Will in ten years Fallout still be relevant as a series?

[xxdemonxspawnnxx]

I guess you are telling about the radio music. Soundtrack is some of the few things Bethesda did right. Inon Zur made music even for Fallout tactics and 3, and they are good too.

I too hate that BOS is spawning everywhere in fallout 3 and 4.

For a 3d Fallout game, the engine is not that bad. I think it is actually good in NV.
Though it is a bit too janky.

 

[Morgan_]

Can't say I liked the skill checks in NV being a hard check where you'd be off 1 point and fail. Then again I assume this is to prevent the save scumming that would happen with percentages.
Gotta compromise in the end.

If by relevance we're talking recognizable franchise that makes money? Yeah, it'll be relevant. Can't speak to anything else though.

 

[SquidWard]

The reuse of the BOS and NCR to such a massive extant is what put me off most about NV and 3's storyline.

Damn the faction that started in the West, expanded into a small "nation" in 2 as it expanded East is ruining the game because they're still trying to expand East?

I'd understand the Brotherhood in 3 but not NCR and BoS in NV being a problem. Seeing as those factions were very much so going to be around that area. And it's not like their stories were done poorly. We're seeing the last of the Brotherhood of Steel (if you follow logical steps, not Bethesda wackiness) in New Vegas. There's a single bunker of them. They were ordered to fight an unwinnable fight at Helios One. They're reclusive now. The best they can hope for is stabilization. BoS will not be tolerated by larger civilizations and their march towards progress and better technology. That's already made apparent in NV.

I also didn't like the eartagged skill checks in New Vegas but you have to understand a lot of the design of NV had to cater to the new Fallout audience. And it did. It delivered a better combat than 3 but was much like it, it had the same philosophy of seeing where to go next on the horizon as 3, it was made easier with eartagged skill checks, snowglobes being the new bobbleheads, and more. NV wouldn't sell well to the Fallout 3 newcomers if it was a turn based RPG. They'd riot about it being "dated."

New Vegas did a great job of respecting Fallout for what it was but having it be played on the foundation that was Gamebryo and Fallout 3 assets and design.

 

[Atomic Postman]

Can't say I liked the skill checks in NV being a hard check where you'd be off 1 point and fail. Then again I assume this is to prevent the save scumming that would happen with percentages.
Gotta compromise in the end.

If by relevance we're talking recognizable franchise that makes money? Yeah, it'll be relevant. Can't speak to anything else though.

I think NV's system is unfortunately better than the alternative of rolling. In the abstract I prefer the roll (with modifiers depending on the situation) but in practice it becomes save-scum tedium. Rolling is more true to the RPG roots but in an actual RPG you can't save and reload. I just wish they'd hidden the markers in Hardcore Mode or something, mods that do that are an essential for me in NV nowadays.

 

[Norzan]

I also didn't like the eartagged skill checks in New Vegas but you have to understand a lot of the design of NV had to cater to the new Fallout audience.

Wouldn't skill checks passing with dice rolls be more user friendly for the new Fallout audience at the time? Specially when 3 had percentage to pass speech checks. I see hard checks actually annoying them much more because they can't just save before trying and reload if it fails. It means they have to go out into the world and level up to get the skill into the number required to pass the check.

Me personally i don't mind the hard checks of New Vegas, the issue is that most are just win buttons. Passing the barter check with Dean in Dead Money and that actually leading to a negative consequence is something that the game should have had in spades. Actually forcing the player to read the check and figure out what it might entail in the future.

 

[Zvezda]

the soundtrack being shit? Do you know that they actually reused some music from FO1 and FO2? Like if you enter Primm NCR camp you can hear FO2 music? So you are saying the same soundtrack is shit in new vegas but in fallout 2 it's a masterpiece?

I'd actually agree. Certain songs like Vault of The Future fit, but NV mostly has a very different vibe than Fo1 and Fo2, so more often than not I feel that the songs are out of place and I either switch off the radio or mute the music. Case in point; Metallic Monks. When I first played NV I was really confused why I was hearing air raid sirens and long depressing tones while I was exploring a wasteland that had clearly way past that. I don't think the reuse was handled very well.

All I'm saying is that the game engine is the main reason the game is bad. Maybe it was good for other games, I don't know. And yeah, I also hate the graphics, but it's not the main reason these games are bad.

Of course some elements are good. Perhaps if NV was made with a different game engine, I would have loved it.

"The game engine is bad!"
"What things about the game engine makes it bad?"
"These things make the game engine bad!"
"Actually, those things are alright."
"Of course there are alright things but the game engine is bad!"

About the skill checks - it doesn't have to be that obvious where the game actually tells you what you need to succeed. Plus, it could use some variation in skill roll methods.

https://www.nexusmods.com/newvegas/mods/62051/

Literally took 10 seconds of googling. That's an incredibly minor design choice which can be changed with a single NVSE plugin. This is meant to be an argument for why the entirety of New Vegas is irredeemable. Come off it, you're picking for straws.

 

[Norzan]

https://www.nexusmods.com/newvegas/mods/62051/

I find it odd that the author said this:

While New Vegas is nowhere near as bad as Fallout 3 in this regard (percentages!), it is still quite immersion breaking, and a far cry from the original Fallout's, in which skill checks were naturally integrated into the dialogue, without huge immersion breaking brackets, to encourage power gaming and save scumming.

I usually see save scumming being condemned, so i find it odd that the author did it to encourage it. I think the entire point of skill checks in the first two Fallouts wasn't to encourage save scumming and more to encourage the player to read the dialogue.

 

[Zvezda]

I find it odd that the author said this:


I usually see save scumming being condemned, so i find it odd that the author did it to encourage it. I think the entire point of skill checks in the first two Fallouts wasn't to encourage save scumming and more to encourage the player to read the dialogue.

I'm pretty sure that's just a punctuation error

While New Vegas is nowhere near as bad as Fallout 3 in this regard (percentages!), it is still quite immersion breaking, and a far cry from the original Fallout's, in which skill checks were naturally integrated into the dialogue, without huge immersion breaking brackets to encourage power gaming and save scumming.

 

[Risewild]

Can't say I liked the skill checks in NV being a hard check where you'd be off 1 point and fail. Then again I assume this is to prevent the save scumming that would happen with percentages.
Gotta compromise in the end.

If by relevance we're talking recognizable franchise that makes money? Yeah, it'll be relevant. Can't speak to anything else though.

That's why NV had the skill magazines.
If you're off by 1, then read a magazine and be over by 9 .

 

[Zorchar]

"The game engine is bad!"
"What things about the game engine makes it bad?"
"These things make the game engine bad!"
"Actually, those things are alright."
"Of course there are alright things but the game engine is bad!"

https://www.nexusmods.com/newvegas/mods/62051/

Literally took 10 seconds of googling. That's an incredibly minor design choice which can be changed with a single NVSE plugin. This is meant to be an argument for why the entirety of New Vegas is irredeemable. Come off it, you're picking for straws.

I think you are the one picking for straws, countering with specific examples to a general saying.

The game engine is not suited for Fallout. The graphics are not to my liking and ruins my immersion. Some elements of the NV game are good. Some elements of the game engine are good even. But most importantly, overall it sucked

 

[SquidWard]

Wouldn't skill checks passing with dice rolls be more user friendly for the new Fallout audience at the time? Specially when 3 had percentage to pass speech checks. I see hard checks actually annoying them much more because they can't just save before trying and reload if it fails. It means they have to go out into the world and level up to get the skill into the number required to pass the check.

Me personally i don't mind the hard checks of New Vegas, the issue is that most are just win buttons. Passing the barter check with Dean in Dead Money and that actually leading to a negative consequence is something that the game should have had in spades. Actually forcing the player to read the check and figure out what it might entail in the future.

I don't mind the must be 60 in speech requirement. I mind that it's telling me that I need exactly 60 speech and just how close I am. Because as @Atomic Postman pointed out with video games, save scumming happens a lot so when it's a roll, people will just reload and try again. The problem with the markers (or whatever you call them) is that they essentially can do the same thing. They say, "Hey, if you're planning on investing in this skill, come back later."

It's something I did the very first time I played New Vegas. I learned it was a lot more interesting to not do that though as I got older. Fallout 1 and 2 had speech checks that could be tied to an exact level (from what I remember) but they simply changed the dialogue. But it wasn't so hidden either. Often the first dialogue option was modified and it was usually longer than anything else you could say. But if your speech was too low, you wouldn't even know the possibility was there. New Vegas telling you that you're 2 points away from success just encourages many more casual players to reload a save, go level up, and come back.

 

[Ugly Kid]

I think skill checks could be a combination of thresholds and dice rolls. Like if a check requires 85 in speech then any character above an 84 has a 100% chance of passing the check. However starting at 84 and going down the chances of passing get lower and lower until it's at a 0% chance by skill 79 or something like that.

 

[Morgan_]

New Vegas telling you that you're 2 points away from success just encourages many more casual players to reload a save, go level up, and come back.

I really don't see this as an issue myself. It let's you know what is needed so that you're able to select for certain outcomes for differnt playthroughs if you're interested in knowing they were ever there and possibly missing out on something you loved. This resolves the save scumming issue as well as can be managed while showing other players that there are more options than what is currently available for future playthroughs.

Atleast I don't mind seeing it, I mostly disliked being just off enough. Give hints at other possibilities withouting showing the specifics of what they are or how to get them. Telling me I'm right there but not quite results in an unenjoyable tease.

 

[Kaptin]

I really don't see this as an issue myself. It let's you know what is needed so that you're able to select for certain outcomes for differnt playthroughs if you're interested in knowing they were ever there and possibly missing out on something you loved. This resolves the save scumming issue as well as can be managed while showing other players that there are more options than what is currently available for future playthroughs.

Atleast I don't mind seeing it, I mostly disliked being just off enough. Give hints at other possibilities withouting showing the specifics of what they are or how to get them. Telling me I'm right there but not quite results in an unenjoyable tease.

Exactly, FO3 encouraged you to save scum in order to pass checks, there is no difference between save scumming your results or getting the exact amount of points in skill to pass checks hell If I have 10 speech and higher speech skill only increase my odds of passing that super hard dialogue check, I then don't need to increase it because I can just save scum until I pass it lol.

 

[SquidWard]

Saying that like I didn't say they result in similar issues. That's the whole point. From a design perspective. Your anecdotal experience doesn't change the fact that its design has a much larger effect and that effect was measured and likely influences future design.

 

[ZetaRaiden]

I don't get why people think Obsidian is a completely different team now. Chris Avellone was the only recognizable name that had departed. Josh Sawyer and Feargus Urquhart are still there, Tim Cain and Leonard Boyarsky have joined, and honestly I don't know about any other members but these four are Fallout.

Mainly because of The Outer Worlds, and how that game was terrible and actually made Fallout 4 look superior in comparison.

 

[SquidWard]

Mainly because of The Outer Worlds, and how that game was terrible and actually made Fallout 4 look superior in comparison.

Damn bro I wouldn't go that far. I wouldn't say TOW is super amazing or anything but I'm also not gonna say Fallout 4 was better than it.

But as to why do people think it's a different team? Because it is. Josh Sawyer was the project director and lead designer. Who had nothing to do with TOW. Tim Cain said 3% of the team worked on Fallout 1 (haha I guess it's Tim, Leonard, and Chris Jones?) and 20% of the team worked on New Vegas.

So that's 1/5 people on the team that had worked on New Vegas in some capacity also worked on TOW in some capacity. Whether that's programming or design or some lead. Not to mention Cain has really weird ideas on how to improve games. So yeah, they're fairly different despite having some similarities.

 

[Norzan]

Damn bro I wouldn't go that far. I wouldn't say TOW is super amazing or anything but I'm also not gonna say Fallout 4 was better than it.

Yeah, gonna disagree as well really hard about Fallout 4 being better than TOW. TOW is definitely very flawed and it should have been far better than it ended up being given the people that worked on it, but Fallout 4 is way worse. Just the bottom of the barrel, the horrible writing in Fallout 4 alone puts it below TOW, forget the sheer dumbing down it did by dropping a bunch of shit from previous games (the worst one being skill points).

The half assed settlement building, that horrible intro, enemies being bullet sponges because of that horseshit legendary enemy system, the really low amount of actual locations because Bethesda decided to waste a bunch of space in the world map for the settlement building and the lore and internal consistency getting fucked in the ass harder than in Fallout 3.

 

[ZetaRaiden]

Damn bro I wouldn't go that far. I wouldn't say TOW is super amazing or anything but I'm also not gonna say Fallout 4 was better than it.

I still can't agree personally, I couldn't stand The Outer Worlds for more than 5 hours. I hated how bland it was, and how it lacked any style at all. All the characters looked like tumblr lesbians. The "capitalism bad" stuff being rammed down your throat every second of the game with no nuance at all just got tiresome. At the least I could tolerate Fallout 4 long enough to complete the main story, and at least it wasn't so damn preachy.

But TOW didn't ruin an established franchise and it's lore like FO4 did, so it was harmless in comparison I suppose. It's at least easier to ignore the existence of TOW. It just destroyed my hopes in Obsidian and the future of RPG video games more, as I was hoping for it to be a return to form, and I can't really get over that.

 

[Morgan_]

Outer Worlds was omega bad. Not trying to meme either. It was just a sloppy, uninspired mess that wasn't redeemed by gameplay, or level design. It's really just a wackier Bethesda formula on a budget. A bigger let down than the No Man's Sky release and I don't expect the next game to deliver on a comeback either. It's too involved to just be able to pick up and putz around in but at the same time not well written enough for that to be worth the effort.