Fallout 3 is overrated

Brother None

Brother None

This ghoul has seen it all
Orderite
So says Safety's Off.<blockquote>This is one of the reasons why the presentation of Fallout 3 is so hit and miss. While the story is truly original and interesting, there are so many gameplay elements that serve to hinder that strength. For the first 5 or so hours (purely story-wise), you are following your dad from city to city, only to find that he’s moved on to somewhere you’ve either already been or a city that seems to be miles away. Bethesda intends for this element to increase the suspense and anticipation of finally finding your dad (whom Liam Neeson voices wonderfully I might add) but it only makes the experience feel contrived and forced. Rather than getting a new hint at every city, it would’ve been much more beneficial to have sprinkled these events much farther apart throughout the course of the story. What this results in is a fantastic concept dumbed down to make it painfully apparent what your next step needs to be. While a sense of direction and progress in an open-world, story-driven game is critical, it should be more of a nudge than a shove.

More than anything, Fallout 3 is a game that suffers from an identity crisis. While it alienates the hardcore Fallout fans for its sharp departure from typical Fallout games, it also attempts to appeal to those who enjoyed Oblivion. Some of those players might be enjoying the game right now, but many others who found Oblivion to be an engrossing game with a world that you could lose yourself for hours in have already tried their hand at Fallout 3 and moved on. Is Fallout 3 a disaster? Not by any means. Is it deserving of all the GOTY awards it received last year? Not by a long shot.</blockquote>Spotted on GameBanshee.
 
Especially since this is part of what made Fallout such an interesting experience during one's first playthrough : not being given any real indication and having to find your own path. It worked in both FO1 and FO2. I mean, who really expected to find the waterchip under Necropolis ? In Fallout 3, the main quest is litteraly spoonfed to you...
 
*looks at comments below the article*


Wow, some people get really defensive about their Fallout 3...
 
Verd1234 said:
Wow, some people get really defensive about their Fallout 3...
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Interestingly, Destructoid blames the ruin of the games press on this kind of behaviour in a recent article. The more I think about it the more I think they have a point, and fanboy pressure is at least as bad as publisher manipulation.
 
i noticed that the person who wrote the original article thinks that fallout 3 has good story,so wouldnt consider the person very experinced in RPG games. Gameplay issues and the writing issues are main reason why i didnt really like fallout 3. i disliked it, but if i had to review it, i would give it 68-70/100

Fan pressure is not the only reason. i would say it has been the fan pressure and the companies AND the coward gaming journalists combined that has caused the current situation where almost every big or hyped release gets 10/10 and almost religious praise, regardless of actual quality.
 
I see that crap on every site i go to with a comment page and it angers me that someone cannot have an opinion without getting personally attacked.
 
The comments are the best part of that article.

Not quite as amusing as the email responses I got to my "slanderous" Fallout 3 Will Suck article, but still hilarious.
 
Logical thinking isn't a thing for everyone in the interwebz.
 
It is a well known fact that logical and critical thinking pale in comparison to mispelling and exlamation points on teh interwebz.
 
How about the severely game crippling bugs (getting permanently stuck in objects, quest NPCs dying from faulty AI path finding, VATS fuck ups with point blank attacks), broken game mechanics (the worthlessness of Strength, Endurance and Luck, finicky repetitive combat with terrible hit detection, erratic AI that doesn't actually respond but randomly acts out) and hordes of other problems (terrible writing, copy & paste level cells, horrendous level cap, repetitive boring perks, pointless skills and maxing out most of your skills, lack of specialization, artificial replay value from binary alignment decisions, etc.)?

Yeah it's nice that he thinks it's overrated, maybe if more people realized that then the gaming industry wouldn't be so complacent when it comes to sub par "AAA" titles, but the first thing he needs to do is to write a more compelling argument that actually hits on the major issues that truly make the game a pain to play.

Also I have absolutely no clue what he's talking about when he says "without being decimated by Super Mutants". I took out small clusters of Super Mutants at level 3 in the DC ruins with no problem. As long as you have a companion as a meat shield (which isn't difficult to find. Dogmeat or one of the other NPCs) they're a complete breeze. Even without an NPC just being able to shoot a Super Mutant in the arm and ruin his aim is good enough. VATS makes the game too easy, it makes it too boring, yet if it didn't exist, the combat would still be a shoddy fucking mess, there's no middle ground, you either go for broken half-assed FPS combat or a deliriously mediocre RTwP system.
 
well is this the start of the "big bang" finally ?

To be a bit more acurate. Is it just my inexperience with the gaming media, or do really a few more "critical" voices appear now regarding those super postive hype supporting reviews? I mean at one point I definetly would expect a situation where the whole gaming media makes almost no sense anymore if magazines and other media just act like another for of biased advertisement for the big companies instead of independent observers.

I really wish there would be some form of rating system for games that is somewhat regulated. I know I know ... this would be extremly hard to accomplish, but I was thinking about something like a consumer safety working as Foundation. You know something that cant be so easily manipulated by everyone.
 
Brother None said:
Interestingly, Destructoid blames the ruin of the games press on this kind of behaviour in a recent article. The more I think about it the more I think they have a point, and fanboy pressure is at least as bad as publisher manipulation.
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Yeah, a lot of people that are disenfranchised like to blame top-down pressures, but most of the pressure is bottom up. Even some of the nefarious top-down manipulations are just reactions to bottom-up pressure. People want to get excited about the next big thing. People want their favorite game to get high scores. Some people won't look at a game if it gets <80 on metacritic.

Anyway, I can't say that I agree with the article at all. The game isn't a technological wonder, but it isn't ugly IMO, and I wouldn't necessarily care if it was. I think the complaint about a lack of Oblivion-style level scaling actually touches on one of the good things about the game rather than a flaw. If anything, I would rip the game's story, because it is pretty far from being interesting or original. And it's silly to imply that the game should either be a carbon copy of Oblivion or a carbon copy of Fallout. I'd say that there's more than a little viable middle ground between those games. Everyone is entitled to their opinion, but I don't think that was a noteworthy critique.
 
Dionysus said:
disenfranchised
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Do you mean "disenchanted" here? (I only ask because I'm interested in words.) (This could have a been a PM I guess.) (SPARTAAAA)
 
Per said:
Dionysus said:
disenfranchised
Click to expand...

Do you mean "disenchanted" here? (I only ask because I'm interested in words.) (This could have a been a PM I guess.) (SPARTAAAA)
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That probably wasn't the best word, because I'm using a loose definition of "franchise." Basically, I'm talking about people that feel like they are no longer part of the industry. Games aren't being made for them and the press isn't talking to them. These people often blame the publishers and the press even though the gamers have the most influence over the direction of the industry.
 
Brother None said:
Verd1234 said:
Wow, some people get really defensive about their Fallout 3...
Click to expand...

Interestingly, Destructoid blames the ruin of the games press on this kind of behaviour in a recent article. The more I think about it the more I think they have a point, and fanboy pressure is at least as bad as publisher manipulation.
Click to expand...
u r the win

Thanks for the tip BN :P

Yeah, it's a real problem with the journalism industry. You are providing a service, sure, but your job is to be honest, and that sometimes isn't compatible... I say be honest and fuck everyone. So what if you have only 50% of the readership you'd have otherwise? That way you're "educating" and "training" those 50% and they'll grow, eventually "educating" they themselves the other guys dudes people have. Shmorphmorphcramph. Blerghblaghblaphleh.

(what's wrong with me today? I can't write anything.. xD)

generalissimofurioso said:
The comments are the best part of that article.

Not quite as amusing as the email responses I got to my "slanderous" Fallout 3 Will Suck article, but still hilarious.
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Since it's email you can make a wit save and multiply their anger bonus x2 in your reply. Only downside is you have to apply their same twisted fanboyish logic, but it actually works out great because it's very brutal. In my experience, you get a critical at first strike like 80% of the time and every subsequent strike they attempt is critically missed. :D
 
Alphadrop said:
It is a well known fact that logical and critical thinking pale in comparison to mispelling and exlamation points on teh interwebz.
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you mean "misspelling" and "exclamation."

also, i'd rate fallout 3 at about a 50-60/100. on it's own, it stands as a decent shooter provided you never enter into vats. is that fallout though? well, it is now apparently. also, sequels are sure to follow. the author of the article is right though that it pretty much alienates all the target audience. oblivion fans can't cast spells and fallout fans don't get a good story. then again, fallout fans that expected bethsoft to make a decent story were only ever kidding themselves. i just wish it were a real fallout game, so i'd have had the option to kill dad and the children in little lamplight.
 
The story is one of the biggest things that sort of pissed me off.

Fallout 1, Fallout 2 or Tactics storylines weren't exactly Shakespeare but they captivating enough for me to want to finish the game.

Van Buren would have been just as interesting, perhaps even a little more as this time it didn't deal with some phantom army.

But Fallout 3... honestly it really angers me that some people consider it wonderful storytelling.
What starts with a scavenger hunt for dad, which is more forced IMO than finding a water chip or a GECK, turns into story that cuts and copies from Fallout 1 and 2 and not even that good.

There is no intrigue or plot development.
 
Dionysus said:
Yeah, a lot of people that are disenfranchised like to blame top-down pressures, but most of the pressure is bottom up.
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Grow some nuts? Seriously if game reviewers can't handle possible swarms of pre teens/teens having their tantrums what are they doing reviewing games? Have your honest opinion..if some don't agree who gives a shit. Thick skin.
 
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