Moments: Becoming A Wasteland Warrior In Fallout 3

[Brother None]

Game Informer offers a short Moment from Fallout 3, an early-game moment, the writer's first encounter with a supermutant.<blockquote>I was fairly low level at the time without a significant stock of weapons, ammo, or supplies, but I used the hallways and rooms of the hospital to my advantage. In particular, I remember one sequence where I took out a handful of Super Mutants by picking them off one-by-one as we played cat-and-mouse through a series of rooms.

I can vividly remember the terror of seeing a hulking mutant walk through a doorway. As I lined up a shot, I started to panic. What if I miss? A head shot is fun, but shouldn't I take the best-percentage shot? Even though the mutant was frozen in place by the VATS combat system, I couldn't but help envision the hell that would be unleashed by the beast even after I got my shot off. Even though the VATS stops time and ostensibly makes combat easier, I credit it for still not draining any of the tension and brutality out of battles.</blockquote>

 

[Falloutvet]

Whatever one might think about FO3, I definitely felt a sense of awe as I first started roaming the wastes. It was pretty absorbing, from a stylistic point of view, Imo.

 

[zeppelin1216]

Yeah, i definitely agree. The moment of awe that you get when you first step out of the vault is literally breathtaking. Even today, when engines are so much better and graphics can look sooo real, i still get that feeling of wonder an excitement to this day....that idea of being immersed in the wasteland...becoming a true warrior.

 

[Dukeanumberone]

becoming uber- awesome early game(pre lev 10) on the hardest setting is not that easy unless you do a lot of grinding before and and pump all skills into small guns ( which in theory shouldn't due much/if any dam to super-mutants, going by the in game files from vault 87)
this must have been set on easy. I understand the feeling of impending doom after seeing my first SM, but SM should be much tougher, and be much more agressive, and not use small arms.

 

[person]

This can be done on hard, I guarantee it.

 

[WorstUsernameEver]

I'm in the process of setting up a playthrough of Fallout 3 after I'm done with Darksiders II (without mods) so I'll see if my memory holds up.. but I remember Fallout 3's early balance to be fairly decent at marrying gameplay with the atmosphere of a post-apocalyptic world. You become an uber-powerful god pretty soon, though, as unfortunate as that is.

 

[Lexx]

Yeah, at around level 4. I think I killed supermutants with my pistol at that stage, so I could get a minigun (on my second playthrough when I knew the game a bit more).

 

[pyroD]

I can agree that VATS doesn't make Point Lookout feel any less like the swamp version of The Hills Have Eyes.

 

[shihonage]

Much like everything else that's remotely salvageable about Fallout 3, the "coming out of the vault" moment was stolen from Fallout 1.

 

[TorontoReign]

Much like everything else that's remotely salvageable about Fallout 3, the "coming out of the vault" moment was stolen from Fallout 1.

It actually felt closer to Oblivion, even with similar music playing when you first exit, which kinda rubbed me wrong. Why use music that sounds like it belongs in Oblivion? I didn't really get that personally. Fallout 3 would have felt more dangerous without level scaling.

 

[WorstUsernameEver]

Much like everything else that's remotely salvageable about Fallout 3, the "coming out of the vault" moment was stolen from Fallout 1.

It actually felt closer to Oblivion, even with similar music playing when you first exit, which kinda rubbed me wrong. Why use music that sounds like it belongs in Oblivion? I didn't really get that personally. Fallout 3 would have felt more dangerous without level scaling.

That's just not Bethesda's philosophy though, and I don't think they will ever budge on that. I'm afraid a Fallout 3 level of challenge is about as far as they will go in terms of level scaling, and that's kind of what they replicated with Skyrim more or less.

You *have* to be able to explore the gameworld from the get go in their games. It's their biggest selling feature and it's all the point of their structure and the way they're designed.

 

[Tagaziel]

Skyrim was pretty decent, actually. High level wildlife, such as bears, sabretooth cats or dragons will kick your ass if you try to explore the wilds at a low level.

Still, it has nothing on Morrowind. In the Game of Exploration you win or you die a horrible death mauled by daedric princes/general daedra/cliff racers/bandits/undead/everything.

 

[rcorporon]

I found the "leaving the vault" moment to be nearly identical to "leaving the dungeon" from Oblivion (as mentioned above).

Then it was re-used again in "New Vegas" except it was "leaving some guys shack".

It would appear that this trope will now be used in every Beth game I guess.

 

[WorstUsernameEver]

I found the "leaving the vault" moment to be nearly identical to "leaving the dungeon" from Oblivion (as mentioned above).

Then it was re-used again in "New Vegas" except it was "leaving some guys shack".

It would appear that this trope will now be used in every Beth game I guess.

I think in New Vegas it was just reused because.. it was kind of expected, even though it didn't really make sense for Obsidian to do that. Then again, I have a bunch of gripes about New Vegas' beginning (and how it does no favors to the game especially considering the market it caters to), but that's maybe for another time.

 

[person]

Much like everything else that's remotely salvageable about Fallout 3, the "coming out of the vault" moment was stolen from Fallout 1.

It actually felt closer to Oblivion, even with similar music playing when you first exit, which kinda rubbed me wrong.

Having never played Oblivion I was only (and greatly) reminded of Fallout 1. And I wouldn't use the word "stolen," as it's a sequel, and expected.

 

[shihonage]

Having never played Oblivion I was only (and greatly) reminded of Fallout 1. And I wouldn't use the word "stolen," as it's a sequel, and expected.

The point was, it wasn't an original Bethesda design. Everything that still has even a remote sense of coolness in the creatively bankrupt, uninspired, incohesive world of Fallout 3, has been taken by Bethesda from Fallout 1.

 

[Paul_cz]

Are people really complaining that Bethesda took seminal moment from Fallout 1 where it was only seen from top down 2D perspective and described in writing, and recreated it in first person 3D perspective ?
Really?

 

[TorontoReign]

Are people really complaining that Bethesda took seminal moment from Fallout 1 where it was only seen from top down 2D perspective and described in writing, and recreated it in first person 3D perspective ?
Really?

No, I'm complaining that they got Oblivion on my Fallout.

 

[Crni Vuk]

people would complain less if Bethesda did something on their own that was at least somewhat remotely interesting.

Thing is, when you look at it, take all obvious Fallout references out of F3 (not that there are that many) and what do you have left? I would say it would be hard to recognize it as as "Fallout" game.

It would be post apoc oblivion with mediocre/bad writing and boring quests. And even the good view on the wasteland is most of the time right next to totally inconstant and silly content.

Take a person who is not familiar with Fallout. Show him Oblivion. And show him Fallout 1. Then show him a generic part from Fallout 3. What do you think he will say?

Of course the stuff is not "stolen" they bought it. But many times it is a copy paste. If that makes people feel better.

 

[shihonage]

Are people really complaining that Bethesda took seminal moment from Fallout 1 where it was only seen from top down 2D perspective and described in writing, and recreated it in first person 3D perspective ?
Really?

Not complaining, just pointing out that Bethesda has done nothing worthy of admiration in Fallout 3.