Microsoft has bought Zenimax/Bethesda

[Jabberwok]

I can accept the Legion Assassins/NCR Ranger kill teams way more than those guys in FO3, Talon Company? like who the fuck are these guys and who is paying them? Or the Bounty Hunters, these fucks don't even have farms but somehow gathered enough people together to get a Bondsmans Guild going.

I forgot Talon Company existed. I did not manage to retain much of that game. I know I was following Liam Neeson, and there were some annoying Brotherhood types, and some super mutants who yelled a lot. That's about it. Oh, there was a DLC about hicks, and another one about aliens. I stopped thinking about all of it the moment I stopped playing it.

 

[The Dutch Ghost]

Basically they are the Mid Tier enemy type which you have to face once you have graduated from giant bugs and raiders.

The Gunners, another random militia served that role in Fallout 4.

 

[TheGM]

I forgot Talon Company existed. I did not manage to retain much of that game.

Bethesda seems to be obsessed with these militaristic raider gangs masquerading as mercenaries. FO4 had The Gunners(had to go to the wiki to get the name of these guys). It's like they want to the do the Remnant of the US Army gang but then they remember they keep setting the game 200+ years since there was a US Army....also the BOS already fill that role. Oh but they are the evil remnants. We got that too...The Enclave.

Legion wants to Assassinate you for messing up their plans and killing their troops. Some guy hired those schmucks at Talon Company to kill you because you gave a hobo a water bottle and we need more things to shoot at. at least Bethesda know their audience.

 

[eissa]

Only in Fallout 3 Charisma stat works. Also i prefer repair mechanic in 3. But Charisma, i dont think any fallout games has manage to make it functional beyond fan made pnp rpg. I hope Sawyer can address this should New Vegas get a remake/sequel.

 

[Lucas9]

Conversely, walking the Mojave in Vegas felt like an arduous chore. Empty walking between my destinations (which I really wanted to get to and enjoyed) so I could speed over to the next faction or questline.

My two cents:

1. Yes, the Mojave is a chore. Then again, I always found Bethesda's open world philosophy a chore because eventually you explore everything and the walking remains.
   
2. It's supposed to be a desert, and having it packed with stuff to kill or explore wouldn't make much sense.

I'd say the actual problem with the map in New Vegas is that many of its little locations are not particularly interesting in the slightest. But the real issue is that the design philosophy for these games (which Obsidian forcefully inherited from Bethedsa) is, IMO, flawed.

Clearly a lot of people disagree! And they love Skyrim and Fallout 4 just fine. Not me, though. I prefer the classic Fallout approach: the worthwile places are given their own map, the meaningless places are replaced by an overworld which represents your movement and is populated with random encounters. Doesn't help that the game looks like shit. A nicely done 3D overworld (like Wasteland 2's, don't know about 3) would be great. I think the Hardcore system would greatly benefit from having to genuinely get enough rations to survive long treks into unknown territories.

The additional problem with New Vegas is that the way it is structured, most quests require you to come and go from the city of New Vegas or nearby, and thus eventually you will want to fast travel to deal with the tedium, and in doing so, stop engaging into fights altogether. On my latest playthrough, I installed a handful of mods that added more life to the wasteland, and it truly felt artificial.

Bethesda's gameplay design philosophy places too much importance into stuff I don't care about, to the detriment of things I DO care about. Large worlds with LOTS of content ends up with a lot of samey content, down to the assets. LOTS of combat means that, at the end of the day, few (if any) encounters require tactical thought, just popamole cover shooting (if it even comes down to that, generally you can snipe everyone from stealth or from a distance).

Overall I think Fallout should go back to its isometric roots because that's easier than trying to fix it as an open world FPS RPG. But if one COULD do the latter, it would be nice to see it bring back many mechanics and aspects of the classics. One thing I've always loved was the postcards when reaching a location. Imagine reaching a location, and having the option to look at the entrance from a fully realized 3D perspective. Maybe you reached the destination at night, and when you turn your camera around, you get to see (from miles upon miles upon miles away) a shining light that is the city of New Vegas.

My conclusion from writing this post is that Fallout has lost that which it had in spades in the 90s: substance, and STYLE. There's no style anymore because Bethesda treats Fallout as a glorified Elder Scrolls mod.

 

[Norzan]

Honestly, New Vegas would have benefitted much more from a smaller map. It would have allowed the devs to make several of the smaller locations have actual content instead of just enemies to shoot or stuff to loot, and given them more time to flesh out other locations. Probably would have given more time to also put every Legion content into the game that they wanted to.

Instead either Obsidian decided to do a big map because that's Bethesda thing or were forced by Bethesda to make a big world because that's what Bethesda believes makes Fallout sell apparently.


I'll take a medium sized map where every location is worthwhile and memorable instead of a shitty big world filled with copy and pasted dungeons that only exist to give short bursts of dopamine rush, something that only works in the short term. The former is a far better experience to me because the game doesn't drag on for hundreds of hours of filler, forgettable content.

So again, i don't want Bethesda's terrible world design to be put in any Fallout that would be worked on by Obsidian.

 

[Mr Fish]

I'd rather have individual map nodes where if you go too close to the exit the green border shows and once you exit it you get a world map to travel on instead. Fallout 1 and 2 barely has any dungeons. The focus was on the civilized locations and even in them a lot of the time you didn't need to resort to combat what so ever.

 

[Jabberwok]

I'd rather have individual map nodes where if you go too close to the exit the green border shows and once you exit it you get a world map to travel on instead. Fallout 1 and 2 barely has any dungeons. The focus was on the civilized locations and even in them a lot of the time you didn't need to resort to combat what so ever.

Exactly. Using a world map would stretch the same amount of content much further. And they could use a mix of random and authored areas for encounters, that would make the world feel huge. Though AAA seems to be allergic to procgen... Probably too difficult to control, or doesn't suit the content generation pipeline.

 

[The Dutch Ghost]

Another benefit of using a world map is that locations can be used that are otherwise not in range of each other.
Interesting locations do not always tend to be close to each other to the point that one can easily walk between them.

I feel FNV did the best with a bad situation as at least Las Vegas and Hoover Dam are close to each other.
With a world map though places such as Flagstaff and other Legion controlled settlements could have been included.
It also makes it much easier to add in new locations through expansions.

 

[RangerBoo]

Bethesda seems to be obsessed with these militaristic raider gangs masquerading as mercenaries. FO4 had The Gunners(had to go to the wiki to get the name of these guys). It's like they want to the do the Remnant of the US Army gang but then they remember they keep setting the game 200+ years since there was a US Army....also the BOS already fill that role. Oh but they are the evil remnants. We got that too...The Enclave.

Legion wants to Assassinate you for messing up their plans and killing their troops. Some guy hired those schmucks at Talon Company to kill you because you gave a hobo a water bottle and we need more things to shoot at. at least Bethesda know their audience.

Yeah, Bethesda didn't really put much thought into the assassin encounters. The Reputation System is much better for this then the Karma System. Your reputation is low with a certain faction for messing with their plans or killing their men then they will come after you and try to kill you. Makes so much more sense from a gameplay perspective.

 

[KingArthur]

I just don't get karma-based shit in general for the most part. Take Childkiller for example; if you were known for that, it's perfectly reasonable that someone wants you dead. But if I'm a good man and Talon Company is hired "just cause", then it's absolutely retarded. What they SHOULD HAVE DONE is linked the assassins to the Contract Killer and Lawbringer perks, so that these Regulators and Talon Mercs would be after you based on faction allegiance, albeit a rudimentary form of it.

 

[Mr Fish]

I just don't get karma-based shit in general for the most part. Take Childkiller for example; if you were known for that, it's perfectly reasonable that someone wants you dead. But if I'm a good man and Talon Company is hired "just cause", then it's absolutely retarded. What they SHOULD HAVE DONE is linked the assassins to the Contract Killer and Lawbringer perks, so that these Regulators and Talon Mercs would be after you based on faction allegiance, albeit a rudimentary form of it.

IIRC there's some lore reason for why Talon Company is after you. They're meant to sow chaos and destruction and keep the region destabilized so your good deeds are fucking those plans up.

 

[RangerBoo]

IIRC there's some lore reason for why Talon Company is after you. They're meant to sow chaos and destruction and keep the region destabilized so your good deeds are fucking those plans up.

It is still dumb as Bethesda never tells you what those plans are. With the Legion and NCR we know what their plans are and why they would want someone like you dead. Sometimes you need to tell the audiences the why of things. Bethesda however is like: "Fuck that! That would take way too much thinking and work."
With Bethesda games you are always guessing or left in the dark. This is why I have compared Bethesda with J.J Abrams in the past and not in a good way. They both use the stupid "Mystery Box" concept as a means to fill in the holes of their stories and worlds.

 

[Mr Fish]

It is still dumb as Bethesda never tells you what those plans are.

Of course it's dumb, Bethesda wrote it.

 

[Black Angel]

New Vegas's maps being empty? Walking there is 'boring'?!! Frankly, I never remembered any moment in New Vegas where walking from places to places being 'boring'. If anything, I actually like just trekking across emptier stretch of plains once in a while, sure as hell preferable to FO3 where literally every 5 seconds I came across critters and NPCs for absolutely no fucking reason than just because.

Meanwhile, I couldn't try reminisce about walking through FO3 without seething with hatred and anger, for the fact that it was my virgin Fallout experience.

Only in Fallout 3 Charisma stat works. Also i prefer repair mechanic in 3. But Charisma, i dont think any fallout games has manage to make it functional beyond fan made pnp rpg. I hope Sawyer can address this should New Vegas get a remake/sequel.

CHA in Fallout 2 dictates the amount of companions you can take in your party, which I think is, honestly, all that matters in the end for a cavalier oblique, turn-based role-playing game. Unfortunately the fundamental combat mechanics is flawed, and companions there don't get involved much with PC's decision making across the walkthrough.
And while it's a shame that New Vegas didn't allow you to take more than 1 human and 1 non-human companion, CHA being a modifier to your companions combat stats actually works well in the favor of this implement, IMHO, because of how each companions in New Vegas has their own personal questline.

 

[Risewild]

a cavalier oblique, turn-based role-playing game.

It's actually a trimetric, turn.based role-playing game.

Here's an animated gif (quickly made by me a while ago) showing the difference between Cavalier Oblique and Trimetric Axonometric perspectives:

The easiest way of knowing the difference, it's that the "facade" of buildings are totally horizontal in Cavalier Oblique, but they are diagonal in Trimetric.

 

[Norzan]

Legion and the NCR sending death squads to kill you does become hilarious when you decide to help House (and i believe the same happens with the Independent path) because there's a chance that both squads will come at you at the same time, causing them to meet halfway through getting to you and they start murdering each other. Then all you do is kill the remaining and loot their bodies.

It's a case of a system making sense but also causing funny stuff.

 

[KingArthur]

Legion and the NCR sending death squads to kill you does become hilarious when you decide to help House (and i believe the same happens with the Independent path) because there's a chance that both squads will come at you at the same time, causing them to meet halfway through getting to you and they start murdering each other. Then all you do is kill the remaining and loot their bodies.

It's a case of a system making sense but also causing funny stuff.

 

[SquidWard]

I just don't get karma-based shit in general for the most part. Take Childkiller for example; if you were known for that, it's perfectly reasonable that someone wants you dead. But if I'm a good man and Talon Company is hired "just cause", then it's absolutely retarded. What they SHOULD HAVE DONE is linked the assassins to the Contract Killer and Lawbringer perks, so that these Regulators and Talon Mercs would be after you based on faction allegiance, albeit a rudimentary form of it.

I've always felt this way. Never been too keen on karma. I feel like keeping it could provide some uses but its overall impact shouldn't be so prevalent. I'd be fine with traits you earn that define your character like "Good hearted," "Child killer," "Thief," "Businessman," etc. Just things that you could do and hit a certain threshold and it would affect how people might react to you.

 

[Black Angel]

I've always felt this way. Never been too keen on karma. I feel like keeping it could provide some uses but its overall impact shouldn't be so prevalent. I'd be fine with traits you earn that define your character like "Good hearted," "Child killer," "Thief," "Businessman," etc. Just things that you could do and hit a certain threshold and it would affect how people might react to you.

I like it how in New Vegas, with Lonesome Road add-on, you can access to Karma-based perks like Just Lucky I'm Alive, Thought You Died, and Ain't Like That Now. Pretty OP endgame perks where the main attraction were immunity to critical hits, albeit karma reset seemed kinda useless because at that point in the time you can access them you're more than likely done with 80-90% of the entire game content.

I personally preferred General Reputation and Factional Reputation, but if they can rework Karma in such a way that taking those perks actually meant more than gaining some OP endgame bonus, like Karma deciding whether or not you can gain access to a merchant (like it did in Fallout 1 where caravan random encounter can yield two different merchants (where they would accept trading with you based on your current Karma)), and even Karma-based companions like in Fallout 1.5: Resurrection, I would be fine with Karmic system like that.