It is good pacing if the idea is to hurl you into the world
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Fallout 4 has one of the weirdest openings I've seen in a long time
- Thread starter Fantastapotamus
- Start date
It is good pacing if the idea is to hurl you into the world
TheMrPliskin
Member
The intro was definitely rough, the idea of having some time before the bombs fell is interesting but it's so rushed that it feels pointless. As a way to get you into the wasteland ASAP it's fine but the story side of it falls flat.
It's not a good pace though, it's rushed. There's no real build-up to any events that happen as everything is just thrown at you immediately which leads to a lot of events feeling awkwardly stuck together.
The short amount of time that was spent with your son during the intro also weakens any drive in the story because I have zero reason to actually care about finding him because I have no attachment to him.
It's not a good pace though, it's rushed. There's no real build-up to any events that happen as everything is just thrown at you immediately which leads to a lot of events feeling awkwardly stuck together.
The short amount of time that was spent with your son during the intro also weakens any drive in the story because I have zero reason to actually care about finding him because I have no attachment to him.
Deaf Spacker
Memb
The beginning of the game was awful and not very immersive, it does get better though.
Rockandrollclown
lookwhatyou'vedone
Yeah, I assumed Vault-Tec guy knew the bombs were coming, and they were scrambling to fill those cryo chambers before it all went to shit.
It may of been better to have an intro movie of sorts using that initial sequence but fleshed out a bit more, and used some filmesque storytelling to cut some corners. For example the guy knocks on the door, you sign up and the camera pans away. 6 months later text pops up on screen, we get to the alarms going off scen, follow our hero into the vault etc etc. The first time you are actually playing would be when you wake in the cryo chamber.
Edit: And just to be clear i was fine with it as clearly they just want you in the game asap.
Edit: And just to be clear i was fine with it as clearly they just want you in the game asap.
So you mean that they had to cram in a tutorial for every tacked on new gimmick into the story. You know what also works good? Not having tacked on gimmicks. But if you're a real fan of all that, then you know what would also work well? Not having a story.
Moreover I am gonna deliver a better story for that tutorial from the top of my head, which perfectly fits Bethesda's wacky lore. There goes:
"You've been leading Brotherhood for a long time. Some people say too long. You got comfortable. That's why when a new threat surfaced in form of Synths you decided to attack first. You were lucky to survive, but your time is running out as does your blood from a gushing wound. Your only hope now is your bastard child who has to receive the reigns of the Brotherhood leadership before you expire into great nothing.
Faced with consequences of your brash attack you have to teach him how to wear your battered power armor, architect rebuilding of BoS outposts and settlements, and treat with respect the mythos and technology of an old world long gone.
But the only one thing that he will need to learn for himself is that war...
...war never changes".
OverBlood 3
Banned
Yep totally agree OP
It's like they skipped on having a proper beginning. Kinda feels like playing a fallout 3 save 7 years on when you've played most of the game (sans story of course) but with mods and everything already unlocked.
It's like they skipped on having a proper beginning. Kinda feels like playing a fallout 3 save 7 years on when you've played most of the game (sans story of course) but with mods and everything already unlocked.
Fantastapotamus
Wrong about commas, wrong about everything
Even then it's not great. Look at New Vegas. You are in the world after 2 minutes in that game.
What I'm saying is: Whatever your plan is, do it right.
If you don't care about telling a story and just want to throw the player in the world, don't waste my time with a badly told and rushed intro sequence.
If your goal is to tell a compelling story, don't make a badly told and rushed intro sequence.
From what I understand, the MC is completely unfazed by everything the new world throws at him/her. Nothing is strange, nothing worthy of exclamation. I guess all Bethesda games require wild leaps in logical inconsistency, maybe instead of shitting up the ending, they decided to bork the beginning?
Maybe somebody further along could possibly contradict this?
Maybe somebody further along could possibly contradict this?
Denton
Member
Literally the worst post.
DrROBschiz
Member
Its an RPG
You are supposed to fill that in
Which is why it boggles my damn mind that the made the MC anything but a voiceless avatar
So yeah I agree with you guys. Bethesda did seem confused about what they wanted to achieve
Should have just kept it simple.... though they kind of did with how brief the opening is
InsaneTiger
Member
Funny when some people interact with calling you some damm vault person. I'm thinking, "I walked in and was frozen right away, then wake up and everyone is dead. Then I left the vault." You have no experience with live in the vault. No fighting the extreme isolation, not fighting for food. It is kinda weird how the game throws you into situations without explaining anything.
Just because its a video game doesn't mean we can't criticize bad story-telling.
OverBlood 3
Banned
NV was great for pacing in my opinion. I felt like the story and the gameplay made sense, it was cohesive.
Fantastapotamus
Wrong about commas, wrong about everything
Yes, and I still like the game. Playing it is still fun. I didn't want to imply that the bad beginning ruined the game for me or anything like that.
It also really helped that your character belonged in that world.
I don't have any problems with a fast intro or anything, but if you do your cinematic opening (or whatever) do it right. You can throw the player in the world and still make it interesting and engaging, it's not an either-or.
Summer Haze
Banned
Play on survival difficulty, they're still scary as shit.
War Peaceman
You're a big guy.
On one hand I respect that they wanted to really get the player out there exploring and not overburden the intro with lengthy tutorials and narrative. On the other hand the way they did it was far too rapid. It felt like a joke - the bomb goes off with the ink still wet on your contract. I was thinking the whole time that it would be a simulation, but no.
It really felt like stuff was cut out - the neighbours were all named and referenced in the terminal. Yet there is no interaction.
The thing they could have cut out is seeing your child stolen away. I feel it would have been more affecting to be frozen with them in front of you and then to wake to their empty chamber.
Bethesda as a collective are atrocious writers. Or should I say the writing philosophy is very, very poor in their games.
It really felt like stuff was cut out - the neighbours were all named and referenced in the terminal. Yet there is no interaction.
The thing they could have cut out is seeing your child stolen away. I feel it would have been more affecting to be frozen with them in front of you and then to wake to their empty chamber.
Bethesda as a collective are atrocious writers. Or should I say the writing philosophy is very, very poor in their games.
DrROBschiz
Member
Maybe the game is better if we just throw away all aspects of the MC
I guess they wanted to give the player some driving force hence creating the baby and all the logic breaks that follow after that lol
I guess they wanted to give the player some driving force hence creating the baby and all the logic breaks that follow after that lol
How far are you into the game?
For what it's worth, all of the vaults are actually experiments. This part doesn't seem far fetched to me.
SirRyanOfSmeg
Member
Yeah there are a few terminals in the vault that go into detail about this.
BossDarkseid
Member
Bethesda done fucked up the role playing aspect.
I suspect this is what Bethesda thinks too.
Blackthorn
"hello?" "this is vagina"
To be fair the opening of Skyrim was:
"Prisoner, step for-"
!¡!¡DRAGONS!¡!¡
Bethesda's games, despite giving plenty to do for methodical, nerdy types, are also mass market (look at the sales). This unique ability to appeal to usually disparate audiences means you get weird moments of bombast amongst all the subtle minutiae that the typical Gaffer celebrates.
"Prisoner, step for-"
!¡!¡DRAGONS!¡!¡
Bethesda's games, despite giving plenty to do for methodical, nerdy types, are also mass market (look at the sales). This unique ability to appeal to usually disparate audiences means you get weird moments of bombast amongst all the subtle minutiae that the typical Gaffer celebrates.
Fantastapotamus
Wrong about commas, wrong about everything
It's not, it was just a bit weird to me (again). Hey, if you were going to tell me "Now we are going to freeze you, so that you don't have to spend your life in this bunker!" I would be all for it! But yeah, it's not too far fetched.
Count of Monte Sawed-Off
un33dab@dpu$$y
Yeah, I have to say I agree with all that, it feels very weird. it's amazing how your character takes all the weird fallout wasteland shit so well. Fallout 3 did a somewhat better job here. But Obsidian really had the right idea, we really shouldn't be a vault dweller anymore. They just handle it too awkwardly.
I've played through it 3 times so far, and I've beaten the game. I think it's awesome that the intro doesn't get in the way
It sets up some weirdness and some mysteries, but it doesn't feel rushed to me for the same reason day-night cycles in games don't feel rushed even though they too are not realistic. I just want games to hit me with the big important points at the beginning and then let me go off on my own.
Blackthorn
"hello?" "this is vagina"
There's a log on one of the terminals that talks about how surprised the Overseer was about the ease in which they got people into the pods. Accounted it to shock and trust in authority.
UberTag
Member
All of this chatter just makes me want to return my copy of Fallout 4 when it arrives today and finally crack into my copy of New Vegas.
That way I'll get the full Fallout experience with a narrative that won't insult my intelligence. (It won't insult my intelligence, right?)
I should hope so, Skyrim had the worst storytelling and characters of any Elder Scrolls game (except maybe Arena).
captainnapalm
Member
I am so ok with the setup/main storyline in this game. You've woken up in the post-apocalypse and must survive by any means necessary as you find your kid and the bastards who took him and killed your wife. You were a chilled family man, but you better leave all that shit behind or you're radmeat. Done.
It was handled a little bit clumsily, I guess, but I was happy to be set free so quickly.
It was handled a little bit clumsily, I guess, but I was happy to be set free so quickly.
Bethesda's storytelling style seems to revolve around thinking up the visual spectacle first, and then building everything around that which is how it often ends up feeling so contrived. The other stuff about everything being conveniently placed 2 minutes from eachother is a result of the unnaturally dense and compressed world design. Feels like I'm the only one who ever complains about the latter, while the rest of the world somehow sees this as a good thing.
In Fallout 1 the travel time between your starting location at the vault and the first town was visualized by several days of travel on the world map. This felt more natural and immersive because the format wasn't as shackled by all the explicit abstractions and design shortcuts you have to live with in the kind of seamless open world Bethesda portrays.
In Fallout 1 the travel time between your starting location at the vault and the first town was visualized by several days of travel on the world map. This felt more natural and immersive because the format wasn't as shackled by all the explicit abstractions and design shortcuts you have to live with in the kind of seamless open world Bethesda portrays.
If you read the terminals in the bunker you would see that the cryo was used in all bunkers, maybe they all failed after 150 years or so and people started to emerge
Count of Monte Sawed-Off
un33dab@dpu$$y
New Vegas is really good. One of my favorite games ever. You still might want to give Fallout 4 a shot. It's not a bad experience and does some things really well, but it does really botch a few things.
Novel Mike
Member
I agree with the part about the very beginning it just feels like you are being rushed through it, likely because so many people complained about Fallout 3's intro being so long but I think they should have done 1 of 2 things instead of what they did.
1) Give you an option for a long/short beginning, let it be a choice on the menu if you go with the short beginning you get what you got in the game already but if you go with the long version it defines your character more, either the soldier or the lawyer and let you interact with the town and get to know your neighbors, spend time with the kid and the spouse (maybe see him learn how the crawl or walk? would be a nice callback to Fallout 3 where you are playing the baby and look up towards your father). Then have all hell break loose and the normal beginning starts.
or
2) Have the game start off (Very beginning spoilers)
I get the idea they went with, they wanted you to get into the wasteland asap but you can give people the option for both and let them choose what they want to do and how they want to play I mean isn't that the point of the games anyway?
I do disagree somewhat on the first couple of missions tho, yeah the whole
was stupid but I do like how it gives you everything up front and then you can decide what you want to do and how you want to do it. So many games hold certain things back until you've put in 20 hours or more and I think its perfectly fine to have all of your options known to you within those first 5 hours and it shows just how in depth some of the content in the game is.
I do worry about power creep with having so many weapons and options up at the beginning but at the same time the way they actually limit power armor via the battery is actually quite cool it makes it more like a customizable power up or mech suit rather then just the best armor in the game you will always want to use.
Plenty of time left to change my mind about everything, I'm still not even that far into the game only about 5 hours but lets fix that now shall we? XD
1) Give you an option for a long/short beginning, let it be a choice on the menu if you go with the short beginning you get what you got in the game already but if you go with the long version it defines your character more, either the soldier or the lawyer and let you interact with the town and get to know your neighbors, spend time with the kid and the spouse (maybe see him learn how the crawl or walk? would be a nice callback to Fallout 3 where you are playing the baby and look up towards your father). Then have all hell break loose and the normal beginning starts.
or
2) Have the game start off (Very beginning spoilers)
with you waking up from being frozen, lost and confused you try to figure out what happened and as you get through the vault you have short flash backs or find logs about whats going on for you to piece it all together, gives it more of a mystery.
I get the idea they went with, they wanted you to get into the wasteland asap but you can give people the option for both and let them choose what they want to do and how they want to play I mean isn't that the point of the games anyway?
I do disagree somewhat on the first couple of missions tho, yeah the whole
general thing
I do worry about power creep with having so many weapons and options up at the beginning but at the same time the way they actually limit power armor via the battery is actually quite cool it makes it more like a customizable power up or mech suit rather then just the best armor in the game you will always want to use.
Plenty of time left to change my mind about everything, I'm still not even that far into the game only about 5 hours but lets fix that now shall we? XD
You should play New Vegas first for sure.
No, it was not. And in lore it's established that a lot of people survived without turning into Ghouls. And also that Vaults open pretty often.
gameplay is much improved in fo4 though :\
Yup, i'm there with you.
This opening was just a rush job to send you in the world as fast as possible.
No guiding through the world and the events that occur in it; basically no tutorial (you have to figure out things like modding by yourself); no emotional attachment or developement for your family for which you're supposed to love like nothing else in the world; no exciting and mystery feelings for when you're about to set out of the Vault the first time...
A real letdown compared to FO3.
This opening was just a rush job to send you in the world as fast as possible.
No guiding through the world and the events that occur in it; basically no tutorial (you have to figure out things like modding by yourself); no emotional attachment or developement for your family for which you're supposed to love like nothing else in the world; no exciting and mystery feelings for when you're about to set out of the Vault the first time...
A real letdown compared to FO3.
MMaRsu
Banned
I agree. I especially liked the one where there were two skeletal corpses fighting over a safe in one building.
But I think it's good storytelling. Someone stole your kid, killed your SO, and called you "the backup." That's all I need. The rest of the story is out in the world.
Aztechnology
Member
Yup, I can tell you right now the only reason I was able to touch that death claw on survival was because of the power armor and minigun (it really shouldn't have given us the minigun to keep.) I was level 3. It was awesome when it ripped one of my guys arm platings off. I had 500 armor roughly while in the power armor. In one hit the death claw still took 40% of my health. I'm not looking forward to fighting them again.
Survival really hasn't been all that tough yet, seems fairly balanced so I can't imagine how much of a joke normal is in this game. Did the death claw just die in like 3 seconds?
Well, a destroyed world 200 years later really wont change much considering the environment is a toxic waste dump. The issue is that no body came by in that 200 years? There were no other heroes? You wake up at the exact same time people decide to come to your old village/neighborhood and rebuild?
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