Diablo III proves old-school Fallout can do well today

Aside from setting the mood, point of view and graphics in a game are only really relevant to strategy gamers in the sense that they dictate gameplay. As I have recently realized, gameplay is important.

Elsewhere, some acquaintances were talking about New Vegas and "whether it was good", or "better than F3" and so on... I realized that while New Vegas had good writing and decent design within the limitations of the engine, the ultimate problem is that, as a strategy gamer, I really didn't enjoy the game part of the game. I found VATS kind of MEH, and of course I burned out my FPS gaming pleasure center easily a decade ago, and what's left? Crafting? The "walking around" mechanic? There's not much to the actual game other than a sightseeing engine.

In contrast, I can create a new Fallout 1 character and have an interesting experience, even though I've memorized all of the story lines and death animations, because the game itself is entertaining. I'm not replaying it because of Vault Boy, although that stuff is always good for a laugh... in the long run the gameplay is still fun. In a strategy RPG it's all about the long run.

At some point, regardless of the vibe, environment, art, story, and so on, this is a game, and Gameplay is important. As my friend pointed out, that's why we don't call it a Computer VibeArtStory. It's a Computer Game.

Of course, good writing is kind of a prerequisite. :)
"Was that a warning shot, or do you just suck!"
 
I personally don't care what view it's in as much as I care about the feel of the game. Story, aesthetic, fallouttyness. Isometric did not make it a fallout game. The ability to hit rats and children in the balls with a sledgehammer made it a fallout game.

Fallout 2 did something that few sequels do, and that is change very little while improving and expanding immensely.

But after spending two huge games immersed in that universe, I wanted to get closer to it. I wanted to see those streets from eye level.
As bad as FO3 turned out to be, I got chills looking out over the landscape when I first left the vault. I was waiting 12 years for that view.

Story and aesthetic aren't great in the new games. There are improvements that need to be made. But there have been some. Fallout NV is way better than Fallout 3. Lets hope they continue this trend.
 
tekhedd said:
..."Was that a warning shot, or do you just suck!"
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You know how I measure games today? By their forums. If hot topic there is "what pixel shader is the best", "how to enhance textures" or "why so much obscenity", I know, most likely, that's not a game for me.

Devs, it seems, forgot that games are not played on our machines, but in our heads. I haven't played Minecraft but it's looks as a good example that imagination is more important then "is that game directx 14 or 15?"... From their site: "Minecraft is a game about placing blocks to build anything you can imagine."
Imagine coming to a publisher with that sentence...

Good/deep Stories/quests, delayed consequences, survival atmosphere, procedural sub/terrain, "smart" AI.

If the game has this all, and is post-apoc., damn it, I'll marry her.
 
If Bethesda gets any Idea's from this It'll make me a sad panda. Diablo III is just shit in the writing, art and gameplay departments.
 
Crni Vuk said:
its just the feeling I have with many 3D engines. That they age much faster and worse compared to even much older games that use a different approach. Like Oblivion or Fallout 3 which look outright shit in my eyes.
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I understand with your sentiment here, but there is a point where the technology reaches some of plateau that keeps it looking acceptable for the duration.

The Bards' Tale games, or Wasteland, or really any game made up until 1995, looks too old for me to enjoy, despite the fact that I wasted most of my childhood playing such games. Many games from the later 90's, while of course looking dated today, allowed for actual artistic style to be shown. So Fallout, Baldur's Gate, Commandos, Jagged Alliance 2, etc look decent enough to my eyes. The graphics had a reached a plateau of acceptibility. Compare Fallout to Wasteland, then Diablo 3 to Fallout. yeah Diablo 3 looks a lot better than Fallout, but there is nothing like the gulf between Fallout and Wasteland.

First person games have followed the same route, they were just a little behind. System Shock 2 and Half-Life look woefully dated, much moreso than X-Com Apocalypse. Going back further, I can still play Warcraft 2 and Command & Conquer but Duke Nukem 3D looks awful. Then you hit the mid 2000's and I'd argue first person technology hit that plateau. Doom 3 and Half-Life 2 still look good. Bioshock looks about as good as any FPS released this year, IMO. And no I don't agree that Fallout 3 looks like shit.

Point is, advances in graphic technology over the last decade have been fairly incremental. Ok, bloom effects. Nice but who really cares. So while I would have agreed with you in 2001, when first person games from 5 years prior looked like ass, I wouldn't now, as I'd happily play first person games from 2008.
 
You know, in all that typing, I forgot that I had a point. :)

My point is that if you consider the actual gameplay and forget about the pretty eye candy (which some say was disappointing in D3) Diablo III has nothing to do with the marketability of top-down strategy games, which is to say Fallout-esque games.

Gameplay *is* important, but what does D3 have to do with anything? Diablo isn't a fallout style game. It just has a top-down viewpoint. So what?

Google Maps also has a top-down satellite view mode, and a first-person view. Does "street view" validate the market for first-person games? And don't try to tell me street view isn't a game, I've played with it for hours, it's very similar to playing most Bethesda titles. :)

If Diablo III inspires Bethesda to make a top-down Fallout, it still won't have Fallout gameplay because they don't make strategy games. And that is that.
 
Just wanted to comment and say: I love the commentary that Brother None leaves in newsposts like this. It always strikes me as a swift yet subtle kick in the arse of the hackenyed contributors pulling together these kinds of articles.
 
Brother None said:
I was making decent process, I'm not really in a position to watch any more films right now, and all my notes were on the HD of my computer, the one that I lost when its motherboard was fried.

Was having fun with it too. It's a weird, diversified genre, especially when you stretch the definition a bit and make sure to include Z-list films :P

I can barely do anything on this computer. Let alone get stuff done.
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I'm betting $5 that your movies had a fattening web admin guide mankind to a new beginning through enlightened despotism (and possibly gay sex).
 
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