It's to the point where some people who favor New Vegas actually call Fallout 3 a bad game, which only proves that they see the two games through an extremely narrow mental-filter.

 

[GonzoGamer]

I have played over 100 hours of fallout 3. In my first 15 minutes of NV I had literally the entire lizard population that me and sunny were supposed to kill stuck in the stone. I just took pot shots at each one.

Fallout 3 has a better environment, music, and fewer glitches.
Fallout NV has a better story, and combat.

And the desert will never compare to ruined DC.

That sums it up nicely.
I personally preferred Fallout 3 because I spend more time exploring the map in these games rather than exploring the story. The map and locations of Fallout 3 were a lot more fun and rewarding to root through. The only location in NV that had the same feeling that you stepped in the twilight zone was vault 11 (I think...the one with the election); but most of them were very shallow and all clustered together like a Hollywood backlot.

OP
For me Fallout 3 worked way better than New Vegas. I did have a problem with Fallout 3 when it was modded incorrectly but after I found out how to mod it properly(there are probably better videos on youtube now than the ones I used) it works better than I would've ever imagined.

 

[BENZOOKA]

I liked the environment more in F3, but otherwise I prefer NV and think it's clearly the better game overall.