Can we honestly say Fallout 4 is better than Fallout 3?

Fallout 4 has to better than Fallout 3, because 3 did absolutely nothing right, while 4 at least did something right. Doing only one thing right is still always better than doing zero things right.

(That said, I have a bias towards shooters. I would love a game with the shooting and crafting mechanics of Fallout 4, but with the RPG mechanics, dialogue system and writing of Fallout: New Vegas. The worst-case scenario for me is a continuation of the Far Cry-ification of Fallout, but I would still be very, very upset if they went back to the isometric style.)
 
Ben Soto said:
but I would still be very, very upset if they went back to the isometric style.)
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Tbh, Fallout was born with Isometric and Turn-Based combat in mind. It was what made it truly possible to become great in the first place, as the intention of the devs under Tim Cain back then. Van Buren could've been VERY great, or whatever Fallout game that was meant to be by Troika if only Bethesda didn't threw more money at the IP *sigh*

Truth be told, if Obsidian or whoever it is gonna have their hands on making Fallout 'spin-off' after Fallout 4 had to put up with Bethesda's engine for Fallout 4 and/or their bullshit design decision, I'd rather they don't, and instead made an isometric game with a different engine instead.
 
Ben Soto said:
Fallout 4 has to better than Fallout 3, because 3 did absolutely nothing right, while 4 at least did something right. Doing only one thing right is still always better than doing zero things right.
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Not quite. Doing nothing right is still better than doing so many things wrong even with that one right. It's still an achievement to be a complete failure when compared to doing one thing right and doing everything else wrong. The latter just makes the failure seem like some effort was put into it and the result was due to more factors going wrong rather than abject incompetence.

Despite my own disdain for 3 after sampling the main series, 3 still has some merits for me unlike 4 which was the worse game for me. At least 3 somewhat worked as a poor post-apocalyptic game masquerading as an RPG since it had a working character creation (among other things) in comparison to 4. 4 was a shooter hampered by token RPG elements that turned enemies into bullet sponges despite the realistic shooting by id Software and also butchered so many elements of previous Fallout games that it was no longer a Fallout game by the time it was released.

A return to isometric turn-based would be welcome if only to get rid of the audience Bethesda drew in by dumbing down FO4.
 
CerberusGate said:
A return to isometric turn-based would be welcome if only to get rid of the audience Bethesda drew in by dumbing down FO4.
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Well, there's still Wasteland 2 (which, in my mind, is the origin story of the Mojave Rangers, simply under a name/timeline that wouldn't twist Beth's tits) and Wasteland 3 has been teased by Brian Fargo a few weeks ago. Just wait for the toolkit to come out (if it ever comes out, that is) and you can bet there will be Fallout remakes / reboots using Unity engine. Which could be great.

Another thing that really bothers me about Bethesda's policy : dumbing down games does not, by itself, gather any audience. At all. Look at "The last of us", it litteraly took a massive dump on all EA games released for the entire year, in terms of selling numbers, and guess what ? It was smart. Simple, yet mature, and it got a wide audience.
Tomb Raider remake ? Exploded every sales its predecessors made, and did it by doing the exact opposite of dumbing down the writing. They actually hired Pratchett as main writer (whose job not only consisted in changing the story, but also the atmosphere, thematics, progression etc.).
Same could be said for Deus Ex, and hell even Dishonored (published by Bethesda, so they should know better), which sold incredibly well, and will sell again, mostly by promising a mature, gritty and meaningful story. There's a reason why people will buy Deus Ex and Dishonored 2 and won't touch Homefront revolution. The audience is not dumb per se. A gigantic part of the market expects mature, well written stories, and the numbers are there to prove it. There's litteraly no business plan that would back a dumbing down, in this industry. As it happens, Fallout sold, but it would have sold the same with a good writing.
 
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Ben Soto said:
Fallout 4 has to better than Fallout 3, because 3 did absolutely nothing right, while 4 at least did something right. Doing only one thing right is still always better than doing zero things right.

(That said, I have a bias towards shooters. I would love a game with the shooting and crafting mechanics of Fallout 4, but with the RPG mechanics, dialogue system and writing of Fallout: New Vegas. The worst-case scenario for me is a continuation of the Far Cry-ification of Fallout, but I would still be very, very upset if they went back to the isometric style.)
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Actually for me Fallout 3 had more things right than Fallout 4:
  • SPECIAL matters (although not as much in older fallout games)
  • Harder to permanently increase SPECIAL values
  • Perks weren't awarded every level Wrong on this one, Fallout New Vegas is the only one that doesn't award a perk every level.
  • There are actual skills
  • Has SPECIAL and Skills checks in dialogue
  • Many quests have multiple ways of finishing them
  • No voiced character to spoil my character
  • Way more Unarmed weapons (FO4 has 4)
  • More interesting and unique weapons you can actually craft from scratch if you have blueprints
  • More variation of weapons (that actually feel different when using them)
  • No Fusion Cores for Power Armor
  • No legendary crap
  • No VANS perk :facepalm:
  • Has more varied perk options (80% of FO4 perks are increase damage with this kind of weapon)
  • Level Cap
  • No super fast levelling because EXP wasn't awarded as fast
  • We are not pushed to play a goody two shoes with only 4 "evil" options in the whole game
  • Better stealth mechanic (In FO4 we can be literally next to the enemy and hit him and he still doesn't see us)
  • Better equipment features (weapons and armors degrade with use, in FO4 Power Armor degrades while weaker armors are indestructible?)
  • More than 4 dialogue options
  • Dialogue options that actually are different from each other
  • Dialogue options that actually have different responses
  • Loot was handled much better
  • Probably a few things I am forgetting at the moment
Fallout 4 has:
  • Better shooting mechanics (which I don't really care because I prefer to play unarmed or melee characters)
  • Using Power Armor feels more awesome
  • More in-depth craft system
  • Settlement building (even thought it is more of a chore than fun and takes ages to make what I want, at least for me)
  • Probably a few things I am forgetting at the moment
For me Fallout 3 even with it's problems (which are quite a lot) is more fun to play than Fallout 4.
Most time spent in fallout 4 was settlement building and crafting stuff and not because it was fun but because it was so clunky and time consuming just to build a building the way I wanted it. Second most time spent was killing things. Third most time spent was being a hoarder because I needed materials for the thing that took more time of me playing... It is always rinse and repeat. Gets boring after a while.
 
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@Risewild Most of what you said is correct except for the part about perks every level and the SPECIAL stats being harder to raise. In Fallout 3 you were awarded a perk every level, which some people prefer btw. There is a very popular mod for New Vegas that gives you perks every level. The SPECIAL thing depends on what DLC you own because if you have Broken Steel you can boost every SPECIAL stat to 9 when you hit level 30 if you get the perk for it and you also have bobbleheads that increase stats. The bobbleheads part doesn't bother me but that Broken Steel perk is stupid and broken (forgive the pun) and I never take it because of that.

EDIT Another thing that Fallout 3 does better is the ending slide. Last I played the game I played an evil character but made the good choice at the end to sacrifice myself, kind of a darth vadar moment I guess. And the narrator acknowledged that playstyle and supported it really well. I kind of thought the ending narration would've been more awkward if I did that but it actually wasn't.
 
Perks in Fallout 3 were largely irrelevant in any case, didn't matter much that it was every level when it was mostly just +10 to x stat and similarly boring crap. NV fixed that by adding a bunch of useful and fun perks (Shotgun Surgeon + And Stay Back + Riot Shotgun = aww baby).
 
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You guyz missing the part of speech checks. Prior to FNV (and I mean PRIOR, EVERY GODDAMN GAME flawed in this), Speech was overkill. It was laughable, characters talks his way out by verbal diarrhea from V13 to Purifier. New Vegas cleverly fixed it by giving more skillchecks along with SPECIAL-checks in dialogs. And Fallout 4 ignores this and basically returns to overkilling speech, Oh CHARISMA, I'm sorry.
BTW At least perks and SPECIAL matters in the outcome of Survival Guide quest for example, I can give Fallout 3 this. Fallout 4 is just plain NOPE.
 
Paladin Waffles said:
@Risewild Most of what you said is correct except for the part about perks every level and the SPECIAL stats being harder to raise. In Fallout 3 you were awarded a perk every level, which some people prefer btw. There is a very popular mod for New Vegas that gives you perks every level. The SPECIAL thing depends on what DLC you own because if you have Broken Steel you can boost every SPECIAL stat to 9 when you hit level 30 if you get the perk for it and you also have bobbleheads that increase stats. The bobbleheads part doesn't bother me but that Broken Steel perk is stupid and broken (forgive the pun) and I never take it because of that.

EDIT Another thing that Fallout 3 does better is the ending slide. Last I played the game I played an evil character but made the good choice at the end to sacrifice myself, kind of a darth vadar moment I guess. And the narrator acknowledged that playstyle and supported it really well. I kind of thought the ending narration would've been more awkward if I did that but it actually wasn't.
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Darn I have been playing TTW for so long that I forgot Fallout 3 had perks every level, sorry about that. I stand corrected :ok:.
About the Almost Perfect perk to get all 9 SPECIAL, I meant during actual playing the game (that perk is only available at the last level a character can take, there is no other way to increase SPECIAL besides Bobbleheads which increase 1 and the Intense Training perk which trades one perk for a SPECIAL (but it is capped at 10 ranks) which older Fallout 2 already did). So an average player would pretty much play most of the game with the same SPECIAL values until it reached the last possible character level and as you said only if the player owns Broken Steel (which was the last DLC to be released and so most players had to play the game before that was released without being able to get SPECIAL to 9 easily).
My point is that in Fallout 4 you can just get 10 on everything in a few hours of playing out of the box if you don't get perks while in FO3 you would have to have reached max character level to be able to do it.

Totally agree with the ending slides. I have no idea how I forgot to put that one there on the list.
 
No. 10 on all special within a couple of hours in fo4 is a load of shit. Average score in fallout 4 is 4. 6x7=42. You need to level up 42 times to max out speciaö in fo4. That is hardly done in mere hours. And if you level up to 43 without picking a single crafting or damage perk. Well... Have fun fighting bullet sponges.
 
Mr Fish said:
No. 10 on all special within a couple of hours in fo4 is a load of shit. Average score in fallout 4 is 4. 6x7=42. You need to level up 42 times to max out speciaö in fo4. That is hardly done in mere hours. And if you level up to 43 without picking a single crafting or damage perk. Well... Have fun fighting bullet sponges.
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We actually need 34 levels:
We need 70 total SPECIAL points to have 10 on each attribute, we start with 28 (which makes the 42 levels needed you mention), but there are 7 bobbleheads which increase 1 stat each (which makes 35 levels needed to max each) and then there is 1 You're SPECIAL book which increases another 1 to a stat. Total 34 levels.

I know it is possible without taking that long because it was what happened when I played it in the past (although it was my intention from the start to reach 10 SPECIAL in all Attributes before taking level up perks, so I confess I played to try and get it the faster I could): I started with a character with 9 Intelligence I was gaining an extra 27% of experience every time I gained XP, got 9 on END also at start and I had nice HP, then I dumped the rest of the initial points in STR to reach 6 IIRC (like I said I like playing melee or unarmed).
To reach level 35 we need 48,876 XP and I think I got there in a few days of playing (2 or 3 now that I think about it, it was really fast). I wasn't interested in the settlement stuff but I do remember crafting junk and it gave me xp I also gained xp from finding locations and lockpicking and hacking. I also remember using drugs and stealth boys to cross harder areas or deal with some enemies, also I abused my companions and when the enemies were busy with them I would sneak crit with my melee weapon (we can attach mods we aquire even without perks). Yes I died a lot, yes I would have gotten perks instead of SPECIAL points if I was playing normally, but I made a bet I would max my SPECIAL before getting perks (although I also abused the magazine perks, some of them were quite handy). I would have levelled even faster if I had gotten the Intelligence bobblehead first but it took me a while to get it.
The problem with FO4 leveling is that it awards way more xp than FO3 and faster, even by doing stuff like pick an easy lock we get more xp in FO4 than FO3.

Now on a different note I am curious how long it would take me to reach max level in FO3. I have to try and do it the fastest I can once I get a new computer, who knows I might reach max level around the same time as I maxed FO4 SPECIAL :scratch:.
 
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I forgot about the bobbleheads. But unless you know where they are and actively seek them out you ain't getting 10 in all SPECIAL within a few hours. You also went out with the specific purpose to get them to 10 and in a way grinded for that specific purpose.

You implied (or at least that's what I've interpreted from your posts) that it was easy to just whip it all up to 10 within mere hours, as if the player doesn't even have to try. Which is flat out wrong. Yes, it can happen. Yes, it is easy if you know what to do and aim for specifically that. But then you're at level 34 or 43 (depending on whether or not you went for the bobbleheads) and now you got tier one modded weapons and no damage modifier perks which means that combat will be a total chore.

Fallout 4's system is shit. I dislike that we can level up stats. But it is still about choice and consequence. You 'can' level up your stats to 10 if you know what to do and go for specifically that, but it'll gimp your character in pretty much everything else and by that level it will slow down to a crawl.
 
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