Things that Fallout 3 did right!

AlphaPromethean said:
gordog_frohman said:
I liked the pip boy. Sure, it's forcibly put on your arm and it is kinda large, but I think it's a well designed interface and it certainly makes you unique in the wasteland. Just wish the pip boy glove got some more love, honestly I don't even know what it does.
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It controls the Pip-Boy's on-screen cursor and map scrolling, according to the Art of Fallout 3 book.

I feel like the wrist-mounted Pip-Boy was a good decision, and it's certainly become iconic, but they kinda dropped the ball in some areas.

1.The design is incorrect,ergonomically/practically speaking. To operate it you have to cover the screen with your arm, the fix to this is as simple as flipping the knobs and switches to the other side of the device. This was a careless mistake that the designer himself admitted was dumb and mindless

2.Making it bio-metrically locked was stupid, and all though New Vegas retconned this, it was still dumb.
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What's even dumber is that in the same art book that tells us what the glove is for, it's mentioned that the thing is sealed via bolts and not some hermetic thing, thereby making it WAY easier to remove than the hermetic seal would indicate.

3. They could have added some minor references to the 2000 in the design somewhere, perhaps add in a miniaturized vacuum tube/lightbulb vent from the original design.
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Honestly, I think the non-ergonomic design itself was a reference to the 2000 series. The 3000 though should have been brown, not gray. At least the 3000 Mark IV corrects this and the ergonomics issues in Fallout 4.


I realize that saying 3000>2000 is paramount to heresy here, but it's implied in Fallout 2 that it was wrist-mounted and it was very clearly going to be wrist-mounted in Van Buren.
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I seem to recall that the game manuals and the Fallout Bible itself established that the 2000 series was indeed wrist-mounted. I'll have to double-check, but it DOES make more sense than being a hand-held item. No idea where that notion came from...
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Making it bio-metrically locked was stupid
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I think Bethesda creating Vault 101 was going for that 1984 feel, you know, bio-metrically locked pip-boys, "thank you overseer" posters everywhere, tunnel snakes working as the secret police (kinda), brutal interrogations, the overseer being omnipotent and shit.

I seem to recall that the game manuals and the Fallout Bible itself established that the 2000 series was indeed wrist-mounted. I'll have to double-check, but it DOES make more sense than being a hand-held item. No idea where that notion came from...
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Librarian in Hub notices that you have a pip-boy, so yeah, it couldn't be hand-held. Unless they predicted the future and in 1997 they knew that everyone will be walking around with smartphones in their hands all the time.
 
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(let it be noted that asides from being newer here than EA are to making good games, I am only just playing Fallout 2 now)

The good:

-exploration. I enjoy walking simulators (Gone Home, Ether One, Snore: The Game, etc) so I don't mind scenery checking, and what I appreciate is that if there is a dot on the horizon you will definitely go to it and in there is a monster that wants you dead. It is one of the main reasons I have had trouble ranking it with NV
-Point Lookout. Bethedsa make a screwy glitch that OPs the NPCs, a challenge arises. Plot was JUST goofy enough but the spy business was fun, and I can deal with the brain ending.
-Hunting rifle didn't use .308, and aiming with the sniper rifles is hard. in NV I can headshot ANYONE with a 40+ guns skill
-Deathclaws are actually difficult. In NV, they're easy to kill.
-exploration
-dungeon crawling is something Bethsoft do alright. But Copypasting makes it less enjoyable.
-Dat intro.
-exploration
-that cannibal village was wonderful
-exploration
-random encounters system is much better.

Overall, NV was better in every way except for the exploration factor, and unfortunately that is something I consider really significant to Fallout. As I roam around F2 it's the random encounters, every door to a building begging to be looked through for nothing in particular despite having nothing close to the level of detail to what F3/NV have. That means a lot, and I'll always hand it to them that the original exploring is fun. NV is the superior game, and as an artwork is much more mature while still being able to have a giggle (OWB, for example), and is a truly great successor to Fallout in the modern day, but eh. The map is too small.
 
Maybe I already posted this years ago, but I was watching Fallout 3's honest trailer, and got reminded of Harold becoming a tree. I might be bashed for this (?) but I liked that. I don't particularly recall the writing, so the execution might have been poor, but I liked the progression of the character into what I see as a counterpart to the master (instead of assimilating life into him, he brought life himself and became an extended sentient being, etc).
 
I know the hardcore "classic" Fallout fans are going to give me a ton of shit for this, but the only thing I found bad about the game were the plotholes, to be honest.
 
Dunno if i already mentioned it, but the need of training to be able to use a power armor is quite a good idea, that can lead to good use in the lore, and explain why every retard that find one cannot necessary wear it.

Unfortunately :
- Vanilla Fallout 3 provide only one single way to acquire said training. (just as it allow only one single way to move forward in the game)
- You are the only one that need training. Every companions, every people you reverse pick-pocket or trade a power armor with, will be able to wear it without training....
 
naossano said:
Dunno if i already mentioned it, but the need of training to be able to use a power armor is quite a good idea, that can lead to good use in the lore, and explain why every retard that find one cannot necessary wear it.

Unfortunately :
- Vanilla Fallout 3 provide only one single way to acquire said training. (just as it allow only one single way to move forward in the game)
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Not true if you take the DLCs in account. You can get power armor training after finishing OA.
 
sesom said:
naossano said:
Dunno if i already mentioned it, but the need of training to be able to use a power armor is quite a good idea, that can lead to good use in the lore, and explain why every retard that find one cannot necessary wear it.

Unfortunately :
- Vanilla Fallout 3 provide only one single way to acquire said training. (just as it allow only one single way to move forward in the game)
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Not true if you take the DLCs in account. You can get power armor training after finishing OA.
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Along with getting it right after leaving the vault with the most powerful set of PA.
 
Listening to Fallout 3 soundtrack rn and actually they got it absolutely spot on. The lyrics to the songs, well, 'apposite' is an understatement. It often takes a track that has two lines that, in the context of the game world, have a sort of sick humour to them, the most obvious example being

I don't want to set the world on fire
I just want to start a flame in your heart

You get that rise and fall, like a joke. At first you think it's about the apocalypse, and then it's love. I'd say that's got a real 'closeness' to the mix of humour and despair that the older ones stab at. It's not subtle but it doesn't need to be - that's the point. Butcher Pete is very apt if one looks at it in terms of the raiders, who are a dead rip-off of the wasteland gangs of Mad Max - that raunchy, no holds barred vocal delivery that alludes to almost a mix of animalistic fucking and murder, objectification where he refers to women as things, as 'meat, while still framing it as a clear reference to wives, daughters etc. You get stuff like Way Back Home - the vault, but also the general 'lost-ness' of the wasteland, something I think FNV did too, with Lone Star. Anything Goes harkens back to the old days, the classic vision of that 50s aesthetic that much of the world desperately clings to in an agonised, deluded fit of nostalgia. And then you've got Yankee Doodle and the other classic American tunes, which is dark humour at its finest, framed in the most major of melodies, the funnest of beats, and the raunchiest of lyrics. It screws with my feelings, and the soundtrack (and sound design) is just damn solid. The emptiness of the wasteland as you explore (3's second strongest feature), as you take in this ruined world filled with chaos and suffering with small pockets of humanity, well, the soundtrack fits in excellently, both with the simpler instrumental tracks full of upbeat joy, and the relevant, ever hinting lyrics. NV's soundtrack I would say is far less considered, or apt, anyway. Yeah, new music would have been made and they probably could have done something with that, but I think it ties back to both 2, 3 and NV in that there's a clear attempt at returning to the old ways (a huge part of the plot in NV), and when you have spare records + holodisks floating around that survived the apocalypse, I can see it being a reasonable thing. I'll always have fond memories of my first playthrough, exploring the world with the radio on in the background, blowing away raiders as I searched for the last bastions of humanity in the dying world I inhabited. That's what I love about it - it's the cheesiest of optimism in a world almost dead, where one individual always lets it last a little longer. It's like Dark Souls only not /completely/ filled with flat, unchanging nihilistic despair.

/overlong post sorry
 
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Well, the specific example you put was actually intended by the devs of Fallout 1, but they didn't get the rights for that song so they went with Maybe.
 
The best part of FO3 is the radio system, I think. It adds so much character to the game and the news bulletins are an awesome way to add some dialogue about the player's actions. The music was also spectacular! If there's one thing I want in FO4, I want more music stations and a bigger emphasis on radio communications. It's an untapped avenue with a lot of storytelling potential (or a least it would be, in more competent hands.)
 
If there is anything you can bet on making it into F4 then radios playing old music will definitely be at the top (right after a dog named Dogmeat). After all, the spirit of Fallout is shooting people in the head to 50's music.
 
I've made a list of things I like about Fallout 3, however they are things I like in my opinion rather than game or lore quality so if you don't agree with them then that's okay.


- The way guns' designs from the first 2 games appear since I think their designs translated well into Fallout 3 (10mm pistol for example).
- The gun designs in general.
- The designs of the 50s style cars you can find in the wasteland.
- The loading screen artwork.
- The way the wasteland looks and the overall design of it. Take note, I only like the way it appears, I've taken note of the abundance of world design flaws.
- The 50s music that was chosen, which also had the side effect of introducing a new generation of people to it.
- The ambient music, even though it supposedly sounds "fantasy" but it sounds apocalyptic to me.
- The Enclave can be more sympathetic this time around than how they were in F2.
- The big firefight at the Capitol Building, even if it doesn't make much sense story wise.
- How eerie Point Lookout can be.
 
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