I... really, really like Fallout 4. Oh, god.

Magnus said:
phipboy said:
I completely disagree about perks. Simple as that. It's a horrible system and playing it a bit I have concluded that it's awful. There is no strategy evolved, all of it comes down to how you assigned SPECIAL points and even that requires no strategy or thinking. If anything Strength and Intelligence seem to be the best probably. It also doesn't help that the game is really easy in general. Might be better than skills in some sense but it's a completely backwards system. Improving the actual skills and their balance would have been much better. Compared to FNV the lack of skills is really felt and the skills in the classic games didn't bother me too much. You know you didn't really have to increase your Barter, First Aid etc but that's what makes it a good RPG.

E: I can totally see though how some people who just completely switch their minds off and don't pay attention to the characters, writing, setting etc can enjoy the game. I can't really do that anymore as it's just awful to see so much potential lost.
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Now, think about this for a second. What is the fundamental difference between skills and perks? There isn't one, really. Every time you level up, you get a (perkpoint/skillpoint) that you put in a (perk/skill), and it makes you better at (science/medicine/guns/talking etc...).

The way I see it, the perks in Fallout 4 are the skills, just a bit confusingly laid out. If you invest, say, 100 points in Guns in New Vegas, you will do a lot more damage with guns. This is the equivalent of spending 5 perk points on gun-related perks in Fallout 4, in which case you will also do a lot more damage with guns, but it will be the guns that you chose to spend perks for, like say if you invested 3 of them in the Sniper perk, one in the no-scope accuracy perk and one in the non-automatic Rifles perk, you would have a completely different build than one who spent all of them on pistols.

Furthermore, the benefits you would gain from the perks are much more diverse than just a flat hit bonus or damage. They range from armor piercing, knockdowns, ammo use, accuracy, pretty much anything you could think of regarding the "skill" that they're related to.

So in conclusion, the skills are an unnecessary abstraction that don't help to define your character any further than what can be achieved with perks. Saying that a character can heal crippled limbs with stimpaks and has 20% armor penetration with revolvers is more describing than saying he has 25 Medic skill and 50 Guns skill.
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I see the simplication of the perk system that way too. My issue is that, there isnt really much reasons to diversify your points in other elements.
The game is like you said, a shooter. You invest in Guns, Maybe in a few in intelligence and a few in luck for criticals.
Is there any significance in fully investing in Intelligence or Charisma, because i honestly dont get a sense in the changes in the game play as a highly charming intelligent fellow. It just simply makes the game more challenging without the combat buffs since the game focuses way too much on combat anyway.

If the essense of the game is about diversification, and finding different ways to complete a quest (main quest at least), i can see the revelance of it. Right now, its just a hoax in my mind.
 
Magnus said:
phipboy said:
Umm.. No. It's totally fine if you disagree with me and I'm not disagreeing with you for the sake of disagreeing with you.

If it helps, perhaps you tell me how did your experience go with the leveling up system? Did you feel like it was a good system over-all that made you think and made you feel like you've actually improved in a certain direction?

I'm not the best person to discuss these things. Others know better for sure.
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Well, my first and currently only character is a brainy type with 6 strength and 9 intelligence (I made a thread about him here), and his other stats are kinda crap. Here's roughly how I've played with him:

1. Study perk chart for half an hour. Decide that I can't make sense of it, and will save levels until I know what playstyle I want.
2. Play the game and discover that gun mods are awesome, but that you need Gun Nut in order to make gun mods.
3. Pick Gun Nut. Discover that you need to scrap junk for materials for gun mods.
4. Pick Scrapper to increase gained scrap. Run around Concord to look for junk, realize that I can't open safes.
5. Pick Locksmith so I can open safes. Play until I find Power Armor, fall in love with it.
6. Pick Armorer so I can trick out my Power Armor.

That's about as far as I've gone, but now I realize that I've progressed into a sort of well-armored looter and crafter build. I need a weapon, though. Since I took Gun Nut I'll probably not go for Energy Weapons, and my Perception is too low to do anything with sniper rifles or explosives (I refuse to spend perks on increasing SPECIALs until I really have to), but since I do have the strength for it I'm thinking about taking Heavy weapons, with Melee ones as backup. My Minigun is out of ammo, so my next perk will be either Blacksmith (melee weapon mods) or the one that increases melee damage. I like the Power Armor so I'll also be getting the perk that gives them longer-lasting fuel, but for now I'll focus on my melee skills.

So, I can't say it feels any different from how I would normally level up my character in an RPG. It's not a marked improvement over a skill system done well, but if the skills' only function are as a prerequisite for picking perks (which they are in Bethesda's games), then you might as well not have them and only go with the perks.
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Ok, i just read this post. I think that makes sense.
 
GlowHound said:
The Dutch Ghost said:
Kilgore Trout said:
snip
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That is the design plan for Fallout 5. Emil, Todd, and Pete will promote it as the most immersive game experience ever in which the player can do whatever he or she wants to do. And this time there won't even be a storyline to possible obstruct the player.
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And there would still be essential characters that aren't children.
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It could actually work as a spin-off STALKER style game. But Bethesda...
 
Magnus said:
Let's be honest, when was the last time in Fallout 2 that you leveled Barter, First Aid, Gambling, Sneak, Throwing or Traps (apart from assassinating Bishop, which I admit is a valid reason)? And even when you did level one of the useful skills, what part of that was enjoyable aside from seeing a number go up?
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Always.
harry-2.gif



My last PC had Gambling Tagged; and the joy was walking into a casino with 5 caps, and leaving with 1500.
(But it's true about First Aid, it's better to level it up with books first.)

I thought Power Armor looked and seemed to behave, just perfect when I saw it in the game trailer.
 
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In original fallout, they didn't add level requirements on weapon skills. Now you have to be level X to do some damage. It's a TES game system. I love open world shooters like Far Cry series, but this doesn't make it Fallout.
 
Dr Fallout said:
Kilgore Trout said:
Gizmojunk said:
I thought Power Armor looked and seemed to behave, just perfect when I saw it in the game trailer.
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That seems to be the one thing they got right, at least aesthetically. Power Armor was an ugly joke in Fallout 3 and even New Vegas.
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They got that right at least. Nothing else.
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And even then, they still fucked it up. Made easy to find everywhere, get it at an early level, enemies have it, "power armor gang", and the shit runs on AA batteries.
 
Doctor 0 said:
Dr Fallout said:
Kilgore Trout said:
Gizmojunk said:
I thought Power Armor looked and seemed to behave, just perfect when I saw it in the game trailer.
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That seems to be the one thing they got right, at least aesthetically. Power Armor was an ugly joke in Fallout 3 and even New Vegas.
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They got that right at least. Nothing else.
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And even then, they still fucked it up. Made easy to find everywhere, get it at an early level, enemies have it, "power armor gang", and the shit runs on AA batteries.
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Yeah found some Power armour gangs. Damn it but how did they get it?
 
It's not that unreasonable that someone reverse engineered an old suit they found lying around and started manufacturing them again. I mean, the player can do it, why shouldn't they?

I just realized that you can find power armor before the quest in Concord that lets you do it. I'm going to try taking that quest while actually wearing power armor, and see if their reaction is different. If it is, good. If not... cringe.
 
Kilgore Trout said:
Kind of makes you wonder why Bethesda bothers with plotlines at all - they should just make a pure open world sandbox, with lots of flashy guns and exploration, and no plot or semblance of a plot. Just build your character, drop them into the world, and run around picking up loot, blowing people's heads off, and hiking. No quests, no real dialogue beyond combat taunts, no endgame.

This would play to their strengths, rather than their weaknesses (i.e. writing of any kind). Best of all, there would be no need for them to confuse fans of RPGs; they could just call it a sandbox FPS (with crafting).
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Nope, can't happen, won't happen.
As much as Bethesda fans taking their freedom and agency as a digital crack, they can't do anything in a pure sandbox situation. There are already other open world games that focused almost purely on sandboxing and guess what? They don't sell. Despite the freedom and player agency these people worship so much and used against the slightest trace of "linear" experience, they still "proper" context from the game itself so their free behavior still have some meaning. This is the reason why GTA so goddamned popular and even more so on Bethesda case since their game featured customizable protagonist, something that GTA doesn't have besides San Andreas (lite customization) and GTA Online (it also doesn't sell as much as it should, due to lack of context I mentioned).

Personally, I called this oxymoronic demand, a sickness that plagued many core gamer. Yes. not casual but core gamer.
 
shengar said:
Kilgore Trout said:
Kind of makes you wonder why Bethesda bothers with plotlines at all - they should just make a pure open world sandbox, with lots of flashy guns and exploration, and no plot or semblance of a plot. Just build your character, drop them into the world, and run around picking up loot, blowing people's heads off, and hiking. No quests, no real dialogue beyond combat taunts, no endgame.

This would play to their strengths, rather than their weaknesses (i.e. writing of any kind). Best of all, there would be no need for them to confuse fans of RPGs; they could just call it a sandbox FPS (with crafting).
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Nope, can't happen, won't happen.
As much as Bethesda fans taking their freedom and agency as a digital crack, they can't do anything in a pure sandbox situation. There are already other open world games that focused almost purely on sandboxing and guess what? They don't sell. Despite the freedom and player agency these people worship so much and used against the slightest trace of "linear" experience, they still "proper" context from the game itself so their free behavior still have some meaning. This is the reason why GTA so goddamned popular and even more so on Bethesda case since their game featured customizable protagonist, something that GTA doesn't have besides San Andreas (lite customization) and GTA Online (it also doesn't sell as much as it should, due to lack of context I mentioned).

Personally, I called this oxymoronic demand, a sickness that plagued many core gamer. Yes. not casual but core gamer.
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Yeah, Far Cry 2 was basically this, and I for one found it horrible.

Again though, I think Bethesda's writing has improved a little in Fallout 4. Maybe not the quests or the story, but at least the dialogue has some more nuances to it. Yesterday I was exploring an old satellite dish, and when I found a fusion core Codsworth started a little monologue lamenting the death of technology. That's neat. They also have about 5 different ways for him to say "I don't feel one way or another about you" when you question your relationship with him, which is good. And his combat taunts are priceless.
 
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That's not real dialog though, of course I can not comment on all quests and possible situations, I am sure there are some good lines here and there - but not EVERYTHING was garbage in Fallout 3 either! But when you look directly at the dialog in good RPGs, and I am not just talking about Fallout, I could say The Witcher 1, Planescape, Arcanum and many more, the dialog wheel makes pretty much everything bad in Fallout 4. What works in Mass Effect - for the most part ... - is very much a problem in Fallout 4, simply because Bethesda as company hasn't really worked with that concept.

Magnus said:
It's not that unreasonable that someone reverse engineered an old suit they found lying around and started manufacturing them again. I mean, the player can do it, why shouldn't they?
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That's kind of a problem though, the old games made it relatively clear that maintaining, repairing, leave alone building a power armor requires a very high and sophisticated understanding of technology. Usually no one really reverse-engineers a lot in Fallout. If I remember correctly, even the Brotherhood comments on the fact that they can't really do much more than keeping the PAs they already have in good shape as they can't really construct new ones, making it a rather rare piece of technology.

Power armor gangs in F4 just make me cringe. It seems that it slowly but steadily just becomes as common like any other piece of generic equipment :S
 
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I think I'd like Fallout 4 for the weapons, armor, modding, and possibly town building. Dear God! I may end up liking it.
 
The_Guide said:
In original fallout, they didn't add level requirements on weapon skills. Now you have to be level X to do some damage. It's a TES game system. I love open world shooters like Far Cry series, but this doesn't make it Fallout.
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True. In the older Fallout series high gun skill didn't affect damage with guns, just accuracy. I'm guessing they took the formula in Fallout 3 and put it in 4 where higher level and gun skill means moooooooooooores damagesssz. Fucking Bethesda.
 
As an action game is solid. As a Fallout game tho... that's a nother story.

Also the Settlement building is extremely clunky and monotonous, I tried doing some of it for a while and just got bored of crafting beds and planting melons....
 
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