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Fallout 4 - A Nuclear Disappointment

ship it

Member
lol I just noticed the OP labeled himself as a rant, but its really not (to me). the tone makes a world of difference.

I think a big difference is wanting the game to live up to the potential it has (or has been demonstrated in the past) vs. expecting and hoping its horrible for the sake of nerd rage or self-validation.

Does anyone really want them to use the same engine again?
 

Takuan

Member
All criticisms in the OP are on-point, but I could deal. The only thing that left a bitter taste in my mouth was the writing. That last string of quests for each faction felt incredibly rushed and shamefully lazy. If you're going to gimp replayability the way they did, you'd think at the very least they'd have put together a strong story, but no. They created a pretty compelling world and the themes were solid, they just weren't able to tie things together in a satisfying way.

All this doesn't matter, because the game was a huge success and therefore validates the design choices in the eyes of Bethesda and their benefactors. The irony that I'm part of the problem isn't lost on me.
 
Because Fallout 4 is a major disappointment to any fan of the Fallout series or RPGs and wanna voice their opinions on why?

Fallout 4 is a disappointment to most people who understand the basic concept of RPG. Fallout 4 is not the worse game ever made, it is however the game that has finally shown the ridiculousness of what "Journalist" consider a good game.

Ignoring the open world aspect of the game, how can any sane journalist ever consider praising a game that has terrible mechanics, story, animation, and graphics. Combat is bad but that is in the eye of the beholder. I mean how can so many game reviewers ignore all those glaring flaws yet, they will deduct points for other lesser games.
 
Fallout 4 is a disappointment to most people who understand the basic concept of RPG. Fallout 4 is not the worse game ever made, it is however the game that has finally shown the ridiculousness of what "Journalist" consider a good game.

Ignoring the open world aspect of the game, how can any sane journalist ever consider praising a game that has terrible mechanics, story, animation, and graphics. Combat is bad but that is in the eye of the beholder. I mean how can so many game reviewers ignore all those glaring flaws yet, they will deduct points for other lesser games.
I'm not defending Fallout 4 specifically here but sum of the parts and all that. And you can't really "ignore" the open world aspect of the game. That's how the game was built.
 

kamineko

Does his best thinking in the flying car
Having heard all the negativity surrounding FO4's RPG and story aspects, i'm going in like it's an action game, an open world Half Life 2 or something.

Playing it as a straight up immersive action game, it seems pretty damn great. I'm embracing its simplicity.

Only 2 hours in.

Given your posts in the storytelling thread, I will be surprised if you can sustain that enthusiasm for 40+ hours.

The real story of Fallout 4, imo, is a story about the current state of video game criticism
 

kamineko

Does his best thinking in the flying car
I'm confused. What happened? Was someone's reply confused with mine or something?

Someone else made a thread about F4 and a moderator merged your thread and his/her thread, so all the posts are mixed together.

The "OP" mentioned isn't yours, it's the one from that other thread (which is in here, someplace I assume)

edit: o so beaten
 

Morrigan Stark

Arrogant Smirk
i didnt even bother with the game once i found out that talking/bartering/science-ing your way through the game was not possible.
Shit. Is this true? That was my favourite aspect of F:NV and why I found FO3 disappointing in comparison (I played NV before FO3).


The dialog wheel in this game is a fucking sin.
4wNG0N3.png
Yeah that is inexcusable.

Can someone defend this? At all? What were they thinking?

Seriously, I want to know what was the reasoning/justification for this decision. It makes zero fucking sense.

My problem was that they learned absolutely nothing from New Vegas. The faction system in Fallout 4 sucks, there is no companion wheel, the dialog sucks, the blank slate is gone, the story is meaningless.
Yeah that's really disappointing to hear if true. I hear they mostly fixed the combat so that it doesn't suck now, and it's less buggy than the others... so why couldn't they just leave everything else more or less intact? A game F:NV with better combat and fewer bugs sound like a really amazing game. But instead it seems they fixed those two things and did a huge step backwards on everything else, if this thread is to be believed. Guess it'll be a $2-3 Steam sale purchase from me in a few years, hah.


OP negated their entire argument with accusations of moneyhattings.

Now the massive rant just looks like the ramblings of a lunatic.
I was wondering what the hell you were talking about, but...

What is now post 342 in this thread was earlier this morning its own thread called "Fallout 4 is a huge turd and we should talk about it". There were basically two threads on the front page talking about their negative experience with Fallout 4 so they were merged into one.
...I guess that explains it. I understand why they merged the threads but it has some unfortunate side-effects.
 

kamineko

Does his best thinking in the flying car
Shit. Is this true? That was my favourite aspect of F:NV and why I found FO3 disappointing in comparison (I played NV before FO3).


That is absolutely, positively true. You can occasionally hassle people to pay you more money on quests, but after a while you don't really need money so who gives a shit.

People don't actually try to defend the dialog system so much as hand-wave because you don't play Bethesda games for the [insert typically valued characteristic]

It is true that the combat more closely approximates that of a shooter (there are not dice rolls influencing hit detection).... but it's hardly Wolfenstein quality shooting. Or Destiny. Or Resident Evil Revelations 2. Or whatever gunplay you consider good. So if ditching the RPG combat for middling gunplay is a step up for you (as it is for many customers), then that might be a positive.

Mods may improve/reinstate a lot of the missing RPG elements (skill checks?), but at this point they might be better off just making their own game. Taking a wait and see approach couldn't hurt.
 

Elios83

Member
I think it's a great game overall.
There are some obvious flaws, AI is bad, animations are bad, the dialogue system has been stupidly axed, the inventory and upgrade system is archaic and overworked.
But this is clearly a game where the whole is greater than the sum of the parts.
They nailed the world, the missions are great, there are surprises everywhere while you explore the map, the factions and their entwined stories are really interesting.
It's a great game limited by the outdated technology that Bethesda used but it's still a great game.
Even The Witcher 3 has many flaws with its totally forgettable combat system, an insane amount of chained fetch quests, story pace ruined by the open world structure and yet it's GOTY pretty much everywhere.
 

water_wendi

Water is not wet!
It is true that the combat more closely approximates that of a shooter (there are not dice rolls influencing hit detection).... but it's hardly Wolfenstein quality shooting. Or Destiny. Or Resident Evil Revelations 2. Or whatever gunplay you consider good. So if ditching the RPG combat for middling gunplay is a step up for you (as it is for many customers), then that might be a positive.
Maybe you mean VATS accuracy but i just wanted to point out that to-hit dice rolls have not been in a Bethesda game since Morrowind. Gun skills in FO3 and NV affect weapon sway/spread and there is no instance where you hit an enemy with gunfire but miss because of a dice roll.
 

kamineko

Does his best thinking in the flying car
Maybe you mean VATS accuracy but i just wanted to point out that to-hit dice rolls have not been in a Bethesda game since Morrowind. Gun skills in FO3 and NV affect weapon sway/spread and there is no instance where you hit an enemy with gunfire but miss because of a dice roll.

Yes, you are correct and I am speaking imprecisely. Hit detection in VATS, sway in realtime, damage modification in both modes. These are the implications of guns/small guns in F3/NV

I'm less clear on the implications of Energy Weapons/Big Guns, but presumably they influence damage and maybe sway as well....

Whatever they used to do, they are gone now. Though perks exist now for damage modifiers
 

grumble

Member
A chunk into the game right now. It's really more of a dungeon crawler than a quest driven game in some ways. The quests seem more designed to get you to the interesting places than to be the whole point. There are some genuinely neat places too, the robot place comes to mind.

Yes combat is improved a lot, and yes the combat is too big a part of the game. Some of the areas can kind of feel like shooting arenas. The dialogue system is dumb, the settlement thing should have been cut entirely, and the crafting is pretty cool but involves a lot of junk collection which isn't fun. Wish they focused more on non-combat options

Overall a decent game and worth playing. I think fallout 5 will be an interesting one, hopefully they keep the good and rework the missteps.
 
Shit. Is this true? That was my favourite aspect of F:NV and why I found FO3 disappointing in comparison (I played NV before FO3).




Yeah that is inexcusable.

Can someone defend this? At all? What were they thinking?

Seriously, I want to know what was the reasoning/justification for this decision. It makes zero fucking sense.
Well Fallout 3's dialog and choice of dialog was already pretty dire, combine that with the modern mainstream gamer feels like they need a voiced protagonist to be immersed or whatever bullshit and you get this.
 

blackjaw

Member
I'm almost finished with the game (over 7 days of in-game play) and I put it up as a tie for my GOTY with Witcher 3

To each his own I guess
 
This is so straightforward, I don't understand how people get stuck on this.
For some reason I decided to get all fancy with it. Guess I tried to make it some grand thing. Also put a lot of defences outside it to prevent the possible fight over the tech later on. Which never happened since
you can just teleport in and out at will
. No to mention that this game suddenly
invented teleportation in a universe which (as far as I can recall) never had it, because ... eh we need some way into the hidden base. Although the BOS never could figure it out until the player comes along and then all they need to do is smash a little hole in the ground.
Weak.

I built a building big enough to house it all, put in floors at each level, and so on. And none of it fit together, despite there clearly being enough room for it.

I ended up building it outside next to the giant building, it instantly magically fit. Then I moved it back inside and lo and behold, it was all fine.
 

jtb

Banned
morrowind was more than ten years ago

fucking oblivion was ten years ago

let it go... the bethesda of yesteryear is so fucking far gone it's not even funny anymore
 

Yopis

Member
morrowind was more than ten years ago

fucking oblivion was ten years ago

let it go... the bethesda of yesteryear is so fucking far gone it's not even funny anymore


So true and after NV everyone can see how shitty their Fallout was/is.
 
morrowind was more than ten years ago

fucking oblivion was ten years ago

let it go... the bethesda of yesteryear is so fucking far gone it's not even funny anymore
Are we at the point now where we kid ourselves that Oblivion was some great roleplaying game? It had the worst level scaling in a game I've ever seen, dialog was still fairly limited, main story was linear, you could fast travel to all the cities before even visiting them, armor system and magic was gutted from Morrowind, speech minigame thing was an atrocity etc. etc.
 

Recall

Member
So New Vegas gave me options on how to tackle certain quests, Fallout 4 is just about shooting your way to victory.

Options and choices are nice.
 

jtb

Banned
Are we at the point now where we kid ourselves that Oblivion was some great roleplaying game? It had the worst level scaling in a game I've ever seen, dialog was still fairly limited, main story was linear, you could fast travel to all the cities before even visiting them, armor system and magic was gutted from Morrowind, speech minigame thing was an atrocity etc. etc.

no, it's awful. that's my point: they've been awful for a whole decade at this point. what do people really expect at this point?
 
man thank god I skipped this game. these guys are getting worse with every new game. such stagnation.

I think at this point Bioware puts them to shame as well.
 

Acinixys

Member
RPG elements were laughable
FPS elements were terrible and boring
Exploration was pretty stagnant (90% of building are boarded up and cant be entered. Laziest design choice ive seen in a long time)
Quests were garbage
Companions were dumb as shit (AI wise)
NOTHING you say or do has any lasting consequences

I have played 40 hours and am level 31. The only thing that keeps me coming back is that some of the locations have moderately interesting back stories

Maybe I just hate all Bethesda games. I only played Skyrim for like 20 hours because it was such a bore.

So many other Devs have stepped up and are doing what Bethesda does but 10x better
 

Floody

Member
I agree with everything, but especially the factions and ending, I think that's what made me go from it's a bit meh, to just not liking it. It just felt so half-arsed and rushed, and locking most of the faction missions behind story missions was stupid. But the part that really annoys me, is that Obsidian showed them how to do it with NV (even if they didn't do it amazingly well, it was done a 1000 times better), and they probably had less time and most likely way less money.
 
I liked the 10 or so hours I've put into it but I can definitely see flaws in terms of well written story, silly missions etc.

I was really disappointed in how many buildings you couldn't enter. Especially in the first town you come across, 90% of the buildings are just boarded up.

Slightly off topic: Are consoles only going to get mods after practically everyone has moved on to something else?
 

SomTervo

Member
Given your posts in the storytelling thread, I will be surprised if you can sustain that enthusiasm for 40+ hours.

The real story of Fallout 4, imo, is a story about the current state of video game criticism

A cross-thread reference, I'm impressed!

You might be right, but bear in mind I don't necessarily see story as the most important thing in videogames. I'm arguing their corner in that thread, but totally acknowledge that for many games they just aren't the priority.

I'm good at keeping low expectations for story when necessary and enjoying videogames as a mechanical exercise only in those cases. I do that with the Just Causes, the Gears of Wars, and the Metal Gear Solid Vs.

Once you stop expecting anything from a game's story and enjoy it as a functional game only, it's usually fine.

I'll let you know whether this happens with FO4! I'll be playing it very differently to how I played FO3 or NV.

EDIT: I'm fucking hugely impressed with the voice acting, though. The male protagonist's performance is really nuanced and heartfelt. It's actually softening the blow of the "not what I wanted to say" effect.
 
The fuck is this?? Holy shit...

Those dialogue options are somewhat cherry-picked to show the worst examples.
I use that "show 1st line of response" mod and the differences between the lines are almost always just mood differences, with the exception that option 1 is usually a question (which tends to get a 1-line answer before you automatically respond with a neutral equivalent to options 2-4).

Usually Bethesda games work really well as being better than the sum of their parts. I think this is because all the parts work well together.

But Fallout 4 seems to fall apart because none of its parts really work together.
You have a new crafting mechanic to encourage hording, coupled with an abysmal inventory management system.
A streamlined perk system that reduces micromanagement, coupled with an awkward modding system that requires constant micromanagement.
A protagonist who has no personality but a dialogue system that prevents you from making interesting decisions to create your own story.
A game that encourages exploration, but areas 'off the beaten track' are filled with tough enemies that encourage you to turn back and get into power armour, which in turn punishes any inefficient movement - such as exploration.
It has a fantasticly detailed open world, rendered in an ancient crumbling engine.
The bad parts always seem to get in the way of my enjoyment in a way that never really happened F3/NV/Skyrim.

F4 isn't terrible, but it's my least favourite Bethesda game (though Oblivion got pretty boring/tedious/annoying/repetitive too).
 

SomTervo

Member
- You have a new crafting mechanic to encourage hording, coupled with an abysmal inventory management system.
- A streamlined perk system that reduces micromanagement, coupled with an awkward modding system that requires constant micromanagement.
- A protagonist who has no personality but a dialogue system that prevents you from making interesting decisions to create your own story.
- A game that encourages exploration, but areas 'off the beaten track' are filled with tough enemies that encourage you to turn back and get into power armour, which in turn punishes any inefficient movement - such as exploration.
- It has a fantasticly detailed open world, rendered in an ancient crumbling engine.
The bad parts always seem to get in the way of my enjoyment in a way that never really happened F3/NV/Skyrim.

F4 isn't terrible, but it's my least favourite Bethesda game (though Oblivion got pretty boring/tedious/annoying/repetitive too).

That is some strong criticism, eloquently put. Bethesda really have to up their game next time, especially after CDPR just showed them up entirely.

Also shit, I need to look into this 'show 1st line of dialogue' mod.

Does the 'start a settlement anywhere' mod work well, too?
 
I really really want to like this game. I'm about 18 hours in (and around level 18 as well), and because of my schedule, I have about two hours of gaming every other evening.

It seems like every Fallout session is the same. Go do this quest for a character I don't like, where I enter a creepy and depressing location, spend 90% of my time looting junk and 10% shooting things with the very limited ammo I have, constantly switching weapons to accommodate whatever ammo is plentiful. It takes a good hour to clear out one location, and then I have to reserve time to go back to camp and unload and scrap everything I acquired.

Usually by the 20 hour mark in most games, I'm using a weapon I'm in love with and I'm very comfortable with the world and confident in my skills. In Fallout 4, I still feel like a damn scavenger in a scary world where there's always some tedious monster just around the corner waiting to inconvenience me.

Fallout 3 was not like this. Most quests were interesting - whether it was about vampires, little kid communities, crazy oasis or black and white retro neighborhood, or me making big decisions that would affect the fate of many. Fallout 4 so far is a junk collection sim.
 

kamineko

Does his best thinking in the flying car
A cross-thread reference, I'm impressed!

You might be right, but bear in mind I don't necessarily see story as the most important thing in videogames. I'm arguing their corner in that thread, but totally acknowledge that for many games they just aren't the priority.

I'm good at keeping low expectations for story when necessary and enjoying videogames as a mechanical exercise only in those cases. I do that with the Just Causes, the Gears of Wars, and the Metal Gear Solid Vs.

Once you stop expecting anything from a game's story and enjoy it as a functional game only, it's usually fine.

I'll let you know whether this happens with FO4! I'll be playing it very differently to how I played FO3 or NV.

EDIT: I'm fucking hugely impressed with the voice acting, though. The male protagonist's performance is really nuanced and heartfelt. It's actually softening the blow of the "not what I wanted to say" effect.

I studied literature, too, so your comments there were memorable to me.

& I agreed with them, too. I mentioned that even Breakout had a story, and that story sometimes exists solely to contextualize compelling gameplay loops. & hey, when that works, it's great. Player agency can make even the most humdrum scenario and dialog more than the sum of its storytelling parts.

For many, F4 accomplishes this. We will see what you think!
 
EDIT: I'm fucking hugely impressed with the voice acting, though. The male protagonist's performance is really nuanced and heartfelt. It's actually softening the blow of the "not what I wanted to say" effect.
I really hope you're kidding with this. The male VA was laughable.... Hell, the reaction he made when the wife was killed was laughable, so was the reaction when you open her cryogenic capsule and take her ring.
It's an all around mediocre acting. Maybe he is a good VA, but the horrible mess that is the writing and dialogs made him do badly.
 

Brandon F

Well congratulations! You got yourself caught!
I really really want to like this game. I'm about 18 hours in (and around level 18 as well), and because of my schedule, I have about two hours of gaming every other evening.

It seems like every Fallout session is the same. Go do this quest for a character I don't like, where I enter a creepy and depressing location, spend 90% of my time looting junk and 10% shooting things with the very limited ammo I have, constantly switching weapons to accommodate whatever ammo is plentiful. It takes a good hour to clear out one location, and then I have to reserve time to go back to camp and unload and scrap everything I acquired.

Usually by the 20 hour mark in most games, I'm using a weapon I'm in love with and I'm very comfortable with the world and confident in my skills. In Fallout 4, I still feel like a damn scavenger in a scary world where there's always some tedious monster just around the corner waiting to inconvenience me.

Fallout 3 was not like this. Most quests were interesting - whether it was about vampires, little kid communities, crazy oasis or black and white retro neighborhood, or me making big decisions that would affect the fate of many. Fallout 4 so far is a junk collection sim.

I'm above the 100 hour mark and agree almost completely. I have been forcing myself to keep returning as I am edging very close to the platinum, which at the this point has become the primary motivation to press on. There is a slight morbid curiosity to also see this limp story cross the finish line, but out of the dozens of quests and locations, I can count on a single hand the very few that have woken me out of the coma loop this game has forced on me. A vast majority of the game has been a tepid shootout through very redundant locales against a scant few enemy types that feature no distinguishing need to alter or adjust the combat rhythm.

I never really had issues with a lack of ammo and healing supplies however. My weapons have been maxed out for a majority of playtime, including a beefed up shotgun, laser rifle, sniper, and a combat rifle all with legendary perks and no more upgrades to attach. If and when my ammo count hits 100 remaining for a particular gun, I just switch out to one of the other three for a few hours as my supplies seem to naturally bulk up with scavenging(again, there is almost no encounter that requires real thought to my armament use anyway). Stimpacks have been overflowing making any other healing options moot as well.

It's one of the most tedious games I have ever touched, and by far the most lackluster released by Bethesda. Yet, despite these issues I do keep coming back for trophy cleanup, so I can't outright decry that I completely dislike it(as much as I have tried to convince myself to just move on)...but I am long past the point of reasonable doubt that I could still be convinced this is a good game experience.
 
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