Polish Click! review
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UncannyGarlic
Sonny, I Watched the Vault Bein' Built!
And here I was hoping that not even Bethesda would be stupid enough to transplant him. 
Good job Bethesda, you failed to meet low expectations by slithering along the floor 
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Good job Bethesda, you failed to meet low expectations by slithering along the floor .
You're right, that doesn't seem like the reason they would make a game that way. I'm quite sure that the Black Isle folks didn't say "Hey, let's give the player a ton of freedom in the paths they choose so they can 'beat' the game quickly and say it sucks."betamonkey said:
I believe that Black Isle had more confidence in the intelligence, thoughtfulness and creativity of their target audience than what you propose. I guess most other dev studios don't share that opinion of their audience.
Bethesda just might have made their macguffin chase a bit too linear.
Seymour the spore plant
Still Mildly Glowing
UncannyGarlic said:
It gets a little worse, actually.
[spoiler:8de50735fc]This sort of cult that forms around Harold, what with him making the soil fertile again for plants in his surroundings, call themselves the "Treeminders". I shit you not. Don't know if he can still speak or has become a full-fledged vegetable, though.[/spoiler:8de50735fc]
Seymour the spore plant said:
[spoiler:f7fcfd9bb8]He can speak. In fact he asks you to kill him, as he's not really happy with his new situation, while the Treeminders want to expand/fertilize Bob.
And - no joke - if you do help the Treeminders Harold will be happy anyway 'coz he'll be at peace knowing he's helping people and shit.[/spoiler:f7fcfd9bb8]
betamonkey
First time out of the vault
Snackpack said:
Yes. It is different. Saying it sucks because it is different is what I take issue with. Not that I want to defend Beth or FO3 or critique two 10 year old games, but different doesn't mean bad.. and to most people being able to skip right to the oil tanker and blow it up is not what they think of when they think about Fallout.
Which explains why their other games don't fit the same mold? No, it had nothing to do with their oh so high and respectful opinion of the target audience.
It's also not what most people do. It's just a possibility, and an extreme one at that.betamonkey said:
I agree that BISs opinion of their target audience was not the deciding factor in the structure of the game and plot. Their goal was the deciding factor, and that happened to be pen and paper emulation, as previously stated. And, also previously stated, a large part of that involves having an open, nonlinear plot. This isn't Fallout 3's goal, which by itself would be fine if it weren't supposed to be a sequel of the first two.
betamonkey
First time out of the vault
Leon said:
Well, it would take someone on the original design team clarifying why it was possible to make a definitive statement. Maybe they just wanted it to be possible for the heck of it. Maybe it was an accidental oversight. Maybe they just never expected people to play that way out of naivety. It certainly wouldn't be the first time a talented dev team didn't consider all the possibilities in a large project.
As to the last sentence, it's a different take on the game. Everyone knows it will be different. It was stated to be different 4 years ago. Being different doesn't automatically mean good, but it doesn't have to mean terrible either. And I think we all can agree that different people regard Fallout great for different reasons. While one person may hold that ability to speed run in 10 minutes as great others may not care. It doesn't mean either is wrong, and it is certainly understandable why someone may miss that feature, just as it is understandable why someone may not care about it.
Trying to be middle of the road here since I do not think FO3 will be all that great myself but I just find many of the criticisms to be based on the oddest things. Well, odd to me.
betamonkey
First time out of the vault
Leon said:
Well, I'm certainly not going to get into a sequel/spinoff debate. I've seen some pretty terrible reasoning on both sides of that already. As long with some good for both too. But in the industry a sequel is whatever the developer decides it is. Whether or not you accept it as such is another matter and entirely personal.
My personal opinion is that I don't care if a number is on a box or not. If the game is good and I enjoy it then that is what matters. We've known for years that Bethesda was doing it how they want and they are certainly within their rights to do so being the owners of the franchise.
God is Dog backwards
Mildly Dipped
How long is FO1/2's main quest when compared to the other stuff you can do in the game?
I guess maybe the difference is, in FO2 for instance, you need to spend time doing other stuff to get your level up to survive the endgame. In Beth's FO3, you can rush to the end and survive at low level due to the level scaling.
I guess maybe the difference is, in FO2 for instance, you need to spend time doing other stuff to get your level up to survive the endgame. In Beth's FO3, you can rush to the end and survive at low level due to the level scaling.
Leon said:
Why indeed? Canon storyline had Gecko thriving, so he would've been at least sitting pretty in the community, if not leading it. There'd better be a good plotline as to why, besides travelling across the countryside with a Leyland Brothers style caravan.
If I get even a whiff of Ian in this here game, I'm returning it to the video store and telling them that it doesn't work.
Maybe you will meet a time-travelling Parker Ian.
Bernard Bumner
Still Mildly Glowing
betamonkey said:
The problem being that, for most of the people who've taken their time to explain their reasoning, isn't just a case of different = bad. The difference is that the original Fallouts are classic games, whereas Fallout 3 seems to have many, many problems.
So the difference is that the originals were good, but this sequel is bad. Now, it doesn't take a genius to realise that what made the original games good was the content of the games, and therefore that what must make this game bad is the changes.
The reason that so many people compare and contrast Fallout 3 with Fallout 1/2, is that it is a sequel. A standard had been set via a winning formula - all Bethesda had to do was to carry enough of that formula through to their sequel, but they seem to have failed. They already had a recipe for success - in creating a classic game, I mean - but they chose to disregard it, or lacked the ability to follow it.
There is no excuse for taking a working, finessed game system and great mythology, and somehow losing every positive element of it in translation to a sequel.
I was cautiously optimistic about Fallout 3; firstly as a good sequel, up until details of the game-mechanics became available. After that, as a good Fallout game, until details of the treatment of the mythology became available. And finally that it would be a good game at least, because I believed that there was no way that Bethesda could break a working game as strong as Fallout. The gameplay videos and plot details finally convinced me that they may well have failed even to achieve this basic level of competence.
How is that even possible with an established series?
H.A.D.E.S.
First time out of the vault
Where do you get all your knoweledge about the plot of Fallout 3? I am just interested.