Best Fallout 3 Preview Around

[vovan]

Originally posted by Imran Siddiqui
Oblivion, unfortunately, suffered a bit in the immersion aspects from having an "Imperial" province. That meant that every city was basically similar architecturally speaking, since it was the heart of the Empire. Though for all that, it did draw the player in.

I think Oblivion also fell a bit short on the quests themselves. The Dark Brotherhood quests were fun, and the Thieves were OK, but the vast majority of the other "side-quests" were kind of mindless FedEx quests, which was a bit boring.

That and the fact that you could be the prince of thieves and the ... umm... head of the good guys (forget what they were called) at the same time was kinda... meh. One of the biggest appeals of Fallout to me was the fact that you could play a "good" guy or a "bad" guy more so than in Oblivion. If you became a slaver, for instance, that would preclude you from talking to a good few people, or completing a bunch of quests. Whereas in Oblivion, you could be the head of the Dark Brotherhood, and nobody would care (sure, sure, stealth organization and what not, but still... doesn't feel quite right).

I don't know... Maybe just me: there seem to be as many opinions as to why Fallout was awesome as there are people who have played it.

[Imran Siddiqui]

Well, I think you just answered yourself as to why you could head the Dark Brotherhood and no one would care .

[vovan]

Originally posted by Imran Siddiqui
Well, I think you just answered yourself as to why you could head the Dark Brotherhood and no one would care

Heh. I know. But that's the thing though... Even though they have provided some implicit narrative justification, it still feels kind of wrong that the same character could be the main good guy and the main bad guy at the same time... You know?

I guess my main point is it just doesn't feel like you are changing anything by making the choice to be good or evil. Wheras in Fallout, it mattered plenty, and almost every town's "end story" was affected by the choices you made there.

[Dis]

That's the thing. The organizations in TES didn't really have much impact. You'd think being the head of a criminal organization would cause increase crime in towns etc. But nothing really changes.

The key difference in the games in TES really doesn't have an ending like Fallout. You can keep on playing, though I do know you can keep on playing in Fallout 2 as well... So it's really not a good excuse for TES not to wrap up the town's histories.

The point is towns in TES are static. No matter what you do. Sure if you kill people, guards will try to arrest you. But other than that, what changes?

I can understand the organization is secret, including the leadership. I'll buy into that. But what impact does this organization have really? Why do they exist?

[Vesayen]

Satans First Gaming Corrolary(year 2001+ edition):

Any game released both on the PC and consoles, will suck.

Fallout 3 will suck.

[Dis]

sadly that seems to be the case. I thought Oblivion would buck that trend, but just reinforced it.

Before my mod, the text on Oblivion menus looked like it was designed for a 3rd grader. But the worst part is the game seems pointless and boring.

[DrSpike]

Originally posted by Vesayen
Satans First Gaming Corrolary(year 2001+ edition):

Any game released both on the PC and consoles, will suck.

Fallout 3 will suck.

DrSpike's gaming rule: anyone who makes silly statements like this sucks.

BioShock? HL2? Gears of War? Halo? KotOR? Call of Duty 4? C&C3?

That should suffice for now.

[Vesayen]

There was an omission in the corollary.

Here is the full version:

Satan's First Gaming Corollary(year 2001+ edition)

Any game released at the same time on both the PC and consoles, will suck.

Many C&C fans did not like C&C3 at all, myself included.

Likewise, while many rave over COD4, many are not happy, the pathetically short single player?

Many people do not like Halo. It may be popular, but many PC vets loath it. Also, not released at the same time for PC and consoles.

KOTOR, see above. Not released at the same time for PC and consoles.

HL2, see above. Also, once again, some criticize HL2. Lets look at it. The single player was short and pathetically easy for any FPS vet. *AT RELEASE* there was no multiplayer and the "multiplayer out of the box" is still well, crap.

Bioshock. You have infinite respawns and you walk through a hamster maze the entire game. Would of been fun if there was any challenge but those respawn tubes ruined it. I also would of liked to get out of the damn hamster maze-almost(not all) every console FPS has you walking through tiny room after tiny room, modules which are all roughly the same size.

KOTOR and GOW were not developed for the PC and console at the same time. Both are popular games on both consoles and generally well recieved.

They were developed FIRST for the console, then had a prolonged period to tweak it for consoles. As I recall, GoW took 2 years to go from console to PC, KOTOR if I recall, took almost 3.

Developing for both systems at the same times always ruins it for the PC side, however if they take time after to fix issues, you can have good games released on both.

[DrSpike]

Over the last few months CoD4 and BioShock were both released at the same time and score 90+ on metacritic and gamerankings. If you don't like them, fine, but it's hard to argue they fit your rule as 'sucking'.

[Vesayen]

Halo also has a high ranking on gamerankings, are you going to say that is a good game?

Half life was 5 years older then it and a more complex and entertaining game.

Bioshock had crappy level design. You went from one tiny room to another the entire game, most of the rooms were an identical box shape, or made up of 4 such box shapes. Larger rooms were copied from a template the entire game. Killed immersion for me.

Bioshock also had infinite respawns which killed any sense of a challenge, where is the challenge if you can't fail?

CoD4 has no single player.

[vovan]

Originally posted by Vesayen
Halo also has a high ranking on gamerankings, are you going to say that is a good game?

Nah. It's only the game that kicked off the most successful franchise on the XBox.

[Vesayen]

Just because something is popular does not mean it is good.

Halo is a crappy game. Simplistic, droll, no story, no character interaction, no plot development, simplistic weapons(and not many of them). Half life predates it by 5 years and is superior to it in every way.

[vovan]

Originally posted by Vesayen
Just because something is popular does not mean it is good.

OK. We agree to disagree then. To save on typing out the arguments, see one of the eleventy billion "sims rock/sims suck" threads around here.

[Vesayen]

There are more practitioners of Christianity then any other single world religion, therefore, Christianity is the one true religion?

Hordes can like whatever they like, that does not make it valuable or true.

(And the sims DO suck, however it is a cleverly designed game)

[Dis]

I've been thinking of some things (bear with me here )

Perhaps I'm a bit harsh on Oblivion earlier about endings. Most older rpg's don't have them (just finished playing bg1), and perhaps Oblivion is more realistic in this aspect. But is it fun? I say no. It's more fun that your actions did have more of an impact on the places you've been to. Be it a bit narcissistic. It feels good at the end of the game when you see your actions improved the life of a certain village or town.

Although I still think Bethesda are just lazy storytellers. I think Bioware and Obsidian have the story telling market cornered, and all the good writers are working for those companies.

I want to try playing Oblivion again (it would be my 3rd attempt ). The biggest thing that puts me off I think is not the levelling monsters. I can deal with that. But it's the horrible combat and character system. The magic system is bland and there is no personality to the spells. The levelling system is complete crap, no question about it. My character seems to have no identity. And it seems if you work at it, you can become jack of all trades, which I don't like.

Which gives me hope about Fallout 3. If they completely revamp the character system, it might actually be fun for me. I think the biggest downer will the the lack of a well written back story and main quest.