Starfield

[TorontoReign]

As long as you guys know you are part of the problem I guess you can be disgusting Bethedafags. My browser is acting weird it double posted that so I deleted and reposted. Opera sucks. Or my net sucks.

I ain't part of the problem because i'm not buying shitty Bethesda games.


And then Bethesda proceeds to go back on the dialogue system of F4 in F76. (well, at least when the Wastelanders update came out).

You are one of the few hardliners. You are appreciated.

 

[Black_Electric]

To be fair, while I do actually like VA for the protagonist, I would much rather time be spent expanding the dialogue options because having only four responses each time is bullshit, especially when you have no idea what they are going to say.

It would be easy enough for bethesda to put in an option to skip va dialogue for those that don't like it.

 

[TorontoReign]

I mean it will be a Bethesda Mass Effect so I am not sure what we are discussing here. Will it have shitty VA or silent shitty dialog? OH BOY!

 

[Mechazawa]

I actually kind of liked the VA'd protagonist. Sure maybe some of the lines were a bit awkward but always enjoyed listening to the delivery of the sarcastic lines.

I wasnt a fan of the voiced protag in 4 mostly because, at least the for the male, the lines were too cringy. Granted, I have never had my baby son kidnaped, but I felt it was obvious that you would have no clue how old your son is, but the characters just kept insisting that they were still babies and thats not what I would have thought were it me. Ive never played a male playthrough of the game because the content of the lines for the female are just that much better; I have watched let's play's of the male character.

However, I think voiced lines for other characters are basically required if you want good memorable characters and companions. None of the characters from the earlier Fallout games are memorable unless they had voiced dialog/talking heads. Voice and good voice acting adds so much to a character that you cannot get with text on a screen. And fuck trying to imagine it.

 

[Norzan]

None of the characters from the earlier Fallout games are memorable unless they had voiced dialog/talking heads.

To you maybe, but for me plenty of characters in the original two Fallout games that don't have talking heads are memorable.

If anything, there a lot of characters in videogames with no voice acting that are far more memorable than many with voice acting, even the ones with good voice acting. How well written they are is far more important than if they have voice acting, good or not.

 

[Black_Electric]

To you maybe, but for me plenty of characters in the original two Fallout games that don't have talking heads are memorable.

I'd agree. Yes, voice acting certainly helps and adds to the personality but I don't think it NEEDS to be there to make a character memorable.

In this day and age though, with modern graphics if an NPC isn't voiced it's a bit awkward imo.

 

[TorontoReign]

To you maybe, but for me plenty of characters in the original two Fallout games that don't have talking heads are memorable.

If anything, there a lot of characters in videogames with no voice acting that are far more memorable than many with voice acting, even the ones with good voice acting. How well written they are is far more important than if they have voice acting, good or not.

Yeah that is a BAD TAKE on their part.

 

[The_Citzen]

My main problem with voice acted protagonists in modern RPGs is that no matter how many dialogue options they give you it always seem like part of the roleplaying aspect is killed, feels like the character has already a set personality. Cyberpunk 2077 is one game that comes into my mind with this problem, I was really expecting V to be your own character, but he ends up being a set character from the start with a personality that you can't change all that much...

 

[TorontoReign]

Those kind of RPG's are a different breed. I find myself not wanting to play Witcher 3 (I did not enjoy it) because there is little roleplaying involved aside from how mean you are and how you kill shit. I played through Fallout 4 once but I could not see how anybody would ever want to play it again due to the VA being so bad, the writing being so bad, and the mechanics being so bad. So when people see Fallout 4 in space and go: I MIGHT BUY THIS ON SALE DERP DERP or I MIGHT BE ABLE TO MAKE MYSELF ENJOY THIS it just rubs me the wrong way. You are all why Fallout is dead. Go fuck yourselves.

 

[The_Citzen]

Those kind of RPG's are a different breed. I find myself not wanting to play Witcher 3 (I did not enjoy it) because there is little roleplaying involved aside from how mean you are and how you kill shit. I played through Fallout 4 once but I could not see how anybody would ever want to play it again due to the VA being so bad, the writing being so bad, and the mechanics being so bad. So when people see Fallout 4 in space and go:

I think I can get over the fact that a game is not a real RPG a bit more easily, I have to be really honest, while Fallout 4 writing and rpg design is pretty bad I still really like the game and have around 300h on it. Mostly because I enojoy exploring, the artstyle and mainly the base building mechanics, overall it is a game that if you stray off the main quest, there is quite a bit of roleplay value on it.

Overall I think good writing and a engaging gameplay is more important than deep rpg systems, bringing up The Outer Worlds again, that was one of the very few games that I dropped off because it was so boring and dull, even while it had most of the rpg systems that I enjoy.

 

[The_Citzen]

Those kind of RPG's are a different breed. I find myself not wanting to play Witcher 3 (I did not enjoy it)

Also Witcher 3 is probably the most overrated game ever (maybe alongside Fallout 3), that shit isn't even an action RPG, it is an action adventure game with shitty combat and choices. It fails to be a good RPG in every possible way, I really don't understand how there are people that dare to call it "the best RPG ever made"...

 

[Mechazawa]

Those kind of RPG's are a different breed. I find myself not wanting to play Witcher 3 (I did not enjoy it) because there is little roleplaying involved aside from how mean you are and how you kill shit. I played through Fallout 4 once but I could not see how anybody would ever want to play it again due to the VA being so bad, the writing being so bad, and the mechanics being so bad. So when people see Fallout 4 in space and go: I MIGHT BUY THIS ON SALE DERP DERP or I MIGHT BE ABLE TO MAKE MYSELF ENJOY THIS it just rubs me the wrong way. You are all why Fallout is dead. Go fuck yourselves.

Fallout 4 has the best mechanics in a Fallout game. They could be tweaked a little to be more interesting, but the step away from SPECIAL and the move towards a unified perk system was a good thing in both Fallout and TES. There is no real good argument as to why skills are better than perks other than skill checks. Which, you could just use perks for. Half the skills in fo1/2 are garbage to take anyways, guides everywhere tell you to avoid them, even more than half the perks are trash in 1/2. What amazing system of yeaterdecade are you pining for? Because it sure isnt the systems of Fo1/2. FNV was a pretty decent mix, but most skills only matter at breakpoints of 25, 50, 75, and 100 (so, 4 perks would suffice). You do lose out on the ability to make stimpacks and gun accuracy 1% better because you invested 1 skill point in it, I guess if you view that as good content and character development then it would seem crazy to you where the franchise has gone.

 

[Mechazawa]

Also Witcher 3 is probably the most overrated game ever (maybe alongside Fallout 3), that shit isn't even an action RPG, it is an action adventure game with shitty combat and choices. It fails to be a good RPG in every possible way, I really don't understand how there are people that dare to call it "the best RPG ever made"...

You're the first person on the internet I have ever seen who also doesn't like Witcher 3. *High fives.* The controls were ass and the story was the definition of a "slow burn". Like 20+ hours in-between plot development levels of slow burn.

 

[Norzan]

Fallout 4 has the best mechanics in a Fallout game.

That's funny.

but the step away from SPECIAL and the move towards a unified perk system was a good thing in both Fallout and TES.

The entire point of skill points in the games pre-Fallout 4 was to make the "boring" damage increase, leaving perks to do the more creative stuff. What the system of Fallout 4 does is that now a bunch of perks slots have to be wasted on those damage increases because without those the game would be a slog since every enemy would turn into a bullet sponge (which they kind of do anyway because the scaling in Fallout 4 is terrible). So yes, unifying both was bad.

Also, plenty of perks in Fallout 4 are terrible, so i don't get criticizing the older games for that and turn around and say Fallout 4 has the "best mechanics in a Fallout game". If anything Fallout 4 has the worst mechanics in the series and clearly Bethesda agrees given that they are backtracking in a lot of them.

 

[The_Citzen]

That's funny.


The entire point of skill points in the games pre-Fallout 4 was to make the "boring" damage increase, leaving perks to do the more creative stuff. What the system of Fallout 4 does is that now a bunch of perks slots have to be wasted on those damage increases because without those the game would be a slog since every enemy would turn into a bullet sponge

This.

The main thing that bothers me in rpgs nowadays is how much combat focused they are, sure hlaf of the skills in fo1/2 are useless in combat but those games have many important checks and puzzles that require many of them.

One thing that a lot of people forget is actually how little combat fo1/2 has, most of those games are about exploration, solving some puzzles and especially dialogue. I would argue that in fo2 you spend around 60% - 70% of your entire playthrough outside combat. Just wish those new RPGs that like to call themselves spiritual successors to the classic Fallouts knew about that, because most of them seem to be completely combat focused.

 

[Mechazawa]

That's funny.


The entire point of skill points in the games pre-Fallout 4 was to make the "boring" damage increase, leaving perks to do the more creative stuff. What the system of Fallout 4 does is that now a bunch of perks slots have to be wasted on those damage increases because without those the game would be a slog since every enemy would turn into a bullet sponge (which they kind of do anyway because the scaling in Fallout 4 is terrible). So yes, unifying both was bad.

Also, plenty of perks in Fallout 4 are terrible, so i don't get criticizing the older games for that and turn around and say Fallout 4 has the "best mechanics in a Fallout game". If anything Fallout 4 has the worst mechanics in the series and clearly Bethesda agrees given that they are backtracking in a lot of them.

I think the solution to get rid of those more boring perks that just increase damage requires a level of world design that I don't think Bethesda or any other company is really capable of doing on a large scale. The "boring" stuff should all be upgraded via in world interactions. Take damage, you could design a world where damage is strictly gear based and then balance that gear/the ability to make that gear around exploration (metroidvania style) or have trainers in the form of NPCs who give some quest that gives you a boost to damage. So your character development is tied to in world interaction. You could argue that is going away from the RPGness because there's less of a need for a stat allocation page. My "ultimate" RPG system would be one that is entirely via exploration and questing, no clicking buttons in a stats page at all and no levels or experience, no "skills get better as you use them". You got better at shotguns because you found a guy who is trained to use them and he taught you, you got better at repairing shit because you found a gunsmith who taught you, etc.

In Fallout 4, I would agree that all the incremental perks should also include things that in some way change how you play the game, and I also think everything related to crafting should be off the perk tree (same in Skyrim) and strictly in the environment. But leveling up, and having one currency you have to think about how to spend, is better, in my opinion, then having multiple currencies that are broken up into pieces (1% intervals). Does anyone really ever NOT just dump their whole level into one skill when they level up? 2 MAYBE if you're trying to keep them even (like I am doing in FNV right now with stealth and guns). Or do people really sit down every level and go "Okay, I got 15 points, lets put 3 here, 2 here, 7 here and 3 there. Or wait, maybe I want 6 there and 4 here? No, 7 is good!"

Edit: The reason I went on about FO1/2 perks and skills is because ive never understood where this "amazing" system of yesteryear is that people feel we have gotten away from. I don't get it at all.

 

[The_Citzen]

My "ultimate" RPG system would be one that is entirely via exploration and questing, no clicking buttons in a stats page at all and no levels or experience, no "skills get better as you use them". You got better at shotguns because you found a guy who is trained to use them and he taught you, you got better at repairing shit because you found a gunsmith who taught you, etc.

Sounds like you have to play Kenshi.

 

[william dempsey]

that in fo2 you spend around 60% - 70% of your entire playthrough outside combat. I suppose it's all down to playing style. I quite enjoy the massacres or the opposite getting into a fight underpowered but winning. I wiped out all the slaver dens etc as I am a righteous bastard. Also I wish there were far more puzzles in the early games but not totally necessary to progress. Exhibit 1 Milord.

 

[Mechazawa]

Sounds like you have to play Kenshi.

Kenshi is in my top 10.

 

[The_Citzen]

Sounds like you have to play Kenshi.

It still uses the "you use it you get better". But it does in a very nice way, your skills level related to the difficulty of what you are doing, at the start you learn by getting beaten by starving bandits, but once you finally manage to handle them you ain't gonna learn anything new and you must move to a stronger foe.