Why is Fallout 3 so hated?

Ekans22 said:
And Shihonage, chill man. The dialogue I'm talking about in Shady Sands were not blurbs. I'm talking about three complete dialogues, identical for 3 NPCs (not to split hairs). If it helps to remember, in all three cases you end the dialogue by either saying, "Lets see how tough you are!" (starts combat); or by saying "I don't want any trouble" (no combat). If you choose latter, they say, in blurbs, that they guess you're an alright guy after all (I'm paraphrasing).

Same thing. You're using an anecdotal segment that does not represent the gross total of the quality of writing in Fallout1, to compare it with the gross total of the quality of writing in Fallout3.

This isn't the only example of fallacious defenses you used in your post. In real-life conversations, hearing someone start those sentences would elicit an immediate "you can't be serious" cringe, which usually makes the person realize they sound like an idiot, and they stop.

The Internet however, allows one to prattle on and on, unchecked, dumping this turd of demagogy on others and then proudly strutting away as if something of significance has been accomplished.
 
I used that segment as just an example.

But since you absolutely cannot stop with the ad-hom. attacks...here goes on more of what I thought was lame about FO1 (despite still thinking it was a great game - heaven forbid I don't think its perfect):

How about the Killian/Gizmo plot in Junktown. Very typical. Southern-accented mayor and honest store owner (good) vs Gizmo, the corrupt casino owner(bad) who hires hits on Killian. Gizmo is violent and unrestricted, and Killian does things by the law. ooooooh, black+white, so original. Felt like a future-ized version of the thieves guild vs the Lawful Good captain of the guard. Sorry, but thats how it came off to me.

Oh and that assassination attempt? Seriously? The guy comes in at BROAD DAYLIGHT, past two armed guards, and shoots Killian. Even if he had succeeded, no way in hell he's getting paid, because he's not getting out. Oh, and he blatantly yells 'Gizmo sends his regards'. Subtle, eh? (why do I even need to get evidence on Gizmo at that point - how many witnesses were there to hear Gizmo by name? 4 or 5?)

Or how about the Brotherhood of Steel. For me, this was a 'bomb' in FO1 (not the good kind of bomb).

Lets first look at FO3 BOS. To join them, I had to a) help them fight off hoards of super-mutants (including a bohemeth) in DC downtown area, and b) install a satellite dish to broadcast their staple channel Galaxy News Radio. You know, practical stuff. Even better, they didn't explicitly ask me to do these things - more like I had to build up a decent reputation (for helping them) on my own. Only when they recognized my contributions to their cause in hindsight, did they initiate me.

Now was it annoying that FO3 rail roaded me into supporting them, in this very exact manner, through use of main quests? Yes. But did it at least make me feel like I 'earned' my place in the BOS? Maybe not entirely, but lets compare that to FO1's genius....

Go get an item (any item) from 'the glow', radioactive crater, just to prove that you've been there. Ok, you're in! Screw your motives or the kind of person you are - if you can get an item - any item- from this radioactive area, then that proves you're resourceful, and you can be one of us!

Really? Its that ...simple? A fetch quest? Granted it ends up not being any item, but it ends up being a 'holotape' - but they don't tell you that; the way the quest is introduced, is that the BOS will take anyone who is able to fetch an arbitrary item from a dangerous area, for the pure sake of proving 'resoursefulness'. Screw, y'know, adding to their cause. Plus its one quest. Go to A, get item, come back. You're in!

In FO3, you don't become initiated until nearly the end of the game, by which then you've (unfortunately due to railroading) installed their radio dish, helped your father finish Project Purity, and killed many a super mutants. On top of that, Enclave shows up, and by then you've already had personal experience with them, inside their own base. Experience which could help the BOS.

In short, FO3 induction into BOS was believable (at least moreso). In FO1, it sure as hell was not.

Oh, and lets get back to WoW-esque style quests again; that is, go to area A and kill all of monster B. We can't forget about the Gun Runner quest in FO1 that has you, y'know...go to Area A (boneyard warehouse) and, y'know...kill all of monster B (deathclaws). Guess the radscorpian quest in Shady Sands wasn't the only example after all.

I could go on and on - there are plenty of shortcomings in FO1. They are not exclusive to FO3(plenty there too). Even my beloved BG1 (Baldur's Gate), which I'm a huge fan of and have nostalgic cravings for, has many, many shortcomings.

But ultimately who -cares-? If you enjoy the game, thats great for you. To each their own. I enjoyed it too. FO1, FO3, and FONV were all fun, for me at least, because I didn't let the small stuff hang me up. I poke holes in FO1 only to show that FO3 isn't the only game with holes.

Like I said, FO1 has become one of my top 10 or 15 RPGs of all time (I don't replay games not on that list). I highly regard it. Heaven forbid I like FO3 about as much and that it also make that list; despite its many, many holes as well.
 
Also, they built Megaton around the atomic bomb as part of their agreement to the Church of the Children of Atom, who in return supplied labor and technical expertise. Without their help they would not have been able to build Megaton.

Is it a good reason? ehhhh....no. Its pretty lame, actually.

And don't 'even' get me 'started' with Tenpenny Tower.

But oh well. If I let certain things ruin the whole pie for my appetite, then I'd enjoy a lot less in life, and life's too short for that.

Same story with Mass Effect 3 - bad ending did 'not' ruin the entire game for me (much less the entire trilogy and ALL of bioware/EA - bunch of melodrams, I swear...)
 
You would have trouble not resorting to ad hominem too, if you had to deal with your kind for about the 200th time (and I wish this was a severe exaggeration), spending time and effort on pointing out the obvious, only to have the next guy come in and start with the same garbage.

I'll let someone else babysit this latest gem of yours.

Meanwhile, enjoy this. It's very educational and may even raise your level of critical discernment a few notches.
 
So far, you've given NO specifics on FO1 except that I haven't provided 'enough holes';

and your ONLY specifics on FO3 are,
Then maybe you'll ask yourself how come the cars in Fallout 3 explode, really, or why there's a retarded tree cult, or The Matrix in that game, or why a ghoul would insta-appear after a nuclear blast, or who in their right mind would build a town on a nuclear bomb, or offer a complete stranger to blow it up...

1) Cars shouldn't explode. Stupid foul-up, trying to make game more action-y. Is it justified? Depends on experience you're looking for. I'm not personally fori t.

2) Don't remember a tree cult. Remember the Atom Church though.

3) You mean Slow-Mo? Matrix would be -dodging- bullets - and that doesn't happen in FO3. Slow-Mo? Whats wrong with Slow-Mo? Comes down to taste, and who is to say yours is better than mine?

4) Ghoul never insta-appeared for me when I blew megaton up

5) Already answered (granted its not a great plot device)
 
Personally, I prefer Fallout 3 over New Vegas, I find it generally less buggy, overall better level design and much better pacing. It also seems to run on a decent framerate.

I'm not even going to bother commenting on the story of both the games, not saying they were bad or good, just keeping neutral.

I just personally stick to Fallout 3 or 2, Fallout 2 is my favorite, but the dated technology gets to me sometimes.
 
Meanwhile, enjoy this. It's very educational and may even raise your level of critical discernment a few notches.

Read it.

1) Terrible voice acting in FO3? Yes. With the exception of President Eden and your father. But on average, very bad. Voice acting better in FO1? Maybe marginally, but actually, mostly nonexistent. They tie here. Terrible voice acting, I read and skip anyway, which leads to to reading text.

2) RPG mechancs are awful - agree. Their whole box on Megaton and all that I'm 100 % with. Except for SPECIAL being useless. Few bad examples does NOT make SPECIAL, overall, useless for the whole game. Melodram here.

3) Out of context quotes by the Beth executive producer (who has less to do with the game). wooh.

4) If dialogue/writing is terrible in FO3, its terrible in FO1 - they're comparable. Already given examples of it here. I don't do DLC, so the zeta crap doesn't relate to me.

5) FPS was opposite for me - i had trouble hitting in VATS (for long distances), but could hit out of VATS just fine. As per guns skill making bullets more powerful, I agree in principle, but its a generic RPG power scaling element. didn't bother me in borderlands, doesn't bother me here. thats the whole POINT of an FPS-RPG.

6) Slow mo isn't matrix. Also I shoot legs all the time in FO3 - on melee enemies/ghouls/etc.

7) Totally agree it needs to be 'fellout', not fallout. But it adds flavor to the game too. but yeah, green tint should go, for realism. For atomosphere/feel, its nice to have desolate look from green tint/lack of vegetation.

8) Some of the plot holes made me lol and agree on. Like getting shot in the head 10 times and being alive. Or the kid settlement - how are they alive?

9) Ugly models? If its compared to FO1, its still better. Its the wasteland, I don't expect Dead or Alive hot Hitomi chicks here.

Overall my biggest gripe is how FO3 meshes FO1 and FO2 content and doesn't actually add anything 'new'. Thats the worst thing for me. The rest, though some I agree on, at least to me, are freakin' details. Maybe I'm too casual of a gamer, but w/e.
 
Ekans22 said:
And seriously, pointing out the obvious? Frankly, you haven't, on a specific level, pointed out much of anything.

I'll read it.

But while were posting links, there's this:

http://ninjagameden.com/2011/05/12/fallout-1-first-impressions/

Another gamer, with no nostalgic connection to FO1, giving an honest review thats more eloquent than anything I can come up with.

What a horribly biased review. You can tell he wanted to hate this game from the start. He didn't even play it through.

You've got to look at it from NMA's point of view. The guys here have spent the last FIVE YEARS arguing with irritating kids who have never played the original games but insist that they must love this disappointing game they spent a decade waiting for. To them, you're just another kid bitching at them, and like many before you, they'll just wait for you to quietly disappear after your 20th post. I'm not saying that's what you are, I'm just saying that that's what most will think of you when you insist on continuing the argument that everyone here is fed up of. Just leave it, people are tired of explaining their points. If you just disagree with everything they say, then post reviews (hating on the game this site is a fansite for) then what's the point of the discussion?
 
Yes, but HOW can people see me as said kid, when I've said FO1 is is in my top ten RPGs of all time?! Is it ONLY because I also like FO3? Is the hate ... 'really'... -that-... bad?

You obviously haven't read what I've said either. -obviously-. Because I've agreed with some things people have said.

like here,

Some of the plot holes made me lol and agree on. Like getting shot in the head 10 times and being alive. Or the kid settlement - how are they alive?

here,

Totally agree it needs to be 'fellout', not fallout. But it adds flavor to the game too. but yeah, green tint should go, for realism. For atomosphere/feel, its nice to have desolate look from green tint/lack of vegetation.

and here,

2) RPG mechancs are awful - agree. Their whole box on Megaton and all that I'm 100 % with. Except for SPECIAL being useless. Few bad examples does NOT make SPECIAL, overall, useless for the whole game. Melodram here.

And prolly at least 6 or more other times in previous posts, but whose counting? Seriously...wtf. I wouldn't call that disagreeing with everything being said and thus killing point of discussion. I learned some new things and will probably check out Wasteland as a result of this conversation as well - so hu'ah.
 
You're also not the first person in the world who managed to enjoy both Transformers 2 and Terminator.

Both are about robots, amirite? And c'mon, is Transformers 2 really --that-- bad? You just gotta be able to enjoy the uh... good things... in it. Stop being such a close-minded scrooge.

akdeef.jpg


No, you're not special.

No, you are not the first to attribute a mythical enlightened peacemaker status to himself because you profoundly failed to discern between a piece of shit and a masterpiece.
 
Was that a Scent of a Woman reference? :)

Sorry, I've seen so many FO3 arguments now I basically just skip over most of them now. I wasn't being mean or anything, I was just saying that these debates/discussions/arguments have just become incredibly tedious now, especially in NMA. Cut the guys some slack, I'm amazed they can even be bothered to respond to these posts anymore.

It's cool, I get that people want to have a debate or at least have their say, and it can be a bit crazy how much some of the guys here hate FO3 (a lot do like it, they just hate that it's called an "rpg" which I noticed you agreed with anyway so :) ) However, it's a bit like Banjo Kazooie and other games, where fans had to wait years and then they got something not only completely different to what they were expecting, but was pretty disappointing in the aspects that they loved (rpg, story, characters, dark humour) You have to admit, though it has better visuals than say Oblivion, FO3 is just TES:Wasteland, Oblivion with guns

I stand by that "review" being godawful though. That guy was a tool, and I haven't even played FO1 (no nostalgia here either) :P

edit: sorry, came out late, should've quoted, speaking to Ekans
 
When did I say I was special? Point to it at least once!

How the hell does me being a casual gamer who enjoys lots of different genres make me a close minded scrooge?

Frankly, I'm over the line now and am sick of your shit. You are not a deity who can dictate quality games over trashy games. No, you don't get to decide which games are 'good' and which games are 'bad'. No, your aesthetic appeal is not somehow superior.

No, the fact that I have a different taste in gaming than you, does not mean that you're more enlightened on what games are good and what games are bad - seriously WTF kind of standard is that?

Are you a joke? Thats your standard so far up until this whole point - "if you agree with me, then you know your shit - if you don't agree with me, than you're an immature kid who can't discern a masterpiece from trash. "

Thats the ONLY standard you've provided - agreeing or disagreeing with you.

Grats, you finally managed to piss me off. Get your head out of your ass.

I've met a lot of old school FO fans (who managed to get me into FO1/FO2 in the first place). (some) of them don't like the new games, some of them do. But none of them, were ever a collosal PRIG about it.

Edit: was not in response to earth, just the one before him - exclusively. I need to run a few miles and cool off. Break time anyway.
 
At shihonage,

you obviously think your opinion, from a supposedly objective point of view (which is funny, given how subjective aesthetics is), is superior.

Prove. It.

Instead. Of. Just. Saying. It.

Repeating. It. Does. Not. Make. It. So.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

At earth, no you have a point. Though I did get the urge to try Wasteland for the first time out of this, and learned FO1 is based on Wasteland heavily - cool enough. But yeah, these talks are pointless.

And yeah, FO3 is not an RPG - thats why its not in my top ten, but FO1 is. (of RPGs anyway). And I do agree that FO3 is basically Oblivion with guns - ironically I'm not as much into TES games, but like the Beth fallout games - b/c 1st person perspective feels more natural when guns are involved. And yeah, for me it'd be like FPSing Baldur's Gate - so I can see why some people would be bitter with FO3 and FONV.

I guess, to be fair and flip the table, it would be like someone trying to defend Baldur's Gate Dark Alliance to me. *shudder*

Even then, though, I wouldn't trash talk their preferences just because they're different than mine.

And yeah, in hindsight, wish I hadn't posted the link to the review. And, ironically, being one who just beat FO1 and say I enjoyed it much, I'd say his review was biased and maybe he was impatient or ADD or something. I posted that in the heat of the moment. Derp.
 
I made an accurate analogy there, but it flew right over your head.

The close-minded scrooge was a sarcastic remark as to how you are framing -me- and other people who hate FO3.

I don't particularly enjoy that, nor does it get funny everytime a clone of you tries to project this "cranky old man" image on old-school Fallout fans as some sort of revelation coming from an enlightened source.

We need to stop being so close-minded and religious about the prequels, am I right?

Your arguments are banal and tiring, and the reason I don't get into detailed debates with you over every single issue of comparison is because you've proven to resort to fallacies which would make this effort completely wasted.

You're playing with words and conveniently shrinking mountains into molehills and vice versa, to achieve false validity in your comparisons. This is your modus operandi - to manipulate facts and skew reality in order to convince someone else of your twisted views.

If you were truly looking to understand why Fallout 3 so hated, you would've read not just this thread but many others like it.

Fallout was an important milestone. It was head-and-shoulders above most everything else. It should've been a new starting point, calling for improvements on everything it has done, a beginning of the golden age of CRPGs.

Over time, it still stood, unmistakably, as Fallout.

Then a shitty namesake game appeared. People like you, by elevating the namesake to original's level, help retroactively bury it in obscurity. You play directly into the hands of decline.

Usually I don't bother talking to the likes of you. Chances are, I missed a dozen of your clones before this. But sometimes the pure idiocy, the ignorance and obliviousness of it, just makes me snap.

This stopped being fun a while back. If you want to receive a real lesson, come over to RPG Codex forums. And study, for god's sake, the old threads on game design.

Bye.
 
Ekans22 said:
How about the Killian/Gizmo plot in Junktown. Very typical. Southern-accented mayor and honest store owner (good) vs Gizmo, the corrupt casino owner(bad) who hires hits on Killian. Gizmo is violent and unrestricted, and Killian does things by the law. ooooooh, black+white, so original. Felt like a future-ized version of the thieves guild vs the Lawful Good captain of the guard. Sorry, but thats how it came off to me.
That's a funny example, because that was changed late in development. Originally it was supposed to give an extra turn of screw, where the ending for helping Gizmo was the community fluorishing while Killian would have started a totalitarian, militarized government or something like that. I don't remember the details, nor if it affected during gameplay or why it was changed. It's in the wiki, though, if you are interested I'll look for the link for you.

Or how about the Brotherhood of Steel. For me, this was a 'bomb' in FO1 (not the good kind of bomb).

Lets first look at FO3 BOS. To join them, I had to a) help them fight off hoards of super-mutants (including a bohemeth) in DC downtown area, and b) install a satellite dish to broadcast their staple channel Galaxy News Radio. You know, practical stuff. Even better, they didn't explicitly ask me to do these things - more like I had to build up a decent reputation (for helping them) on my own. Only when they recognized my contributions to their cause in hindsight, did they initiate me.

Now was it annoying that FO3 rail roaded me into supporting them, in this very exact manner, through use of main quests? Yes. But did it at least make me feel like I 'earned' my place in the BOS? Maybe not entirely, but lets compare that to FO1's genius....

Go get an item (any item) from 'the glow', radioactive crater, just to prove that you've been there. Ok, you're in! Screw your motives or the kind of person you are - if you can get an item - any item- from this radioactive area, then that proves you're resourceful, and you can be one of us!
I grant you the thing about "are we really sure we can trust this guy?", but in their defense, it seems to be just a way of saying "get lost", since they lead you to what they think will be certain death. They probably didn't think too much in the possibility of you actually coming back. I grant you it's weak, but it's understandable to scare off the random wastelander.
 
Ekans22 said:
Also, they built Megaton around the atomic bomb as part of their agreement to the Church of the Children of Atom, who in return supplied labor and technical expertise. Without their help they would not have been able to build Megaton.

Is it a good reason? ehhhh....no. Its pretty lame, actually.

And don't 'even' get me 'started' with Tenpenny Tower.

But oh well. If I let certain things ruin the whole pie for my appetite, then I'd enjoy a lot less in life, and life's too short for that.

Same story with Mass Effect 3 - bad ending did 'not' ruin the entire game for me (much less the entire trilogy and ALL of bioware/EA - bunch of melodrams, I swear...)
At least is SOME reason, as far as I knew it was just because.

Ekans22 said:
2) Don't remember a tree cult. Remember the Atom Church though.

3) You mean Slow-Mo? Matrix would be -dodging- bullets - and that doesn't happen in FO3. Slow-Mo? Whats wrong with Slow-Mo? Comes down to taste, and who is to say yours is better than mine?

4) Ghoul never insta-appeared for me when I blew megaton up

The tree cult is a cult around Harold and his head-grew tree, which is restoring the flora of the Wasteland. If any cult in FO 3 makes sense, IMO, this is the one. Wouldn't you feel a huge joy if you find out the huge, sterile desert you live in can become fertile again thanks to a particular tree? Even knowing the trees by themselves are of no use, the leaves that fall can fertilize the dirt, and thus allowing other plants to grow.

About the ghoul, they mean Moira Brown. She just appears as a ghoul to allow you to follow the quest. The extra nonsense is that she seems to be just slightly annoyed because you BLEW UP HER ENTIRE TOWN AND KILLED EVERYONE SHE KNOWS, and then just allows you to continue the quest.

The thing about Matrix, I think he means the simulated reality in which Dad gets trapped.
 
Aye, Oppen - I did get the vibe from BOS in FO1 that, at least at first, they were trying to just get me killed. And that was actually a pleasant surprise - since it was different from the FO3 more 'altruistic/nice guys'. Hence my disappointment when I got back to them, and they were all like, "ok, come on in".

And sure thing on the Killian twist - the idea of a surprise militarized Killian ending sounds pretty cool. Again, I only played FO1 recently - so to be fair, I should play it 2 or 3 times in different ways to see how it responds differently - or just read the wikis.

Yeah Megaton wasn't explained well. For the longest time I thought it was arbitrary that they built the town around the bomb. But if you talk to the NPCs (I forgot the old lady's name whose the most senior member), you find it was based on their deal with the Church of the Children of the Atom. Its not a 'great' reason, but egh. I guess I just didn't buy the fact that a large group of labor/specialists, big enough to be crucial to Megaton's development, was infected with this Religious Atom madness. A few oddballs cracking under the pressure of living in the wastelands here and there, sure. But not group apparently big enough to influence the location of Megaton's construction.

I feel like I need to replay FO3. Somehow I played it twice and never bumped into this tree cult. Harold's in underworld, right? Its a neat concept, I admit - group overjoyed with hope from seeing a tree. It sounds vaguely familiar - maybe I did see it - was it warped with Harold's head on it? Making it the same Harold as in FO1 (if they did that) might have been a mistake...but again, I don't know context.

And oooooh, I remember Moira. In one playthrough I did blow up Megaton, and when I ran into her, remembered fearing a really pissed off character (and my having to fight/kill my only source of weapon repair at the time - didn't know any others, and had no Repair skill). I was relieved, then extremely disappointed, at her reaction.

And ok on the matrix - though I liked it, personally. Gave me a chance to 'play' in the pre-war heavily 50's era (even tho lorewise, I know it shouldn't have been 50's). I'm a 50's black'n'white nut, so I ate that part of the game right up. I didn't like being a kid in the simulation, though.
 
Ekans22 said:
Aye, Oppen - I did get the vibe from BOS in FO1 that, at least at first, they were trying to just get me killed. And that was actually a pleasant surprise - since it was different from the FO3 more 'altruistic/nice guys'. Hence my disappointment when I got back to them, and they were all like, "ok, come on in".
Agree.
And sure thing on the Killian twist - the idea of a surprise militarized Killian ending sounds pretty cool. Again, I only played FO1 recently - so to be fair, I should play it 2 or 3 times in different ways to see how it responds differently - or just read the wikis.
That thing, only in the wiki. You'd never find out through gameplay. I just like to read the wiki because my main attraction when I play is for the story. I know there's no reason you should know that, I just pointed out that was funny you gave that example. I'd like it a lot better if they'd keep the old ending.
Yeah Megaton wasn't explained well. For the longest time I thought it was arbitrary that they built the town around the bomb. But if you talk to the NPCs (I forgot the old lady's name whose the most senior member), you find it was based on their deal with the Church of the Children of the Atom. Its not a 'great' reason, but egh. I guess I just didn't buy the fact that a large group of labor/specialists, big enough to be crucial to Megaton's development, was infected with this Religious Atom madness. A few oddballs cracking under the pressure of living in the wastelands here and there, sure. But not group apparently big enough to influence the location of Megaton's construction.
Again, at least there is a reason. Not the best one, I'm not sure yet if I'd buy something like that, but definitely gives it a few extra points in my perception of the game.
I feel like I need to replay FO3. Somehow I played it twice and never bumped into this tree cult. Harold's in underworld, right? Its a neat concept, I admit - group overjoyed with hope from seeing a tree. It sounds vaguely familiar - maybe I did see it - was it warped with Harold's head on it? Making it the same Harold as in FO1 (if they did that) might have been a mistake...but again, I don't know context.
Hmmm, I don't think it was wrong for it to be FO1's Harold (it is, but the tree growing on his head is from FO 2), because it is consistent with the lore. In FO2's ending, if you've met Harold and he survives (I don't remember the extra requirements) it's said something like he moved east (is arguably if THAT FAR makes sense, at the most) and that there are rumours his tree grew even larger and that he set roots, so in this subject, FO3 only confirms things that were rumours in FO2.
And yes, all of Harold's body became part of the main tree (it's a forest, thus the cult; a single tree is pretty useless overall, its leaves won't fertilize anything that is not covered by them; but this tree gave seeds and became a forest), his face is in the trunk, his heart under the roots.

And ok on the matrix - though I liked it, personally. Gave me a chance to 'play' in the pre-war heavily 50's era (even tho lorewise, I know it shouldn't have been 50's). I'm a 50's black'n'white nut, so I ate that part of the game right up. I didn't like being a kid in the simulation, though.
I kind of liked it too, same reasons, but later gave it a little bit of thought and I think it's somewhat contradicting the kind of technology they had in the FO universe. In any other sci-fi game I know I'd love it, without any regrets, but I just doubt that would be feasible with the techs available in the FO universe.
 
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