Fallout 3 QA guy on subject of "200 years later"

I think some of you have a bit of a double standard when it comes to the realism of things in the old fallouts vs the new one. Vault 15 was supposed to have been looted by raiders but you can find a nice 10mm SMG just sitting in one of the armory lockers. There's a fuel cell regulator sitting the back of a car that's so obvious you can see it from the other side of the fence. Even minor stuff like Aradesh's accent are things that wouldn't "really" happen but were left in to make a more interesting game/experience.
 
I dont think it takes a genius to tie up any loose ends and fix any discrepencies with the story. A little time and effort and all will be good.

I think they should allow you to visit the old locations just to give a feeling of nostalgia and maybe incorporate that into the "tieing up" story arc(s).
 
If they had made a game that was set between FO and FO2, they would not have been able to change the PipBoy2000 into the PipBoy3000 with such ease
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How so? It wasn't made after the War, simply some vaults got a newer model, while others got an older one. Not very implausible.

I think they should allow you to visit the old locations just to give a feeling of nostalgia and maybe incorporate that into the "tieing up" story arc(s).
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Maybe Jason Anderson will do that in Fallout Online?
 
Ausir said:
If they had made a game that was set between FO and FO2, they would not have been able to change the PipBoy2000 into the PipBoy3000 with such ease
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True, they must have been made before the war. (Funny, though, how the PipBoy3000 shows pictures of the Vault Boy, guess the company that made the PipBoy series felt they had to do some hidden advertising for Vault Tec industries, eh?)
Still, it's easier to introduce new gimmicks when you set a game AFTER the previous games. Seems a logcal decision to me.
 
Anani Masu said:
I think some of you have a bit of a double standard when it comes to the realism of things in the old fallouts vs the new one.
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What have we been saying about the old Fallouts that create the double standard? If you want I'll say that loot in a ruined, inaccessible underground Vault out in the wasteland can be rationalized quite a bit easier than loot in an open, inhabited ground structure in a relatively densely populated area, but I don't think that really qualifies.

Anani Masu said:
Even minor stuff like Aradesh's accent are things that wouldn't "really" happen but were left in to make a more interesting game/experience.
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That would be one of those cases where artistic license does quite well. I won't complain if the Megaton store owner has a funny accent, promise.
 
Anani Masu said:
I think some of you have a bit of a double standard when it comes to the realism of things in the old fallouts vs the new one...
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hmm, better put this post in such a way so no one deletes it again.
I agree with you Anani. There are lots of things in many games that could be picked apart but to do so only starts to destroy that game and take away the fun of it.
 
deanimate said:
hmm, better put this post in such a way so no one deletes it again.
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We don't delete posts. However, we do remove posts that add nothing and only serve to derail a thread in a pointless way to the vats.

deanimate said:
There are lots of things in many games that could be picked apart but to do so only starts to destroy that game and take away the fun of it.
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There are indeed. And it is equally stupid to just close your eyes to the flaws. I love Fallout, just like I love many games like Planescape: Torment, Arcanum, Vampire: Bloodlines, Pathalogic or Gothic II. But if someone asks me to explain my opinion of them or alternatively someone wants to express criticism, I feel it rather pointless to shut my eyes to their flaws.

Sure, I can just close my eyes, hum and pretend each game is flawless. But does that actually expand on my enjoyment? The flaws are still there. Does ignoring them help me deal with them? Or does understanding them give me a more balanced view and thus a more balanced game experience?

Fallout 3 is showing massive, hard-to-ignore flaws even before it has been released. Will us ignoring those flaws mean they actually don't exist? We certainly never ignored the flaws of Fallout 1/2, a look through our archives will easily uncover loads of discussion of the flawed nature of the games' turn-based system, the unbalanced nature of SPECIAL and - for Fallout 2 - the massive setting flaws.

All this enumerated in the vain hope they would be fixed in Fallout 3. Instead we just get a game with even more flaws.

The advise to just ignore the flaws because it is only a game is not very constructive then, is it?

As such, Anani Masu's claim of "double standards" is ridiculous. We've criticized Fallout 1, we've criticized Fallout 2, we've criticized Van Buren and we'll criticize Bethesda's Fallout 3. So far, Fallout 3 simply looks like it's the most flawed game of the lot. "Double standards" have nothing to do with that.
 
I'm mainly talking about going over the top with the criticisms. there really are times when you just have to think "yeah ok maybe that wooden hut/house would have long since disintegrated but ultimately its a very small issue so lets look at things of much more consequence"
Stuff like the storyline would be one I guess. Personally I don't really know it and so am not, at the moment, criticising it but that doesn't mean I'm not a huge fan of fallout. Different things for different people.

Oh and not to be a turnip or anything but the whole wood issue that some people have. Couldn't the wood have been brought in from somewhere where trees still grow? I don't care but that sounds legitimate to me.
 
deanimate said:
I'm mainly talking about going over the top with the criticisms. there really are times when you just have to think "yeah ok maybe that wooden hut/house would have long since disintegrated but ultimately its a very small issue so lets look at things of much more consequence"
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I agree. If Fallout 3's setting were a perfectly implemented post-apocalyptic world with a great scavenging feel, but it had wooden shacks...then who cares?

But it's not. It's a flawed setting, and the wooden shacks are one flaw.

Though personally I'm kind of on two feet about it; I understand what Bethesda wants to do, showing the idealistic white-picket-fence world of before the war decayed. That's kinda cool.

I'm more worried about what Per cites. Scavenging isolated locations felt more natural in Fallout because it was so thinly populated. Remember how the Glow and Vault 15 were way out in the desert, but in L.A. Boneyard there was nothing to scavenge because it was so densely populated? Well, the supermarket is in an area more densely populated than Boneyard, so why can I scavenge?

deanimate said:
Oh and not to be a turnip or anything but the whole wood issue that some people have. Couldn't the wood have been brought in from somewhere where trees still grow? I don't care but that sounds legitimate to me.
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Uh, the buildings in Springvale are pre-war.
 
You know I wondered about maybe there could be "2" enclaves...

I really need to play through the end of the Fallout 2 again..

But I noticed the other day when I was playing, on the news holotapes in the Army depot, that said the president was actually impeached BEFORE he went to the oil platform. So maybe the oil platform was really a renegade government?

I guess I could have misread it, but it got me thinking. That seems plausable.. but again.. I would have to read the info in the oil platform again.
 
The Sierra Army Depot holodisk is not really canon - it contradicts the official timeline in many places, so Chris Avellone retconned it to be tampered with by the soldiers.

And Todd has clearly said that the Enclave are the "bad guys from Fallout 2" and that they're "back".
 
Brother None said:
I'm more worried about what Per cites. Scavenging isolated locations felt more natural in Fallout because it was so thinly populated. Remember how the Glow and Vault 15 were way out in the desert, but in L.A. Boneyard there was nothing to scavenge because it was so densely populated? Well, the supermarket is in an area more densely populated than Boneyard, so why can I scavenge?
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Well the supermarket is currently the base of operations for a large raider group so it not like it's just sitting there unattended. I'm pretty sure one of the previews mentioned the raiders had established elaborate catwalks on top of the aisle shelves.
 
Anani Masu said:
Well the supermarket is currently the base of operations for a large raider group so it not like it's just sitting there unattended. I'm pretty sure one of the previews mentioned the raiders had established elaborate catwalks on top of the aisle shelves.
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And that would explain the medicine still being on the shelf where it was originally sold how, exactly?
 
Well for the first 150 or so years no humans were present to loot it. Then in 2241 Carl Bruisehand discovered it established a raider camp there to protect and live off the cache. Now his daughter Marl Bruisehand continues in her papa's tradition of being a big ol dick and not letting anyone else have access.

I don't know man, how the hell am I supposed to answer that?

Maybe the raider's like how it's organized?

Maybe environmental factors sealed it off until a few years ago?

There's supposed to be a protectron in the back thats not working, maybe a sister bot kept everyone away before recent?

Maybe you're over analyzing this because after 10 years someone is making a Fallout 3 and isn't running everything by you for approval?
 
Anani Masu said:
Maybe you're over analyzing this because after 10 years someone is making a Fallout 3 and isn't running everything by you for approval?
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And you fall back on the same strawman that has already been debunked multiple times in this thread.

If I didn't like you so much, I'd give you a strike for trolling. For now, I'll just tell you to man up and stop relying on those kind of bullshit arguments.
 
Anani Masu said:
Maybe you're over analyzing this because after 10 years someone is making a Fallout 3 and isn't running everything by you for approval?
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We're talking about realism versus believability, I'm throwing out an example of a possible pitfall with the caveat that we only have descriptions from previews, you take issue with this and we're overanalysing it?
 
I'm being honest when I say this strikes me as pissing in your own cheerios. Why are there still some supplies left in the Super Duper Mart? I don't know. I also don't know why there is a giant plastic cow covered in kudzu by a road near my house. I could speculate that it was some sort of promotional thing for a local farm or A&M college just as I proffered some speculation as to the stocked shelves earlier. The only thing I know is that giant disintegrating cows covered in kudzu are kinda freaky, and there are some raiders occupying a supermarket where there are still some supplies.
 
Raiders occyping a supermarket with supplies intact after 200 years, you mean. Just because you can make up an excuse for something doesn't mean that the explanation makes sense and doesn't suck.
 
Anani Masu said:
I'm being honest when I say this strikes me as pissing in your own cheerios.
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Ok, then here's the thing: we don't care.

"I don't think this is a subject worth discussing" is not an argument. If you don't feel it's worth discussing, don't discuss it. You have no business telling us what we should feel is important enough to discuss any more than we have the right to tell other people they should care about whatever we care about.

That's it. Period. Fullstop. End of the line. Either actually discuss the point or shut up, don't discuss whether or not the point is worth discussing.
 
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