FO:NV: The Return of Gameplay Mechanics Discussion

[Purkake]

Will you be posting Sonic fanfic later, mkreku?

[Syraxis]

It's a troll, chill guyz.

[cronicler]

A snip from Fallout 2, Tycho the Desert Ranger's words on his organisation:

We Rangers hail from back east, what used to be called Nevada. Our heritage stretches back to the days of the Texas Rangers. We learn survival and combat skills in order to go out into the world and have a chance of surviving and making things better.

 

Also Tycho's description in Fallout 1:

A man in dusty leather armor with a trenchcoat and gas mask

 

He was already a nod back to the Wasteland (Tycho's grandfather was a Desert Ranger (The Desert Rangers themselves are a reference to Wasteland. Tycho also makes a mentions the "fat freak" from Las Vegas, which is a reference to Fat Freddy from Wasteland.)

 

 

Related or not it is nice to see / think this as a nod to rabid fans (Except you Oner! You Beth fan-Boi! )

[Pop]

I'd think any population center would get hit, so LV should be properly borked.

You'd think so, but no wargame ever goes perfectly. The idea that a nuke got calibrated wrong and missed its target by a long shot isn't implausible. Or maybe it's as others have suggested, and the hotzone is livable several hundred years after the fact. We'll find out next week, I assume.

[cronicler]

Or the nuke might have targeted Ellis or an Industrial site as you know, when you make war you try to hit the other guys production and military centers first.

Besides as far as targets go Civilian Population centers are the worst things you can hit, the more people other guy has to feed with smashed up infastructure, the more trouble he is in

Lastly the place might have been hit with a Neutron Bomb to clean out the living without too much damage to infastructure for future occupation plans.

Edited February 5, 2010 by cronicler

[Purkake]

Ah yes, the good old Neutron Bomb, you don't really hear much about it these days...

 

I like that explanation.

[Pop]

Still wouldn't explain all the working lights but then, Fallout's always kind of taken creative license when it came to power.

[Tigranes]

It *is* 200 years after. Makes sense both lore and gameplay wise.

[WILL THE ALMIGHTY]

200 years does seem way too long to NOT have some sort civilization or large city rebuilt.

[Oner]

I also have to think that Obsidz learned a lot from its K2 experience. It was the first project for the studio, and K2 simply wasn't scoped as a project that was finishable in the time they were given. With a more manageable gameplan from the beginning (cut mini-games, don't waste time planning the droid planet, whack Disciple, etc.), they could've pulled it off.

 

That's not entirely accurate....

 

...except for the "learned a lot" part. But I digress.

Fair enough-- I clearly have no inside information about how the development actually went. My core point was simply that Obsidz dealing with a tight schedule back in '04 probably taught them some lessons in dealing with a tight (tyte?) schedule in '09-'10.

Didn't Avellone say that ~half of K2's dev time was "wasted" on researching SW lore?

 

 

Related or not it is nice to see / think this as a nod to rabid fans (Except you Oner! You Beth fan-Boi! )

I was playing an F1 purist.

YOU DON'T EVEN KNOW THAT, YOU'RE A FAN IN NAME ONLY!!

[Slowtrain]

Josh or Matthew, or anybody really,

 

When will you guys be able to answer specific questions about changes (or lack thereof) to gameplay mechanics?

[Pop]

We should just hold our horses till next week.

[jjc]

Fallout 3 lacks corrals to hold my horses. Will New Vegas fix this at retail or is it planned for DLC?

[bhlaab]

Still wouldn't explain all the working lights but then, Fallout's always kind of taken creative license when it came to power.

 

There was a strange emphasis on the lightning bolt in the fallout logo, so I'm gonna predict that electricity is going to be a major theme in the story (kind of like how everyone was fighting over water in fo3)

[Pop]

Oh yeah MCA had this to say earlier today

Yep, I did area design and encounter design for F2 (worked on Vault City's third and final iteration, companions: Cassidy and Myron, special encounters, New Reno, Raider Camp, and the EPA, which got canned - and good thing, too, we already had too many locations) and some perk designs. Brian Menze, Feargus, Chris Jones, Scotty Everts, and Dan Spitzley are all here, all worked on Fallout 2, not all of them are on New Vegas, though.

 

The trailer is the only thing I can point to to answer your question, can't say much more than that. Josh and John Gonzalez (our creative lead and master of all things plot-related) put together a great story with some fun new mechanics, and they know their Fallout. I think we're using all the stuff we've been kicking around for the past ten+ years with RPGs and seeing how they can be applied to New Vegas on both the plot and system side.

So yeah, time to get pumped bitches.

[bhlaab]

Oh yeah MCA had this to say earlier today

Yep, I did area design and encounter design for F2 (worked on Vault City's third and final iteration, companions: Cassidy and Myron, special encounters, New Reno, Raider Camp, and the EPA, which got canned - and good thing, too, we already had too many locations) and some perk designs. Brian Menze, Feargus, Chris Jones, Scotty Everts, and Dan Spitzley are all here, all worked on Fallout 2, not all of them are on New Vegas, though.

 

The trailer is the only thing I can point to to answer your question, can't say much more than that. Josh and John Gonzalez (our creative lead and master of all things plot-related) put together a great story with some fun new mechanics, and they know their Fallout. I think we're using all the stuff we've been kicking around for the past ten+ years with RPGs and seeing how they can be applied to New Vegas on both the plot and system side.

So yeah, time to get pumped bitches.

 

That would get me pumped, except I'm not exactly sure what it means.

 

They're using their experience making RPGs and putting it towards making a new RPG?

[Pop]

There seems to be a lot of bellyachin' out there regarding whether New Vegas is going to be just Fallout 3 in a new location. It doesn't look like it will be.

[Oner]

There was a strange emphasis on the lightning bolt in the fallout logo, so I'm gonna predict that electricity is going to be a major theme in the story (kind of like how everyone was fighting over water in fo3)

Syraxis' Robo Vegas idea seems a bit likelier now.

Or not, I don't think robots would bother burying bodies.

 

That would get me pumped, except I'm not exactly sure what it means.

 

They're using their experience making RPGs and putting it towards making a new RPG?

Ideas, not experience as I understand it. Edited February 5, 2010 by Oner

[Sannom]

Or the nuke might have targeted Ellis or an Industrial site as you know, when you make war you try to hit the other guys production and military centers first.

Besides as far as targets go Civilian Population centers are the worst things you can hit, the more people other guy has to feed with smashed up infastructure, the more trouble he is in

 

Yeah, Hitler learned the hard way that you don't aim at the civilian centers before having destroyed the military structures. Especially if your enemy is british

[cronicler]

Don't forget the Japs and Colonial English and the Allied High Command and the Mongols and the Huns and Reds and Vlad and....

Without any sarcasm I hate when people cut the scope too narrow to specific instances when the whole thing has to be seen as a whole

 

 

Hitting your enemies' population is a prime tactic as long as you can vipe them out (nearly) completely without expanding too much resources. It's all about cost vs efficiency spread sheet.

 

 

Anyway, It sucks that Obsidian isn't allowed to speak on their own forums.

 

 

Edit: Mr J.E. Sawyer, we see you. Please at least say I'm awake (or about to go to bed. dunno what time is it there) Will we get anything here from you or are we stuck with the sub-optimal Publisher based forums?

Edited February 5, 2010 by cronicler

[Nepenthe]

I love the Beth forum. Guy in generic trench coat, generic gas mask, generic helmet, and they decide it's "helghast (Killzone IIRC) armor". -.-

 

There's also the red facial glow, which makes it less of a leap.

 

Looks like I'll have a good chance of staying totally unspoiled if the Beth forums are going to be the main source of information.

[Oner]

I love the Beth forum. Guy in generic trench coat, generic gas mask, generic helmet, and they decide it's "helghast (Killzone IIRC) armor". -.-

There's also the red facial glow, which makes it less of a leap.

Apparently the glow is just reflected on the mask, or so it's speculated. Edited February 5, 2010 by Oner

[cronicler]

Doesn't seem to be a reflection. It seems like some sort of "in helmet" "to shine on the visor's inner surface, some kind of display?" light (why red?) . And did his red lighted faceplate looked like having a skull image?

 

I wonder if Legion will be in?

[Lexx]

Maybe the red light is just there to make it look evil.

[cronicler]

Maybe...