Emil Pagiarulo: Fallout 3 can not be finished without combat

[Sander]

Aye, honestly, could you really even finish FO without combat? Random encounters made that tough, not to mention the opening area of each game.

You could finish the game without ever engaging in any kind of combat other than running away.

 

[Grimhound]

Don't exactly know where to place this, so I'll put it here in the more diplomatic-ey and seemingly appropriate thread:
Emil Pagliarulo on Dialogue:

I know you guys haven't seen a lot of dialogue, but I really don't think you'll be wanting for options in that regard. The dialogue trees are pretty detailed, and there are plenty of response options, including those that check for skills, perks, S.P.E.C.I.A.L. attributes, etc.

The one screenshot with dialogue that we did release -- shows a guy with a couple of "do you want to come with me" type of responses -- is actually an example of the smallest set of responses. The majority of NPCs have several more.

In general, what you can say depends on who the NPC is, all your combinations of stats and skills, events that have transpired, how you want to respond (different "attitudes" or "voices"), and more.

 

[Black]

Oh Emil, if the rest of FO3 dialogue is so amazingly awesome, why did you guys choose to show us the "yes/no" dialogue?
Is it really that common to show THE WORST of your product?

But it's okay, I understand.
Bethesda's audience doesn't want to see lots of letters.

 

[Brother None]

Re: Emil Pagiarulo: Fallout 3 can not be finished without co

Responding to the Play Magazine's statement that the developers "are considering making the player able to complete the game without killing anyone, using only dialogues, sneaking and hacking" [quoting Ausir's translation], Emil Pagiarulo quickly explains: "no".<blockquote>I've found that, occasionally with European non-English mags, some stuff gets lost in translation. I think this is one of those cases.

We've been pretty upfront before about the fact that we haven't designed the game so you could complete it without killing anyone. You can play MUCH of Fallout 3 without killing people, and there are options to talk your way through just about every situation in the game. But it's a crazy, violent world out there, and you're going to have to defend yourself at times.

Just wanted to clear that up.</blockquote>

Bumping this one up with good reason, because this is kind of odd: apparently Bethesda was considering making the game finishable "without killing anyone, using only dialogues, sneaking and hacking".

So why was Emil so adamant in denying it? Why the unnecessary contradiction?

 

[Ausir]

Maybe they simply didn't design the game with the non-combat approach in mind, but even then someone at Bethesda managed to beat it that way? Also, it might not be beatable with a pacifist character without prior knowledge of the game, locations etc.

 

[whirlingdervish]

Does anyone other than Per remember how relatively easy it was in Fallout and Fallout 2 to knock somebody unconscious with a handy rock and loot them and walk away before they got up?

Does that count for not killing anyone?

I think people are combining the ideas of a non-combat approach and an approach that doesn't require killing, and as such we might be developing some confusing assumptions.


Knocking someone out would be a pretty useful way to render them unable to harm you and simultaneously allow you to get around/past them.

I'm not sure how the "head crippling" mechanic works in FO3, but I have serious doubts that the PC will be able to be knocked unconscious by a good headshot, recover and then get back into the fight.

I just can't imagine a way to relate that occurence to the player in a FPP game with realtime combat.

now, before anyone says "how often did you really do that?", or calls it masturbation to actually try out the different things a game lets you do right out of the box, I state this:

Being able to knock out enemies was actually one of my favorite aspects of FO/FO2.

You could easily lay people out with the right gun or a well placed unarmed attack, and as long as you had a party member NPC to keep the fight going you wouldn't just die if someone did the same to you.

Knocking people out and down with headshots (and groinshots) adds a huge degree of realism and huge opportunities to play the game the way you want, to the standard kill or be killed combat system of most games.

(I still think the cryolator was a stupid idea tho. )