Tagaziel

I've even managed to keep two or three Followers of the Apocalypse alive during the Cathedral assault. Man, was that awesome.

If so, I will mail myself to you guys and dance naked in your parking lot making funny noises.

I was surprised that Dogmeat's heart survived fighting alongside me, as in the LA Vault and Mariposa I had him on a steady diet of Super Stimpaks, Buffout and Psycho.

And how does that make discussing the game world in depth impossible?

Versimilitude.

All the talk about bullet calibers, effects of nuclear fallout and other realistic stuff. Fallout has never really been about that. Then what was it about? Riding on a horse slaying bad people? Wait, that's fantasy according to Toad Hubbard.

I assume you forgot that the world of Fallout is a nuked out wasteland, so a relatively limited number of explorable locations is only a logical result. You know, it's hard to argue a point with you, since I have to state the obvious. Like Fallout 1 and 2 having a number of explorable locations that are fleshed out plus a large number of various random encounters that are rewards for exploring the world by wandering around (fishermen fending off raiders, Patrick the Celt, BoS patrols, caravans etc. in Fo1 for instance). Seriously, what's your problem?

Minor correction: the Vault City GECK was disassembled over the course of the city's development. In 2241 the city relies on food and other nourishment from food synthesizers using raw materials imported from outside (Parlour Room bartender indicates this is the case). Outsiders in the Courtyard grow their own food to sell and sustain themselves.

Funnily, most of the cabinets and dressers that are intact are located in places populated by humans. People who want to maintain their furniture so that they can live? Preposterous! Look in random encounter locations and similiar - those places are truly nuked out and wasted. Fallout 3's problem is that the stuff you mention is TOO commonplace. There's a working computer and lights in every second building, even though they would've broken down in the first two decades after the war. A good story should be presented in a way that is consistent with the world. And lights working for the past two hundred years, generators working for two centuries and operational computers that have been left out in the rain for two centuries break immersion and instead of enjoying the story, the first feeling is WTF. A prime example is Germantown Police HQ.

There will be blood.

Key difference is that the West Coast in Fallout has an extremely dry climate, even more so after the war, so wood wouldn't decay that rapidly. Also, who are you to say there are no skilled carpenters around that made those cabinets, doors and furniture? Most of them are simple enough to be made from scratch by anyone with a rudimentary knowledge of his tools. As for computers and other electronica... http://www.nma-fallout.com/forum/viewtopic...p=349507#349507 Rosh gives good explanations. As for the agriculture, why would it detract from the wasted feeling?

Please point out where Fallout/Fallout 2 were inconsistent in that regard (apart from the obvious New Reno). As I pointed out, there were TWO pieces of pre war food in the game, both inedible and two beverages, both likely to survive.

Didn't J.E. Sawyer say, that he'd love to do a game set during the Resource Wars? Give the man a break, New Vegas is the best thing to happen to the Fallout community since Van Buren's announcement.

Damn right. A prime example of a well executed approach is Half-Life 2, which mixes traditional storytelling with environmental.

Off topic, I wonder if Roshambo still has enough care remaining to start posting here.

It seems we're easily distracted :]

Yes, you are correct, there were only a few pre-war edibles in the game, two of which (Small Dusty Box of Some Sort AKA TV Dinner and Box of Noodles) were inedible, while the other (Nuka-Cola and booze) were way beyond expiration dates (not that alcohol has one). The rest was all postwar. Especially Bob's Iguana Bits, yum yum! Since Fallout came before Fallout 3, I'm judging Fallout 3 as a sequel, not a standalone game. And Fallout 1/2 had their share of flaws, yes, but we're discussing Fallout 3, not them.

Descriptions, as I've said, are one part of the system Fo1 and Fo2 use. Of course, in your quixotic quest against everything Fo1 you blow that part out of proportion, remaining purposefully ignorant. But yeah, let's indulge you with a couple of examples. Farms first and foremost, or rather, visible crops and agriculture. Apart from mere decoration, they serve an important role, indicating that the settlement is large enough to sustain agriculture, is self sufficent and has access to water. It's a sign of civilization and also tells quite a bit about the towns themselves. Compare Shady Sands and Klamath. The former is a settlement built from the ground up with a GECK, neatly organized, with the agriculture out of the way, which contrasts with Klamath, a disorderly town with the crops smack right in the middle of what would be the town square, showing that, in essence, its just a bunch of vultures eking out an existence in the ruins of a burned out pre-war city (something the Chosen One picks up on in conversation with Maida Buckner). But yeah, you might say "wait a minute, I asked about things similiar to those in Fo3, not decor". Okay. Let's get one thing out of the way, The Glow. Now that we have one of the greatest "tell-story-through-gameplay" locations in Fallout, let's focus on your vignettes. Vault 15 for instance, there are clips scattered near rock formations that are obviously cave ins. I don't know about you, but my imagination is pretty vivid, so the first thing coming to mind is the sight of a scavenger crushed by few tons of rock from a collapsing ceiling, leaving behind only a handful of clips. But yeah, since it was vacated about forty years before Fallout happens and the dwellers were pretty thorough, there's not much left behind, since they left and took their stuff with them. A better example is Necropolis. First are the sewers, where you find dead ghoul bodies, shot to death (a text description informs you about that, since it's necessary. Fallout 3 would have to use text too, since apart from the same limbs flying around the place, the engine doesn't support markings on dead bodies to my knowledge) by an unknown party, showing the ruthlessness of the city and ghouls/supermutants (it's never stated who shot them). Cars placed around Necropolis, one Diesel truck jammed halfway into a building, I've always wondered what caused the driver to crash, maybe it was the blinding flash? Fo2 has more of these vignettes (though I'm increasingly unsure as to what exactly you want me to point out), such as the abandoned second Gecko nuclear reactor, the crashed car in Den with a Vault City citizen's body next to it, the slaughtered scavengers in SAD, the malfunctioning howitzer there, Dunton's slaughterhouse and some, err, doubtful ingredients, crashed Vertibird, random encounters with settlements in them, random encounter city maps with crashed cars etc. Most of what I'm pointing out is basic stuff creating believeability and versimilitude, but also creating those little side stories you're so fond of. Note that I'm unsure what you really mean by "background" - do separate quarters for initiates, knights and scribes, paladins and elders in Lost Hills count as background or not? Their big mainframe counts or not? Etc.

I do. It's really annoying, especially after going straight for Fo3 after finishing the two previous games. I grew to rely on the descriptions to the point where primitive pictograms only confuse me.

So I assume the Glow, Vault 15, Sierra Army Depot, New Reno, various random encounters, Klamath (canyon in particular) etc. are just my hallucination? So here you are, stating that Fallout 3's vignettes are subtle storytelling yet completely ignore the backgrounds of Fallout 1 and 2 discarding them. You're either purposefully ignoring them or simply haven't played either of the games. The backgrounds are very rich, except they rely on a combination of text and visual cues, while Fo3 only relies on visuals (and robs itself of an opportunity for the writers to exercise their skills... though maybe it's a blessing, since Beth's writers aren't exactly the best).

Was it ever sane, to begin with?

I just remembered Morrowind and the amount of stuff you could do there and the amount of storytelling... damn awesome. Shame Fo3 isn't even remotely as expansive, coherent and rich.

I find it puzzling, though, as these stories are scattered in obscure locations, while major ones (Corvega Factory, Chryslus, Vault Tec) are devoid of storytelling almost entirely.

It's worthless if it's so obscure that you have to think hard to figure out what happened here. Environmental storytelling is the mastery of Valve, Bethesda's only attempting to do that. Or, rather, relearning after seemingly losing that skill when transitioning to Oblivion from Morrowind. I blame Emil Pagliuro and his hate for text-based storytelling.

Fallout 3's story is nothing special, so it's not like the game is broken for you now.