Old World Blues wins 'Best DLC' award at IGA 2011

Mr Fish said:
Yeah I couldn't hear you over the radio where they nag about penis tipped feet. (This is not meant as a flamebait.)
There might be more to Big Empty than meets the eye, but I didn't understand some of the references and the place was too crowded with talking roboscorpions and radio chatter from a bunch of twats to really notice.
Like that, Yangtze thing, I have no idea what that is, I could look it up now but that doesn't change that I reacted to it like "meh" when I first found it.

As for the dark aspects of it, I saw some, sure, but every time I started thinking about what they were doing a nighstalker came an interrupted me.

Anyway, my point with the Fallout 2 reference way back is that, in Fallout 2 I never saw it as having a lulzy front with a deep dark atmosphere underneath.
I saw it as having a deep dark atmosphere with some lulzy moments spread around.
OWB, to me, felt like a muffin with so much frosting on it that it's as big as a cake.
The frosting is the lulzy stuff, the muffin, is the dark parts.
It's so covered in ridiculous crap that whenever something dark came up I couldn't stay focused to it, because the time between that dark past history spot and the next would be filled with talking robot scorpions and radio chatter.

Maybe it's my fault for not being able to properly separate the two elements of OWB, but the lulzy stuff and repetitive tedious and frequent enemy encounters was far too overwhelming for me to even see the other element most of the time.
Click to expand...

Yes, it is your fault that you're unable to delve deeper into OWB than its most superficial of features.

Old World Blues isn't your typical GRIMDARK horror. It doesn't fling DARK AND MOODY ambience at you constantly to tell you how HORRIBLE it is.

As Elijah put it, Big Empty is a scientific graveyard of Old World misery. You see elements, remnants of pre-War achievements. Some of it are superficially funny, at least until you consider their true nature.

The Think Tank may be amusing, yes. After all, who doesn't laugh at penis-tipped feet or obsession about Teddy Bears? It ceases to be hilarious, at least for me, that these lobotomized zombies are all that remains of the greatest minds of pre-War America. Geniuses, reduced to disembodied, rambling brains. Insane robobrains that at the same time pose a great threat to the wasteland.

"Who are you, who do not know your history?"

Then there are traces of pre-War glory, of achievements that could've averted nuclear disaster. Synthesizers that could create food from inorganic material, indestructible holograms and holographic devices that could revolutionize medicine and warfare, advanced robots fit for all manner of duty, weather control that could change deserts into arable land, genetic splicing... All solutions to problems plaguing the pre-War world: famine, resource shortages, war.

I don't find the fact that they were lost due to human greed and malice amusing. Underneath superficially lulzy content lurks a hideously dark story. Keep that in mind the next time you're hounded by insane lunatics in this graveyard of Old World America.
 
Tagaziel said:
Yes, it is your fault that you're unable to delve deeper into OWB than its most superficial of features.
Click to expand...

It is now the players fault for "not getting" certain stuff, even though it's there, buried beyond a ton of lulz? The developers are not to blame if they are unable to create a certain atmosphere to allow taking things serious in the first place? Wow. I've read lots of stuff on this page, but this comment really tops it.

If there'd be a new TV show where clowns, elves and ponies dance on top of a colorfully lit eiffel tower while they sing songs elaborating on the horrors of Auschwitz or other crimes the Nazis did - would the viewer still be to "blame" if he can't stomach the layers of lulz and crap on top of it? Or is that perfectly fine in your book too?

Following the pattern of your post, you could virtually take everything that was often criticized as being "too lulzy" - the talking Deathclaws? Oh well, maybe they are just an emulation to show how cruel it is for new Species to evolve, to find their place in the world, how evolution/revolution works on can even be triggered by certain people and so on. Thank god the Fallout 2 developers teached us an important lesson in the demise and fall of new species behind all the lulz. I'm pretty sure we can find some "deeper meaning" for the Shi or other lulzy things aswell!
 
Surf Solar said:
It is now the players fault for "not getting" certain stuff, even though it's there, buried beyond a ton of lulz? The developers are not to blame if they are unable to create a certain atmosphere to allow taking things serious in the first place? Wow. I've read lots of stuff on this page, but this comment really tops it.

If there'd be a new TV show where clowns, elves and ponies dance on top of a colorfully lit eiffel tower while they sing songs elaborating on the horrors of Auschwitz or other crimes the Nazis did - would the viewer still be to "blame" if he can't stomach the layers of lulz and crap on top of it? Or is that perfectly fine in your book too?

Following the pattern of your post, you could virtually take everything that was often criticized as being "too lulzy" - the talking Deathclaws? Oh well, maybe they are just an emulation to show how cruel it is for new Species to evolve, to find their place in the world, how evolution/revolution works on can even be triggered by certain people and so on. Thank god the Fallout 2 developers teached us an important lesson in the demise and fall of new species behind all the lulz. I'm pretty sure we can find some "deeper meaning" for the Shi or other lulzy things aswell!
Click to expand...

In your haste to prove me wrong you forgot that in order for analogies to work, they have to make sense. Obvious design inconsistencies from Fallout 2 or exaggerated examples are not really a valid comparison for a game where humour obscures a lot of darkness.

And yes, it's your fault for not understanding the game. Don't worry, it's pretty common. A lot of people fail to understand the story and design of Dead Money, for example. And a great many people often don't understand literature.

Unless, of course, you also believe that it's the fault of eg. Vonnegut or Poe that many people don't understand their writing and deeper meaning in their works.
 
My biggest concern on Old World Blues was the respawning enemies and the very boring, greyish landscape. Also, I didn't watch those B-movies or whatever they were laughing at so I got little idea as to what they were talking about, and even if I did, it seemed slightly ridiculous and not even funny.

The DLC seemed as if it was based on combat since you had enemies attack you all the time, not a lot of character development choice here, no sneaky-sneaky, no bribing, no being smart.
 
Tagaziel said:
I don't find the fact that they were lost due to human greed and malice amusing. Underneath superficially lulzy content lurks a hideously dark story. Keep that in mind the next time you're hounded by insane lunatics in this graveyard of Old World America.
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You make it sound so depressing.

OWB was dark, and yet it was funny... that's the idea behind Black Comedy (much of Fallout's humor is in this realm). It is a dark and serious situation which is presented in a satirical manner, while still portraying the situation as tragic.

Everything you said about the Think Tank is true, and that's where the humor is rooted. It's sad and depressing that something like that has happened to great minds with answers to the world's woes, but the humor comes from the absurdity of the situation where these great minds have devolved, and you're left with having to deal with what they've become.

It's very Dr. Strangelove type of black comedy. It's the humor of General Ripper going off on his speech about his precious bodily fluids after he's started the events leading to nuclear war. It's Buck Turgidson going on about how he thinks his bomber has a chance at penetrating Russian defenses ("Chickens frying in a barnyard!"), then the "OH SHIT!" look of horror on his face when he realizes that success will trigger the destruction of the entire planet's surface.

It's not the kind of laugh that is meant to make you feel good afterwards. It's supposed to give you a "Oh, that's not right" feeling of guilt afterwards when you look at it in hindsight.
 
Tagaziel said:
Mr Fish said:
Yeah I couldn't hear you over the radio where they nag about penis tipped feet. (This is not meant as a flamebait.)
There might be more to Big Empty than meets the eye, but I didn't understand some of the references and the place was too crowded with talking roboscorpions and radio chatter from a bunch of twats to really notice.
Like that, Yangtze thing, I have no idea what that is, I could look it up now but that doesn't change that I reacted to it like "meh" when I first found it.

As for the dark aspects of it, I saw some, sure, but every time I started thinking about what they were doing a nighstalker came an interrupted me.

Anyway, my point with the Fallout 2 reference way back is that, in Fallout 2 I never saw it as having a lulzy front with a deep dark atmosphere underneath.
I saw it as having a deep dark atmosphere with some lulzy moments spread around.
OWB, to me, felt like a muffin with so much frosting on it that it's as big as a cake.
The frosting is the lulzy stuff, the muffin, is the dark parts.
It's so covered in ridiculous crap that whenever something dark came up I couldn't stay focused to it, because the time between that dark past history spot and the next would be filled with talking robot scorpions and radio chatter.

Maybe it's my fault for not being able to properly separate the two elements of OWB, but the lulzy stuff and repetitive tedious and frequent enemy encounters was far too overwhelming for me to even see the other element most of the time.
Click to expand...

Yes, it is your fault that you're unable to delve deeper into OWB than its most superficial of features.

Old World Blues isn't your typical GRIMDARK horror. It doesn't fling DARK AND MOODY ambience at you constantly to tell you how HORRIBLE it is.

As Elijah put it, Big Empty is a scientific graveyard of Old World misery. You see elements, remnants of pre-War achievements. Some of it are superficially funny, at least until you consider their true nature.

The Think Tank may be amusing, yes. After all, who doesn't laugh at penis-tipped feet or obsession about Teddy Bears? It ceases to be hilarious, at least for me, that these lobotomized zombies are all that remains of the greatest minds of pre-War America. Geniuses, reduced to disembodied, rambling brains. Insane robobrains that at the same time pose a great threat to the wasteland.

"Who are you, who do not know your history?"

Then there are traces of pre-War glory, of achievements that could've averted nuclear disaster. Synthesizers that could create food from inorganic material, indestructible holograms and holographic devices that could revolutionize medicine and warfare, advanced robots fit for all manner of duty, weather control that could change deserts into arable land, genetic splicing... All solutions to problems plaguing the pre-War world: famine, resource shortages, war.

I don't find the fact that they were lost due to human greed and malice amusing. Underneath superficially lulzy content lurks a hideously dark story. Keep that in mind the next time you're hounded by insane lunatics in this graveyard of Old World America.
Click to expand...

What Tagaziel said. This post is brilliant. It's good to know there are still such well thought, well written posts in this old Cafe of Broken Dreams that is NMA.
 
The key to Old World Blues for me was the meeting point of scientific idealism and the reality of trying to produce that kind of science. That kind of conflict was key to the original Fallout, and I think OWB managed to capture that feel perfectly. The idea of scientific progress, and the dark things that happened as a direct consequence and during the process of scientific discovery.

That conflict was at the heart of the original Fallout as well. The veneer of silliness is also based on '50s movies like The Incredible Shrinking Man, which often have a similar concept of scientific idealism vs reality underlying it. If you've seen those movies and understand that aspect of the Fallout universe, I think it makes a lot of sense in the context of that setting.

To make it all better, I felt like they did a very good job of using the environment to tell a story, making that intriguing and creating interesting enclosed 'dungeons'. Overall, it was simply a very enjoyable DLC.

Was it perfect? Absolutely not. The enemies were essentially bullet sponges, and those Robo Scorpions can go suck my cock. And yes, there was the silliness that didn't appeal to everyone and sometimes went overboard, but it served a purpose in the context of the DLC. If that doesn't appeal to you, that's fine. But don't confuse the silliness in Fallout 2 with its Monty Python references for the silliness in OWB, as it fits and serves a purpose.


To me, this was easily the best of the four New Vegas DLCs. Honest Hearts was short, boring and didn't have a lot of interesting things to say. Dead Money was a linear survival horror story, and I really don't like survival horror. Lonesome Road? Linear shooter with a really stupid underlying philosophy.

OWB, on the other hand, created an interesting enclosed world with a consistent and interesting setting and story.


Finally, Mr Fish, this is No Mutants Allowed. These are not the Bethesda message boards. If you want to talk about the Bethesda message boards or what people on those message boards think, go there. Don't bring that stuff here.
 
Sub-Human said:
My biggest concern on Old World Blues was the respawning enemies and the very boring, greyish landscape. Also, I didn't watch those B-movies or whatever they were laughing at so I got little idea as to what they were talking about, and even if I did, it seemed slightly ridiculous and not even funny.

The DLC seemed as if it was based on combat since you had enemies attack you all the time, not a lot of character development choice here, no sneaky-sneaky, no bribing, no being smart.
Click to expand...

Concerning the enemies respawn rate in OWB, I agree with you, they are simply boring and screwed up things badly.
There's a mod on Nexus that solves the respawn rate, the DLC becomes much more enjoyable to play.

But the landscape? I loved the grim terrain, it reminds me some planets you explore in the first ME (is funny that the criticized "empty" planets in the first ME are very realistic, because a planet away from the life zone or in formation or too close to a sun or being a dwarf has...well, nothing).
Remember the first Fallouts? "You see a rock", "You see nothing out of ordinary"?
Is more like this.

My biggest problem with NV DLC's are the damn levels being raised, because they overpower your character with a lot of skill points.
By the last DLC you are good with every skill available, so there's go the challenge down the drain.

But your lack of knowledge regarding the Twilight Zone and sci-fi B-movies isn't the devs fault. :cool:
 
Man, that's some yummy good posts in this thread. Good discussion, everyone (but mostly Tagz and Sander).
 
brfritos said:
But the landscape? I loved the grim terrain, it reminds me some planets you explore in the first ME (is funny that the criticized "empty" planets in the first ME are very realistic, because a planet away from the life zone or in formation or too close to a sun or being a dwarf has...well, nothing).
Click to expand...

I am sorry, but if a planet has gigantic fields of grass, I am expecting to see some trees as well or at least something else that is not just grassland. Therefore, yes, the planets have been extremely empty and this wasn't good.

My biggest problem with NV DLC's are the damn levels being raised, because they overpower your character with a lot of skill points.
By the last DLC you are good with every skill available, so there's go the challenge down the drain.
Click to expand...

But even without the DLCs, your character is very much overpowered already after max. 15 levels. The DLCs aren't doing it much worse anymore. Additionally, this isn't a problem unique to Fo3 / FNV. In fact, I felt pretty strong already in Fo1 / 2 as well, as soon as I got a certain rifle or raised a weapon skill to 150.
 
I think with a better engine or even done in a way that it looked more similar to Fallout 1/2 it would not have felt that lulzy. With saying that I never played any DLC. I just guess here from the look. But I am not a usual target audience anyway (for example I think the "fog" in the first DLC is pretty stupid ... but so be it).

I like Vegas and I am sure the DLCs have some great quality in writting and content. But I just cant forget the "gameplay" that is used (Its Fallout 3 yay!) and the engine really is starting to geting old very very fast. Maybe because of the stupid and silly animations and textures. No clue. It just looks outright ugly to me.
 
Crni Vuk said:
I think with a better engine or even done in a way that it looked more similar to Fallout 1/2 it would not have felt that lulzy.
Click to expand...
.......


:roll: How does that make any sense? The engine would make the content different? The Think Tank would be mroe coherent if they had the same lines in an isometric perspective and 2-D graphics?

well, discussion on the posts above, Surf refusing to even acknowledge anything.
I am glad that OWB won, I prefered Dead Money a lot over OWB but well. DM is technically a 2010 DLC and lots of people didn't like it in the least.
 
There were some moments of stellar voice performance, dialogue and oneliners and the area had a really nice layout.. Like the wasteland compressed to cut down distance between areas.. But the good things were pretty far apart. Very poorly balanced and the oneliners.. There are just too few of them and they are repeated too often. Without the voice it would just be more of the same gimped and boring FO:NV - which is still better than anything Bethesda ever did, even though it sucks on the same engine or because of it. In any case I think this award goes to the voice talent.
 
Tagaziel said:
Surf Solar said:
It is now the players fault for "not getting" certain stuff, even though it's there, buried beyond a ton of lulz? The developers are not to blame if they are unable to create a certain atmosphere to allow taking things serious in the first place? Wow. I've read lots of stuff on this page, but this comment really tops it.

If there'd be a new TV show where clowns, elves and ponies dance on top of a colorfully lit eiffel tower while they sing songs elaborating on the horrors of Auschwitz or other crimes the Nazis did - would the viewer still be to "blame" if he can't stomach the layers of lulz and crap on top of it? Or is that perfectly fine in your book too?

Following the pattern of your post, you could virtually take everything that was often criticized as being "too lulzy" - the talking Deathclaws? Oh well, maybe they are just an emulation to show how cruel it is for new Species to evolve, to find their place in the world, how evolution/revolution works on can even be triggered by certain people and so on. Thank god the Fallout 2 developers teached us an important lesson in the demise and fall of new species behind all the lulz. I'm pretty sure we can find some "deeper meaning" for the Shi or other lulzy things aswell!
Click to expand...

In your haste to prove me wrong you forgot that in order for analogies to work, they have to make sense. Obvious design inconsistencies from Fallout 2 or exaggerated examples are not really a valid comparison for a game where humour obscures a lot of darkness.

And yes, it's your fault for not understanding the game. Don't worry, it's pretty common. A lot of people fail to understand the story and design of Dead Money, for example. And a great many people often don't understand literature.

Unless, of course, you also believe that it's the fault of eg. Vonnegut or Poe that many people don't understand their writing and deeper meaning in their works.
Click to expand...

Thanks for not taking my examples into consideration and ridiculing it as "lesser users opinion" like it shines through so often from admins these days here. Thank you also for practically saying that a huge user group (of the very site you seem to manage) is "dumb" by - following your definition - not being able to "understand" something - even though it was never about the "understanding" - do you really think certain Users were "dumb" and didn't "get" the "serious business" in Old World Blues? Really? Thank god you put me out of of the misery, without you I would have never "understood" the meaning of it - I am so pleased you could teach me in the deeper meaning of derp, it's not that I am literate or anything, or could read it in the game.

Maybe you could come back from your high horse and see that it is not the problem of users playing said DLC "not getting" it but Users not accepting certain ridicolous "lulz" factors to stomach the "serious business"? But ah ok, I see, we as the lesser folk, we don't get what it is about, we can't "understand" the "deeper meaning" of it.


Why are talking deathclaws now a design inconsistency, but talking robot brains in an almost 300 year old factory, talking about penisses, teddies and dogs are totally normal? Why is suddenly my argument "a joke" when it is practically the same that you are saying? Really?


Anyway, thank you for pointing out how dumb we all are, how dare we to not "understand" something the same as the admins here!

Do you really think it takes so much to "understand" the "meaning" of said DLC? It does not, it still doesn't make the overall tone less ridicolous. Just because one adds elements that tie into the overaching tone of the DLC it does not make the silly elements less silly. Judging by your last post, you ridicule a huge part of your very community as people who "don't get it", which is just, duh, silly.
 
Surf Solar said:
Tagaziel said:
Surf Solar said:
It is now the players fault for "not getting" certain stuff, even though it's there, buried beyond a ton of lulz? The developers are not to blame if they are unable to create a certain atmosphere to allow taking things serious in the first place? Wow. I've read lots of stuff on this page, but this comment really tops it.

If there'd be a new TV show where clowns, elves and ponies dance on top of a colorfully lit eiffel tower while they sing songs elaborating on the horrors of Auschwitz or other crimes the Nazis did - would the viewer still be to "blame" if he can't stomach the layers of lulz and crap on top of it? Or is that perfectly fine in your book too?

Following the pattern of your post, you could virtually take everything that was often criticized as being "too lulzy" - the talking Deathclaws? Oh well, maybe they are just an emulation to show how cruel it is for new Species to evolve, to find their place in the world, how evolution/revolution works on can even be triggered by certain people and so on. Thank god the Fallout 2 developers teached us an important lesson in the demise and fall of new species behind all the lulz. I'm pretty sure we can find some "deeper meaning" for the Shi or other lulzy things aswell!
Click to expand...

In your haste to prove me wrong you forgot that in order for analogies to work, they have to make sense. Obvious design inconsistencies from Fallout 2 or exaggerated examples are not really a valid comparison for a game where humour obscures a lot of darkness.

And yes, it's your fault for not understanding the game. Don't worry, it's pretty common. A lot of people fail to understand the story and design of Dead Money, for example. And a great many people often don't understand literature.

Unless, of course, you also believe that it's the fault of eg. Vonnegut or Poe that many people don't understand their writing and deeper meaning in their works.
Click to expand...

Thanks for not taking my examples into consideration and ridiculing it as "lesser users opinion" like it shines through so often from admins these days here. Thank you also for practically saying that a huge user group (of the very site you seem to manage) is "dumb" by - following your definition - not being able to "understand" something - even though it was never about the "understanding" - do you really think certain Users were "dumb" and didn't "get" the "serious business" in Old World Blues? Really? Thank god you put me out of of the misery, without you I would have never "understood" the meaning of it - I am so pleased you could teach me in the deeper meaning of derp, it's not that I am literate or anything, or could read it in the game.

Maybe you could come back from your high horse and see that it is not the problem of users playing said DLC "not getting" it but Users not accepting certain ridicolous "lulz" factors to stomach the "serious business"? But ah ok, I see, we as the lesser folk, we don't get what it is about, we can't "understand" the "deeper meaning" of it.


Why are talking deathclaws now a design inconsistency, but talking robot brains in an almost 300 year old factory are totally normal? Why is suddenly my argument "a joke" when it is practically the same that you are saying? Really?


Anyway, thank you for pointing out how dumb we all are, how dare we to not "understand" something the same as the admins here!
Click to expand...



Guys, you both know this is a video game you are arguing about right?

EDIT:

Although I do think tazigel (sic?) or whatever is being really condescending
 
Deathclaw's talking is something Fallout Tactics threw in, and is regarded as non-canon, whereas talking brains in a jar is typical B movie Sci-Fi .

If you did not understand OWB then you probably haven't watched very many 1950's Sci-Fi flicks. Simple as that.
 
Actually, talking Deathclaws go back to Fallout 2. You can even recruit a Deathclaw companion in that game.
 
Walpknut said:
Sabirah said:
Guys, you both know this is a video game you are arguing about right?
Click to expand...

And you are aware that a forum is about dicussions right?
Click to expand...

Yeah, discussion. Not condescending to one another and thinly veiled insults.
 
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