A Fallout game that's not depressing, nor heroic, but in between?

[ZigzagPX4]

I got reminded of this thought of mines through one of the other posts here.

Fallout games tend to have one of the following. I'm not taking a sided view on "this company does this, this game does that" lest this thread degrades into an argument about that instead of my point.

• Harsh atmosphere
• Dark feel in exploration
• Realistic and cynical viewpoint on world
• Factions that have nothing but flaws
• Reminds you of death, destruction, hubris, mistakes, and failures

or

• Bright atmosphere
• Intense feel in exploration
• Hopeful and optimistic viewpoint on world
• Factions that are one-dimensional in aim
• Reminds you of potential, courage, action, and rebuilding

Why, oh why, do we need to go all the way one way or another? Do I always need to be reminded that there's world to explore, fight to take back, and rebuild? People to save? And on the other hand, do I always need it shoved in my face that I'm standing in the grimdark apocalyptic future with no way forward other than to destroy each other in pursuit of pointless aims, again and again? Can we not have something balanced between the two? Something that reaches toward the light without letting go of the somberness? Fallout's tone has one requirement, IN MY OPINION. And that's that it takes places in a nuclear wasteland in a divergent timeline, as a result of an apocalypse caused by the hands of humanity. That's fine. I really don't think there should be an addiction to being dark, or heroic, all the time.

No, Fallout shouldn't always have an alien, somber, dead feel that seeks to invoke despair, strangeness, and a sense of an abandoned world. No, it shouldn't be bravery-filled epic tale of excitement. But the singular tone always end up giving me a single lingering feeling one way or the other, and in that sense it feels sort of empty.

Anyone have any good ideas on how a mix of tone could turn out better?

 

[Dr Fallout]

Fallout 1 wasn't that dark...

 

[Someguy37]

I would guess the reason why we can't have both is because neither Bethesda nor Obsidian want both in one game.

I also think they don't do it because that perfect middle ground is probably the hardest thing to write. Most stories are written to make a point, not be this sort of middle ground of both something and its counter, so most people aren't used to writing the middle ground. This isn't exclusive to Fallout either, the vast majority of games are either written in the direction of HOPE or DESPAIR, and do so to the point that the other becomes largely negligible in its representation because that just isn't the message they wanted to get across to the reader/watcher/player/

 

[Dr Fallout]

I would guess the reason why we can't have both is because neither Bethesda nor Obsidian want both in one game.

I also think they don't do it because that perfect middle ground is probably the hardest thing to write. Most stories are written to make a point, not be this sort of middle ground of both something and its counter, so most people aren't used to writing the middle ground. This isn't exclusive to Fallout either, the vast majority of games are either written in the direction of HOPE or DESPAIR, and do so to the point that the other becomes largely negligible in its representation because that just isn't the message they wanted to get across to the reader/watcher/player/

Fallout 1 had a good mix of hope and despair. We had Shady Sands, a naive settlement surviving and thriving, acting as HOPE for Humanity.

 

[Someguy37]

Fallout 1 had a good mix of hope and despair. We had Shady Sands, a naive settlement surviving and thriving, acting as HOPE for Humanity.

Shady was hopeful in many ways, but I don't feel like the hope was equal to that of the "man this is a fucked up world with raiders, settlements barely managing by, an army of super mutants ready to ass rape everyone" feeling the game gave out.

 

[zegh8578]

Fallout 1 had a good mix of hope and despair. We had Shady Sands, a naive settlement surviving and thriving, acting as HOPE for Humanity.

Shady was hopeful in many ways, but I don't feel like the hope was equal to that of the "man this is a fucked up world with raiders, settlements barely managing by, an army of super mutants ready to ass rape everyone" feeling the game gave out.

Eh, unless you've gone and spoilered your game, the full extent of the super mutant threat only becomes apparent towards the late/end game.

Even the raiders aren't fully apparent untill after you've met and explored Shady Sands.
Even then, it's not a "world with raiders", as they only reference a specific tribe to their immediate south.
Maybe you're confusing FO1 with FO3

 

[Dr Fallout]

Fallout 1 had a good mix of hope and despair. We had Shady Sands, a naive settlement surviving and thriving, acting as HOPE for Humanity.

Shady was hopeful in many ways, but I don't feel like the hope was equal to that of the "man this is a fucked up world with raiders, settlements barely managing by, an army of super mutants ready to ass rape everyone" feeling the game gave out.

Zegh beat me to it, but... are you describing Fallout 3?

 

[Someguy37]

Zegh beat me to it, but... are you describing Fallout 3?

Nope. Fallout 1 began off as depressing, a quest to save your failing vault from certain doom unless you found the water chip, and constantly bombarded you with negatives from raiders, super mutants, massive cities like L.A. being reduced to nearly nothing, horrible experiments such as FEV, and "tragic accidents"(which later got retconed as being deliberate), such as the vault under Bakersfield seemingly failing and turning its entire populace into ghouls.

Fallout 1 was pretty grim.

 

[Dr Fallout]

Zegh beat me to it, but... are you describing Fallout 3?

Nope. Fallout 1 began off as depressing, a quest to save your failing vault from certain doom unless you found the water chip, and constantly bombarded you with negatives from raiders, super mutants, massive cities like L.A. being reduced to nearly nothing, horrible experiments such as FEV, and "tragic accidents"(which later got retconed as being deliberate), such as the vault under Bakersfield seemingly failing and turning its entire populace into ghouls.

Fallout 1 was pretty grim.

One group of raiders that you can talk to. Super Mutants who can be reasoned with. Thriving settlements and helping the good guys such as Killian. Yeah totally grim.

 

[naossano]

If my memory serves me well, all the game of the series so far (can't tell about Fo4 as i don't intend to play it) have made co-existing both hope and hoplessness.
It really depends on how you see that world and what choices do you make.

Even when the story sucks or when the C & C are few and far between, the balance between hope and hopelessness is always there.

 

[zegh8578]

Fallout 1 has a good story arch that turns more grim and dramatic as it goes along.
A player isn't supposed to go wiki the game prior to playing it (I'm looking at you, Someguy37), so - they wouldn't know about Mariposa or the Cathedral while visiting Shady Sands

If played "properly", that means hope and restoration is a recurring theme in the beginning of the game, while grim re-destruction-of-everything begins to loom later on, building up for a good climactic wrap-up.

FO2 lost some of that build-up simply by being too long, venturing a bit into explore-the-world-for-the-sake-of-exploring-the-world-ness, but it catches up by the very end, revealing the genocidal ambitions of the Enclave

FO3 is all over the place, with clueless ghouls building towns in the middle of super mutant talon company battlefields, clueless morons building their town on top of a nuclear warhead that will explode with the least bit of tinkering, clueless idiots building on top of a bridge, where they will quite actually fall down from, clueless idiots founding their own republics with their immediate family as citizens and clueless morons building their city in the middle of a mirelurk nest, FO4 follows this tradition "hey, let's build and live exactly where ALL the super-mutants are congregated! First, we have to build a gigantic metal gate!"
I can't see much hope versus grimness in either of these two, as the sheer stupidity overpowers any other rational notion of normal human development.

 

[berlin1945]

fallout is about fallout, and fallout is ugly.

the bethesda take is stupid, unrealistic. all of it is noncanon to me.

you would have to start your own franchise.

 

[Someguy37]

One group of raiders that you can talk to. Super Mutants who can be reasoned with. Thriving settlements and helping the good guys such as Killian. Yeah totally grim.

Being able to talk to raiders doesn't make the fact that people have become raiders isn't a pretty shitty thing to see.

Same with the super mutants, the fact that there is an army of these assholes running around trying to convert everyone is pretty fucking depressing.

And no settlement in Fallout 1 was thriving, all of them had major problems they needed the VD to fix, or else they could collapse.

 

[Dr Fallout]

One group of raiders that you can talk to. Super Mutants who can be reasoned with. Thriving settlements and helping the good guys such as Killian. Yeah totally grim.

Being able to talk to raiders doesn't make the fact that people have become raiders isn't a pretty shitty thing to see.

Same with the super mutants, the fact that there is an army of these assholes running around trying to convert everyone is pretty fucking depressing.

And no settlement in Fallout 1 was thriving, all of them had major problems they needed the VD to fix, or else they could collapse.

Yes, but unlike Fallout 3, these raiders aren't insane fucks who go around killing shit because they can. Remember, they event try to explain their lifestyle (and fail).

And they have a reason to do that. You can ignore their philosophy in which case they becomes grim.

Actually the Hub was doing well and the Junkyard too. It just had a little struggle but it wasn't collapsing.

 

[ZigzagPX4]

Fallout 1 has a good story arch that turns more grim and dramatic as it goes along.
A player isn't supposed to go wiki the game prior to playing it (I'm looking at you, Someguy37), so - they wouldn't know about Mariposa or the Cathedral while visiting Shady Sands

If played "properly", that means hope and restoration is a recurring theme in the beginning of the game, while grim re-destruction-of-everything begins to loom later on, building up for a good climactic wrap-up.

FO2 lost some of that build-up simply by being too long, venturing a bit into explore-the-world-for-the-sake-of-exploring-the-world-ness, but it catches up by the very end, revealing the genocidal ambitions of the Enclave

FO3 is all over the place, with clueless ghouls building towns in the middle of super mutant talon company battlefields, clueless morons building their town on top of a nuclear warhead that will explode with the least bit of tinkering, clueless idiots building on top of a bridge, where they will quite actually fall down from, clueless idiots founding their own republics with their immediate family as citizens and clueless morons building their city in the middle of a mirelurk nest, FO4 follows this tradition "hey, let's build and live exactly where ALL the super-mutants are congregated! First, we have to build a gigantic metal gate!"
I can't see much hope versus grimness in either of these two, as the sheer stupidity overpowers any other rational notion of normal human development.

Fallout 2 with a slight touch of Fallout 4 would give the right feeling. Fallout 1 was slightly too grim, while Fallout 3 was, right, all over the place.
If I'm to be honest, it's more of the music and art style than the lore itself that makes older Fallout games depressing.
It's not that I'm looking for Post-Apocalyptic MacBrightVille. A little variation in the feel throughout the game would be more interesting. I'm not one to value consistency.

 

[TomJ]

Video games for the most part are supposed to have some sort of heroic story. You as the PC are supposed to be the hero to someone. Did Bethesda go with a bad story direction with Fallout 3? Yes! I was making this point to someone, if Fallout 3 was set in 2247, the only thing that would change is that the Enclave wouldn't have been the bad guys. It would have made more sense to set 3 earlier so they could have a more developed lore in the future, but its Bethesda. Godd Howard, cough, doesn't care about writing a good story or making a coherent universe, they care about one thing, making money. So they load a game up with gimmicks, hype the hell out of it and BANG! LOADS of Money!!!

 

[ZigzagPX4]

Video games for the most part are supposed to have some sort of heroic story. You as the PC are supposed to be the hero to someone. Did Bethesda go with a bad story direction with Fallout 3? Yes! I was making this point to someone, if Fallout 3 was set in 2247, the only thing that would change is that the Enclave wouldn't have been the bad guys. It would have made more sense to set 3 earlier so they could have a more developed lore in the future, but its Bethesda. Godd Howard, cough, doesn't care about writing a good story or making a coherent universe, they care about one thing, making money. So they load a game up with gimmicks, hype the hell out of it and BANG! LOADS of Money!!!

Pal, if people are here, they probably already know this. This discussion is about Fallout and its tone in general, and not Bethesda's influence on the series. Please don't derail the post or it will turn into a hell of a long argument thread about Bethesda again.

 

[TomJ]

Pal, if people are here, they probably already know this. This discussion is about Fallout and its tone in general, and not Bethesda's influence on the series. Please don't derail the post or it will turn into a hell of a long argument thread about Bethesda again.

The saying depressing vs heroic is a bad description. I understand that you want a balance between hope and despair, but calling hope heroic is misleading. I doesn't matter how small of an impact you have, you are a hero to someone. Whether your an ass that ruins things or mother Theresa depends on you. With 3 and NV we saw two different worlds, one ruined and desperate and the other is hopeful with angst.

3 and 4 seem depressing to me, like nothing is going to get better no matter what then you come along and are the light of the world. That is too big of a hero, but that crap sells. New Vegas was slightly better, you don't seem to be a huge part of the world, unless you go with the Wild Card ending, but your still too small to be a part of something big like the struggle over Hoover Dam.

In 3, you went into a depressing world and did something good, providing water for all and defeating the Enclave. I'd prefer to side with Autumn over the BoS, but that's a different story. The story seemed over the top with your impact.

In NV, your rail roaded into the conflict when you're just out for revenge. Some of this was likely do to time constraints, but it still takes from the story.

 

[Ballfondler]

I think it's the dark humor that's necessary in Fallout. It could be a mix of both depressing and heroic but there needs to be that dark sense of humor.
Kind of like the Ultra-Luxe in New Vegas. That was dark as hell! But that's because it had it's twist to it. Even though on the outside it seemed like a very fancy hotel & casino there was a very dark secret behind it. Player was given the choice to side with cannibalism or expose it. It wasn't depressing or heroic but you did have a sense of how the different people within it's world have varying dispositions. I like the dark/creepy undertones but I don't mind the cheekiness either(*ahem* Gundersons). Which is why New Vegas imo did a pretty good job.

If you think about it everyone in New Vegas was getting drunk, getting laid and were gambling. (that includes the NCR).
Then you start to think about what's happening on the other side of the region. People are being bought and sold into slavery in the Legion (depending if you feel that's good or bad). New Vegas had a lot of moments where it wasn't just grim or dark or even heroic. It really felt you had plenty of choices to make. And not just the Legion either as there was plenty of chaos just outside of New Vegas. Remember Freeside that awful gateway before you actually get to the Strip? Or how the NCR are portrayed like the heroes when they're aren't better than any faction out there? New Vegas was a free-for-all it didn't matter if you were "heroic" or not. Because it didn't matter. Plenty of people in the Mojave have stated how each faction had their pros and cons. (hehe Kahns)

I could go on and on about New Vegas or heck! even our real life Las Vegas. There's that sort of promise of fortune and glory but could be swept away in moments. New Vegas gives neither depression or heroism. Because each faction tries to convince you who's really the "enemy". And based on your exploration you're able to generate your own thoughts and feelings about who/which factions you truly supported. Everyone suffers somehow and in some way in the Mojave despite what the major factions (House, NCR, Legion) tell you. Heroism only goes as far as what you believe. There are no real "winners" in Vegas.

 

[Dr Fallout]

Even Fallout 1 is applicable, with the Mutant threat actually doing it for a decent cause (peace for the world) and the various groups had some pros and cons. Of course it did have much more good guys and bad guys but they weren't exaggerated.