A leaf out of Bioware's book.....

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Fallout 3 should be bigger. Interplay should take a leaf out of Bioware's book, and contain bigger environments and have huge amounts of gameplay (3-5 cd's 250 hours). Party interaction should be much improved as well as a complete over-haul of the existing engine. A third-person Fallout would be particularly sweet.....
 
> Fallout 3 should
>be bigger. Interplay should take
>a leaf out of Bioware's
>book, and contain bigger environments
>and have huge amounts of
>gameplay (3-5 cd's 250 hours).

You have GOT to be kidding me. Sure, how about they also take how combat is the solution to every situation? Or how farming combat is the whole game? Fallout 1 and 2 can be long, if you play in certain ways, or replay trying another kind of character that actually IS possible in Fallout - such as the diplomat, a thief, various types of fighters. Those multiple CDs of Baldur's Gate are a simpering, mindless, hack and slash-infested load of crap across a brain-dead map construction method that's nothing more than a huge-ass bitmap with scripting and gratuitous character animation on it (which usually run like ass even on a high-end machine). Fallout will likely continue to use a tile system, which reduces the size and requirement of such storage, and Fo2 if it were just giant scripted bitmaps would likely be on multiple CDs.

Now don't even get me started on Ass-Wind Dale, with how that game can be memorized easily and has less replay than Diablo, multiplayer included. I literally fell asleep after trying to get back into the game, but knew what to expect and where to expect it.

Tell me, when was the last truly original thing BIS or BioWare did? I really love Sawyer's comment of "J. E. Sawyer: Props to BioWare for pulling the game off and making their own engine; it's been a while since BIS has done that."

Correction, all BIS done in their history is cobble together hacks made from already existing engines. They have NOT made their own engine, ever. Agreed, BIS did a good job on PS:T, but aside from that, what have they done? Of note, cram a shitload of cliche easter eggs into the sequel of Fallout to the point where the base game isn't really too complete, and Feargus considered it patched when it still had some significant issues. Plus, some things like politics and New Reno just didn't fit into the setting of Fallout. Wasteland, perhaps, but not Fallout. Then, they had TORN. Their one time to prove that they could do something other than work on 'legacy' or 'grandfatheres' projects and something completely original. Fell apart due to what supposed reasons? Lack of team vision was a reply I do remember. Plus, who would use Lithtech in their right minds?

BioWare, if it wasn't for the AD&D license, would just have a resource-hog engine that you could play a hack-and-slash game by nailing the space-bar like a crack rat. If the setting wasn't AD&D, then it would have DIED due to it resembling a 'constant-map Diablo'. But then you get these fools that will lay down money for big names like AD&D. Feargus, I will put it bluntly, is clueless when he thinks that BGII does a better job of character interaction than Fallout 2. Sure, the main character and the other party characters might simper, sob, whine, etc. back and forth between each other, but as far as the whole world is concerned - BGII's dialog and character reaction/interaction is LAUGHABLE compared to Fallout and Fallout 2. Then, they have NWN, which does look promising, but aside from a few possible heavily-crafted servers it would be just like DarkStone or some MUDs. Basic game, with just a few tweaks, because once the server's GM doesn't get the reaction they want or expect, then they will likely quit (seen this happen to a lot of MUD Imms).

So what then, are they to use in Fallout 3's development?

>Party interaction should be much
>improved as well as a
>complete over-haul of the existing
>engine. A third-person Fallout would
>be particularly sweet.....

Neverminding that it's not how Fallout tells it's story. And what should the existing engine be overhauled into? Huge-ass CD-stuffing bitmaps like Baldur's Gate?

I think I speak on behalf of a number of people who say "No damn way."

As for third person, it's a lost man in a lost world, okay? Like Mad Max, Road Warrior, etc.

I've been rather kind about this, and explained why I think that a good Fallout 3 looks dismal. Others might not be so kind. We WERE about to get Fallout 3 on a heavily-modded Lithtech engine, because TORN was a prime bait and deliver ploy. They make a fantasy world based off of the SPECIAL system and a modded engine, so they will have another world to play with, but also an engine and system they could quickly tool around to make Fallout 3.

Ugh.
 
Now what *I* would like to see is 3-5 CDs (I'd even take more) packed with about the same amount of locations as Fallout 1, but on a much more intricate and detailed scale. Instead of the usual good vs. bad sides in an issue there could be many different people and agendas involved that wouldn't necessarily have a good or bad outcome ("it is life").

Fallout had some very good quests and the ability to let the user play out his or her morals the way he or she chose (well, ideally), but I would like to see more plots that leave you sitting there thinking, "this is just wrong, there are no good guys or bad guys in this incident, but everyone was hurt." That kind of story produces the best books and it certainly could be applied to a game.

Fallout 2 only seemed bigger because it encompassed a larger area and you could go around for years on end killing desert creatures. Fallout 1 had a much more honed and coherent map and storyline that made it seem smaller, but then again, larger than Fallout in scope and detail. Instead of filling those CDs with bigger and badder maps, they should be used to complexify and increase the density of the areas already created.

Quality over quantity.

-Xotor-

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[font size=1" color="#FF0000]LAST EDITED ON Nov-14-01 AT 01:03PM (GMT)[p]Agreed, Xotor, but then take a look at who will most likely be making Fo3 if ever. A game of note that didn't have all the trendy crap (PS:T), and also wasn't as advertised as BGII, was considered a bit of a failure.

So, going by what Feargus has said in that old Terra-Arcanum thread, Fallout 3 will likely resemble the Infinity Engine or something like that - real-time with a TB option (nevermind that anyone with a clue knows how those can NEVER be balanced right). So, it looks like Fallout 3 will also be, involves nailing the space bar like a crack rat, and also multiplayer.

Can you do the quest depth of Fallout 1 in multiplayer? Not quite...and judging how IWD and the Infinity Engine seems to be their cow to milk - they are milking scripted bitmaps for a while.

The wait might be a good thing, if the projects made were decent enough to play, but when it's like Diablo but set in AD&D and constant all the time, it's headed for the 'coaster' stack.
 
All this talk about Fo3 being bigger and more involved might make more problems. I mean, think about it. HOW are you going to make Fallout bigger? Apart from a bigger map and more quests. And then, how many of those quests are going to FIT in coherently with the storyline? And how many will be stupid little side quests that everyone does and then forgets what they were supposed to do?

Fallout 1 was good because it had the 'get the water chip' thing. Then, upon venturing out, you found out that there was a much bigger thing to do, namely destroy the vats and kill the Master. I can remember the first time I played fo1. It was like, after finishing it, you still had something else to do. I liked that feeling. After returning the water chip you had to kill the Master and destroy the vats. In any order that you chose!

Fallout 2 had a little bunch of people on an oil rig. Well whoop-dee-doo-da. Upon venturing out of your stupid little village (I never liked that village or its elders, might be why I killed them all once...) you find that your GECK (which I thought was pushing the limits of reality a BIT too far), is in about 3 places all of which are near the end of the game. Then there are HUNDREDS of little quests that have nothing to do with the game. While that is, in and of itself, not a problem, The fact that there was nothing related to the MAJOR storyline (like no religion spreading propoganda for the oil rig guys like the priests were for the Master) except for that thing at gecko (where you piss off the Oil Rig guy and he never comes to attack) and Nevada. All the major ending locations were all near each other as well. Fallout 1 had the Master down south, the vats out east and the water chip over in the west. As well as a few comments about 'mutants' here and there and a few little quests that had to do with the storyline thrown in for good measure.

A BIG poorly planned Fo3 would just mean that (going by fo2) you end up with one stupid bad boss to go and kill as well as maybe a military base to destroy and while we're at it, we'll throw in mobsters from the 1950's (WTF??) and some japanese guys from a submarine (WTF?? WTF???) as well as a stupid religion in only one spot (sorry, and a building in NCR). Then the BOS are reduced to some simpering weener who wants you to get plans. No nice BOS base.

Sorry, but you throw in HUGE AMOUNTS of gameplay and I think all you'll end up with is a game that's so big and long that no-one can be stuffed (or has the time) to sit down and complete it all. I'd prefer a game that takes a week (maybe two) of full-time gaming (4-6 hours a day) rather than that utter SHEIT that is Fallout: Tactics that I STILL haven't finished after about a month. (Although, that's because all the combat is just shitting me off. I mean, 5 hours for one lousy poorly thought out combat mission? Oh please...)

And as for a Fallout 1st-person??? HEY!!! Why not make Starcraft first person? Or how about make Quake into an RPG???

Notice how all these people who want RPG's turned into '1st person' never want a '1st person' game to be turned into an RPG??? The silence is deafening. I have not ONCE heard anyone who said: 'Hey! Let's make Quake into a really well thought-out CRPG kind of like Fallout or Arcanum!' I mean, imagine the 250 hours of gameplay as you complete quests for the strogg monster who lost his helmet and you have to retrieve it for him. Or how about the zombie who wants you to use your doctor skill on him and cure his zombie-ness??

Huh? Come on! Where are the calls for that? The only people who want 1st person spend all their day running around quake gibbing everyone and sending messages like 'hey kewl man!' 'I got you!' or 'Suk my rocket dude!'

These people obviously suffer from 'u'. (I hope that still works.)

DarkUnderlord
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http://server3003.freeyellow.com/darkunderlord/images/interplay_cow.gif
Moo..... Moo.... I'm an Interplay Cow. (Ready to be milked with a Fallout style MMORPG with aliens!)
 
[font size=1" color="#FF0000]LAST EDITED ON Nov-19-01 AT 03:46AM (GMT)[p](I ended up posting my above comment twice so I'll just edit the second one I posted)

I understand what you're saying Xotor. More involved quests (quality over quantity) would be very good. Although it won't do much in terms of making the game 'bigger'. Instead, you'll have the same quests with the same amount of gameplay only there'll be many more ways to do a quest (of which you can only choose one way) and many more repurcussions from your actions as well.

It sounds interesting. It would certainly add more to the replay value of the game rather than once for good and once for evil and another time just to kill everybody. But the design time would be pushed out quite a bit. I actually have an understanding about this now seeing as I'm making my own module for Arcanum, making several ways to finish a quest and having many repurcussions pushes the development time of a simple 'kill the rats in the cellar' quest into a one month epic of work for little result (other than many ways to finish one quest, only one of which a player will choose at any one time, the others only appearing if they play the game again which may or may not happen).

My only problem is BIS. I don't think the current team have what it takes to make an interesting game like the one you'd like. Considering that, at the end of the day, Interplay has to make money or they cease to exist. Considering they haven't made any (or much) money for a while (anyone know what the sales figures for Fallout Tactics are?) the obvious emphasis is going to be on games that will be big sellers which they can make for little or no effort. Hence the deadly rise of the MMORPG.

DarkUnderlord
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http://server3003.freeyellow.com/darkunderlord/images/interplay_cow.gif
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Moo..... Moo.... I'm an Interplay Cow. (Ready to be milked with a Fallout style MMORPG with aliens!)
 
My idea of "bigger" is not to just add more and more quests and areas to explore but to complexify the quests and areas that already exist. In Fallout there were good and evil quests and usually the only "fork" you'd get in a quest is to either kill the dude or help him out.

I'm envisioning something where "quests" or rather character stories as I would call it, would have all kinds of facets to them, and interact with other quests. There wouldn't just be just good and bad, but also pragmatic, political, religious, and other approaches.

Repuations could be much more effective also, where word of you spreads about, false rumors, and perhaps a community AI model where the NPCs react to you in generic ways.

I'd like Fallout to move from simplistic models and quests to far more complex systems.

-Xotor-

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I know it's off of the Subject, and i know i am new, but i wanted to respond to your comment, DarkUnderlord.

I completely agree with you that you cant change a game from what it is created to be(i.e. a half-life RTS). But you can combine the two elements, RPG and First Person Shooter into one game, complete with quests, and character development, while remaining on the same storyline. Deus Ex the the most perfect example i can give of this. Although the Character Development is weak(only 4 levels of skills) the game does well in other RPG, 1st person areas, as in the missions to complete( if you give Sandra Renton's Father the pistol, and he kills JoJo, Sandra Stays with her father. If you kill JoJo, sandra runs off in the pursuant dialogue.

I know it is in know way relevant, and i hope i dont get banned

=(
 
Can't say I know the game you're talking about (actually, I don't). I *think* what you're saying is to have a 1st Person RPG? So, Fallout, with quests etc... Only 1st person 3d instead of top-down ol' fallout style.

Only thing is I reckon that would be stupid. I mean, does EVERYTHING have to be 1st person 3d these days?

If that's not what you mean then ignore what I just said.

DarkUnderlord
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http://server3003.freeyellow.com/darkunderlord/images/interplay_cow.gif
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Moo..... Moo.... I'm an Interplay Cow. (Ready to be milked with a Fallout style MMORPG with aliens!)
 
>I completely agree with you that
>you cant change a game
>from what it is created
>to be(i.e. a half-life RTS).
>But you can combine the
>two elements, RPG and First
>Person Shooter into one game,
>complete with quests, and character
>development, while remaining on the
>same storyline. Deus Ex the
>the most perfect example i
>can give of this. Although
>the Character Development is weak(only
>4 levels of skills) the
>game does well in other
>RPG, 1st person areas, as
>in the missions to complete(
>if you give Sandra Renton's
>Father the pistol, and he
>kills JoJo, Sandra Stays with
>her father. If you kill
>JoJo, sandra runs off in
>the pursuant dialogue.
>
>I know it is in know
>way relevant, and i hope
>i dont get banned

A really big problem with the FPRPG concept is that it relies on your abilities as a player, i.e. your ability to straff, duck, and take an aimed shot, rather than your character's ability. RPGs are not about your skills as a player, but rather as a decision maker.

An RPG with a first-person view maybe, but not an RTS style RPG.

-Xotor-

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