Fallout:76- the 'emoji' wheel

[zanity]

One remarkable facet of the terrible Fallout:76 reveal trailer was how much time the game spent looking like THE SIMS. And this was no accident.

 

All the multiplayer nonsense in the video was sub-par childish sims-like fun. When focusing on combat, the video went all PvE (player versus computer controlled 'enemy'- time to learn these multi-player terms, folks).

 

But why the Sims (those cringe worthy 'selfies').

 

OK take Fortnite:Battle Royale, a truly brilliant F2P deathmatch. The dream of anyone who dates back to original deathmatch in Duke Nukem and Quake. In 99-1 mode I think microphone comms isn't a thing- at least I never heard or wanted to hear other players. But Fortnite has 'taunts' or 'poses' or 'dances' or whatever those little user selectable animations are called.

 

Now if you haven't played Fortnite:Battle Royale (and everyone should really try it at least once- its original devs were the utterly brilliant People-can-Fly studio that produced the insanely wonderful Painkiller), here's how it runs...

 

1) matchmaking lobby, where you select game mode, and if 'team' mode can try to find online mates to join a server with you.

 

2) Once accepted on a server, you and the other players begin in the 'lobby' island, and spend the countdown to the game proper starting by doing whatever you want. This idea dates back to the days of Quake etc, and involves all sorts of silly, pointless, and non-game relevant 'griefing'. Some use the emoji wheel (well the games equivalent) to select poses and dances.

 

3) then the game proper starts.

 

So, what's my point. Well I've played 99-1 Fortnite a fair amount, and the gameplay is always "kill them before they kill you". And no-one cries about that. But once you die, you have the option to follow the game thru the gameplay of your killer, and then the killer of your killer- all the way thru to last 'man' standing.

 

This means as soon as you die, your killer can use the 'emoji wheel' (diff mechanism in Fortnite) to "dance on your grave". And do you know what? In all the time I played, only ONE person did this to me. And I can honestly say it pissed me off no end.

 

For sure the EVOLVED part of my brain knew there was no reason to draw a conclusion of personal insult. There were all sorts of reasons he/she did this, including a very poor/nervous player dancing in disbelief that they actually got a kill. And what would be wrong with that? Absolutely NOTHING. But the ancient primitive part of my brain hated it.

 

Beth has the EMOJI WHEEL for the most cowardly of reasons. The entirley false belief that cartoon, childish 'communication' will defuse 'griefing'. Beth is saying to you innocent true fans of Skyrim and Fallout 4 "yeah, we know you'll turn off direct Human speech in Fallout:76, because the first time you hear vileness coming from a real person, you'll never want to play again." So here's an awful, immersion breaking childish pile of Emoji rubbish in its place, cos that could never be used for griefing, could it.

 

Did any of you ask for Fallout 4 to be turned into The Sims? Funny, I'd imagine everyone here thinks of the two games as representing completely different genres.

 

Remember, the so-called 'fan demands' for 'online' were 100% a request for limited CO-OP in fallout/skyrim where a player could play the SAME game as single player, but with a girlfriend/boyfriend/parent/child/friend or two in the same world.

 

But now we see a lot of LYING shills telling us that because of the request for co-op online, we should be grateful that Beth answered or wishes (which they clearly did NOT) with a Rust-clone stripped of any meaningful story or mission set. The very OPPOSITE of what fans were asking for, in fact.

 

I see not one element in Fallout:Rust that attempts to meet the requests of true fans of Fallout 4 and Skyrim- not one. I see Todd cramming in a whole bunch of new mechanisms that are stolen from a ton of other (once) fashionable online games without the first consideration of the opinions of the fans of Fallout3/4.

 

For heaven's sake Todd has even totally trashed the controversial settlements building (taken to amazing heights by the Sim Settlements mod), and replaced it with a CAMP mechanism which isn't the same thing at all. In fact the CAMP mechanism of Fallout:76 is far closer to the camping mods introduced for Skyrim. Which might be fine if the CAMPS in fallout:76 had the believable immersion quality of the camps in Skyrim mods (clue- they don't).

 

No, the CAMP system in Fallout:76 is a monetising mechanism to sell new (all destructable with fun breaking animation) camp items that make players who haven't paid for those items jealous, so they go to the Creation Club and buy their own new camp items (blueprints).

 

And guess what, the monetised camp item nonsense matches THE SIMS exactly- where you PAY and PAY and PAY after you purchase the base game of The Sims to access new furniture etc for your game.

 

Fallout:76 exists NOT cos Todd thought about the future of Fallout, but cos Todd looked at the post-launch monetisation of game like The Sims, and drooled and drooled and drooled. That is why Fallout:76 has an emoji wheel.

 

Want the sims, go play the sims. Want rust, go play rust. Want online you and mates vs zombies, go play dying Light 2. Want Fallout 5 or Skyrim 2, go play Metro or Cyberpunk 2077 (or carry on modding Fallout 4 and Skyrim).

 

Want to help Todd finish off single player RPG games, and help Beth ruin gaming with monetisation and addiction mechanisms, then go pre-order Fallout:76.