Fallout 3 screenshots galore

[Brother None]

Seeing that Intense Training alone already has 10 ranks, this could theoretically mean there are only 10 "real" perks with each 10 ranks in the game, yes?

Theoretically, sure. I doubt there are as many perks with multiple ranks.

Not sure why they count multiple ranks either.

And as for intense training/bobble-head, it's already become pretty clear that Fallout 3 features severely nerved characteristics. The importance of skills is down vs the importance of your attributes. Hence it doesn't matter as much when they're pumped up as it did for Fallout 1/2.

 

[Seymour the spore plant]

We knew Jet is in from the OFLC reports. We knew BB ammo is in because you get a BB Gun while still in the Vault.

Yeah, had completely forgotten about that BB gun thing (though I still suspect they'll include the Red Ryder). The Jet part was, to me, a little unclear due to the recent Ultrajet thing, so I took this as confirmation that both the original and this enhanced version are in. You're also probably right about the tag skills, the wording just got me thinking if they couldn't have changed them as well since I don't recall details on that having being revealed yet.

In many ways they are poking fun at themselves when they made those characters.

In Morrowind I might have agreed with you, since M'aiq mostly spouts baseless rumours about features that were left out, like how to become a Lich when there's simply no way to do it. I find it very hard to see it that way in Oblivion though, since most of his lines are specifically directed at complainers and calling them fools, which is pretty mean-spirited any way you look at it.

Seeing that Intense Training alone already has 10 ranks, this could theoretically mean there are only 10 "real" perks with each 10 ranks in the game, yes?

Back when the fan interview was released I did the math on the original's ranks, which amounted to 96 "perks" in Todd's definition (112 with the traits) versus 53 "real" ones. If there aren't other perks like Intense Training and most stay on the 1-3 ranks range, I guess we can expect about the same variety here.

 

[UncannyGarlic]

once we were playing the game, found that the difference between the two systems was so similar that even half the entries in the community "design a perk" contest were actually traits.

Note how this sentence does not actually make any sense, whatsoever.

But yes, fun triumphs over sensible design once again.

Indeed, it's pretty bad when you have six weeks to write the answers and you end up with crap like that -_-;

In many ways they are poking fun at themselves when they made those characters.

In Morrowind I might have agreed with you, since M'aiq mostly spouts baseless rumours about features that were left out, like how to become a Lich when there's simply no way to do it. I find it very hard to see it that way in Oblivion though, since most of his lines are specifically directed at complainers and calling them fools, which is pretty mean-spirited any way you look at it.

It's a really good and clear example of how they interact with and treat their fanbase. It's just something you don't do because it's completely out of line and, as a business, damages company image which results in damage to sales. Granted it's not as bad as it could be due to the nature of gaming journalism but considering how much they rely on PR for selling their games, it's not a good idea to surround themselves with PR clubs that could be used to KO them.

 

[bonustime]

Seeing that Intense Training alone already has 10 ranks, this could theoretically mean there are only 10 "real" perks with each 10 ranks in the game, yes?

Theoretically, sure. I doubt there are as many perks with multiple ranks.

Not sure why they count multiple ranks either.

And as for intense training/bobble-head, it's already become pretty clear that Fallout 3 features severely nerved characteristics. The importance of skills is down vs the importance of your attributes. Hence it doesn't matter as much when they're pumped up as it did for Fallout 1/2.

In Fallout 2 you had the option of increasing most(can't remember exactly which ones) stats by one via the BoS computer and those memchip things. Dunno if the bobbleheads are going to be as difficult to get and take as long to use as those though.
The ten ranks of intense training as well as the fact that you get a perk per level could be compensating for the lack of a Gifted trait. Why they would want to compensate for an absolutely broken trait that shouldn't have even made it to Fallout 2 I have no clue.
Anyways if you took gifted with skilled(essentially the stat gain without the skill loss) you would get a perk every 4 levels instead of three. If you get 7 ranks of intense training in the new system that takes up 35% of the perks you can get(with the level 20 cap). 35% of 3 is roughly 1, or in other words the decrease in perk rate you would get for choosing skilled.
Basically this make me assume it was intended to preserve and balance the old traits while removing their negative parts.
I have to say I still disagree with getting rid of traits and the perk per level nonsense. I liked how in Fallout when you made your character what you chose determined a lot of how what you would end up being able to do. It kind of gave them I guess the word for it would be "character".
I don't like the idea that as you play through the game you could basically do whatever you want and that is how this game is starting to sound a bit. I want my character to be well defined at the start.

 

[Dougly]

I want my character to be well defined at the start.

Gifted + small frame baby! When you have 8 extra character points you can kill whoever you want and use their bookshelves to expand your inventory.

Heh. Lately I've been using Gifted + bruiser a lot. For some reason - perhaps because I'm kind of a big guy in "real life" - I really do like the "bruiser" trait.

On my last run through of F2, I had a ST of 9 and an unarmed skill of about 150%. Though my unarmed skill was "only" around 120% by the time I did the boxing in New Reno, the matches were still unbelievably easy. The only one that gave me trouble was the next to last match. That guy stayed up, despite being blinded and taking a busted arm.

Even better yet: By the end of the game, I could knock down a Super Mutant with one punch to the eyes. Such a thrill.

 

[BowserJesus]

I always chose BM + small guns + .223 pistol. The sweet, sweet sound of the .223.

 

[Endless Void]

These screens are more OK compared to the ones seen before but still they are plain shit IMO... And isn't it funny that all the time complaining about "immershun" they still come out with immersion breakers such as lack of shadows and annoyingly HUGE HUD? I was thinking they'd go for an approach like in Call of Cthulhu when they were yapping all about immersion...

Edit: Oh, also... WTF!!! Mansions!!!??!! What happened to the houses constructed by junk? All I see now is a mansion and ruins...

 

[epiphany]

I think the HUD looks strange because these screens are distorted as hell. The monitor from wich they were taken is probably 16:10, or how they make widescreen monitors today, I don't know.. Here the screens are almost square in proportions and as a result everything is stretched vertically and compressed horisontally.

 

[Lich]

I'm here to buy.

I have to go now.

 

[Public]

These screens are more OK compared to the ones seen before but still they are plain shit IMO... And isn't it funny that all the time complaining about "immershun" they still come out with immersion breakers such as lack of shadows and annoyingly HUGE HUD? I was thinking they'd go for an approach like in Call of Cthulhu when they were yapping all about immersion...

Edit: Oh, also... WTF!!! Mansions!!!??!! What happened to the houses constructed by junk? All I see now is a mansion and ruins...

Looks like mansions and 200 years old wooden ruins were easier to build, because they already had them in Oblivion and Morrowind.

The wierdest thing is this guy sitting on a chair. it's like...where the hell this guy came from? Oblivion's portal brought him?

And I really don't know how you people can say the dialog looks bad or nice only from few lines of it...

I think the HUD looks strange because these screens are distorted as hell.

You want to tell me distortions made it so huge?

The HUD reminds me of Quake 4. It worked fine in Q4, because Q4 is an FPS. But Fallout 3 is suppose to be RPG right?

 

[kyle]

The good news is that there are a ton of perks, around 100 if you include the multiple ranks. And with a level cap of 20, you still have only 19 times you get to pick one, so you need at least 5 playthroughs of the game to use them all.

I would just like things to be a little more ... clear whenever Todd opens his mouth.

well, at least he didnt give total number of possible perks combinations at lvl 20 ...

Also, seems like pulse guns didnt make it into F3

 

[BowserJesus]

Looks like mansions and 200 years old wooden ruins were easier to build, because they already had them in Oblivion and Morrowind.

Its a Mansion. So what? I don't remember mansions in Oblivion.

The wierdest thing is this guy sitting on a chair. it's like...where the hell this guy came from? Oblivion's portal brought him?

Why the hell does it matter, he's some eccentric bastard who wanted to see a nuke go off. It doesn't sound like Oblivion to me.

I think the HUD looks strange because these screens are distorted as hell.

You want to tell me distortions made it so huge?

The HUD reminds me of Quake 4. It worked fine in Q4, because Q4 is an FPS. But Fallout 3 is suppose to be RPG right?

Every game has a HUD, this one just has more tricks up its sleeve.

 

[alec]

Looks like mansions and 200 years old wooden ruins were easier to build, because they already had them in Oblivion and Morrowind.

Its a Mansion. So what? I don't remember mansions in Oblivion.

Ultimately, though, that ain't the point. The point is that those wooden houses and even that nice mansion shouldn't be in the game in the first place. Why? Decay. It doesn't take a mansion, and certainly not a wooden house, several centuries to fall apart, especially not if they were heavily damaged by explosions and so on. Read here if you don't believe me: http://home.howstuffworks.com/house-entropy.htm/printable

There is a reason why FO and FO2 featured so many shacks that were obviously made from rubble and scrap: it is how a post-apoc world would essentially look. And seeing FO3 takes place in an even later timeframe, the chance of seeing structures like these (see pic) still stand erect is beyond nihil.




It's stupid to even think they would look the way they are looking sans being repaired. Wind, rain, an earthquake, frost, time ... all of these things have such a damaging effect on what humans build, if it weren't for the daily TLC and repairworks we do, nothing would still be standing. There's a pub in Ghent, Den Turk, which dates from the fourteenth century. There is a reason it is still standing there: it was cared for, repaired, redecorated, and so on. If no one would have cared to do that, it wouldn't have survived the fifteenth century, even without bombs going off and so on.

All of this leads me to believe that the developers at Bethesda do not only not grasp the Fallout lore but also have not that much insight in how stuff works.

 

[HoKa]

<inventory>

Is that how we're going to browse the frigging inventory? These guys have serious learning disabilities. Furthermore...

I don't know if you've noticed from the previous batch of screenshots but these two houses are actually the same. And they're right next to each other. Say hello to repetitive landscape.

Also notice how nothing in the world casts a shadow. This game is old.

 

[MrBumble]

These two facades have already been discussed to death...The lack of shadows however really bothers me since it seems that they didn't even try to fix it since oblivion ( and oblivion DID have shadows in the E3 video which means that their stupid engine is able to handle projected shadows but for some reason they cut them off ).

 

[Beelzebud]

Yeah the inventory system looks like it totally blows. Just a direct copy/paste of the crap we saw in oblivion.

I guess it wasn't pure IMMERSHION to have a Fallout-style inventory.

 

[Pope Viper]

Bahhh, you guys.

No shadows? The lighting never changes in Bethesda's Fallout.

Duplicate housing? Everyone likes each other's house, and rather then having a society try to "keep up with the Jones", they all have the exact same house.

B'am!

 

[whirlingdervish]

A mansion that doesn't even look as convincing as the one in Resident Evil (the original for PSX)?

Bah! in Bethesda's Fallout things aren't supposed to look better than a game from many years ago, even if they are completely out of place and quite possibly intentionally copied from the other game in an attempt to sell their "survival horror" FPS..

Have we all figured out where they got the idea for the behemoth yet?

*hint

 

[Brother None]

Edit: Oh, also... WTF!!! Mansions!!!??!! What happened to the houses constructed by junk? All I see now is a mansion and ruins...

That's not a mansion, it's the top of Tenpenny Towers. That's to say, it should be the top of Tenpenny Towers since that's where you set off the nuke, but it doesn't actually look like I remember it. Particularly the view is different.

Also, Megaton has junk-constructed houses.

Basically this make me assume it was intended to preserve and balance the old traits while removing their negative parts

Any logic which reads you're "supposed to" take certain perks, as in they're infinitely superior no matter what kind of build you have, is incredibly broken and shitty design.

If your analysis is right, that's really stupid.

There is a reason why FO and FO2 featured so many shacks that were obviously made from rubble and scrap: it is how a post-apoc world would essentially look. And seeing FO3 takes place in an even later timeframe, the chance of seeing structures like these (see pic) still stand erect is beyond nihil.

Nonsense, alec. Fallout also featured old buildings still standing (in the Hub and L.A. boneyard). Fallout 2 did less so, but Fallout 2 had that horrible feel of reconstruction and society living again we really want to avoid.

Yes, perhaps Fallout 3 being set when it is doesn't make much sense, I've noted so myself, but I think the concept of buildings - including wooden shacks - still standing rubs pretty well with the typical view of post-apocalyptic society in the retro-50s sense of Fallout. It works, I think. Though it would have been better if it hadn't been 200 years.

 

[alec]

Nonsense, alec. Fallout also featured old buildings still standing (in the Hub and L.A. boneyard). Fallout 2 did less so, but Fallout 2 had that horrible feel of reconstruction and society living again we really want to avoid.

Nonsense, Brother None. Fallout starts in 2161, 84 years after the Great War (2077). It seems perfectly acceptable to me that large concrete buildings, the kind we get a glimpse of in, for instance, Necropolis, would still "stand" after such a period, although decay would have already set in (as we can see).

Fallout 2 starts in 2241, 80 years after the events occuring in Fallout and 164 years after the Great War. As you say so yourself: FO2 featured less remnants of the old world, except for locations such as Vault City (but that's the magic of the G.E.C.K., I guess) or New Reno (fun city, but totally misplaced). 164 years after the Great War, the only thing making sense would have to be shantytowns and lots of rubble and debris.

Fallout 3 starts in 2277, 200 years after the Great War and what do we suddenly have? Wooden houses (wooden!), damaged by the war, but hey: still standing strong.

That doesn't make any sense whatsoever. None. And it doesn't matter whether the developers and - so to see - even you think that

the concept of buildings - including wooden shacks - still standing rubs pretty well with the typical view of post-apocalyptic society in the retro-50s sense of Fallout.

It doesn't matter a thing. It is absurd. That's all there is to say about it. FO2 already made horrible mistakes in that respect, where to my knowledge FO didn't. Instead of repairing those mistakes, FO3 will just add some more to the pile. I don't see how anyone can be glad with such decisions.

Thing is: 200 years after the war is the most retarded timeframe to set FO3 in IF you desperately want to see ruins and old, heavily damaged wooden houses to render that post-apoc retro fifties atmosphere. If they had had a little common sense, they would have situated FO3 between FO and FO2.

As it is, FO3 should feature nothing but deserts, deserts, deserts, deserts and shantytowns. And no rebuilding, 'cause without fuel rebuilding towns like we know them is completely out of the question on each and every level. But hey: deserts and deserts and small scale shantytowns wouldn't look very good in a FPS, now would they? Stuff like that could perfectly work in an isometric game (where you never get to see the horizon), but in a FPS it would make for nothing but emptiness, but of the wrong kind (not the sense of desolate emptiness FO gives you). And that's why we can see a D.C. Washington in ruins, even though it's 200 years since the bombs fell: it's eye-candy. It's simple cosmetics. And you know what? That just sucks. Like pretty much everything else FO3 seems to stand for.