What don't you want to see in the next Fallout?

[Vagrant0]

The main thing that bothered most about FO3 and NV was the crappy way that the AI tended to react regardless of environment. I don't know what they screwed up, but with the exception of a few areas in NV (where enemies were passive until triggered by scripts), almost every interior ended up being little more than "Stand in the entryway for 10 minutes killing things as they run from all the way on the other side of the complex/cave, then explore freely". I literally lost count of how many times I ran into this problem with both games. It made areas fairly boring since everything would come running right to you as soon as you entered, sometimes even through walls. It wouldn't feel like such a large problem if not for it potentially breaking some quests, or rendering companions useless as they go darting off into the deeper parts ignoring everything along the way just to kill a radroach. The problem persists to a lesser extent in the overworld where you either have whole settlements running out the gate as soon as it's open to hunt down a molerat on the other side of the map just because it looked at you funny. NV made this problem worse due to the frequency that things would get stuck in the terrain, so you'd have a whole NCR camp running out to the middle of nowhere, spending all their ammo shooting at the terrain, and then proceed to run over and beat eachother to death trying to get to a scorpion caught between the geometry. It made exploring a general pain in the ass, and made a maxed sneak necessary to keep anyone meaningful alive... which renderes 90% of encounters meaningless and makes interiors more about sneaking around until you're forced to kill something, and then subsequently everything in the interior even if it is unreachable before you can continue doing anything.

 

I tried fixing this by changing AI values and other stuff in both games, but came to the conclusion that the AI was just plain messed up beyond salvaging. I think it might have been what was a major factor as to why I didn't play either game very much. Everything else can be pretty much dealt with, but if every encounter feels broken or follows the same pattern, the majority of the game just becomes a chore which is only done for the sake of storyline.

 

I'm hoping like hell that they tap some of those related to recent FPS title acquisitions and do combat right. I know VATS is this thing going back to the originals that is supposed to make combat more strategic... But the base combat system just isn't strategic... at all. Damage locations don't affect much of anything, encounters all run up to you or stand in the open shooting, and more often than not, just using VATS means getting mobbed by targets since either you miss shots and can't compensate in time, or waste ammo (and time) because you anticipated missing. So either it has to be all FPS, with VATs working as an indication system for non-conventional targets or pointing out weak points... Or all 3rd person turnbased combat.

[Halororor]

^I think a large part of that can be blamed on Gamebryo. Some of that crappy enemy detection actually made it into Skyrim. A beggar in the street really shouldn't be trying to attack a dragon with his bare fists.

 

I'm honestly not sure I'll buy the next Fallout if it runs on either Gamebryo, or the 'new' engine, Creation, which is actually nothing more than Gamebryo 1.5. Gamebryo should have been dropped entirely ages ago. I know it makes modding easier, but it makes making a decent game so much harder.

[Aegrus]

^I think a large part of that can be blamed on Gamebryo. Some of that crappy enemy detection actually made it into Skyrim. A beggar in the street really shouldn't be trying to attack a dragon with his bare fists.

 

I'm honestly not sure I'll buy the next Fallout if it runs on either Gamebryo, or the 'new' engine, Creation, which is actually nothing more than Gamebryo 1.5. Gamebryo should have been dropped entirely ages ago. I know it makes modding easier, but it makes making a decent game so much harder.

 

The Source Engine (Valve's go-to engine) is about as moddable as the Creation engine, and waaay better optimized. Entire chunks of it can be easily replaced to keep it modern. Valve tends to make their games low-spec enough to run on most pcs, so you don't often see what it can do graphically, but there are some very impressive Half Life 2 mods that show off its potential. The mods also run well, even on my modest pc. I don't think I'd mind at all if Bethesda switched to the Source Engine. . . but that's highly unlikely, since it seems like Valve has a complete monopoly on it.