Wow...
I was off Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday playing the game from about 3pm Tuesday to 2am Wednesday, 9am Wednesday to 1am Thursday and finally 9am Thursday to 11pm Thursday...
I have not finished the main quest and in fact I am not sure how far along I am...
I have not been systematicaly exploring or anything, but rather just getting destracted on my way to a core quest location. The nature of the central story, searching for your father, really plays along with this well. You get to decide how urgent it is for you personally. No one is artifically pushing you along the path with "hurry must save the world now!" as was the case in Oblivion and Mass Effect...
My personal opinion is that it really is a perfect story (so far) for this style of open ended gameplay. You rush out searching for your father but keep getting distracted and and having you priorities tested by what you see. It is a personal journey so the decisions you make and the diversions you take all fit in neatly to the unfolding story...
To me it all really does feel very "Fallout(tm)" in style, content and structure, the Wastland does feel pretty big (I know technically it is not but there is no car and no horse to get around on so it seems like it is). The fast travel works nicely once you have found a location but can't be abused. No fast travel in combat or if you are overloaded with stuff.
One thing that is a bit of a distraction is the music, sometimes it is fine and sometime is sounds just like Oblivion with some extra echo and metalic twangs.
They do have kids in the game but you can't kill them. They react to being attacked and everyone else will come after you but they are essentially immune to injury. Personally I am fine with this, better than not having them in the game at all.
Basically I have the game on my PC, all graphics maxed out and a good resolution and it looks great. Utterly fantastic? No, but very good... The animation is not as bad as has been made out and the AI is decent enough. The intelligent enemies seek cover, change to an approriate melee for the range, pick up better weapons if available or if you have shot their weapon out of their hands. They even run away sometime... This on top of reasonable non-combat activities too...
For my best comparison for how combat works and the general gameplay think back to System Shock 2. Only much prettier, with people you don't have to fight and on the ground. Where as Bioshock took the Survival Horror aspects and built and intelligent shooter, Fallout 3 kept the somewhat awkward RPG/FPS hybrid combat and filled in all the other RPG baggage of NPC's and locations and such.
If you keep in your head that this is an RPG you will enjoy the game more. I recall one event that really got in into the open nature of the story. I was in Big Town and I was talking to the inhabitants. I had rescued some of them and an attack was coming. I was speaking to them as I waited. One of them, Buttercup, started flirting with me and I finished the conversation meaning to talk to her again later. The attack commenced, not a particularly hard one but it was early in the game and both you and the citizens are poorly armed. The the defense went well and the enemy put to flight. NPCs were cheering and very happy. I was speaking to them and soaking up their praise and noticed Buttercup was not there. I went back and found her dead, killed by a random grenade toss I think. I found myself upset for a moment and my finger hovered over F9 (quickload for you 360 and PS3 players). But then I thought better of it and decided to let the story play out, I would save them all on another playthrough (or kill them and steal there stuff maybe). But that momentary pang really brought home to me how much I was buying into the story and my character's role in it...
It is just a computer game, a FPS/RPG hybrid (with more RPG than FPS) and yet, I still feel sad about buttercup. Dogmeat is gone too. I am a hero to the helpless and a deadly storm of violence to the evil and oppressive. But even given those choices, difficult decisions come up. In one case I have now, you know the situation will end badly if you walk away, but the "good guys" are proposing the violent solution and the "bad guys" simply want to be left alone/defended. What is the choice for the boyscout hero type??
I have been rambling about my experiences with the game rather than reviewing it really. My main point, if you like RPG and are not violently opposed to FPS you will like this. And it looks pretty nice...
Originally Posted by Veho Nex
Re: Vaults have a visitor again..
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