Fallout 3

[Mortem Desino]

SneaksieDave, if it consoles you in any way: Every single outdoors and indoors cell was hand-created. In Oblivion, a lot of wilderness was simply pc-generated. Their highlighted section of washington D.C. is not as big as Tamriel, but wherever you go, everything you notice, everything you pick up, every enemy you fight, every object you blow up was put there by hand, and almost every one of them is persistant to your saved character.

[jdude]

From the looks of it, it is Oblivion with art changes. Is that at least semi-accurate? That's not an insult; I'm interested. In fact, more interested than I am in Oblivion.

 

The main concern I'd have about trying it would be Bethesda's infamous lazy generic factor. It was worse with every game up to Morrowind, and from the couple of hours I had at Oblivion, it looks like it has not improved. Cookie cutter placement of random spawns to save on design time, the same "caves" used over and over and over and over and over and (is the point made yet?) over and over again, with the same useless crap in the same containers (wow, more Bittergreen Petals?! Or perhaps another rusty blade!? Even though loot means nothing because stores offer nothing useful, I have everything I want, and can kill everything without batting an eye!). Many things used repeatedly just in different dressing, but most things, without even the different dressing. "Didn't I kill this generic guy in this generic building for this generic item before?" Yes, a hundred times, in fact.

 

It's no wonder they are planning TES in 2010; they can churn these out quickly now.

 

Now that that sounded excessively negative, how's the game?

 

 

Nope. It isn't like Oblivion IMO. Oblivion was huge, but there was a TON of repetition. You could be pretty much in 80% of the areas of the map and not know the difference between them. There are MILLIONS of little details and large details that make everywhere you go unique and the experiences unique. Like I said before there are no stupid generic caves, I too thought those were annoying. There's side missions and stories which you may miss, because their so built into the environments and stories that they just blend in with everything.

 

A lot of the missions are unique as well, I managed to stay very immersed in it.

[SneaksieDave]

Hm. Maybe they learned something.

 

Well I wish they had a demo. It'd get them that much closer to a sale from me. For now I have to

rely on youtube. :-/

[STiFU]

You could also just rely on us. After all, we're all thief fans, so we got a decent gaming-taste I guess...

[SneaksieDave]

You'll mail me your copy?? Thanks!

[Dram]

Well, I got the game. Apart from the same engine issues as in Oblivion (the terrible movement, inability to jump if touching a wall or static object etc), the game is VERY nice. The random spawning of enemies actually works decent here - it doesn't really happen in front of you and they spawn a decent distance away, but usually behind you, out of sight.

 

Had a very awesome scenario where I was casually exploring the landscape when I heard a "boom", then a boom again but closer, and upon turning to the direction I saw the smoke. Then again another boom but right behind me, injuring me a bit. I'm like wtf? and then suddenly was attacked by two super-mutants, who upon slashing me with their melee weapon took of almost a third of my health. So my best course of action was to run. As I ran away from them (they kept up just behind) suddenly from behind another ledge two radscorpions came out to join the fun. So now I had 4 trailing enemies with an exclusive goal to kill me. Then, as if by a scripted sequence, two friendly troopers (the ones dressed up in that crazy looking armor) popped up from behind this little party and started firing with lasers at the scorpions and mutants. Then dispatched them quite easily and then continued on their merry way, jogging, some way North or so.

 

After this little run-in I figured I'd continue exploring, and as I did I found myself under attack by a big fat fly which shoots shit at you. I was shooting at it...with a pistol...almost killed one when another turned up (I later found these were actually there before I got there and were wandering around), so I decided to run. As I got further away from them they more or less gave up, so I stayed out of sight for a while near an old container......when suddenly from over a ledge further away from me comes a super mutant behemoth. Now, this behemoth was 2.5 times or so as tall as a normal super mutant, so it was a kind of situation where you feel shooting at it will really do nothing more then piss it off further. So I kind of stayed in that old container waiting for it to do something. It just stood there, waiting for its prey (which happened to be me) to come out and play. I waited for a minute or so before trying to dash for it. Unfortunately (for me) its legs were larger, more powerful, and thus faster, and so caught up with me without much of an issue (that, and due to the fact that when I ran out of the container it started striding toward me so I tried to get back in the container). One fell swipe and my corpse hit the inner wall of the container, lifelessly falling to the ground thereafter. That's when it became evident that perhaps I should have put more points into agility.

 

In other words Sneaks, it's actually a decent game worth getting

[jdude]

Also, I forgot to mention this game doesn't use that ridiculous level system where enemies level with you which makes leveling pointless. And I've heard you top out at level 20. The game DOES get harder as you progress through the main story but that is expected, unlike oblivion where the game got harder as you got stronger, which was stupid imo.

[STiFU]

A giant super-mutant? Where? I only saw those normal sized ones stronger than the regular super-mutants.

 

I actually never realized a random spawn and my guess so far was, that the spawning is triggered after a couple of ingame days. The corpses are really lying around quite some time. There is a mission, where you're supposed to sneak in somewhere and plant a device without killing anybody(I'll keep it as general as possible). That was no problem at all because a few ingame days earlier, I already cleared that place out... Kinda sad, that the game didn't realize that, but well, nothing's perfect.

 

Basically my only critique on that game is that you cannot do a quickjump to the actual game from the beginning. You always have to do the tutorial combined with answering a couple of questions like in oblivion and morrowind to define your character.

[SneaksieDave]

Dayum: http://www.bluesnews.com/cgi-bin/board.pl?...;threadid=92946

 

Well, it sounds from you guys that it is a quality game, and they've even made specific improvements over TES titles (thx jdude for info about leveling), and considering that they are "DRM-lite" (just a DVD check I think?), then good on them. Though it's interesting that there is a wiki for their bugs.

[STiFU]

It actually uses Securom, which fucks around if you have daemon tools or similar installed. But you can hide those tools with YASU and you're ready to go. (I'd like to emphasize that this is no talk about cracking or anything. You just have to use that tool if you don't wanna uninstall your prefered dvd-emulation software)

Edited November 6, 2008 by STiFU

[Dram]

Securom? Interesting. I am not having a problem with it at all, what version do you have? US?

 

@Sneaks: After playing yesterday my opinion of the game has changed.....from it is good to it is AWESOME.

 

I snuck into DC, avoiding combat etc and seriously, in DC is where the fun begins. Many enemies and possibly just enough ammo hehe. Had to rescue someone and then snuck back out with them. Conveniently following AI do the same actions as you in the sense of sneaking or walking etc.

[STiFU]

Austrian version of course: German + Violence! Especially in the high-budget-department of games you always got a really good localization. I also liked it in Bioshock or Oblivion for instance, but I don't make many friends with that oppinion I guess...

[jdude]

It actually uses Securom, which fucks around if you have daemon tools or similar installed. But you can hide those tools with YASU and you're ready to go. (I'd like to emphasize that this is no talk about cracking or anything. You just have to use that tool if you don't wanna uninstall your prefered dvd-emulation software)

 

Yes lately I've been having a ton of bugs, crashing for no reason up north of the map. But the game takes less than 20 seconds to reload and get into playing so it doesn't bother me too much.

[SplaTtzZ]

Fallout 3 is definitely an awesome game, much better than Oblivion i guess. One of the coolest aspects for me is the eeriness of some of the settings. Especially in the section called Minefield or those areas where there are just these abandoned houses, and you go inside and wander around and there's all this dust in the air and everything is really still just as it once was; and light filters in through the cracks in the walls and ceiling as you enter the bedroom of the house and you can see these skeletons lying in their bed, embracing one another just as they were when the bombs dropped.

Or in one house I entered there was this childs playroom and I just saw this tiny skeleton sitting there against the wall with its toys on the floor near its legs and a teddy bear in the corner; it actually made me feel really sad. That's what bethesda got right in this game I think, the setting is just brilliant, and there is alot of great atmosphere in some areas. Its particularly impressive seeing the monuments of Washington DC like the Capitol Building in all their destroyed glory.

 

i disagree about the difficulty though; i have yet to die even once in this game except for inadvertantly jumping off cliffs. I'm at max level now which isnt difficult to achieve and im killing Enclave soldiers in power armour with one bullet. On the one hand i hated how Oblivion had scaling enemies but Fallout 3 doesnt seem to hodl much of a challenge. Those Super Mutant behemoths put up a hell of a fight though; i've nearly died a few times fighting them and i've heard if you play through the game using melee it can be alot harder.

 

I cant wait for someone to do a total conversion and remake the Mad Max 2 movie

[STiFU]

Well I didn't say the game was too hard. It was just too hard in the beginning 'cause I skilled wrong at first, but didn't wanna restart the whole thing. Later I even switched the difficulty to high and managed to rape the whole Citadel. In the end I really missed the challenge a little.

[Dram]

Yeah I have to agree. At first the game has a very strong need for survival ingrained in your mind, and ammo is hard to come by and weapons are weak etc. But later on you become quite uber and it becomes a tad too easy.

 

In any case, Bethesda learnt from their mistakes from Oblivion. Also, no bullcrap total lies marketing this time Which is a VERY good trend

[Mortem Desino]

STiFU and Dram have the right idea.

Do not play in easy difficulty. It's called EASY for a good reason.

 

I goofed off while first playing the game on easy. I hoped to see Bethesda's promise, "Don't be surprised if you wander somewhere you shouldn't and a supermutant punches your face in." Wrong. I accidentally stepped on his widdle foot and he yelled wewwy woud, "OWEE OWEE MEAN MAN I'LL GET YOU AT RECESS"

 

Then I played it on hard. Yep. It felt like Fallout 1/2, where a level 1 beginner will lose his leg to a rat if he's gets a little too carried away goofing off, can call little kids adult terms, and blow raspberries at computer consoles. I'll repeat it again: "It felt like Fallout 1/2" not "It reminded me of Oblivion."

[SneaksieDave]

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/vie...n/420-Fallout-3

[Dram]

Wow, it is always amazing how accurate his reviews really are hehe, those reviews are spot on awesome.

[sparhawk]

Currently playing Fallout 3 and I must say I really like it. I only hate it, that I'm notoriously short on ammo, but I'm only at level 3 at the moment, so I hope that this is increasing.

 

I'm trying to build my character as a thief with some explosives, but so far the hiding is very dissapointing.

 

Otherwise the game fells quite good. I was a bit suspicious when I learned that it was from Bethesda, because I didn't really like Oblivion and expected similar here, but so far it doesn't seem to be the case.

[STiFU]

Believe me, by the end you are starting to miss having little ammo. At the beginning it's a real fight of survival, which creates a lot of immersion, but later it becomes too easy, when you have the nice weapons and ammo en masse (and skills of course).

 

I was very recently talking to a friend about the game and we've discovered that you can reach the end of this game in many different ways (at least two^^). He experienced big story elements that I didn't and vice versa. We were both very suprised about that...

Edited December 12, 2008 by STiFU

[jdude]

Their working on an expansion where you take part in the Alaskan invasion according to IGN. The update also has raised level cap and new weapons and armor.

[sparhawk]

Believe me, by the end you are starting to miss having little ammo. At the beginning it's a real fight of survival, which creates a lot of immersion, but later it becomes too easy, when you have the nice weapons and ammo en masse (and skills of course).

 

I'm currently at level 6 (almost 7) and already have lots of ammo now. I'M stealing quite a lot, which is bad for karma, so I bought some old used metal for cheap and gave it to the waterpipe guy, which raised my karma so much that I'm now almost a saint.