Fallout 4 is coming soon.. is there a new OB Fallout Scheduled?

[Fenixp]

oh my, disagree on all points 

You're right, I'd have to elaborate to actually get my point across. It's just for a bit more writing/reading than I was willing to do up to this point, so if you want, I can write a small essay here - and it'll be fun and relatively well written, I promise! But for that somebody would be willing to listen, so if any of you want me to put in the effort, I gladly will. Otherwise, well, let's agree to disagree :D Let's just say that Extra Credits are not the only people in the field of game design theory who consider world design of F3 superior, and there's a list of good reasons for that, but at the end of the day, there's no accounting for taste.

[Hurlshort]

I thought Fallout 3 was just one big grey mess of concrete.  Fallout 4 still has a lot of repetitive stuff, but at least there is some color.

[CoM_Solaufein]

Stupid game. I get notified Sanctuary was under attack. I dropped what I was doing at another settlement and rushed back. I killed the Gunners who were attacking. I waited a little bit and no more appeared. I left to return to the other settlement I was working on and then I get a message saying I failed to protect Sanctuary. I return and find all of my generators broken, some of my water pumps and turrets broken. WTF?

[sorophx]

Edited November 29, 2015 by sorophx

[Gorgon]

Saw a drawer full of rolls of duckt tape on sale today and instinctually went 'I need that'

[GhostofAnakin]

These fusion cores for the power armor run out so quickly.  Half the time I don't even bother with the armor because it seems to run out halfway through a quest.

[ktchong]

I have not played Fallout 4 and won't play it until all of its inevitable DLC are released.  However, I've been watching Let's Play Fallout 4 videos on YouTube.  IMO, the character facial models and animations in the first Mass Effect, a game that came out eight years ago, are on par or even better than those in Fallout 4.  Bethesda has a lot of catching up to do in the facial animation technology.

 

Then again, the facial models and animations in Mass Effect have always been so far advanced than GTA, Obsidian games, just about all other RPG and action adventures, and even BioWare's own Dragon Age series.  The latest Dragon Age, Inquisition, has only come close to the Mass Effect series.  (The first two Dragon Age games were awful in terms of facial modeling and animations.)  The Witcher 3 comes close or is on par; however, players do not design their characters' faces in The Witcher 3.  Mass Effect is so far ahead of competitions in terms of character facial models and animations - at least eight years ahead, which is quite amazing.

Edited November 29, 2015 by ktchong

[Humanoid]

I thought FO3's worldbuilding was at its most disjointed when they forced you to travel via subway tunnels to a lot of places. It makes the world feel like a bunch of disconnected rooms that don't even exist in the same physical space. It was a crap approach when Ultima 8 did it, and it's worse still to do it 15 years later.

[GhostofAnakin]

Early impressions (very early):

 

-Big game world, but seems rather sparsely populated.

 

-Prefer the various towns/settlements/communities in FO:NV to FO4 so far.

 

-The workshop is more annoying than fun so far.

[Fenixp]

I thought FO3's worldbuilding was at its most disjointed when they forced you to travel via subway tunnels to a lot of places. It makes the world feel like a bunch of disconnected rooms that don't even exist in the same physical space. It was a crap approach when Ultima 8 did it, and it's worse still to do it 15 years later.

It is crap, but it's also a tiny portion of the map. Look at this picture, it actually says a lot. The disjointed bits are only present in DC. It also quite nicely shows how different are the two maps in 'scale' and how badly New Vegas maps railroads you, one of my big complaints about it (might as well draw a red line between starting location and Vegas as well, it requires serious metagaming to get trough. I'm a sucker for freedom of movement.) Edited November 30, 2015 by Fenixp

[Lexx]

I really wouldn't call it railroading. It leads you a certain part in the beginning, but it's not impossible to take the straight northern way- in worst case it needs a stealth boy, in best case you simply go via Black Mountain.

 

Games like Gothic and Gothic 2 did this too and they are awesome. Especially the colony in G1 feels very alive despite being really tiny in comparison. Now thinking back to this game, I really think dev studios nowadays should try to concentrate on smaller, well developed wordmaps instead of huge ones stuffed with lots of boring filler content.

 

/edit: Years ago one of the Gothic developers said in an interview that the games didn't sold well in America because Americans didn't liked how you can't go wherever you want from the beginning and that certain enemies can't be defeated as soon as you meet them the first time. I think it was pretty spot on and still applies today, especially to Obsidian, who's games usually get better reviews in Europe and russia than in America...

Edited November 30, 2015 by Lexx

[Fenixp]

Yeah I hated Gothic games, the amount of gating there was ridiculous - it sort of kind of worked in the first game as it was a prison colony, but Gothic 2 fell apart due to presenting a living world completely under siege by critters. Don't get me wrong, I also dislike the way Oblivion did things, scaling the entire world to your level. Morrowind's worldbuilding is probably my favorite, followed by Skyrim - they initially allow you to go wherever you want when it comes to main towns and cities, but sticking your nose into a difficult dungeons will get you killed quite easily. I find this way of building a world to give me a lot more reasons to actually replay a game.

 

And yes, modern game studios indeed do need to stop with the bloody open world craze in general, it's insane.

Edited November 30, 2015 by Fenixp

[GhostofAnakin]

I'm assuming the big cities/settlements comes later?  Early in the game, but the only "cities" I've come across are Sanctuary (and that's not even big) and Diamond City.  Everything else has been a 2 or 3 person farm/settlement.

[HoonDing]

your supposed to build those small settlements yourself

[Humanoid]

Diamond City is as big as it gets, unfortunately.

[GhostofAnakin]

That sucks.  As I said above, I prefer then FO:NV's approach where there are a bunch of settlements with pretty decent sized populations to visit.

[mkreku]

Oh yeah, wandering through New Vegas City with a loading screen every two feet was an amazing experience..

 

I think I've explored 95%+ of Fallout 4 now and the map really is awesome. The sheer variety of things to see and find is absolutely astonishing. I especially love the fact that there are things hidden out there that are not marked anywhere and that can give you more than just random things in a box. No spoilers, but it really is worth exploring thoroughly if you find some environmental puzzle you don't understand at first.

 

I've begun working my way through the main quest now (entered Diamond City for the first time after 140+ hours played) and I have no idea why you guys whine so much about the writing. It's just normal writing to me. But as usual when complaining about writing everyone just calls it "bad" without any explanation as to why this writing is any worse than [insert favourite isometric RPG here]. No, it's not the verbal diarrhea of Planescape: Torment, no it's not your standard fantasy "hitherto, alas thy questeth sucketh". Is this what's missing for you basement dwellers?

[Lexx]

I find the writing bad, not necessarily because the words are bad, but because you either don't have any choices in dialogue or they are fake choices. Also the setup is often just awkward- as example you adress people with their names despite never having talked to them before + nobody ever told you the names.

 

If you ask a question about a quest, the npc will answer and then you can accept. If you don't ask about the quest and just accept it, he will first tell you what you could have asked before, therefore making the choice of asking totally irrelevant.

 

Stuff like this is what I'd already call bad writing.

Edited November 30, 2015 by Lexx

[Katphood]

What destroyed Fallout 4 for me was the writing. Some conversations were so bad it was as if they were written by a 10 year old. I could get past the technical issues but the characters simply made the game unbearable for me.

[Raithe]

Then there are jarring things, like you do the memory retrieval with Doctor Amari, and find out about the Glowing Sea quest..  Then later you're talking to the Brotherhood of Steel and they know everything about it without you telling them,  and its not like Danse was a companion at the time either. So wow, apparently the Elder is omniscient and has all these details regardless.

[StormbringerGT]

The writing seems to be the issue a lot of people have with this game.

As for why they are wasting time making synths?

My theory is that because: Science! because they can.

Look at technology now. Its usually developed in one of two areas: Money or Because they can.

Remember when we tried to make phones as small as possible years ago? Man did that flip flop.
There are many applications for science and technology that could be used today to help with many issues we have. But we continue to develop in areas where there are huge markets. Or areas that are just cool and the practical application beyond entertainment are limiting.

Oh and military tech.
So I think they created the synths at first to see if they could. Then hubris enters and you realize you can make these things very life like. You stop wondering why you are doing it and do it to see if you can. At some point your life like creations will help mankind. How? You don't even remember anymore, but they will! In your isolated facility disconnected from the dirty world above you think you are helping but you are only helping yourself feel better and like you are making a difference.

Anyway that's what I think about the whole reasoning behind synths. I'm not far into the game yet story wise and I haven't properly allied with a side. Maybe they explain more later.

That being said I had my moments fuming at the TV. There are a lot of scenarios where engaging a sit down between factions would have sorted out a lot of problems. Or things I wanted to say to certain faction leaders that I just couldn't say and so war slowly builds. Again I haven't picked a side yet but I have a feeling there is only very violent options. 

On a side note: Man BoS thanks for being complete jerks this time around. I usually love siding with them when I can but man do they make it as hard as possible to do so this time around.
 

[GhostofAnakin]

Is it me, or is there much, much, much less dialogue than in previous FO games?  When you can actually speak to a NPC (without getting a generic response), you have maybe one line of dialogue and then the options become to "trade" with them and nothing else.

 

Where's the dialogue about background info?  Where that NPC came from?  Why they ended up where they are?  The dialogue seems so sparse.

[Raithe]

That, and the damn radiant quests that keep turning places you've cleared into yet another pack of raiders.

 

I think I've got the Corvega Factory cleared about 7 times now. And then oh look, in the space of two days, another raider group have apparently moved in, set up shop and started threatening settlements which send me right back there.

[GhostofAnakin]

This is why Obsidian's version felt so much more alive than FO4 does.  You came across a lot of characters who actually had something to say, so you learned about them and learned about the places you visit.  FO4, so far it feels like barely anyone has anything to say about themselves or the place they live.  And the ones that do don't say a whole lot.

 

I mean, the dialogue has been broken down to such basics.

 

Player: (press Y) "The Institute?"

 

NPC: "You haven't heard about the Institute?  It's where they make synths."

 

Player: (press Y) "Synths?"

 

NPC: "Short for synthetic humans.  They're created by the Institute."

 

Player: (press X) "I just want to trade."

 

That's it.  That's how much you get out of these NPCs!  I met a reporter who had a "quest" for me where she interviewed me.  If I agreed to the interview, she'd travel with me.  Great.  Except I don't get the option to actually ask WHO THE HELL SHE IS.  No questions about her background, or why she became a reporter, or what is transpiring in her life.  If I want her along, I've got to basically agree to let her tag along just because.

 

Such a stark difference to say, learning about Cassidy's past before taking her on, or learning about Boone's wife before taking him on.

[Rosbjerg]

FO4, so far it feels like barely anyone has anything to say about themselves or the place they live. 

 

This is what caused me to quit playing actually - it felt so weird.. You wanna recruit me? all right, who are you... "that should be self evident", erh not really, no. I mean sure, I as a player know you, but my character doesn't. After about 2 hours, I had to alt-tab out of the game to look up "The Commonwealth", because everyone spoke to me about it, but no one ever explained what it was. I assumed correctly, that it was the region, but come on, give me something! anything.

 

It's the exact opposite of Skyrim where everyone would walk up to you and give you a lecture on their life, political affiliation and sexual problems. Can't we get a happy middle ground?