Bethesda’s Pete Hines Fallout 4 interview

[SikTh]

Eh, don't know why you're that angry about it, they've done this same thing to their own games, let alone bought franchises... just vote with your feet and don't buy it/play it, that's what I'm doing. I can still kinda appreciate that other people draw happiness out of Bethesda games, and they would otherwise not bother with the Fallout entries, so that's okay. I notice a lot of the gaming community (new age; the 'masses' as it were) is over the moon with what they've seen of the game, and they are observing it from an objective standpoint -- that is, of it simply being a videogame. They do not view it as a die-hard original Fallout fan like you or I. We have quite a rigid tolerance of what can 'go' and what can't in the games, and I admit has instilled some myopia on my behalf. Androids don't make much sense here, but the majority have seemingly accepted the notion. But like pigs in shit, trying to dissuade them is just a futile endeavour. It saddens me to see what Fallout has become, but you can't stop devolution.

However, I jumped that ship when that first Fallout 3 teaser came out; we all knew what was coming...and yet folk here seem to intend on purchasing this when it releases... WHAT?! Isn't that kind of hypocritical behaviour funding the future corruption of the Fallout name, by those fools at Bethesda? Stupefying stuff, really.

 

[Dr Fallout]

You would be surprised. I got into Fallout during the Oblivion/Fallout 3 era. Should have been playing them but I didn't. I love it how to become a die-hard fan all you have to do is play the games and love it. But yes, I consider myself a die-hard fan and always will be. I can't complain that many find enjoyment in Beth's games BUT it's Bethesda's spitting in our faces, their love of quashing any attempt to make a 'true' Fallout game and their tried and true method of making games, that they NEVER change which annoys me. If others love their games then fine, but Bethesda's work ethics and what they do... it annoys me.

 

[Gnarles Bronson]

(...)
So, we have the pip-boy insofar as pre-apocalyptic technology, and then there's two hundred years of technology after the apocalypse, assuming the institute has somehow been running for all that time (not such a leap considering vaults and whatnot).

I don't get the big deal about androids, they've already been done in fallout 3.

So if Fallout 3 had a quest where you had to help a Jedi find his lightsaber it would be alright to feature the Death Star in Fallout 4.

See no matter how well something is writen but not everything simply fits a setting. Androids are not even so much of a problem, but they would require a hell lot of a good reason to be there. And excellnt writing. Because I don't see how they add something to the narrative that can't be exploited without Androids, like the topic of slavery.

It's just your opinion that androids don't fit the retro-futuristic world of Fallout. There were stories about androids in the fifties, so in my opinion it's potentially perfectly fitting in fallout games.

Now that's not to say that they do fit based on the context of the story, for example supermutants in 3 didn't fit all that well. But in a fallout set in Boston around MIT, I think it at least potentially fits the genre.

 

[Practicat]

What still bugs me is this simple question; where the hell does the Institute get its resources from to build these things?
Plastics, metals, fabricated components like transistors, chips, or conductors, scaled down electric engines and so on.

Ask any manufacturer of these and he or she will probably tell you from which countries they get the raw resources, through which refining and half fabrication stages they have to go to before it resembles something that can be moulded, melted into shape, or become such a state that they can be put together.
You know, an industrial infrastructure.

In a region that does not even have something close to resembling industry with exception of what is crafted by hand by craftsmen, where does this stuff come from? Salvage? Perhaps you find enough intact material and components to assemble two or three of these androids but I doubt they would look pretty.

And what is exactly the point? Are the scientists of the Institute so bored in their isolated laboratories that they just put together androids when there is a whole world out there that needs to be rebuild? (not to mention, where do they get their life essentials from?)
Reason why we in the real world can spend time and resources on designing and building robots is because we have the basics on food, water, shelter and such covered, and in general don't face immediate threats that could take these away or kill us.

If they need automated labor, just reclaim all those still working robots that seem to be around everywhere and reprogram them as laborers and security forces. The scientists probably just have to rig some giant antennae to send out override signals and call all the working robots to their facility.

An android like Harkness could make a perfect soldier. Can't be visually discerned from a human, can be programmed to not know fear, can be programmed to have extremely accurate aim when using guns, can have perfect memory, so they'd be the perfect spies. The Institute is a self-sustained, sealed environment according to Zimmer, so it can be assumed they have beyond basic living necessities, and can thus focus efforts on more complex things like androids. As for were they get the resources to produce their advanced technologies, the Institute may have accumulated them and such hard to find things as rare earth minerals in the days before the Great War, and now have a way of synthesizing them. We saw that Big MT, even after the Great War, was able to produce new technologies.

 

[Crni Vuk]

(...)
So, we have the pip-boy insofar as pre-apocalyptic technology, and then there's two hundred years of technology after the apocalypse, assuming the institute has somehow been running for all that time (not such a leap considering vaults and whatnot).

I don't get the big deal about androids, they've already been done in fallout 3.

So if Fallout 3 had a quest where you had to help a Jedi find his lightsaber it would be alright to feature the Death Star in Fallout 4.

See no matter how well something is writen but not everything simply fits a setting. Androids are not even so much of a problem, but they would require a hell lot of a good reason to be there. And excellnt writing. Because I don't see how they add something to the narrative that can't be exploited without Androids, like the topic of slavery.

It's just your opinion that androids don't fit the retro-futuristic world of Fallout. There were stories about androids in the fifties, so in my opinion it's potentially perfectly fitting in fallout games.

Now that's not to say that they do fit based on the context of the story, for example supermutants in 3 didn't fit all that well. But in a fallout set in Boston around MIT, I think it at least potentially fits the genre.

And they also had 1930s gangster stories and movies in the 1950s. Doesn't mean that New Reno now fitts better.

Also, if you really want to use the 1950s than we are looking mainly at material like,

Gort (The Day the Earth Stood Still)

Robot Monster

Kronos (Movie monster)

The Human Robot in The Robot vs. the Aztec Mummy (1958)

And it really isn't much of a surprise that pretty much anyting robotic you come along in F1 and F2 looks like something like seen above.Look, I am not hating on Androids, just the way how they have been shown by Bethesda, particularly in Fallout 3 with their little quest. And the concept art at least might even hint to a Fallout 4 that contradicts their own game even - if ALL androids you encounter look like in the concept art and not actually like humans that can bleed and all that.

 

[Gnarles Bronson]

What still bugs me is this simple question; where the hell does the Institute get its resources from to build these things?
Plastics, metals, fabricated components like transistors, chips, or conductors, scaled down electric engines and so on.

Ask any manufacturer of these and he or she will probably tell you from which countries they get the raw resources, through which refining and half fabrication stages they have to go to before it resembles something that can be moulded, melted into shape, or become such a state that they can be put together.
You know, an industrial infrastructure.

In a region that does not even have something close to resembling industry with exception of what is crafted by hand by craftsmen, where does this stuff come from? Salvage? Perhaps you find enough intact material and components to assemble two or three of these androids but I doubt they would look pretty.

And what is exactly the point? Are the scientists of the Institute so bored in their isolated laboratories that they just put together androids when there is a whole world out there that needs to be rebuild? (not to mention, where do they get their life essentials from?)
Reason why we in the real world can spend time and resources on designing and building robots is because we have the basics on food, water, shelter and such covered, and in general don't face immediate threats that could take these away or kill us.

If they need automated labor, just reclaim all those still working robots that seem to be around everywhere and reprogram them as laborers and security forces. The scientists probably just have to rig some giant antennae to send out override signals and call all the working robots to their facility.

An android like Harkness could make a perfect soldier. Can't be visually discerned from a human, can be programmed to not know fear, can be programmed to have extremely accurate aim when using guns, can have perfect memory, so they'd be the perfect spies. The Institute is a self-sustained, sealed environment according to Zimmer, so it can be assumed they have beyond basic living necessities, and can thus focus efforts on more complex things like androids. As for were they get the resources to produce their advanced technologies, the Institute may have accumulated them and such hard to find things as rare earth minerals in the days before the Great War, and now have a way of synthesizing them. We saw that Big MT, even after the Great War, was able to produce new technologies.

Also a big one you didn't mention: radiation resistance.

 

[Gnarles Bronson]

(...)
So, we have the pip-boy insofar as pre-apocalyptic technology, and then there's two hundred years of technology after the apocalypse, assuming the institute has somehow been running for all that time (not such a leap considering vaults and whatnot).

I don't get the big deal about androids, they've already been done in fallout 3.

So if Fallout 3 had a quest where you had to help a Jedi find his lightsaber it would be alright to feature the Death Star in Fallout 4.

See no matter how well something is writen but not everything simply fits a setting. Androids are not even so much of a problem, but they would require a hell lot of a good reason to be there. And excellnt writing. Because I don't see how they add something to the narrative that can't be exploited without Androids, like the topic of slavery.

It's just your opinion that androids don't fit the retro-futuristic world of Fallout. There were stories about androids in the fifties, so in my opinion it's potentially perfectly fitting in fallout games.

Now that's not to say that they do fit based on the context of the story, for example supermutants in 3 didn't fit all that well. But in a fallout set in Boston around MIT, I think it at least potentially fits the genre.

And they also had 1930s gangster stories and movies in the 1950s. Doesn't mean that New Reno now fitts better.

Also, if you really want to use the 1950s than we are looking mainly at material like,
The Human Robot in The Robot vs. the Aztec Mummy (1958)

And it really isn't much of a surprise that pretty much anyting robotic you come along in F1 and F2 looks like something like seen above.Look, I am not hating on Androids, just the way how they have been shown by Bethesda, particularly in Fallout 3 with their little quest. And the concept art at least might even hint to a Fallout 4 that contradicts their own game even - if ALL androids you encounter look like in the concept art and not actually like humans that can bleed and all that.

Robots aren't the same as androids. This is from 1963 but it's close to the same era, and quite similar to the Harkness plot in 3.

While seeking answers, he comes face to face with his double. It turns out that he is an android created by Walter Ryder in his own image, provided with Walter's memories from twenty years before. Walter has been trying to create a less flawed image of himself with mixed success. Alan is the third such creation, and has been "living" for only eight days.

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/6/60/In_His_Image(The_Twilight_Zone).jpg

Also you're only using 50's films, as apposed to books. I don't remember much from the fifties depicting super mutants or whathaveyou either.

I almost mentioned your New Reno comment earlier, not realizing it was you that said it: Again, it's just your opinion that New Reno doesn't fit. I thought it was the shit and one of the highlights of the entire series.

As series grow they inherently add new aspects and dimensions, and it's totally fair for fans of the original works to not like the direction they are heading. I'm sure many people didn't like Frank Miller's Dark Knight Rises anthology, for example; many would be happy with with nothing but Adam West and the golden age -- not me, but many I'm sure.

I simply disagree that there is something about this specific instance that is so unholy that it can't be justified in the fallout universe. Which isn't to say that it's going to be a well implemented device, or a good game in general.

 

[Gnarles Bronson]

Twilight zone: 1959

 

[Mr Fish]

What still bugs me is this simple question; where the hell does the Institute get its resources from to build these things?

The uh, poker chip machine thingies that reconstruct base materials into other stuff. Like food or batteries. The ones in Sierra Madre that were developed by the Big Empty.

 

[Walpknut]

Why do people keep indisting robots aren't affected by radiation, of course they are.

 

[SikTh]

Not really, some guy mentioned it above. And you had to pick that one out of every point he mentioned. Talk about being pedantic, and then in the same breath touting OWB's explanation/narrative as totally plausible. That's sickeningly over-scrupulous.

 

[Walpknut]

Eh? What are you even talking about?
You are really getting very easily offended at a single line questioning the "Robots aren't affected by radiation" for some weird reason. Also you don't seem to know what Scrupulous means.

 

[The Dutch Ghost]

What still bugs me is this simple question; where the hell does the Institute get its resources from to build these things?

The uh, poker chip machine thingies that reconstruct base materials into other stuff. Like food or batteries. The ones in Sierra Madre that were developed by the Big Empty.

Heh, thing is, outside Big Mountain the only other place to find the technology is the Sierra Madre. Sinclair arranged to get exclusive use of them.
It is one of those 'it could have solved a lot of problems if only...' type of situations. It could perhaps actually have made a difference before the War had the technology been widely distributed, it may not have prevented the the US-China conflict but it could have done something about the resource shortage.

Together with industrial scale fusion power the matter conversion technology might even have prevented the great war.

 

[SikTh]

Eh? What are you even talking about?
You are really getting very easily offended at a single line questioning the "Robots aren't affected by radiation" for some weird reason. Also you don't seem to know what Scrupulous means.

Of course I do. You're overly obsessed with details in Fallout 4, to an excessive degree. In your case, most seem to have a baseless foundation. That argument about androids not intaking radiation is simply pedantic. And it applies perfectly here. What about the likes of Planet for Transients? Humans had cybernetic implants that made them immune to irradiation in that. You're being needlessly hypercritical...again. Just searching for every little flaw and pointing it out to gain a perceived superiority. And yet you say you're going to shell-out for the game, just not at full price.


And I'm also reading this argument about 'androids not existing' according to 30s-50s fiction, but that's entirely erroneous. Asimov made several (I can think of 3 off the top of my head) stories based on androids/synthetic humans in the 40s alone, I just don't know where you pulled that fact from (well, actually, I do have a fair idea.) ... B-movies? What the hell did you expect? I can discuss the validity of this as a plot device/framework in a Fallout game ad-nausea. The fact remains you're just clutching at straws, that's a paper thin argument in a universe where the power of plasma weaponry and effective nuclear fusion . You are simply pointing out these punctilious non-flaws in Fallout 4. And we can pick better, as this game certainly has many already.

 

[Walpknut]

Wow, I seem to have angered a Bethesda fanboy.
It's funny you are getting mad at me beign "pedantic with androids" when I am literally the only person in 2 pages who has said he is willing to give them a chance.

I am just pointign out that the idea of robots being inmune to radiation is erroneous, radiation messes up with electronics pretty badly, and those andoids look like a robotic frame with some skin on top, so they don't look like they would be that well shielded. No idea why it got your panties in a knot that much.

Heh, thing is, outside Big Mountain the only other place to find the technology is the Sierra Madre. Sinclair arranged to get exclusive use of them.
It is one of those 'it could have solved a lot of problems if only...' type of situations. It could perhaps actually have made a difference before the War had the technology been widely distributed, it may not have prevented the the US-China conflict but it could have done something about the resource shortage.

Together with industrial scale fusion power the matter conversion technology might even have prevented the great war.

Weren't those machines also the source of the Cloud? All the Big Mt "marvels" seem to have some rather nasty secondary effects.

 

[The Dutch Ghost]

Hey Walpknut, regarding your question; I don't think so. It was something the Think Tank had cooked up in the Innovative Toxins plant and was sneaked in along with the equipment and suits Sinclair bought from Big Mt.

Sometimes the Big Mt stuff did indeed have secondary effects as you said, but in other cases Big Mt rather than putting any modifications in the technology or equipment that was purchased, instead implemented their experiments or creations in a different way at their 'test sites'.
Ashton and Hopeville for example bought nothing that had to do with weather manipulation (I think the military there bought that modified combat armor from Big Mt) but ended up being used for meteorological experiments.

 

[Walpknut]

Really? I always thought of it as waste produced by the whatever energy consuming process was used to transform the chips. Like nuclear waste but more oxidyzing than tha plain radioactive.
Well it would also make sense as the Big MT testing a new Chemical Weapon and their own Hazmat suits when dealing with it.

 

[generalissimofurioso]

Yeah, the thing with the Big MT testing program was that you agreed to test out one project (replicators, holograms, cosmic knives etc.) and then didn't realize that you actually agreed to let them carry out even more tests, which would require you to take more projects and essentially you had a serious problem on your hands.

It's why they had Little Yangtze in Big MT, lots of experimental subjects and no pesky bill of rights to worry about or anything.

 

[Walpknut]

Sounds like the Apple user agreement policies. //Topical.

Well, Like I said before, if they at least have a plausible justification for the Androids, like with how Victor and Yesman worked then I will be open to Androids, as long as they don't make them too human, or too powerfull. There is no way that Whimpy Robotic frame can be that strong.

 

[Crni Vuk]

I almost mentioned your New Reno comment earlier, not realizing it was you that said it: Again, it's just your opinion that New Reno doesn't fit. I thought it was the shit and one of the highlights of the entire series.

Are you serious? THis has been discussed to DEATH on NMA. Up to the point where I believe even the developers somewhere said that New Reno, while beeing a great location story whise, was a bit overboard in terms of the 50s retro-future. But don't quote me on it.

Also you're only using 50's films, as apposed to books. I don't remember much from the fifties depicting super mutants or whathaveyou either.

And the 50s have been also a lot about Aliens and UFOs, yet it is not one of the core aspects of F1 and F2 and in many cases Aliens can be almost seen as non-canon - but that is not really a very clear point.

Sorry, but the Androids as how we saw them in F3 and from the concept art simply don't really scream Fallout in to my face. And the way how Beth is treating the franchise they are diluting the canon and core elements of Fallout. That's simply my opinion.