I pretty much agree with the original poster's sentiments. This, so far at least, feels like a very impressive game that falls short of the greatness that was Fallout 1, but still feels like it's in the same family. It might not be "Fallout" in the truest sense, but this game really seems like the younger, hipper, but far more immature cousin of Fallout.
After having played with VATS for a while, I seriously think that it's a great game mechanic. In fact, I think that as far as game mechanics go, this one really feels like Fallout. It feels like an upgraded version of called shots brought to the 3D realm, and despite me missing the ability to shoot people in the eyes (or the groin), I really had a moment of "Wow, this is Fallout."
I'm not even remotely a fan of the death in this game, however. I don't understand how shooting somebody with a pistol twice in the leg will effectively amputate the leg, nor do I understand how me shooting somebody repeatedly in the FACE (again, with a pistol) will, rather than cause his face to explode perhaps, instead decapitate him smoothly from the neck. This is really lame, and the UK IGN review that complains about this as feeling like a 13 year old's idea of what's "super cool" is spot on.
The writing isn't terrible. It's a lot better than what a lot of the negativity has said, but not quite as good as what some of the glowing reviews have said, either. It falls short of the maturity of Fallout, though I haven't yet found the swearing to be gratuitous. A few F-bombs have been dropped, but I even had a conversation with the Sherriff of Megaton and I don't think he used the word once. Though I stayed on his good side so who knows.
I really loved the Vault, but I don't like what they did with the story in the Vault once your Dad leaves. I also didn't like how fast they got to that part. I really would have liked to spend some more time in the vault. I spent maybe 2 hours in the Vault, and probably 75 minutes of that was spent during the escape, and I was really taking my time to savor everything about the vault. There wasn't really much you could do in terms of exploration up until it's time for you to make your escape, and I thought that was pretty disappointing. Had there been enough material to spend 3 hours in the Vault before having to leave I would have been more than happy with it. Even if they just upped the side-quests so that it was optional, I would have been happy with that. But alas.
I've only got in one fight outside the Vault so far (I only played for 3 hours though) and I have to admit I'm a little worried about the frequency at which you might be getting into random fights you can't talk your way out of. Then again, I got into a lot of random encounters in the original Fallout so maybe I just need to adopt the mindset that this is the equivalent, there's just no pop-up telling me this is a random encounter.
While I'm not enormously impressed with the writing so far, I am impressed with the amount of dialogue options available to you as a character. In this regard, I think it might actually surpass the original Fallout, in a good way. The fact that you can lie and claim you did a job you haven't bothered with at all and potentially convince somebody you did it is extremely cool. I talked my way out of taking the GOAT, though I felt a little jipped after that so I went back to a previous save so I could actually take it (though then I regretted I bothered, as the GOAT is pretty stupid).
Character creation is cool. I liked that my character didn't wind up turning out to look like a cave man like my character in Oblivion did. He actually looks pretty cool. I am, however, disappointed by the amount of hair options. There's like three times as many beards as there are normal hair styles, and most of the hair styles are pretty lame. What's up with that? I've heard you can get your hair cut later in the game though with extra options; if so, I can live with that.
One thing I'm not a fan of, is in the original Fallout they really laid your character sheet right out in front of you and let you tweak your stats right from the getgo and see the hard mechanical values of your choices. If you increased your Agility to 10 you saw that it gave you 10 Action Points. If you increased your Strength you saw exactly how much melee damage you'd do, and how much you could lift. It isn't the case in this game. In fact, when you read the "You're SPECIAL!" book they don't really even tell you what each option really does, let alone give you the hard values. If I ever try for a second play-through on this game I'll probably use an internet guide or something to tweak my stats, since Bethesda seems intent on sacrificing their hardcore tabletop RPG player crowd for "usability." This is the one area where I can definitely sing the tune to the "dumbing things up for the console kiddies crowd" song.
In the end, and again, this is only after playing for 3 hours, but I feel like this is a close cousin to Fallout, and I feel like it does it justice, but it definitely falls short. I feel like Bethesda does really, really care about Fallout, and I think that the details and attention put into the game stands up for itself in this regard. Anyone who thinks that Bethesda is just using Fallout as a cash cow and doesn't give a shit about it is lying, pure and simple. However, despite the fact that I am certain Bethesda cares about the franchise, I don't think they truly understand it. The retro 50's style in the original was prevelant without being truly obvious outside of a few areas, like the original cut scenes with the music and some of the pictures. It's much more obvious in Fallout 3, almost rubbed in your face. Bethesda has no sense of subtlety, which is something the original Fallout excelled at.
Even the combat, despite the fact that you saw heads explode and very graphic violence in the originals, it wasn't constant and it felt real. In Fallout 3, again, subtlety is gone, and it feels much more hyper-real, to the point that it doesn't actually feel real at all anymore. It seems like blood and gore for its own sake, rather than to give you a kind of feeling that supplemented the feeling of the rest of the game, that this was a gritty, real, lived in (and died in) world.
But these, in the end, really are nitpicks. The core of the game is good and solid, and while in no way do I think this game is worth the perfect scores a lot of reviews are giving it, I do think it's worthy of a lot of the really high scores it's getting. 8.8 is fair, 9.2 I think is very accurate, 9.6 is a bit exaggerated but I can understand it. Any higher than that seems a little retarded to me.
After having played with VATS for a while, I seriously think that it's a great game mechanic. In fact, I think that as far as game mechanics go, this one really feels like Fallout. It feels like an upgraded version of called shots brought to the 3D realm, and despite me missing the ability to shoot people in the eyes (or the groin), I really had a moment of "Wow, this is Fallout."
I'm not even remotely a fan of the death in this game, however. I don't understand how shooting somebody with a pistol twice in the leg will effectively amputate the leg, nor do I understand how me shooting somebody repeatedly in the FACE (again, with a pistol) will, rather than cause his face to explode perhaps, instead decapitate him smoothly from the neck. This is really lame, and the UK IGN review that complains about this as feeling like a 13 year old's idea of what's "super cool" is spot on.
The writing isn't terrible. It's a lot better than what a lot of the negativity has said, but not quite as good as what some of the glowing reviews have said, either. It falls short of the maturity of Fallout, though I haven't yet found the swearing to be gratuitous. A few F-bombs have been dropped, but I even had a conversation with the Sherriff of Megaton and I don't think he used the word once. Though I stayed on his good side so who knows.
I really loved the Vault, but I don't like what they did with the story in the Vault once your Dad leaves. I also didn't like how fast they got to that part. I really would have liked to spend some more time in the vault. I spent maybe 2 hours in the Vault, and probably 75 minutes of that was spent during the escape, and I was really taking my time to savor everything about the vault. There wasn't really much you could do in terms of exploration up until it's time for you to make your escape, and I thought that was pretty disappointing. Had there been enough material to spend 3 hours in the Vault before having to leave I would have been more than happy with it. Even if they just upped the side-quests so that it was optional, I would have been happy with that. But alas.
I've only got in one fight outside the Vault so far (I only played for 3 hours though) and I have to admit I'm a little worried about the frequency at which you might be getting into random fights you can't talk your way out of. Then again, I got into a lot of random encounters in the original Fallout so maybe I just need to adopt the mindset that this is the equivalent, there's just no pop-up telling me this is a random encounter.
While I'm not enormously impressed with the writing so far, I am impressed with the amount of dialogue options available to you as a character. In this regard, I think it might actually surpass the original Fallout, in a good way. The fact that you can lie and claim you did a job you haven't bothered with at all and potentially convince somebody you did it is extremely cool. I talked my way out of taking the GOAT, though I felt a little jipped after that so I went back to a previous save so I could actually take it (though then I regretted I bothered, as the GOAT is pretty stupid).
Character creation is cool. I liked that my character didn't wind up turning out to look like a cave man like my character in Oblivion did. He actually looks pretty cool. I am, however, disappointed by the amount of hair options. There's like three times as many beards as there are normal hair styles, and most of the hair styles are pretty lame. What's up with that? I've heard you can get your hair cut later in the game though with extra options; if so, I can live with that.
One thing I'm not a fan of, is in the original Fallout they really laid your character sheet right out in front of you and let you tweak your stats right from the getgo and see the hard mechanical values of your choices. If you increased your Agility to 10 you saw that it gave you 10 Action Points. If you increased your Strength you saw exactly how much melee damage you'd do, and how much you could lift. It isn't the case in this game. In fact, when you read the "You're SPECIAL!" book they don't really even tell you what each option really does, let alone give you the hard values. If I ever try for a second play-through on this game I'll probably use an internet guide or something to tweak my stats, since Bethesda seems intent on sacrificing their hardcore tabletop RPG player crowd for "usability." This is the one area where I can definitely sing the tune to the "dumbing things up for the console kiddies crowd" song.
In the end, and again, this is only after playing for 3 hours, but I feel like this is a close cousin to Fallout, and I feel like it does it justice, but it definitely falls short. I feel like Bethesda does really, really care about Fallout, and I think that the details and attention put into the game stands up for itself in this regard. Anyone who thinks that Bethesda is just using Fallout as a cash cow and doesn't give a shit about it is lying, pure and simple. However, despite the fact that I am certain Bethesda cares about the franchise, I don't think they truly understand it. The retro 50's style in the original was prevelant without being truly obvious outside of a few areas, like the original cut scenes with the music and some of the pictures. It's much more obvious in Fallout 3, almost rubbed in your face. Bethesda has no sense of subtlety, which is something the original Fallout excelled at.
Even the combat, despite the fact that you saw heads explode and very graphic violence in the originals, it wasn't constant and it felt real. In Fallout 3, again, subtlety is gone, and it feels much more hyper-real, to the point that it doesn't actually feel real at all anymore. It seems like blood and gore for its own sake, rather than to give you a kind of feeling that supplemented the feeling of the rest of the game, that this was a gritty, real, lived in (and died in) world.
But these, in the end, really are nitpicks. The core of the game is good and solid, and while in no way do I think this game is worth the perfect scores a lot of reviews are giving it, I do think it's worthy of a lot of the really high scores it's getting. 8.8 is fair, 9.2 I think is very accurate, 9.6 is a bit exaggerated but I can understand it. Any higher than that seems a little retarded to me.
