Irony of Post-War America

[DoctorKaizeld]

 

I liked Freelancer so I'm pretty excited for Star Citizen, haven't bought into it yet though.

i'll be honest... i have... a lot... as in LTI Yellowjacket Dragonfly, LTI Reliant, Starfarer, LTI Hull - C, LTI Freelancer DUR, and a LTI Endeavor...

 

 

I played SWKOTOR2 with the community patch and enjoyed it, but the parts where content was cut was really obvious.

i agree, i wish we could have gotten the uncut game as they had planned... but alas we didnt... oh and a third installment would also be cool but instead we got a meh MMO that isnt even as good as Galaxies had been.

 

 

Yes, I agree the problem we perceive is a balance in philosophy of the company. I really get the feeling they are marketing heavily towards consoles and less of the "RPG crowd," or at least trying to bring more people into the "RPG crowd" by broadening the scope (dumbing down) the games.

this is what i mean when i talk about the previous games main plot not making me dislike them. Fallout is an RPG series that is supposed to be lore driven not story driven like Mass Effect is. i like the fact that the main character in previous installments wasnt interesting they arent supposed to be unless the player makes them interesting. as i have said before the PC is supposed to be a legend in the waste with no set-in-stone story behind them while canon picks the options they actually chose it doesnt tell us they were good people or exactly who they are. one of my issues with FO4 is that it feels story driven... and i couldnt give two cares about the story... i dont like the PC when the PC is supposed to be my character instead i get someone elses character. it's like i am playing a fanfiction with redundant radiant quests!

 

 

I like the idea of a Bethesda style game that's not made by Bethesda... if you get what I mean. Like someone else to do the writing, because they aren't so good at it.

understatement... seriously they need some decent writers. im glad they are getting better in the VA department though, seriously i have to say it is a lot better... but the writing... oh gawd the writing!

 

 

I mean, what's with the family-oriented plots? Doesn't make sense to me, it's like they are to make some emotional appeal, it just ends up feeling strange. They are known for making games where you begin as a nobody with no family, why tamper with what is not broken?

right? really the first game you go into the wastes to find a chip for the Vault... that is it no personality, no name, no details on the vault. the second game has less! you literally become a MAHUN! and then go and do stuff. FO3 your dad leaves... okay... but we also have the intro to the vault where you get interact with a living vault and sorta get a feel for the people, sure it wasnt great or nothing but hey it was okay you still leave as a mostly blank slate and a goal of lets go find the jerk who screwed me over! (it's like the Johnny Cash song Boy Named Sue only your name doesnt have to be Sue) the game allows you to wander the wastes and 'look' for your dad. you dont know where you are, you dont know what to do, you dont know who to talk to. so wandering off and not going to Megaton is actually quite reasonable. also you can find dad without even going there! in FO4 every five seconds it's like "im lookin for my boy." seriously why do i need to talk to everybody and their sister about a missing kid? also the whole 'twist' was so freakin obvious that when someone spoiled it for me i didnt believe them. it couldnt be that stupid! also you have to do the main quest step for step, you have to talk Nick, you have to track down *spoiler* with the dog, you have to go to the Glowing Sea, you have to talk to *spoiler*, you have to get *spoiler* for *spoiler*, you have to pick a faction, you have to build the *spoiler*, you have to believe *spoiler* without once having the option to not believe it then get the ham fisted twist... there is no skipping parts. you have to do it in order... in every ES game you are some prisoner who got out somehow (III you were pardoned, IV you were technically pardoned, V you escaped) that left you with nothing and no decent skills, you were a blank slate, and again the game is not directly focused on the PCs story but the world around them and how the choices of the player affect the world.

 

 

I was really upset with them after Skyrim, but I honestly do think they have gone back to a more complex gameplay with FO4. It's not as complex as I'd like, but bearing in mind they are doing what I described above, it makes me hopeful.

yes Skyrim was aweful. i actually returned it after i bought it originally. the only reason i play it is for the mods and a friend got me the PC version... then another did... and another... like seriously i had 17 copies of the freakin game at one point! FO4 is better on comparison, but saying it is a great game because it is better then the previous title is stupid (i know you didnt say that but i have heard people say it) you need to compare it to all of the previous titles. as i have said several times though i do not feel as though i wasted my money on it. i do not feel like returning it, i have fun playing it, but i am not happy with it and know it could have been a lot better.

 

 

There is less dumbing down in FO4 than in Skyrim. Think of the upgrade system, settlement stuff (like it or hate it, it's there),

the leveling system is terrible in this game... i want the old one back. the weapon modding and settlement stuff is cool but are also problems.

-the settlement system plays to much of a role in the game

-the weapon mods replaced the ability to build weapons instead of enhancing it

-there are fewer weapons in FO4 then in previous games. changing how the gun works through a modification doesnt just make it a new gun.

-equipment modifications dont have side grades only upgrades meaning you have to use the best upgrade if you want your gear be useful.

-you can build weapons and gear and upgrade it in Skyrim. it didnt change things visually but it was there.

-the Settlement system would have been better as DLC instead of taking up dev time they could have used to make a better game. or i dont know just let people mod it into the freakin game themselves!

-dialog has been dumbed down

-the leveling system has been 'streamlined' as in dumbed down

-the level cap is over 9000! not a negative i actually think that is cool.

-only three 'cities' and one of them is inaccessible if you choose certain dialog. all of them are small as well.

-swatters... again not a negative what they think baseball was like is funny.

 

 

companions with backstory

yet still ironically shallow, but not in the same way. it's more of just not a lot for them... while the companion quests are better there really isnt much there and it feels half done. you pretty much have three character building moments for each of them and done. you cant even have some decent idle dialog. like why cant i discuss various locations with them? why do i only get a bunch of one shot comments? why cant i take them to Vault 111 and have them discuss the corpse of our spouse for example? it is just a simple line about it. i agree though it is a step in the right direction... but they are also the only intresting NPCs where you can learn 'a lot' about. everybody else just need you for quests or are there to talk about your kid. like the Father in Diamond city for example i talked to him and the conversation was fine interesting in fact. then it ends with "what are you looking for?" and i get three responses about my son all of which directly mention him and the fourth option is just an a-hole response akin to "screw off" which makes no sense for me. why cant i talk about anything other then freakin Shaun? and when i choose to not tell people about him i can only give a "screw off" response to avoid it. seriously try playing the game without talking to people about your son, you cant.

 

 

quests

yeah a thousand redundant save that settlement quests are way better then Skyrims fetch quests... no the quests are garbage. there are a couple standout ones but Skyrim had those too.

 

 

and interaction

screw the PC to NPC interaction it is awful. though a lot of the world interaction is nice like the no click looting, the cover system, faster cleaner gun play, the ability to open some stuff that often has nothing in them but screw it they are cool.

 

the animation is also pretty good except that the PC smiles way to freakin often for someone who is wondering the ruins of their home.

 

 

multiple endings... in Skyrim there was only one ending, Kill the big black dragon, totally lame.

SPOILERS DUDE! im kidding yeah one ending nonsense is stupid but doesnt excuse bad multiple endings. i would go further into this but then we will have to enter spoiler territory and i want to avoid that.

 

 

The perks are more interesting and varied than Skyrim's.

agreed but it is still terrible i want the old system.

 

 

So I think they are headed in the right direction, for now. But we'll see what happens.

i hope

 

 

the irony is that despite an atomic holocaust literally nothing has changed :D

"all of the above" still exists

 

oh and, the nothing has changed element, even though everything's changed, alas, as the saying goes "the more things change the more they stay the same"

 

oh and, as far as these things go, I pay attention to world events, I check out footage, I go to alternative sources other than typical north american media sites reasonably often as well (not conspiracy sites but like, other continents' media and not just europe's)

ANYWAYS, with that explanation out of the way, playing fallout 4 is like being in a warzone from tdoay except you're able to shoot back, and it's a hero ego trip to boot, but with those thematic/story elements taken out, it's identical in its nature of the situation :D

okay and lasers, but like, come on I think that one should go without saying

... uh

[mkborgelt13]

Definitely agree the Shaun-centric plot is obnoxious, and yeah, I guessed the "twist" a couple hours into my first playthrough, it's obvious really...

 

The "200-year-old pre-war character" is actually a great idea to make the PC important without making them the center of the game universe. A pre-war person, even a nobody that we can fill in ourselves, would have numerous advantages over wastelanders but I've already discussed that in another thread. Unfortunately this comes with the baggage of your missing kid and dead spouse in the freezer.

 

They did away with skills completely and replaced them with perks. I enjoyed having skills, BUT this always bothered me about D&D derived levelling systems. How does killing 40 guys and "levelling up" equate to gaining a rank in hacking skill? I think skills should be raised by specific xp related to the skill, not overall xp. I also found the level cap in FO3 to be too restrictive so the unlimited cap in FO4 is most welcome.

 

One of the things I enjoyed about FO3 was the robust quest designs, where you could shoot the guy who gave you the quest, take the reward off his body, and complete it in your journal. That skips a lot of content but it's nice to have options.

I couldn't play without the realtime conversation / NPC interaction. The ability to break out of conversation, save, and continue is great. Or blowing someone off mid-sentence and running away. Can't do that in Oblivion, FO3, NV, and it's the major thing holding me back from completing NV, apart from the combat AI I mentioned.

[DoctorKaizeld]

 

Definitely agree the Shaun-centric plot is obnoxious, and yeah, I guessed the "twist" a couple hours into my first playthrough, it's obvious really...

yeah i figured it out when i got to diamond city and talked to Piper and her sister... really a stupid twist.

 

 

The "200-year-old pre-war character" is actually a great idea to make the PC important without making them the center of the game universe.

agreed! i actually loved that idea until it was thrown out the window thirty minutes into the game

 

seriously other then a handful of characters you never mention this to people. you dont even tell half the companions you get about it.

 

 

A pre-war person, even a nobody that we can fill in ourselves, would have numerous advantages over wastelanders but I've already discussed that in another thread. Unfortunately this comes with the baggage of your missing kid and dead spouse in the freezer.

well to bad im talkin about it! :D

 

actually i am adding to it, there is a way to fix the way they started the game:

1) dont start the game with a spouse and kid... seriously done nothing else needed.

... what you want something better? fine.

2) allow character creation via interacting with your prewar house.

-interact with Shaun and you can change his name, sex, personality type, whether he/she takes after mom or dad, alter minor other details

this would make Shaun a much more important character to the player as now you have the ability to change the kid into something else which actually affects the game in small ways.

-click on the diploma and change what you went to school for if at all and whether or not it was the spouse or both of you who went to college

-alter spouses personality/sex

-interacting with the food items will allow you to change your characters preferences such as whether the like nuka cola or are more of a beer person

-interacting with the uniform in the closet will allow you to change who was in the military and for how long (maybe they are just off duty and not retired)

-dialog choices with the Vault-Professional-Solicitor-Rep changes how your character interacts with people in the game. like are they sarcastic, a jerk, friendly, ect this would actually fix the limited dialog system so it works, and to get around people who complain about not wanting to start a new game to change this just have an option in dialog that will change it. for example if you started sarcastic 3 options will be sarcastic where as the fourth is friendly. or even better make the dialog dynamic so by choosing sarcastic responses will unlock further sarcastic dialog with that NPC.

-change Codworth to be a female option and give him a hat. seriously if i owned him i would have gotten him a hat.

 

all of these would build your character and help build a bit of a bond with the spouse and son... it doesnt help though that the spouse dies in the first 5 minutes though... oh yeah why not have it so you can change whether he/she dies or not? yeah in the beginning when picking their personality or in dialog you change this like implying they are quite trusting or something, so when the *spoiler* peoples show up he/she actually gives them the baby thinking they are the vault scientist or something and they then seal him/her back into it before he/she could realize what they did.

 

 

They did away with skills completely and replaced them with perks. I enjoyed having skills, BUT this always bothered me about D&D derived levelling systems. How does killing 40 guys and "levelling up" equate to gaining a rank in hacking skill? I think skills should be raised by specific xp related to the skill, not overall xp. I also found the level cap in FO3 to be too restrictive so the unlimited cap in FO4 is most welcome.

and that is fair, i dont have a problem with the leveling system itself i have a problem with it not being a good fallout leveling system. honestly i think they should have gone with the ES leveling system where you level things as you use the skill. the new system is fine and works but like i said it doesnt fit.

 

also FONV was the game that had a restrictive level cap in my opinion with half as many perks as FO3 but the same cap for the most part. i am happy they got rid of it.

 

 

One of the things I enjoyed about FO3 was the robust quest designs, where you could shoot the guy who gave you the quest, take the reward off his body, and complete it in your journal. That skips a lot of content but it's nice to have options.

agreed. i liked that a lot. i should be able to cap the shop keeper and take his shop inventory dang it!

 

 

I couldn't play without the realtime conversation / NPC interaction. The ability to break out of conversation, save, and continue is great.

eh i like it but i have a minor gripe with it being that you are often forced into dialog with people all the freakin time just by passing them and that screws with the camera. Edward Deegan at Bunker Hill is a good example of this for me. also some characters get annoyed by this when you walk past and dont stop to talk to them often causing you to miss out on some of what they said because the blended into the conversations of random NPCs talking to you.

 

 

Or blowing someone off mid-sentence and running away. Can't do that in Oblivion, FO3, NV, and it's the major thing holding me back from completing NV, apart from the combat AI I mentioned.

fair enough... i honestly dont talk to people often in that game i usually just wander around doin stuff.

[Zaklex55]

Keep in mind it took Bethesda 7, I repeat 7(seven) years to make FO4...don't you think that was enough time to make a much better game than the one they ultimately made(and if you're going to take that long, then make 2 versions: 1 for PC and use everything it's capable of, and 1 for consoles, with their limitations).

[DoctorKaizeld]

 

Keep in mind it took Bethesda 7, I repeat 7(seven) years to make FO4...don't you think that was enough time to make a much better game than the one they ultimately made(and if you're going to take that long, then make 2 versions: 1 for PC and use everything it's capable of, and 1 for consoles, with their limitations).

Duke Nukem mean anything to you? either way it was 4 years full time and 3 years off and on.

 

no excuse though 4 years is plenty of time to make something better, but there are good reasons to not make dedicated versions for devices. though i think they should have focused on the PC and dumbed it down for the Console version.

[TrickyVein]

Keep in mind it took Bethesda 7, I repeat 7(seven) years to make FO4...

 

Nobody's who's played the game believes this.

[DoctorKaizeld]

 

Keep in mind it took Bethesda 7, I repeat 7(seven) years to make FO4...

 

Nobody's who's played the game believes this.

 

agreed

[cossayos]

Keep in mind it took Bethesda 7, I repeat 7(seven) years to make FO4...don't you think that was enough time to make a much better game than the one they ultimately made(and if you're going to take that long, then make 2 versions: 1 for PC and use everything it's capable of, and 1 for consoles, with their limitations).

 

Why? I played Bethesda games since 2002, Morrowind. I gave up on them creating better games. Also, it's not 7 years, it's only 4, since there was Skyrim in the meantime. Which, by the way, rolled back on what FO3 already offered in it's vanilla state.

 

So, no, I didn't expect anything more. I expected Bethesda, and since I'm a leech, I expected the modders to take care of Bethesda when I bought this game. And that's exactly what I got.

[mkborgelt13]

7 years..... that's a bit much, what exactly were they doing in all that time?

 

I do think that if it took that long to develop, it should be way more complex than it is. At leats have more open buildings instead of entire streets boarded up.

 

A lot of technical stuff is already "borrowed" from previous games.

 

Power armor is reminiscent of the vampire-bat transDraculaTion you can do in one of the Skyrim dlc's, for example.

 

The only new stuff I can list off the top of my head: settlement building, dynamic weapon and armor mods. And those two are related through nif snapping, so it's not like they are separate research projects.

[Zaklex55]

 

 

Keep in mind it took Bethesda 7, I repeat 7(seven) years to make FO4...don't you think that was enough time to make a much better game than the one they ultimately made(and if you're going to take that long, then make 2 versions: 1 for PC and use everything it's capable of, and 1 for consoles, with their limitations).

Duke Nukem mean anything to you? either way it was 4 years full time and 3 years off and on.

 

no excuse though 4 years is plenty of time to make something better, but there are good reasons to not make dedicated versions for devices. though i think they should have focused on the PC and dumbed it down for the Console version.

 

 

 

The problem with comparing it to Duke Nukem is that the last version was scrapped and rewritten/made how many times in the dozen or so years it was in development, at least 2 that I'm aware of, so that makes 3 versions(the 2 scrapped and the 3rd released) of a single game in 12 years, which averages out to around 4 years each(just numbers, not the actual development time on each version).

 

If you take into consideration the boatloads of money they made from this title(and from Skyrim before it) then there really is no valid reason not to develop two separate version, you could conceivably make even more money, though the console players might wonder why the PC version is different, it's just something that marketing would have to be fairly forceful to push for(I know it costs a little more, but that should easily be earned back with even more sales). Technically making separate versions as I'm stating doesn't require two development teams, but the one team to make it for PC, and a much smaller team to then take that PC version and turn it into a usable console title, which most people call dumbing down for consoles, but in reality is a separate version of the game.

 

You can say it was 3 years off and on and 4 full time, but that still works out to 7 years total...and it's not like they had to design a completely new engine or anything...I just think the organization is not very well streamlined nor do they appear to coordinate very well. Let's see how well they don't do making 3 games at the same time(does that mean they have about 700 - 750 employees now, or more like 900) as they should have 233 - 250, but ideally ~300 per team for each game(and that's all staffing, not just the game designers/programmers, etc.). Of course the first thing they need to do is have the brand new game engine designed and built(which they should have someone else do, but that won't happen).

 

 

Keep in mind it took Bethesda 7, I repeat 7(seven) years to make FO4...

 

Nobody's who's played the game believes this.

 

 

 

 

Keep in mind it took Bethesda 7, I repeat 7(seven) years to make FO4...don't you think that was enough time to make a much better game than the one they ultimately made(and if you're going to take that long, then make 2 versions: 1 for PC and use everything it's capable of, and 1 for consoles, with their limitations).

 

Why? I played Bethesda games since 2002, Morrowind. I gave up on them creating better games. Also, it's not 7 years, it's only 4, since there was Skyrim in the meantime. Which, by the way, rolled back on what FO3 already offered in it's vanilla state.

 

So, no, I didn't expect anything more. I expected Bethesda, and since I'm a leech, I expected the modders to take care of Bethesda when I bought this game. And that's exactly what I got.

 

 

 

That's true, but there's a difference between expecting and knowing what you'll end up with. You can expect better while knowing you won't get better, without disappointing yourself.

Edited August 28, 2016 by Zaklex55