Fallout3 Shortcomings & your ideas

[Skotte]

This little budget game from 2001 called Darkened Skye has better animations than Fallout3

 

 

See for yourselves. There is proper body movement in the this game. When you look around in the game, your waist actually turns naturally. Even the hair is animated.

 

Wanna guess which game has the higher budget?

 

I see you are comparing a strictly third person shooter with Fallout3's third person option IMO that's not really a fair comparison.

[Tony the Wookie]

This little budget game from 2001 called Darkened Skye has better animations than Fallout3

 

 

See for yourselves. There is proper body movement in the this game. When you look around in the game, your waist actually turns naturally. Even the hair is animated.

 

Wanna guess which game has the higher budget?

 

I see you are comparing a strictly third person shooter with Fallout3's third person option IMO that's not really a fair comparison.

 

But someone who has never tried to fine tune a game mechanic before would have no way of knowing that, so his ignorance on the matter is pretty understandable.

 

 

 

You add too many variables into you mechanic and it ill just blow up in your face, I have learned that from expereince.

 

Videogames by their very nature want to be one thing, and one thing only, and trying to make something that is everything is such a monumental task that it makes my head hurt just thinking about trying to fine tune something like that.

 

 

 

And for the record, it isn't really that the animations are that much better, but that the mechanic actually allows for different animations based on stuff like moving in a 3/4 direction or backwards and jumping. It isn't the animators fault if the mechanic doesn't trigger a new animation when the player hits the S key.

 

The waist turning naturally would be because the bone has a linked constraint that makes it face in the direction of the cursor, and has nothing to do with the animator. (at least that is how I do it in Unity, I don't know thier exact process, but I know for a fact that they didn't aminate the waste turning in Maya or 3Ds Max.)

[ancalimonungol]

You know, the problem is, people are expecting too much from Bethesda. They wrote dialogue that is used by the hundreds of characters in Fallout, dozens having totally unique dialogue. Now, when you say that the NPC's should react to mass murders when your are talking to them, that's asking to much. You're essentially asking Bethesda to record and write hundreds of new dialogue for the certain quests, all of the NPC's, a fool's errand I should say.

 

The thing is, I don't think anyone who is insulting Beth for the dialogue has ever even attempted to write interactive dialogue.

 

Some people just seem to love throwing out judgement over things they havn't tried to do or even tried to understand, and that doesn't just apply to this topic, but life in general.

 

There is no excuse for not being good at dialogue writing for a RPG. If it was done before with much lower budget, then it must be done again. I don't know how it can be done. Maybe be friends with the old writer and ask him if he could do it. I don't know.

 

I just compared Fallout3 to Fallout1 and 2. I don't care about real life on this topic as it's about "shortcomings of Fallout3" (I care about my life when I'm not writing on this topic :teehee: ). I am not a game designer, but I'm a professional when it comes to knowing the positive and the negative. I started playing games on the Commodore64, so I know a lot about how a game should be. I probably played thousands of games and most of them were not what you would call a bad game. Most of them were gross games, but I played because of the music, or the story, or just because I wanted to catch something good. That's what makes me a professional on immediately deciding the good and bad about a game.

[ancalimonungol]

This little budget game from 2001 called Darkened Skye has better animations than Fallout3

 

 

See for yourselves. There is proper body movement in the this game. When you look around in the game, your waist actually turns naturally. Even the hair is animated.

 

Wanna guess which game has the higher budget?

 

I see you are comparing a strictly third person shooter with Fallout3's third person option IMO that's not really a fair comparison.

 

But someone who has never tried to fine tune a game mechanic before would have no way of knowing that, so his ignorance on the matter is pretty understandable.

 

 

 

You add too many variables into you mechanic and it ill just blow up in your face, I have learned that from expereince.

 

Videogames by their very nature want to be one thing, and one thing only, and trying to make something that is everything is such a monumental task that it makes my head hurt just thinking about trying to fine tune something like that.

 

 

 

And for the record, it isn't really that the animations are that much better, but that the mechanic actually allows for different animations based on stuff like moving in a 3/4 direction or backwards and jumping. It isn't the animators fault if the mechanic doesn't trigger a new animation when the player hits the S key.

 

The waist turning naturally would be because the bone has a linked constraint that makes it face in the direction of the cursor, and has nothing to do with the animator. (at least that is how I do it in Unity, I don't know thier exact process, but I know for a fact that they didn't aminate the waste turning in Maya or 3Ds Max.)

 

 

I still see other characters "even when I'm playing on the first person mode" :ninja:

[Tony the Wookie]

 

I just compared Fallout3 to Fallout1 and 2. I don't care about real life on this topic as it's about "shortcomings of Fallout3" (I care about my life when I'm not writing on this topic :teehee: ). I am not a game designer, but I'm a professional when it comes to knowing the positive and the negative. I started playing games on the Commodore64, so I know a lot about how a game should be. I probably played thousands of games and most of them were not what you would call a bad game. Most of them were gross games, but I played because of the music, or the story, or just because I wanted to catch something good. That's what makes me a professional on immediately deciding the good and bad about a game.

 

So by your logic I am an NFL Quarterback and know how to tell Peyton Manning how to do his job :laugh:

 

You can see the finished product, but you don't understand the thought process behind why they make the decisions they make.

 

 

But anyways, I would be willing to bet that Fallout 1 and 2 had a far large budget alloted to dialogue and writing than Fallout 3 did. Maybe if Falout 3 cut all the lypsyncing animators and the voice actors they could bring in a good writing team. The only problem with that logic is that there is absolutly no way a publisher is going to allow you to make a game with no voiceovers in todays market.

 

As sad as it is, dialogue and writing is an afterthought in the modern game industry. Publishers control the money, and they want you to produce what sells, and good dialogue is not it.

 

Whether or not you or I agree, the truth is a game without voiceovers would be destroyed by critics while a game with cheap dialogue will get a 9 out of 10 for haveing an immersive story.

 

 

Whether you like it or not, publishers control everything, and the market isn't even in the same ballpark as it was when Fallout 1 and 2 came out.

 

 

 

I can only name one company that has been able to produce good interactive dialogue in recent years, and that is Bioware, and you can't expect everyone to live up to their standard, they are simply at the top of what they do.

[ancalimonungol]

Tonny The Wookie: You miss my point. I don't care whether it takes more money to create better dialogue. (I've seen games with "NO" budget that has better dialogue and games with more budget that has worse dialogue) The only thing I care is how much value a game has. It's just entertainment for me. I don't see games as "there is huge money to be made in business" because I was lucky enough to live in the Amiga era. Back then students made games in their bed rooms. There were even games made by 12 years old kids.

 

From a business perspective, there should be rules when making a game. It's just a program. You tell the programmer what you want, and he makes it. If you think something's wrong, you tell him and he fixes it. It's easy. The programmer knows how to talk to the computer and make it do what he wants it to do.

 

From a gamer's perspective, he doesn't care how the game is programmed as long as it does things properly. The term proper changes over time. When Dune2 was first released 18 years ago, it was an innovation. We loved it and every Amiga user or PC user played it. Many games copied the concept and some made better games. If the latest Command&Conquer game didn't allow multiple units to be selected like it was on Dune2, who would have played it? If you had choose every single unit and give orders it would be a disaster. We thought about how it could be better if we could give orders to many units at the same time back then. Then game designers implemented it; to hundreds of games that were made later.

 

When I talk about what is wrong with Fallout3, I compare it with what we have today and what we had in the past. I don't really care about finances, programming or something similar. That's because Fallout3 does not bring anything new like Dune2 did. Fallout3 tries to be a remake of 1&2 with a new story and engine and also appeal to the console market as well.

 

What I've learned about how games are made is only this: You have a team responsible for design, story, script, graphics, animation, music and quality assurance. If you fail in two of these, you fail to make the game a "GEM" like: Ufo Enemy Unknown, Half Life 2, Baldur's Gate, Sensible Soccer, etc...

 

Is the animations of Fallout3 better than Fallout2 ? NO That was what we had back then, and no one complained about it. There weren't any RPG's that had better animations than Fallout2, so everybody liked the crap animation in Fallout2.

 

Is the animations of Vampire Bloodlines better than Fallout3 ? YES Even though that game was released much before Fallout3, it had animated body parts, hair, proper and believable animations when talking to characters.

 

Is the animations of Fallout3 really bad? YES

 

Is the script of Fallout2 better than Fallout3? YES

 

Is the script of Fallout3 really bad? YES

 

two fails. And one of them is an essential for a RPG: Dialogue.

 

Fallout world is a story. There are always little stories to tell from the big picture. You must perfect the story, then the script even before you attempt making a RPG. The story was already ready when they started to make Fallout3.

 

If you want to make it a FPS to also attract children, then make the animations believable. Because now we are inside the world. It's no longer like how it was in Fallout2. Think about how Pro Evolution Soccer would have look like if its animations were like it was in Sensible Soccer.

[Tony the Wookie]

No modern RPGs have perfect stories... most don't even have good stories... No one even attempts to have interactive dialogue anymore, more or less have good interactive dialogue. Dragon Age has a few memorable conversations, and Mass Effect has a few more, but that is about it for the entire Publisher based indstry as well as the Indie game industry.

 

Truly good plot and dialogue isn't seen as immportant by the mainstream game publishers, and the indie guys know that it is too large of a task for them to take on without totaly bankrupting their studio and themselves in the process.

 

What you are asking Fallout to be is something that isn't really possible in the year 2010. You can't delay the release date on your game and ask the publisher for more money because you want hair animation and more dialogue, they would laugh you out of thier office.

 

 

 

You can't just look at everything from an idealistic perspective of how you wish games were. No game can stand up to your vision of a perfect game.

 

It just isn't possible to have the interactive dialogue of Fallout 1 and the complex animations of Vampire Bloodlines and the FPS mechanics of Metro 2033 and the meele mechanics of God of War and the finely tuned 3rd person camera of Mass Effect and the detailed character models of Final Fantasy 13 and the polished environments of Call of Juarez and the engine rendering capabilities of Crysis and the lighting effects of Resistance Fall of Man and have it be as open worlded as Grand Theft Auto and with as polished a story as Final Fantasy X and also make it able to be modded...

 

 

It just isn't possible, that is all there is to say, it just isn't possible.

 

 

 

 

But anyways, I will save you some time by telling you that I am done here. If you want to respond do it because other people may read, but I don't plan on coming back to read it. Not because I have anything against anyone, I am just tired of dicussing this and I have games to make and mechanics to tweak and models to build.

 

so have a good day

[olafreinhardweyer]

You write: "Truly good plot and dialogue isn't seen as immportant by the mainstream game publishers, and the indie guys know that it is too large of a task for them to take on without totaly bankrupting their studio and themselves in the process."

 

First about Fallout and other Dialogue

 

All in all, i do not find Fallout 3's dialogue that bad.

I just would like to talk more and about different topics but what has been done i am almost satisfied with. Moira Brown (Karen Carbone) was a superb job, considering above limitations.

 

I remember some very bad, bad dialogue from Neverwinternights. A female shopowner commented about how PC was looking at her breast and that she knows how attractive she where. All characters not evil seemed very goofy to me and i just could'nt stand it anymore so i discontinued playing. They probably thought they made funny characters but all they did was annoy me.

 

In Fallout there is no one annoying (who isn't supposed to).

 

Second, how many resources does good dialogue really afford?

 

I am a learned screenwriter. Hollywood and NY are swarming with great screenwriters who would jump at the oportunity writing good dialogue for games, even if it meant very, very little income. It is the change of scenery (so to say :) that attracts them most. So a game company can snatch itself a newbie who's nonetheless great at his job and pay him less than his usual staffwriter. Television is doing it all the time and they love doing it, when their staff writers are on strike. Voice actors aren't that much expensive either. So all in all, creating more and better dialogue should be no issue.

 

That good dialogue isn't a seller would only be true if you look at a published product idependently. However a game enjoyed better because of good dialogue also refelcts upon a publisher as a whole and therefore enhances the customers Lifetime Value (look that up) in regards of other and later products.

 

The problem to me, it seems, is a flawed production process. If time is money and writing good dialogue takes it's time, you must give it a proper place in the production chain. The question would be when to enhance dialogue in that chain and when to finally invite voice actors to voiceover the dialogue. Also contracts could be made, that allow the editing of voice acts down to a single word into new sentences, if that editing would be cheaper than letting them act it again. I've done that myself with pretty natural results.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

No modern RPGs have perfect stories... most don't even have good stories... No one even attempts to have interactive dialogue anymore, more or less have good interactive dialogue. Dragon Age has a few memorable conversations, and Mass Effect has a few more, but that is about it for the entire Publisher based indstry as well as the Indie game industry.

 

Truly good plot and dialogue isn't seen as immportant by the mainstream game publishers, and the indie guys know that it is too large of a task for them to take on without totaly bankrupting their studio and themselves in the process.

 

What you are asking Fallout to be is something that isn't really possible in the year 2010. You can't delay the release date on your game and ask the publisher for more money because you want hair animation and more dialogue, they would laugh you out of thier office.

 

 

 

You can't just look at everything from an idealistic perspective of how you wish games were. No game can stand up to your vision of a perfect game.

 

It just isn't possible to have the interactive dialogue of Fallout 1 and the complex animations of Vampire Bloodlines and the FPS mechanics of Metro 2033 and the meele mechanics of God of War and the finely tuned 3rd person camera of Mass Effect and the detailed character models of Final Fantasy 13 and the polished environments of Call of Juarez and the engine rendering capabilities of Crysis and the lighting effects of Resistance Fall of Man and have it be as open worlded as Grand Theft Auto and with as polished a story as Final Fantasy X and also make it able to be modded...

 

 

It just isn't possible, that is all there is to say, it just isn't possible.

 

 

 

 

But anyways, I will save you some time by telling you that I am done here. If you want to respond do it because other people may read, but I don't plan on coming back to read it. Not because I have anything against anyone, I am just tired of dicussing this and I have games to make and mechanics to tweak and models to build.

 

so have a good day

[Tertisentar]

You know, the problem is, people are expecting too much from Bethesda. They wrote dialogue that is used by the hundreds of characters in Fallout, dozens having totally unique dialogue. Now, when you say that the NPC's should react to mass murders when your are talking to them, that's asking to much. You're essentially asking Bethesda to record and write hundreds of new dialogue for the certain quests, all of the NPC's, a fool's errand I should say.

 

They did it with Morrowind, which had about 3000 unique NPC's, all of them being named and even the generic dialogue was unique to the person being talked to. The unique and quest dialogues, well, any random quest puts the fallout quests to shame where dialogue is concerned, in my opinion. The only thing that could even be considered a tiny excuse as for why fallout does not have at least a fraction of that is the hard space the voice files occupy, but I believe there was plenty of space left to fill.

 

It's not like it should be hard to set up a small studio somewhere in a city and offer people 15 bucks to spend 10 minutes voicing a character either, that too would've helped alot. :sleep:

[Xanorak]

So you don't care about the limitations of the engine, the money, the publisher, you just WANT it. It's like asking your mom to turn the loaf of bread into a lump of gold. And no matter how your mom tries to explain it's NOT POSSIBLE, you stubbornly keep screaming for something impossible to be done. And don't think playing games makes you know the game creating process. Just because I read a few tips on how to play football doesn't mean I can play it like a pro straight away.