Everything in Fallout 4 looks too new

What's with this poster that's still standing? Maybe it was put up after the Great War for some strange reason, but I don't see why someone in the wasteland would do that. So my conclusion is that it's pre-war, and Concord has been in complete neglect for 200 years until recently when the raiders settled in, which means I want to know what that poster is made out of.

http://i.imgur.com/d5XQztQ.png
 
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Indeed, some of the stuff I have seen has sort of a 'stylish' new plastic look, and not something that has been out in the opening and been decaying for centuries.
There is such a thing as artistic freedom which is allowed from time to time to negate reality but in this case it is bullshit, like the intact banners, posters, and party/tourist decorations that decorate the town.

It seems like a 'comfortable' apocalypse, rather than a destructive event that wiped almost everything out. (this describes Bethesda's Fallout rather well)

I have the same with Boston, the buildings are way to much intact including that government building with the golden dome and that monument on bunker hill. That stuff should have collapsed a long time ago due to lack of maintenance and the shockwaves of the nuclear detonations.

If anything, I think the setting should have been more like what we see in Lonesome Road (minus the torn apart land and canyons which were caused by nuclear armed missiles going off in their silos).
Lots of 'skeletons' of buildings or collapsed buildings with only a few standing, painstakingly restored with various kinds of materials the occupants managed to salvage from all over the place.

I really have a hard time taking this design serious.
 
Bethesda seems to think that that the series takes place in the 1950's, like two years after the bombs exploded.

And they don't seem to grasp that nukes in Fallout work pretty much like real world nukes do.

In fact, most of their design aesthetic for the series is just incongruous, consisting of handwaves and the old fallback of "Well, the old games had radiation do everything."

Which is basically a lie.
 
I'll give BGS the benefit of the doubt for Fallout 4. I've seen some things I've liked, some I don't, and there's still the most important matter unknown to us - the story and writing. So I'm patiently waiting for release before I truly judge the game.
 
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Sorry Practicat but I think your hopes may be to high for those aspects of the game, I understand Emil is working as the main designer again and he is not exactly a stellar writer.
Some people have already brought up some of the rather forced and awkward writing that has been shown such as the conversation with that Minutemen leader. (the whole reverence to the American civil war FO4 is going for is another thing that annoys me, just like FO3 liked to bring up the great war time and time again.)
 
I'm cautious with my expectations, but I'm hoping Emil has somehow improved significantly. Fallout: New Vegas had a fascination for the old west, and New Vegas the city in particular had a gang centered around Elvis. Developer reverence for the past before the Divergence is a theme that I think fits well into Fallout.

I think reverence for the American Revolution is acceptable in Fallout and in the context of the former state of Massachusetts, because it represents a time of purity in American history that contrasts with the dystopia of the U.S. in the years leading to the Great War. I also think that it should be emphasized, not throughout the game, but in specific locations like Concord for example, because it complements the nationalism of the U.S. leading up to the Great War and most noteworthy of all, was the birth of the nation.
 
The problem is that it's almost inevitable that the Minutemen are going to be portrayed as purely good guys and not as an interesting faction of people with their own beliefs or thoughts.

Idiosyncrasies like wearing powdered wigs or tri-corner hats aren't characterization.

It's like the problem I had with the slavers and the abolitionists in Fallout 3.

What the slavers do with the slaves besides selling them to the Pitt? Are they doing it to survive or live in luxury or what?

Nobody knows, they're just evil slavers who are evil and enslave people even though the emancipation proclamation says slavery is bad (it doesn't, it says the Confederacy can't keep their slaves once the Union rolls through. The 13th and 14th amendments to the U.S. Constitution are what outlawed slavery for the most part).

The abolitionists are good because they hate the slavers.

We don't ever see them do anything of their own accord and they mostly just hide and give themselves historical names.

Because that's what makes characters for Bethesda, punny names and funny hats.
 
Except New Vegas didn't bring up the old west at all. The Old West stuff was more thematic than anything, nobody was talking about the war or the cowboys unless they were Pre War ghouls or Brotherhood Scribes. The Kings similarly didn't just mention Elvis at all, every character was always focused on the present time and situation, the battle of hoover dam, the lawlessness of Freeside, their history with the NCR and so forth.

Bethesda are the only ones who make the Fallout Wastelands so shallow and plastic, with characters barely even caring about their present or futures and mostly focusing on events rom a past they didn't live in.
 
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I wasn't clear with how I phrased it. What I meant was that the developers imbued historical themes into the game like you said, and they're not something that characters actually talk about or are even aware of.
 
Doctor 0 said:
Bethesda, Bethesda never changes.
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Water. Water never changes. I'm still convinced dear old Dad wasn't actually trying to purify the water (god that whole plot thread is terrible...), in reality he just wanted to build the world's biggest moonshine still and get rich selling it to the people of the wastes.
 
What do you think? How hamfisted will the theme of civil-war and slavery be this time? You know, it would be really interesting if they actually created a moral dilema here. Ok? You know slavery is bad and such, but they explain to you that they need them to survive! You know! I am just beeing factious here, but you get the picture. Though I doubt that they will even try to create a more moraly ambigious situation where the player has to pause and think at least for 30 sec. before pulling the trigger.

Walpknut said:
Except New Vegas didn't bring up the old west at all. The Old West stuff was more thematic than anything, nobody was talking about the war or the cowboys unless they were Pre War ghouls or Brotherhood Scribes. The Kings similarly didn't just mention Elvis at all, every character was always focused on the present time and situation, the battle of hoover dam, the lawlessness of Freeside, their history with the NCR and so forth.

Bethesda are the only ones who make the Fallout Wastelands so shallow and plastic, with characters barely even caring about their present or futures and mostly focusing on events rom a past they didn't live in.
Click to expand...

I actually think the Kings are one of the best factions in Vegas, even if you don't interact with them as much like with House/Legion/NCR. But just the idea alone is so awesome in my opinion. The fact that one of our (past) pop-cultures becomes like a saint and/or god figure to the people based on the few bits that survived the war. Heh, I can't help it but imaginet hat 200 years after WW3 someone would do the same with Laddy Gaga :V
 
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