I played through both Fallouts a couple of times, just to see how much changed if I tried other characters and tactics. And... no. OK games, but not much more than that. In order to enjoy the second route through I set strict limitations on myself (not allowed to steal, lie to people or use guns...) but still ended up being just another ok experience. Mostly because of the one dimensional characters and the repetitive gameplay. (As I could solve balancing issues by just not allowing myself to do things that made it too easy.)
The idea of the Fallout world is interesting. And the special character building system shows a lot of promise.
It is then very likely that You did something wrong while trying to make the game exciting for Yourself. I've finished each Fallout at least a hundred times (and I'm not exaggerating here), and I don't seem to have enough of it. I doubt this is because of some appearent difference between my taste and Yours. But know for sure, that by playing the game one time You can't get even 1/10 of the available quests done, and I'm pretty positive of that. You need to try the game with different statistics (ever tried playing with a character with lower intelligence than 3? that simply kills ), You need to make waaay more limitations on Yourself than You did, You need to do everything in a different order than You did last time. And then repeat everything with a female character.
Checkout the topic about Fallout 1 and 2 in the RPG's section of this board.
One thing I can guarantee: if You've finished the game only once, it will be an OK game to You, but to get the feel of it, and to understand while so many people are fascinated by this game, You would have to finish it at least a couple of times (first finish Fallout 1, then wait even a couple of months, and finish fallout2. And repeat ).
Regards.