PC Action Germany reviews Fallout 3

[Sicblades]

Because "violence is fucking funny"

 

[Outbreak]

As mentioned above, there is a serious conflict of interest when a gaming company takes reviewers out to luxury hotels to do reviews. What happened to reviewing a game based on it's merits, rather than how well a company treats you beforehand.

I "like" the fact that most of these reviewers appear to only have 10% of the score to work with. It's almost as if Beth (like most big game companies) said, "alright, we're cool as long as you give us a 9 or 90% and above. Anything lower and we're taking back the porn, money and fruit basket." I'm very cynical about most reviews too. One thing I noticed though is that some reviewers try to explain what's actually wrong with the game in the write-up even though it doesn't reflect in the score. I've seen games get 7 and 8's while in the text, the guy basically says, "this really is a boring game," meaning it's a 5 or 6. I think in this case, this game is really a 7-7.5, (maybe 8) but that's only apparent in the writing. Of course, some reviewers/magazines just aren't in the loop and you'll always get a straight story.

 

[Artisticspaz]

Here we are at the point where every negative review will be considered as a vendetta against Bethesda by fanatic Fallout fans. Even now I read arguments like: they can't all be wrong by some freak coincidence can they? So Fallout must be a great game since most of reviewers give it 9/10 and 10/10. And if we appeal to more negative review Bethesda's fanboys can always say that we're clinging to some irrelevant text.
The end is nigh.

or it could be that the game is pretty good, just maybe not like a 9 or 10 though. Im guessing an 8ish how i'll feel about the game, only about 9 days left to find out.

and personally i think if all but a handful of reviewers give it a 9 or above that it must be atleast in the 8's in actuality.Also if you cling to bad reviews when they're only like 4 to 6 of em, compared to like 20-30 good, then it'd be kind of easy to assume you were clinging....

Besides reviews these days tell me whether the game is worth buying or not, quality is more something you decide for yourself:
8-10=good game to great game that's worth the money
7's-rent/borrow this game unless ur a huge fanboy
under 6- just no......

* some guy actually argued that one game deserved a 5 instead of a 3; maybe it's just me but that doesn't really help convince me its worth my time.

 

[kikomiko]

Yet another review to prove that Fallout 3 is a great game. Sure, I will still have to play the game to make my final verdict, but I am pretty much positive at this point that I will greatly enjoy the experience. What matters most to me in open world games like Fallout 3 are: A HUGE expansive environment, a great story, engaging characters, many, many quests, the gameplay, of course, and the replayability. It seems that FO3 has covered all of these bases and then some, so I am a happy man. The 28th cannot come soon enough!

 

[rcorporon]

{I'm trying to say your, you are, or you're, but I'm likely too stupid to know which to use.}

Your is a possessive. As in: This is your house.

You are is the proper usage in your sentence.

You're is a contraction of "you" and "are, and would be used in the same context as "you are."

 

[Leon]

What matters most to me in open world games like Fallout 3 are: A HUGE expansive environment, a great story, engaging characters, many, many quests, the gameplay, of course, and the replayability.

Then hopefully the game is actually nothing like Oblivion, yes?

 

[mulaalia]

Here we are at the point where every negative review will be considered as a vendetta against Bethesda by fanatic Fallout fans. Even now I read arguments like: they can't all be wrong by some freak coincidence can they? So Fallout must be a great game since most of reviewers give it 9/10 and 10/10. And if we appeal to more negative review Bethesda's fanboys can always say that we're clinging to some irrelevant text.
The end is nigh.

or it could be that the game is pretty good, just maybe not like a 9 or 10 though. Im guessing an 8ish how i'll feel about the game, only about 9 days left to find out.

and personally i think if all but a handful of reviewers give it a 9 or above that it must be atleast in the 8's in actuality.Also if you cling to bad reviews when they're only like 4 to 6 of em, compared to like 20-30 good, then it'd be kind of easy to assume you were clinging....

Besides reviews these days tell me whether the game is worth buying or not, quality is more something you decide for yourself:
8-10=good game to great game that's worth the money
7's-rent/borrow this game unless {I'm trying to say your, you are, or you're, but I'm likely too stupid to know which to use.} a huge fanboy
under 6- just no......

* some guy actually argued that one game deserved a 5 instead of a 3; maybe it's just me but that doesn't really help convince me its worth my time.

So you buy Halo3 and forget about, let's say....King of Dragon Pass(King of Dragon Pass doesn't have a review), Mount&Blade......

 

[Artisticspaz]

Why in the hell is Fallout 3 endlessly compared to how it measures up to Oblivion? Shouldn't the measure of Fallout 3 be gauged against the games it's a sequel to?

Well, I think it should be compared to both. Comparisons to Oblivion make sense since Fallout 3 is based around the Oblivion engine and style, (like the goofy animations) and also because it's the last big game that Bethesda has done. If Rockstar came out with a free-roam ninja game, they'd still ask, "is this as good as GTA?" It should be compared to the original Fallouts too though since that is the franchise they are emulating. If Interplay were making this new version of Fallout, then comparisons would not only be made with FO1 and 2, but probably the most recent game Interplay had released as well. (unless it was on a whole new engine or something)

But, I suppose the sad truth of it is; if you start making comparisons to FO1 or FO2, then a whole lot of people won't even know or care of what the reviewer is even talking about. The reviewer of the launch party made that quite clear at the end of his write-up. There seem to be a ton of people who, if not love Oblivion, at least know more about it than they do Fallout. I mean, I even see comments about how this is a ripoff of Bioshock. Yeah, OK. I don't have any real knowledge of this, but the old school Fallout crowd seem to be a pretty tight knit group.

Gamer: "There was a Fallout 1 and 2? Must have been for the Atari or something."

yeah i was about comment on that myself, i mean it's easier to compare it to another game that bethseda made using the same engine than a game made 10 yrs ago after alot of different changes in gaming. That doesn't mean they shouldn't bring the originals in, but considering oblivion came out 2 years ago more people are gonna know about it and relate.

 

[rcorporon]

yeah i was about comment on that myself, i mean it's easier to compare it to another game that bethseda made using the same engine than a game made 10 yrs ago after alot of different changes in gaming. That doesn't mean they shouldn't bring the originals in, but considering oblivion came out 2 years ago more people are gonna know about it and relate.

That's not the point. The point is that this is Fallout "3," NOT Oblivion "2."

When Beth make TES V, it'll make sense that it gets compared to previous Elder Scrolls games.

Fallout 3 should be compared to Fallout 1 & 2, as it's supposed to be a sequel.

 

[Artisticspaz]

Apologies if this has been addressed before (I tried searching) but how is VATS explained in the game? Is it some kind of funky eyepiece or part of the PIPboy or just a game mechanic explained fourth-wall style?

They don't. Your character can freeze time, and shoot people in the face until it explodes.

yeah, i mean those mexican stand-offs where everyone took their turn and treated battle like a riveting game of D 'n D where they each have a certain number of AP were teh realism

Vaultdweller:well this is a little invasive of my personal space. You gonna stab me or what?
Raider:can't man i ran out of action points and now its ur turn
VaultDweller:Lolz,*shoots at raiders head twice but misses* OH NOEZ NOW I'm out 2
Raider:OMFG for seriously!?

....good times, fallout combat systems and their realism ftw

 

[Artisticspaz]

{I'm trying to say your, you are, or you're, but I'm likely too stupid to know which to use.}

Your is a possessive. As in: This is your house.

You are is the proper usage in your sentence.

You're is a contraction of "you" and "are, and would be used in the same context as "you are."

the spellcheck here is an evil bitch.....
and thanks, i guess you do learn something new every day

 

[Leon]

hurr

The combat in Fallout 1 and 2 were supposed to emulate pen and paper games, in which they succeeded. Realism wasn't a priority in that way. VATS is a poor imitation of the turn-based PnP emulation to give Bethesda's real time action some semblance of a link with the previous games.

Besides that, in the turn-based system every combatant was on more-or-less equal ground. VATS gives the player an unfair advantage, since he's the only one capable of it and also receives less damage while in VATS.

EDIT: By the way, use the edit button instead of double-posting.

 

[Artisticspaz]

So you buy Halo3 and forget about, let's say....King of Dragon Pass(King of Dragon Pass doesn't have a review), Mount&Blade......

well halo 3 was a fun game, andIMO it was hugely overrated out the ass. I only really base my opinion to buy a game off reviews when i know nothing about the game. Otherwise i judge by what i have seen and found out about the game to see whether i want to buy it or not.


i have played games that the reviewers i like have given a 2/5 or 3/5 respectively.

 

[Artisticspaz]

go suck donald ducks dick if you love em so much

The combat in Fallout 1 and 2 were supposed to emulate pen and paper games, in which they succeeded. Realism wasn't a priority in that way. VATS is a poor imitation of the turn-based PnP emulation to give Bethesda's real time action some semblance of a link with the previous games.
EDIT: By the way, use the edit button instead of double-posting.

...didn't know i double posted....

but i was making a joke on how the guy was poking fun at it for being completely unrealistic and unexplainable. I know fallout was based on paper/pen games, it's called i was making a joke in the same way he did but because i insulted FO1/2 instead of 3 I'm obviously an imbecile

And Turnbased games are bogus anyway, in life not everyone gets a turn to fight. yeah i'm sure the spartans would have had a much easier time if the persians called a timeout to let them go get their spears back. If you want to show how tough you are go realtime where the quickest to react wins.

 

[Leon]

qwaak

And Turnbased games are bogus anyway, in life not everyone gets a turn to fight.

And in life I don't get to fly around in a space triangle, shooting asteroids. What bunk!

I understand what you're saying though. Still, this goes right back into the "What made Fallout what is was?" thing. Core gameplay and all that. Anyways, this is quickly getting off-topic.

 

[Artisticspaz]

qwaak

And Turnbased games are bogus anyway, in life not everyone gets a turn to fight.

And in life I don't get to fly around in a space triangle, shooting asteroids. What bunk!

I understand what you're saying though. Still, this goes right back into the "What made Fallout what is was?" thing. Core gameplay and all that. Anyways, this is quickly getting off-topic.

yeah....it is way off-topic, i understand the core gameplay was turnbased but sometimes change is good, as long as fallout 3 still has alot of the other elements to make up for it. When i play it Oct.28 i'll be able to say whether it has those other elements.

Re4 change from a survival-horror to an action horror and ended up being very enjoyable. Fallout 3 could atleast make a nice spin-off for the fallout series

 

[Ixyroth]

As mentioned above, there is a serious conflict of interest when a gaming company takes reviewers out to luxury hotels to do reviews. What happened to reviewing a game based on it's merits, rather than how well a company treats you beforehand.

I "like" the fact that most of these reviewers appear to only have 10% of the score to work with. It's almost as if Beth (like most big game companies) said, "alright, we're cool as long as you give us a 9 or 90% and above. Anything lower and we're taking back the porn, money and fruit basket." I'm very cynical about most reviews too. One thing I noticed though is that some reviewers try to explain what's actually wrong with the game in the write-up even though it doesn't reflect in the score. I've seen games get 7 and 8's while in the text, the guy basically says, "this really is a boring game," meaning it's a 5 or 6. I think in this case, this game is really a 7-7.5, (maybe 8) but that's only apparent in the writing. Of course, some reviewers/magazines just aren't in the loop and you'll always get a straight story.

It certainly looks like 9 is the minimum set by Beth. The graphics and animations alone warrant a 1 point (10%) deduction given how dated they are compared to current AAA titles like Mass Effect.

 

[InZaneFlea]

I'll agree that sometimes, Oblivion got boring.

But hell, you install MMM and OOO, and that game had hundreds of hours of replayability.

I'm looking for the same thing from Fallout 3, which is why I'm buying it on PC.

And I'm going to challenge everyone here to stop hating on the game, until you've played it

Then again, that'll never happen.

And really, I'm sick of all the "Bethsoft made them give it over a 90". They didn't. They can't. All these people talking about pay-offs...

You try and tell me Halo 3 was worth a 10/10. You try and tell me that The Orange Box wasn't. Gah, this place makes me rage, Bethsoft is a perfectly find company, and all this misplaced hate!

 

[Leon]

And really, I'm sick of all the "Bethsoft made them give it over a 90". They didn't. They can't.

Sure they can. They can deny the reviewer (or his employer) future early reviews and previews, or ad revenue, or whatever else, which allows Bethesda to put the squeeze on the reviewer's employer, who in turn puts the squeeze on the reviewer himself.

A decent example to illustrate this is how GameSpot fired Jeff Gerstmann after giving Kane & Lynch a low score while the site was plastered with Kane & Lynch ads.

 

[thefalloutfan]

True, OOO made it much better, I finally exceeded the 200 hour mark *looks down*

Still, I was disappointed. A mod like that should have been part of the original game!