Fallout 4...

[Rosbjerg]

 

I'm afraid I'm not enjoying Fallout 4 nearly as much as I did 3. I'm not sure why. The writing seems to be okay. 

 

I think it's the combat system? And the endless problems with weight limitations? 

 

Anyway, it's okay, but I'm regretting paying 70 bucks for it.

 

I enjoyed 3 far more but I was less critical back then so I dunno, maybe it's me?  I think the combat and world design are excellent but the disjointed conversations are frustrating and major characters don't react in a believable way to events, very often they don't react at all 

 

It feels to me like Bethesda have abandoned internal consistency for the sake of epic ****, I know many people will say they've always been this way but I felt Skyrim was a step up and I had high hopes for Fallout 4.

 

So that's probably my problem, dashed hopes.  No doubt I'll come back to the game in a better mood next year, with my expectations suitably adjusted.

 

I'm actually somewhat optimistic that DLC might fix it, if only because it seems Bethesda has focused alot on player feedback in the development of F4, by adding some of the most popular mods (and concepts from New Vegas), but obviously thought consistent story was an auxiliary strength to open world gameplay, rather than a main asset.

 

Hopefully they'll take the criticism to heart and try to add some general reciprocity to the game in future updates etc. But I'm certainly happy that I'm seeing across the net that people are openly criticizing the lacking story consistency/strength. If only because that might mean the next game will have more focus on a cohesive story. In any case however, I will certainly wait to buy that until at least a year after release (and maybe steal a friends copy to try heh)

[Raithe]

So I keep losing farms/settlements because I keep ignoring their happiness meter.  Why did Bethesda think it would be a good idea to implement this in a RPG?  I'm playing Fallout, not the Sims.  Yet I have to waste time at each and every farm/settlement building stuff for them or they get cranky and leave?  It's not fun, it's tedious and has no real point in the overall game.

 

I saved you from Raiders/Mutants.  I built you food, water, and turret defenses.  Now do something for yourselves for change.  Jesus.

 

Hm, I don't really see happiness drop that much. It keeps hovering between 65-83.  Of course, when I have to "build" a settlement, I slap down the beds and then throw up a few paintings, chairs, and a couple of flags on the exterior of the building. From what I gather as long as you put a few of those "luxuries" up, that keeps them all satisfied.

 

Edit: I have to admit, having the combo perks of Rifleman, Stealth, Ninja and Mr Sandman maxed, while using a Legendary "Mighty" Gauss Rifle with Silencer... Really lets you one shot kill pretty much everything you encounter with a stealth headshot..

Edited December 10, 2015 by Raithe

[Tale]

If I don't scavenge every random suit of T-45 I come across, I might as well be dead.

And now Strong must really hate me.

 

I found like 5 suits yesterday.

[Longknife]

I'm afraid I'm not enjoying Fallout 4 nearly as much as I did 3. I'm not sure why. The writing seems to be okay. 

 

I think it's the combat system? And the endless problems with weight limitations? 

 

Anyway, it's okay, but I'm regretting paying 70 bucks for it.

 

 

I've seen people comment that although it's a disappointment compared to NV, it's a vast improvement over FO3.

 

I asked myself if there could be anything FO3 does better, and the main thing that popped in my head was choice and consequence.

Make no mistake, FO3's writing was pants on head retarded, but it still had consequences to it. Blow up Megaton or save it, and either way, you have drastic consequences. Help Paradise Falls or kill them off, either way there's consequences. Decide what to do with Harold, regardless there's consequences. For all the faults with the story and the logical continuity of some of the choices you faced, the choices were still there and very real. This meant that if you were able to look past all the story hiccups, yes, you could play the game 2-3 times and experience different choices and consequences. Best example of this? Broken Steel. Only a ****ing mental case would suddenly blow up the Brotherhood of Steel for no apparent reason. This would be akin to if I fought a legal battle with a major corporation for years with the support of my family, finally won my case, and then upon winning, I shot my entire family dead. It makes zero ****ing sense from a storytelling perspective to blow up the Brotherhood in FO3. Despite this, your choice has consequences. Even if you do take the stupid evil route and blow them up while struggling to explain why, it does AT LEAST have affects on the game. The Citadel is just plain gone, and you gain access to a gun or two that can't be accessed otherwise. The storylines reinforcing the decisions? Those suck ass. But the weight behind decisions being made...? Those often still manage to be there, amazingly. Strange but true.

 

Another one is weapon balance. The weapon balance in FO3 is by no means award-winning, but there were at least maybe ~8 weapons that qualified as end-game that had varying reasons to use them. In FO4, I get the impression this is Skyrim 2.0 and that if you want to craft a god weapon, you can craft a god weapon. There doesn't seem to be demand for any thought in regards to your gear. There's no "ok I have high luck so I should get a weapon with lots of crit-related boosts and benefits," but rather "let's get more damage cause damage is good," both because the customization is TOO expansive and lacks balance, and because you can make your character a master of every stat. You have no reason to worry about stressing crit damage for your weapon, because the basic damage upgrade is the do-all end-all to upgrade types, OR there is indeed a superior stat to upgrade guns with, but you can easily perk your character to be geared towards that kind of upgrade.

 

Finally, survivability. This one I have no idea on because I'm not familiar with how abundant resources are in FO4, but FO3 did have moments where either stimpacks or ammo types could be rare. This meant you had to scrape by with what you could find. I distinctly recall moments where I'd do great in fights if I had a certain type of ammo for a good weapon I had, but I'd run low on that ammo type and need to rely on another less-impressive weapon for a bit until I came across ammo again. Stimpacks could also be high in demand if you hadn't figured out VATS is broken OP yet. Again, I have no idea if resources are rare in FO4, but if they're not, I'd imagine this could be a missed feature from 3.

 

 

Aside from that, all the elements seem similar or like upgrades, so I couldn't say why you might like FO3 more. My money's on the lack of choice and consequence as being the biggest detriment to FO4 when compared to FO3, however.

 

 

 

If only because that might mean the next game will have more focus on a cohesive story. In any case however, I will certainly wait to buy that until at least a year after release (and maybe steal a friends copy to try heh)

 

 

You would think so, right? And yet so often, game companies continue onward in this same direction. No idea why.

Personally I'd dare not wage bets in either direction. Consumer backlash can potentially wake up any company...but then again, there's been plenty of that in the gaming industry. Hasn't changed ****.

 

 

 

I enjoyed 3 far more but I was less critical back then so I dunno, maybe it's me?  I think the combat and world design are excellent but the disjointed conversations are frustrating and major characters don't react in a believable way to events, very often they don't react at all 

 

It feels to me like Bethesda have abandoned internal consistency for the sake of epic ****, I know many people will say they've always been this way but I felt Skyrim was a step up and I had high hopes for Fallout 4.

 

 

Someone was saying Pete Hines made a statement akin to "we're not worried about logical consistency in a world with super mutants and ghouls." Sad, but hey at least there's a straightforward answer regarding their design philosophy.

 

 

As for epic **** that makes no sense, speaking of my question about the USS Consitution, I thought Vinny's recent upload did a fantastic job of summing up FO4 in a nutshell:

 

 

 

Entertaining watch, and I think it inadvertedly highlights some common complaints while showing Vinny still having fun with it. Vertibirds crashing like it's their job, nonsense storylines, repetitive dialog reminiscent of "I work for Belethor at the General Goods Store," strange voice acting (is she supposed to sound drunk?), and lots of explosions like Michael Bay's first video game.

Edited December 10, 2015 by Longknife

[HoonDing]

i watched video by Ronny and he sed it was pretty gud

[GhostofAnakin]

The people on Abernathy farm should think about keeping their daughter locked up in the house somewhere.  I rescued her right near the beginning of the game, and then when I neglected the farm and it no longer was allied with me, I got the task of rescuing her again -- and they rejoined me.

 

Today I spent a tedious amount of time just trying to raise the happiness of each of my farms/settlements.  What a chore.  It's especially annoying when you have to assign workers to vegetable gardens.  Seriously?  They don't even have the common sense to figure out that someone has to pick the vegetables once they're grown?  They'll starve if I don't tell someone to specifically do it?

[kensu]

Sandstorms? In Massachusetts? WTF?

Despite the fact that Bethesda Studios is located in Maryland, it makes me wonder if they don't know much about New England.

Even accepting a nuclear war and global warmimg, there's no way that New England is an effing desert, it would've been reclaimed by forest a long time ago.

And wouldn't that have made an interesting game?

Edited December 11, 2015 by kensu

[WDeranged]

Not that it matters in the grand scheme of things but why did they feel the need to retcon Dr Li into the mastermind behind Liberty Prime?  She talks like he was her life's great work and then the BoS turned him into a weapon of war so she had to leave...a giant pre-war fricking robot that throws nukes got turned into a weapon of war? 

[StormbringerGT]

So I keep losing farms/settlements because I keep ignoring their happiness meter.  Why did Bethesda think it would be a good idea to implement this in a RPG?  I'm playing Fallout, not the Sims.  Yet I have to waste time at each and every farm/settlement building stuff for them or they get cranky and leave?  It's not fun, it's tedious and has no real point in the overall game.

 

I saved you from Raiders/Mutants.  I built you food, water, and turret defenses.  Now do something for yourselves for change.  Jesus.

 

That being said, you can keep ignoring them. They will just eventually depopulate.

[StormbringerGT]

Not that it matters in the grand scheme of things but why did they feel the need to retcon Dr Li into the mastermind behind Liberty Prime?  She talks like he was her life's great work and then the BoS turned him into a weapon of war so she had to leave...a giant pre-war fricking robot that throws nukes got turned into a weapon of war? 

 

She could be lying, I never liked her in Fallout 3 so I wouldn't put it past her.

[WDeranged]

I'm about to do a bit the old war crime for the BoS, those goddamn hippies won't know what hit them.

 

 

Not that it matters in the grand scheme of things but why did they feel the need to retcon Dr Li into the mastermind behind Liberty Prime?  She talks like he was her life's great work and then the BoS turned him into a weapon of war so she had to leave...a giant pre-war fricking robot that throws nukes got turned into a weapon of war? 

 

She could be lying, I never liked her in Fallout 3 so I wouldn't put it past her.

 

 

Oh yeah she's still a bitch but the BoS are all singing her praises too 

[Elerond]

BoS sealed their faith when they asked me to kill my own people so that they could get crops. So they were exterminated for heresy and conspiring against people of Commonwealth and its supreme ruler.  

[GhostofAnakin]

 

So I keep losing farms/settlements because I keep ignoring their happiness meter.  Why did Bethesda think it would be a good idea to implement this in a RPG?  I'm playing Fallout, not the Sims.  Yet I have to waste time at each and every farm/settlement building stuff for them or they get cranky and leave?  It's not fun, it's tedious and has no real point in the overall game.

 

I saved you from Raiders/Mutants.  I built you food, water, and turret defenses.  Now do something for yourselves for change.  Jesus.

 

That being said, you can keep ignoring them. They will just eventually depopulate.

 

 

But then I'd be a failure as a Minuteman.

 

By the way, I hate the name.  Not exactly a group you want to be associated with if you show up at a bar and are trying to pick up a pretty lady.

[GhostofAnakin]

Also, what's the point of adding "power" to a community?  Generators, etc., that sort of thing.

 

Especially with the smaller communities, I haven't found a use for power unless I'm building an antenna to attract new settlers.  For defense, I just use the turrets that don't require power and guard posts that only require settlers to man it.

 

So what am I missing?

[Raithe]

The very few settlements that actually have pools of water? You can stick one Water purifier thingamajig there rather then half a dozen water pumps. They just need power to function.

Oh, and if you stick any forms of lights inside the buildings, along with ceiling fans and terminals... You need to hook power up to the building.

 

 

Kind of annoying, I now have two quests that are clashing but they aren't meant to clash.

 

Or rather, I have one Institute quest that will make the BoS my enemies, but I have the option of telling the BoS about it by talking to Ingram.

But I have a BoS quest that finishes by having me talk to Ingram. Unfortunately, it won't let me do that because it will only do the Institute quest option instead of ending the BoS quest.

So I can't carry on with the BoS quest line at present.

Edited December 11, 2015 by Raithe

[WDeranged]

The very few settlements that actually have pools of water? You can stick one Water purifier thingamajig there rather then half a dozen water pumps. They just need power to function.

Oh, and if you stick any forms of lights inside the buildings, along with ceiling fans and terminals... You need to hook power up to the building.

 

 

Kind of annoying, I now have two quests that are clashing but they aren't meant to clash.

 

Or rather, I have one Institute quest that will make the BoS my enemies, but I have the option of telling the BoS about it by talking to Ingram.

But I have a BoS quest that finishes by having me talk to Ingram. Unfortunately, it won't let me do that because it will only do the Institute quest option instead of ending the BoS quest.

So I can't carry on with the BoS quest line at present.

 

This is the sort of stuff that was grinding my gears, I tried to avoid telling the BoS for a while but when I went to hand in another quest my character just spilled his guts about the Institute's plan, no dialogue prompt.

[Raithe]

This is the sort of stuff that was grinding my gears, I tried to avoid telling the BoS for a while but when I went to hand in another quest my character just spilled his guts about the Institute's plan, no dialogue prompt.

Hell, you don't need to spill your guts. Apparently even though they just arrived and the BoS go everywhere in uniform with righteous attitudes, they have an amazingly effective spy network in the Commonwealth and know everything you do regardless of any surviving witnesses that push the plot line forward.

 

Even though I used the Railroad to build a certain device and get into the Institute sneakily, the BoS knew all about it and that I'd come back. It's that kind of thing that nags at my mind.

[WDeranged]

 

This is the sort of stuff that was grinding my gears, I tried to avoid telling the BoS for a while but when I went to hand in another quest my character just spilled his guts about the Institute's plan, no dialogue prompt.

Hell, you don't need to spill your guts. Apparently even though they just arrived and the BoS go everywhere in uniform with righteous attitudes, they have an amazingly effective spy network in the Commonwealth and know everything you do regardless of any surviving witnesses that push the plot line forward.

 

Even though I used the Railroad to build a certain device and get into the Institute sneakily, the BoS knew all about it and that I'd come back. It's that kind of thing that nags at my mind.

 

 

I remember Maxon telling me all about my experience at the Memory Den as if he were there himself.  I had similar experience speaking to Garvey, I'd passed a certain point in the MQ and suddenly he knows everything I've been doing and talks as if we'd been planning to take down The Institute.

 

Not long afterwards I'm handing in another BoS quest and my character suddenly requests that we share some crucial intel with the Minutemen, they agree cos I was the guy who originally gathered it so it's clearly my right to compromise their security 

 

Hopefully some clever bean will use the CK to adjust these trigger points and chop up the dialogue to give us a bit more freedom.

[Amentep]

So I keep losing farms/settlements because I keep ignoring their happiness meter.  Why did Bethesda think it would be a good idea to implement this in a RPG?  I'm playing Fallout, not the Sims.  Yet I have to waste time at each and every farm/settlement building stuff for them or they get cranky and leave?  It's not fun, it's tedious and has no real point in the overall game.

 

I saved you from Raiders/Mutants.  I built you food, water, and turret defenses.  Now do something for yourselves for change.  Jesus.

 

I wonder if they thought most people would run the critical quest (muh baby!) and that defending the settlements and such would be ways to keep the game "alive" in post game (note this is a theory - I'm assuming Bethesda won't have you don't die of radiation (or similar) again).

[Gfted1]

By the way, I hate the name.  Not exactly a group you want to be associated with if you show up at a bar and are trying to pick up a pretty lady.

Just in case you don't know the meaning: Minutemen

[Humanoid]

Sandstorms? In Massachusetts? WTF?

Despite the fact that Bethesda Studios is located in Maryland, it makes me wonder if they don't know much about New England.

Even accepting a nuclear war and global warmimg, there's no way that New England is an effing desert, it would've been reclaimed by forest a long time ago.

And wouldn't that have made an interesting game?

It occurs to me as a non-American that the setting of Fallout 4 isn't exactly familiar, and that may contribute to the difficulty of getting into the game. Things I know about Boston: It's somewhere in the top right corner of the US, and has a harbour that may or may not taste somewhat tea-like. I couldn't name a single landmark, be able to recognise the general architecture, or know anything about the weather (though I'd guess it gets pretty snowy). This is in sharp contrast to Vegas and DC (sort of, I know it has, uh, the White House, and that obelisk) in the immediately preceding Fallout games, and would be the case with cities like New York, Miami, New Orleans and San Francisco for example. If I wanted to see what Boston was like from a movie portrayal, I wouldn't even know what to watch, whereas say Philadelphia, a city I'd consider equally unremarkable, I can at least get a feel for by watching Rocky.

[Amentep]

 

Sandstorms? In Massachusetts? WTF?

Despite the fact that Bethesda Studios is located in Maryland, it makes me wonder if they don't know much about New England.

Even accepting a nuclear war and global warmimg, there's no way that New England is an effing desert, it would've been reclaimed by forest a long time ago.

And wouldn't that have made an interesting game?

It occurs to me as a non-American that the setting of Fallout 4 isn't exactly familiar, and that may contribute to the difficulty of getting into the game. Things I know about Boston: It's somewhere in the top right corner of the US, and has a harbour that may or may not taste somewhat tea-like. I couldn't name a single landmark, be able to recognise the general architecture, or know anything about the weather (though I'd guess it gets pretty snowy). This is in sharp contrast to Vegas and DC (sort of, I know it has, uh, the White House, and that obelisk) in the immediately preceding Fallout games, and would be the case with cities like New York, Miami, New Orleans and San Francisco for example. If I wanted to see what Boston was like from a movie portrayal, I wouldn't even know what to watch, whereas say Philadelphia, a city I'd consider equally unremarkable, I can at least get a feel for by watching Rocky.

 

 

I've not seen a sandstorm in Boston.  Radiation storm and rain storm, but I haven't seen a sandstorm.

 

IIRC old time poster Slowtrain was from Boston - would have loved to see his thoughts on FO4's portrayal.

 

Movies set in Boston: The Departed, Black Mass, Good Will Hunting (MIT), Ted, The Town, The Boondock Saints.  I think most of them had at least some filming of exteriors in Boston at least.

[HoonDing]

I'm dabbling with settlements until DLC is out.

 

You'd think wastelanders would be tougher. You provide them with food & shelter and they still whine.

 

Also, Finch Farm doesn't make much sense. Very close to Raiders, Gunners and Super Mutants. No wonder that moron's wife gets kidnapped every two hours.

[Gorgon]

 

Sandstorms? In Massachusetts? WTF?

Despite the fact that Bethesda Studios is located in Maryland, it makes me wonder if they don't know much about New England.

Even accepting a nuclear war and global warmimg, there's no way that New England is an effing desert, it would've been reclaimed by forest a long time ago.

And wouldn't that have made an interesting game?

It occurs to me as a non-American that the setting of Fallout 4 isn't exactly familiar, and that may contribute to the difficulty of getting into the game. Things I know about Boston: It's somewhere in the top right corner of the US, and has a harbour that may or may not taste somewhat tea-like. I couldn't name a single landmark, be able to recognise the general architecture, or know anything about the weather (though I'd guess it gets pretty snowy). This is in sharp contrast to Vegas and DC (sort of, I know it has, uh, the White House, and that obelisk) in the immediately preceding Fallout games, and would be the case with cities like New York, Miami, New Orleans and San Francisco for example. If I wanted to see what Boston was like from a movie portrayal, I wouldn't even know what to watch, whereas say Philadelphia, a city I'd consider equally unremarkable, I can at least get a feel for by watching Rocky.

 

Screw Paul Revere and John Han****, it's not the tiniest bit interesting and it all feels forced and stupid. It didn't in FO3 as far as I remember. Anyway where is robot George Washington with 8 go and fetch quests before his barge can cross the Delaware. 

[Lexx]

God, I hate these "historically inspired" quests. If someone would ask me what I would really not connect with a Fallout game, then it would be "historically inspired" quests. This Minutemen stuff- okay, but why the hell do they also need to have laser muskets and wear old ass clothes? Subtlety, that's something nobody at Bethesda knows about.