91 hours in, my review.

[Titan357]

They don't care about the surface people, they don't want to interact with the surface people, and generally see the surface people the same way as The Enclave do, as mutant scum that have no hope of getting anywhere. Why bother dealing peacefully with them when you are safe in an neigh impenetrable bunker, with an endless army of robots, and can just take everything by force?

So for a faction that doesnt care about the surface they sure waste a lot of resources and time on it.
Kidnapping people and replacing them with synths, why? To test some new plants. Whats the point if they have no plans to expand outside?
Torture and experimentation of kidnapped people, for what end? Why would you torture someone then replace them with a synth?
Why go to the trouble of creating a synth that can impersonate people on the surface when they have no intentions of going there?

Why murder countless people when they have no desire of returning to the surface?

To quote a reddit user.

Testing crops by murdering farmers, replacing them with synths, and smuggling seeds to these synth farmers is the most roundabout, insane way to do a simple thing. Its not even good science.

The main quest never generates any feeling of urgent need.

I felt that it actually did generate urgency it just quickly dies off because NPC's you meet very early on just get in the way of it with their problems.

Meeting Preston in Concorde goes something like this for example:
Preston: So what's your story?
Me: My wife was murdered and my son was kidnapped. I'm just here looking for clues..
Preston: That's awful. Oh hey, wanna build some Settlers some houses and grow them some food so they will have something to eat?
Me: .........

Better pacing of the story would have helped the game quite a bit. Not saying it'd be good if they did that but it'd certainly been better and felt more cohesive.

It may sound odd but I think we just get access to too much early on that just detracts from it. We shouldn't have gotten access to Settlement building, most of the Minutemen quest's, and maybe even Power Armor too until the second half of the game. (Second half being after Kellogg's death or after meeting Shaun).. But alas.

I see what you are saying, if a lot of the features was locked out and you got railroaded (heh) into the main quest until chapter 2, meeting the BOS, RR and minutemen first it might have worked out better.

I know that we are all fed up with Bethesda, but common... this review is too much. Plagued by hatred and bias, just as Bethesda games are plagued by bugs and unfinished ideas.

What hatred? Where was I hateful? That a game in 2015 doesn't have a FOV slider, triple screen resolution options and terrible key binding? Even Age of decadence, Dead State, Divinity OS, Wasteland 2 and Pillars supports it.

There are a lot of games which get a pass on those. The most horrible RPG of the century, so far, has been Mass Effect 3, and I without a shadow of a doubt will say that Fallout 4 is much better written, at least so far, than whatever that Bioware thing was.

Besides the ending the game wasn't that bad, although the combat was far removed from ME1 (I prefer it) it was solid, the graphics are better than most of what you have in fallout 4, the writing and characters are better and many of the settings are far more interesting. Both ME3 and FO4 are on about the same level of RPG, they are action games with some RPG elements.

You also do not want to touch on companions, while all of them have been hand fisted right into my face, I think they are pretty good characters. Valentine, Danse, Hancock, Piper, Strong do standout. Their problems with AI are not really the failure of writing but rather an antique engine which should be catapulted into space immediately.

Willow, a mod for New Vegas is far and away than any of them in Fallout 4. Danse is buzz light year in fallout, pipe is the tolken hot chick, strong is annoying and feels tacked on. I agree, Valentine was pretty good.

Also there is no problem with having Raiders be it gunners or not. While I could not join the Forged, I actually liked the quest associated with them and the depth it has given to them.

Raider dont really need a background and that was never my issue. My issues was that generic talon mercs from fallout 3 got replaced as gunners in 4. No backstory, no quests, no real dialog. A totally wasted story line, at one point I found a vault that I thought would detail why the gunners exist but it turned out totally unrelated.

I am still going through the narrative to decide how I feel about it, since I haven't finished it I cant judge. What stands out is the potential that the story can have, as well as the themes which are tightly interwoven into every aspect of the game, so far. It is also undeniable that story wise it probably one of the better Bethesda games.

Its no where near. Morrowind levels but maybe im biased as I still play it (im playing it off and on this last week) and not even close to what Bethesda was/is able to do.
Install Morrowind and the sound and graphics overhaul 3.0. Listen to how well done and fitting the first cut scene is, the voice acting is far better than anything in FO4. Play until you get on the deck of the ship. Stop and listen to how the waves lap against the shore, the sound of the silt strider and wild life and how the main these fits almost majestically into the game. Morrowind came out in 2002, while the SGO 3.0 is a bit more recent its still using the base Morrowind.
Listen to Socucius Ergalla and how that dialog and VA is spot on.
13 years later and this game never fails to captivate me. fallout 4 never gets that far, I never stopped to admire the world, the ambient sounds arent exciting and none of the npcs are memorable.

I think ultimately, what people love to hate about Fallout 4, above all, is the dialogue system which is atrocious

Nope, not the bland character system, not the fact that the character creation is limited to 21 special points so that your character cant even start the game off as average, that we have no skills and by extension no skill checks. Not that keybindings are not well thought out and some arent changeable. Not that fact that the FOV is set way to low and you have to edit the INI. That modders made the dialog system far better by showing you what you are going to say instead of yes/yes/smart ass yes/no and letting you use 1-4 above the wasd instead of the silly arrow key binding. Not that the story feels out of place, the voice acting is flat and the dialog is awful. Not the changes to established lore or that every quest is either a fetch quest or a kill quest. Not the terrible performance of a graphically sub par game on high end hardware.
Nope, none of that.

And finally the new leveling system is by far superior in concept to whatever we had before.

How so? its literately worse than Skyrim. You can have one point in strength and use any weapon with no adverse affects. The special is quite literately on a scale of 1 to 10 and even person who is as feeble as it gets and use a mini gun without power armor as easily as someone with 10 strength.
That a character with a intelligence of 1 can hold a full conversation with no ill effects.
The only special stats that matters is charisma for speech checks so that you can get more caps that you dont need anyway since npcs are walking treasure troves of loot. You could dump everything into charisma and leave the others at 1 and it wont matter. You can fast travel anywhere at anytime with any amount of weight, it doesn't even stop you from moving. You can carry over a ton of items and still move around and fast travel (perk) with the only minor side effect of draining stamina.

Yeah, totally better. You can never fail, you aren't even punished for having 1-2 in every stat besides one.

The game is such a let down on so many levels, even fallout 3 had its merits, New Vegas was a total improvement but this manages to be worse than Fallout 3 in so many ways.

Saying FO4 is a RPG is like a man trying to speak with you underwater: He struggles for some time and then he drowns.

Thanks for the laugh.

 

[omegaspruz]

I want to preface my response saying that I haven't finished the game, I might very well change my opinion, however as of now, this is what I think.

1. Mass Effect 3 doesn't work from a get go from the very first scene actually, and this is a topic for another forum. My opinion, and of a vocal minority thinks it doesn't work. However now is not the time for this deconstruction.
2. I don't agree with your opinion about companions, that said its a matter of opinion. I have no problem with somebody being buzz lightyear and so far Danse was interesting enough, Strong was the right kind of dumb-dumb that I didn't hate him. I have never seen nor used Willow the companion mod, I should check it out.
3. I will give you the gunners in that case. That said, I personally have no problem believing in a different raider gang. I like my canon fodder in those games.
4. Morrowind is a classic. It is a unique RPG, probably the best TES game. That said I haven't played it in a long while to be able t judge right now. Fallout 4 has the best Bethesda Voice acting. Morrowind sounds are amazing, great soundtrack that said I enjoyed fallout 4 soundtrack. I want to apologise, but I think here comes the Bethesda fatigue. Fallout 4 soundtrack is very good, not as good as Soules works, but still and I would urge you to try to listen to it. I enjoy the world of Fallout 4 more than Morrowind, its better done. Boston is great
5. Okay. Here I was very specific in my phrasing. I said In Concept. The way it is implemented makes the game dumb and utterly imbalanced. Lack of intelligence dialogue options is the failure of the dialogue system. However unlike F1/2 where skills were actual percentages which could be utilized at any time and the percentage determined the chance of success. F3/NV the only stats which mattered were roughly speaking the 25 50 75 100. New system cut out the middle man. TES has different leveling system and is not comparable. I would not want to see Skyrim/Oblivion/Morrowind systems in Fallout games. (I hate the dialogue system as well)

When I play games, I can overlook a lot of little stuff because I enjoy myself, so yeah... as I said it might change but to me Fallout 4 is a good game. But to me 5/10 is good. ME3 since we brought it up is 2/10, relatively speaking. Witcher 3 which suffers from the modern day RPG syndrome Is like 9/10. For reference.

 

[Irwin John Finster]

Fallout 4 has the best Bethesda Voice acting.

I have always disagreed with this. In my humble opinion, more voice acting does not mean better voice acting. The male protagonist is actually unforgivably awful in my opinion. They could have spent 5 bucks and found someone on the street to do a better job at reading the lines. In addition, I am convinced that the dialogue was cut and pasted together from separate recordings because there are innumerable instances I have encountered where the protagonist's tone of voice does not at all match the tone of the others interacting.

I will take the re-used voice actors any day over this low quality voice acting. 110,000 of dialogue is nothing to brag about if every dialogue choice is a different variation of the word "Yes."

Also, 110,000 lines of dialogue and apparently every Diamond City Security Guard needs ointment for an itch.

There are some good voice actors - Piper is voice acted well but her lines are stupid, but you can't fault the voice actress for that. I fault the writers. Nick Valentine does the stereotypical detective voice well, although again his lines are not so good. Overall, though, this dialogue system is the worst I have ever seen. I have never seen a video game improved by the transition to a dialogue wheel - it was one of the reasons Dragon Age II was awful.

 

[Someguy37]

snip

Its explained that the Institute replaces people with synths largely to spread fear and paranoia so that the people of The Commonwealth cant unite against them.

Nick Valentine says in one of his conversations that the various settlements of The Commonwealth once tired getting together to form a new government. Every settlement worth anything sent a representative to the meeting, only The Institute sent synths and killed everyone, stopping it before it could even get off the ground.

Its also revealed that Mayor McDonough is a synth, and as Hancock explains, McDonough campaigned on an anti-ghoul stance, inciting anti-ghoul sentiment among the people of Diamond City, and eventually got all the ghouls thrown out of the city.

Many of The Institute's synths are sent simply to make sure no one gets too comfortable, or too powerful, to possibly pose a threat to them. They seed in racism, hatred, and paranoia, so that the people of the surface can't ever muster a combined force large enough to fight them, by making sure everyone on the surface is too weary of each other possibly being a synth to ever try.

 

[Crni Vuk]

Is that actually explained in the game?

 

[Hassknecht]

Is that actually explained in the game?

Yes.
Although it would probably have been safer for the Institute to just lay low completely as they have no interest in the surface world to begin with. Eh, it's for the story.

 

[Theinnerfish]

As a main plot from Bethesda, F4 is probably their best since Morrowind. However quest design is outright worse than Fallout 3. There are many things wrong with Fallout 3 but quest desing wasn't one of them since almost all side quests provided different ways to finish. Also they're unique and different than each other.

Every single quest in F4 is "go there, kill everyone". I mean there isn't even an quest where you kill one person only; it's always a massacre, tearing people to shreds with lasers and nukes. What happened to exploring post apocalyptic landscapes with post apocalyptic morals.

 

[Someguy37]

Is that actually explained in the game?

>Outright lists two people who explain these things
>IS THAT EXPLAINED IN-GAME!!!!?!?!?!?!
ugh....

Although it would probably have been safer for the Institute to just lay low completely as they have no interest in the surface world to begin with. Eh, it's for the story.

They still need to go to the surface for parts. Its mentioned that he gen 1/2 synths are known to slaughter whole settlements, and scrap them for parts for The Institute.

They also try to find important pieces of pre-war technology. University Point was wiped out by Institute synths because they discovered pre-war data about reactor efficiency. The Institute sent someone to try to buy it off them, but the girl who found out it lied out of her ass, led The Institute rep around for weeks, and then tired to sell it to someone else behind their backs. So they sent synths to "retrieve" the data by force.

and one of the Directors mentions needing to tap into surface power stations sometimes for energy, since their reactor isn't that great.

They also need to retrieve rouge synths, which are being let out by a leak inside the Institute itself.

If they could avoid going to the surface they would, but they can't, because they need parts, power, data from prewar research facilities, and they need to recover their stolen toasters.

 

[Irwin John Finster]

As a main plot from Bethesda, F4 is probably their best since Morrowind.

Yea, the *idea*, of the plot is great. Too bad they took that idea and sh** all over it in every possible way imaginable, tacked on minecraft, and spend 1 day on the procedurally generated MMORPG grind quests that comprise the vast majority of the "game."

This game is like playing a MMORPG by yourself.

 

[Askorti]

This game is like playing a MMORPG by yourself.

Inb4 multiplayer DLC.
There is a co-op mod for Skyrim so it's possible...

 

[Irwin John Finster]

This game is like playing a MMORPG by yourself.

Inb4 multiplayer DLC.
There is a co-op mod for Skyrim so it's possible...

They are going to do it. It's the next logical step for business.

When Dragon Age II destroyed Dragon Age I didn't care nearly as much as when Bethesda put out Fallout 4. This Fallout 4 shite is inexcusable. F*** Bethesda for 7 years waiting for this absolute drivel.

I was so looking forward to a new Fallout game for half a decade. If this is what they were doing during that time they could have had the courtesy to just say "Hey guys we're gutting the franchise to sell to kids so be warned." Now I know what people who bought Mass Effect 3 must have felt like.

 

[khain]

What do you mean, "next" step?

They did Elder Scrolls Online already. So in terms of business, they're already there...

But yes, definitely Fallout Online is next.

 

[Irwin John Finster]

What do you mean, "next" step?

They did Elder Scrolls Online already. So in terms of business, they're already there...

But yes, definitely Fallout Online is next.

Given the state of Fallout 4 I'm honestly surprised it didn't come with Co-Op and Multiplayer team deathmatch. I've reached my breaking point with this shite.

 

[khain]

Same here.

I've enjoyed the first few hours because I kept thinking it would get better, and because it was giving me my "Fallout fix".

But I just can't. I tried to go back to it yesterday, and yeah, it's just farming and grinding.

 

[Irwin John Finster]

Same here.

I've enjoyed the first few hours because I kept thinking it would get better, and because it was giving me my "Fallout fix".

But I just can't. I tried to go back to it yesterday, and yeah, it's just farming and grinding.

I played 90 hours so far. I have tried and tried. Then for 1 hour yesterday I received a total of 9 or 10 quests, including a main quest, all of which required me to go to a random building and kill everything inside and loot the place. Even the main quest has you doing this shite.

I was honestly worried that Fallout 4 would make me unproductive, thankfully I think I'm about ready to forget it ever existed.

 

[Theinnerfish]

As a main plot from Bethesda, F4 is probably their best since Morrowind.

Yea, the *idea*, of the plot is great. Too bad they took that idea and sh** all over it in every possible way imaginable, tacked on minecraft, and spend 1 day on the procedurally generated MMORPG grind quests that comprise the vast majority of the "game."

This game is like playing a MMORPG by yourself.

Well i didn't mean it as an accomplishment.