Fallout 3 discussion

[Zenicetus]

Note: this is about the PC/Windows Live version of The Pitt and Broken Steel.

I did the Pitt shortly after it came out, and concur with Froggie's review; she really nailed it. I won't say it was a complete waste of time, because I still enjoy running around in the post-apocalypse world as a change of pace from the other games I've been playing recently. The hot and steamy color palette of the Pitt was a nice contrast to the cool blues of Anchorage. Art-wise and environment design-wise I thought it was pretty good, although it did feel very cramped. I thought I'd be wandering around a city similar to the scale of D.C. like the main campaign, but it was more like being confined in a small neighborhood section. I understand the constraints, for a low-cost, minor DLC release like this, but it was still disappointing once I realized how small an area I was going to be moving around in. It conflicts with the big, open-ended feel of the main campaign (more on that below).

One nice thing I enjoyed was more use of the vertical in the environment. You can get up on rooftops in one area, and there are lots of catwalks. At least it was a little different than the corridor crawls.

I didn't have the patience to do the full steel ingot run, I only did the part that advanced the plot. I agree about the "big moral choice" too. That was very badly handled, with not enough information for the player.

Depending on what difficulty and character type you're playing you'll probably want to do the Pitt at somewhere around level 15-17. I did it with my character post-Anchorage at level 20. Other than a few surprises from scripted attacks, it was pretty easy.

Due to the aggravating way Microsoft forces you to buy points in blocks instead of just enough for the current game you want, I had some leftover points after The Pitt. Fallout 3 is the only reason I have that execrable Windows Live thing installed (I don't own an XBox), and since with the leftover points it only cost me $6.25 USD to buy Broken Steel, I did that. At that price I figured it couldn't be too terrible.

I'm about halfway through Broken Steel, trying to stretch it out a little, and my reaction so far is... meh. It's okay, I guess, although like the previous two DLC's I'm still feeling railroaded through the plot. These "mini" DLC's are not a good match for a game like Fallout 3, where the main campaign takes place in a very large environment where you can do a lot of exploration, and pursue dozens of side quests. I love wandering around the wasteland and discovering stuff.

For me, the three DLC's haven't been total failures, because they don't cost that much. On the other hand, they don't deliver that much either. They're just little stabs at expanding the original game world. Frankly, I would rather have paid another $30-$40 for a single "real" Fallout 3 expansion pack that extended the main campaign, with new character levels, and made the explorable world larger, with dozens more quests and not just one major, railroaded plot line that I'm forced to follow. On the other hand, major expansions like that are larger risks for the game developer. I guess it makes economic sense to do it this way, but I'll definitely be more wary of this approach. Ladling out fresh content in little dribs and drabs isn't a substitute for traditional, major expansion packs.

[frogbeastegg]

I did some digging on various forums. Turns out that the ghoul reavers are broken; if their animation is spasming about they are effectively invulnerable. When they are not spasming they are only a little harder than a Glowing One. The lock ups and other issues I have encountered are being experienced by quite a few others too. I should have waited a bit longer before buying - all of the fuss last week was focused on the broken achievements, with little attention paid to the gameplay issues.

I forgot to mention that I had trouble with The Pit too. A certain speech cut off halfway through, leaving me stuck. I had to reload. Later on another event failed to trigger, once again leaving me trapped with nothing to do except reload. I'm playing the fixed version, and have never downloaded any of the faulty ones so it can't be blamed on residual bad files at my end.

Colour me highly unimpressed. Putting out DLC for a closed environment like a console should be relatively easy to get right on a technical level. Most companies manage it; I can't think of any besides Bethesda which have managed to make such a mess.

I love wandering around the wasteland and discovering stuff.

That's the part of Fallout 3 I do like. It's still nice to wander the wastes and find the last few locations I have missed.

The DLC is like a capsule containing everything I dislike about the game, Broken Steel's main plot line being the worst offender of all. Inane dialogue -> tunnel dungeon -> pick up object -> return for more inane dialogue -> tunnel dungeon -> repeat until it's finally over. They even throw in some plot objects which don't make sense. Minor spoilers for the final plot mission:

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

If the Brotherhood of Steel have no air capacity whatsoever - as we've been told repeatedly throughout the game - then how can they air drop a crate of supplies into an Enclave base? And why does said crate contain an unencrypted voice message any idiot could pick up and listen to, detailing the Brotherhood's attack plans? It's dropped into a corner of a busy base; it would have been spotted as it parachuted in if logic was anywhere at work in the set up. And why couldn't they give me the orders and gun before sending me out to slog through a bunch of tunnel dungeons on my way to the base?

[Fixiwee]

Any PC user tried to play a heavy modded Fallout3? I recently installed FOOK, a mod that adds most of the classical F1 and F2 weapons (.223 pistol hehehe) and many other stuff to it. Then there is also Marts Mutant Mod that's supposed to make ghouls more like zombies. They attack in larger groups, are tougher and so on. Also adds Floaters and Geckos to the game.
It all seems to be expand the fun with a better feeling of the old Fallouts, allthough I have only played them for a short time.