I'm getting this thread up early so I can post more later. I picked up my pre-order of Fallout 3 for PC today and I plan to do a synopsis of the gameplay, story, and overall experience. I hope to bring a few fresh observations to the table beyond what so many have already provided in developer videos and previews.
I think I'll call it: "Fallout 3: Diary of a Hat Thief"
What I Got:
I picked up the Collector's Edition of the game. The set includes the game in a standard size DVD case, a small artbook with glossy pages and a satiny screen print cover, a "making of" DVD in a Holovid themed cardboard slip, a Pip Boy bobblehead figurine, and a retro metal lunch box that contains all the previous items.
The game case is your standard black poly-plastic affair with a good sturdy DVD clip not prone to breakage. There is a colour instruction manual included made of very very glossy paper which uses a combination of game screenshots and comical illustrations to outly the game system. About every third page there's some kind of little Pip Boy illustration of him doing something relating to the game play or menus. Organization of the content is decent and most description paragraphs do not exceed 1/3rd the height of a page.
The art book is very nice to the touch and printed at high quality. Magazine-type moire is practically invisible on the printed pages. I look at the art included and am reminded of days spent leafing through RIFTS books just to look at the illustrations. The subject matter is pretty well spread-out from a quick thumb through. There's a little bit of everything in the book from monsters to costumes to weapons.
I'll have to watch the "making of" DVD later but I do like the Fallout 3 referential slip-cover they put it in. Like the Fallout 3 soundtrack the print on the outside looks pre-weathered like it's been sitting in some dusty rusty corner for a few years. It's a nice little touch.
The Pip Boy figurine has most of the weight centered in the body of the figure. So far I haven't found him prone to tippage and the figure looks appropriately goofy and mental. There's been a decent painting job and a very decent sculpting job. There's only one noticeable lump where the top of the mold was, but it's been sanded down. A+
The lunch box is an aluminum affair covered in a shrink wrap type cover of Pip Boy illustrations and the Fallout 3 logo. While not a full sized lunchbox, it is deep enough to hold a decent amount of whatnot if you chose to use it for storage. The clip is your standard spring-loaded metal lunchbox clip and holds the box tightly shut when closed. There is a small plastic handle on two square brackets on the top of the box. Nifty and once again very retro-futuristic themed. Pretty much everything you'd expect in a collector's edition.
"Fallout 3 The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly"
http://forums.sinsofasolarempire.com/?aid=328504
(a detailed review, in a forum post on the GalCiv devs' website -- which by the way looks spectacular; has anyone played it? (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sins_of_a_solar_empire) cuz I was looking at "X3 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/X%C2%B3:_Reunion)" and "X2" and remember how much fun "Elite" was a few decades ago, and how good of a gameply experience Freelancer "should" have been ;) )
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Fallout 3: The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly
Impressions from a player
By Annatar11 Posted October 29, 2008 07:25:38
So, after years of waiting Fallout 3 is finally here. I took half the day off work yesterday and only missed delivery of my box by about 40 minutes which wasn't too bad. I installed it immediately and got to playing (mostly nonstop the rest of the day).
So, how good is it?
The Good
- Atmosphere. Yes, it's no isometric Fallout 2 but I felt like Bethesda got the Fallout "feel" about right. You get to experience a little bit of the life in a vault as part of character creation and when you first step out and your eyes adjust to the light, you're immediately offered a pretty breathtaking vista. On your right, a broken and crumbled bridge with only the supports left intact. To your left, a winding path down the hill and the burned out ruins of some buildings. Looking far, far ahead you can see many more ruins of buildings big and small and you immediately get the feeling of "Yeah, so, this is definitely a wasteland".
- S.P.E.C.I.A.L. The traditional Fallout character progression system is pretty well preserved. It didn't survive in its completeness, but it's very close. You get the same attributes, you earn EXP to level up (no more cheesy Oblivion-like system), distribute skill points among the traditional skills, pick perks. One notable thing is the exclusion of traits. In the old Fallouts, on character creation you could pick two traits that are with you from the beginning. These don't exist in FO3. Also, you get to pick a perk with each level rather than every so often. There are new perks added and a bunch of them have several ranks. Some of the skills also have a bit of a different functionality. For example, in the Fallouts the Doctor/First Aid skills increased your chances to self heal. Self healing like that isn't possible in FO3, and the Medicine skill (combined Doctor/First Aid) increases the amount of hp you gain from stim packs, for example.
- Voice acting. When the first Megaton trailer hit, there was a lot of complaining about recycled voice actors. So far, most of the characters I encountered could be talked to with various dialogue trees and they've all had unique voices. In some games, it's pretty easy to tell that the voice overs aren't very enthusiastic. Not so in Fallout 3. You hear patronizing voices, condescending, hateful.. Hell, one girl you meet actually has a pretty believable emo tone when she talks about cutting her wrists in the moonlight surrounded by candles wearing her pretty black dress (long story..). These characters feel like they have actual personality. One rather excited store owner you meet can best be described as "bouncy". She always talks in a very upbeat, cheery voice that really gives you a feel for her personality. Now, it has been ages since I played Oblivion so I can't honestly say how many actors were re-used, but just playing FO3 I would say the voice acting in general is superb.
- Combat (VATS). So, VATS is the new combat system and it's pretty damned ingenious. It basically tries to bridge real time and the turn based combat of the previous games. When you hit the VATS key, action pauses. You can scroll through available targets and select body parts to shoot. You then queue attacks (each gun uses some number of action points to shoot in VATS, and you can only queue as much as you have APs for) and execute. You can queue however you like. You can do 3 shots to one target's head, or a shot to each of 3 targets' heads. The awesome part of VATS is that how you see the enemy counts. For example, a super mutant with a minigun holds it in his right arm, with the left supporting. When you're staring at one, the left arm is in front of the body and covers up the right arm - so in VATS, you have a much higher chance to hit the left arm than the right. Another example is those crab things we saw from the videos. They have a "face" protected by the shell. Sometimes, they lower their head so their outer shell blocks your vision of the face which means you can't even target the face in VATS. It's a great system, and once you start using it it's hard to stop. You can shoot in real-time without it of course, but VATS is just too much fun.
- Humor. Yep, there's plenty of it. From the emo girl to the bouncy store owner writing a book on how to survive the "basic" wasteland dangers of finding food, medicine, and not getting blown up by land mines, to an exam questionaire during your stay in the vault that asks such questions as "Your grandmother hands you a gun and tells you to kill another Vault citizen. What do you do?" and having one of the available responses "Ask for a minigun, after all you don't want to miss". A lot of characters have their own little bits of humorous conversation or tones.
- AI. It's a bit early to be definitive here, but so far the AI seems pretty good. It hasn't been doing stupid stuff like getting stuck, and seems to be pretty smart in combat. In general, people tend to drop their weapons when you shoot their arms. Usually that's a good thing since them punching you is better than shooting you. It becomes decidedly less good when a second super mutant decides to pick up a minigun that another mutant dropped, though.
- Item repair. In FO3, your armor and guns wear out. Guns do less damage, armor offers less protection. You can pay various merchants to repair your stuff.. or you can do your own that goes along with your Repair skill. The way it works is you repair by salvaging parts from similar items. If you want to repair your 10mm pistol by yourself, you need to have other 10mm pistols in your inventory. Those get destroyed, and depending on your Repair skill you repair your original a certain amount. It's a pretty neat take on a durability system.
NOTE: I can't comment very much on the story since I just barely scratched the surface, so I'm not including it.
The Bad
- UI. It's obvious Bethesda didn't put any extra effort in the PC version. The UI is suited for consoles, but severely lacking for PCs. In basic functionality, it's similar to Oblivion in that you open your Pip Boy and it has various screens that you can navigate through. Armor, Weapons, Aids (chems, stims), Ammo. Then there's your stats, your SPECIAL screen, skills, maps, quests, notes, so on so forth. The problem is there's no quick access and no hotkeys for anything. If you want to use a stim, you have to open the pip boy and navigate through the list of aids to find the stim and use it. You can't assign weapons to hotkeys, so to switch out a weapon you have to open the Pip Boy each and every time. The Pip Boy itself looks good and inline with what should appear in the setting, but it's a very cumbersome system. You get used to it, but I still wish they at least had hotkeys for weapon switching/stims.
Edit: Per kryo's sage advice to RTFM, there is a way to assign up to 8 hotkeys for items. I missed it on my first quick pass through the manual. Holding down the hotkey and left clicking on the item will bind the item to the hotkey (so, same system as Oblivion).
- Map. It's not that it's "bad" per se, it's just not easily readable. It's basically a single color (depends on what color you chose for your UI in the options) and just tries to differentiate different areas with shades of that color. It fits in with the Pip Boy theme, but doesn't do much for making maps easy to look at. For example, in one area the world map there was a big black gap - which normally gives you the impression that it's not something you can navigate through. That would be the wrong impression, because most of that area turned out to be pretty normal land. Maybe the map just shows elevation and since that area was "below" the horizontal it showed blacked out? Who knows. There's also a local map for the nearby area/building schematics but that's no easier to read. Corridors and pathways don't show very clearly at all. I was in one mine with narrow pathways, but on the map it was impossible to tell what was a path and what was a wall when zoomed out to be able to see the whole layout - and it was not that big of a mine.
The Ugly
- It's obvious also that the PC version didn't get much special loving with textures. It looks good, but the textures could've been made higher resolution to take advantage of more memory generally available for PCs. It doesn't quite stand out like a very sore thumb, but if you go up to a wrecked/burned car, well.. it doesn't look very prettily textured. Other than that, the game really looks great.
All in all, I think it's a great game. It's not perfect, but so far it definitely seems like a worthwhile addition to the Fallout family of games. I'll post more stuff here if I think of anything
LOL DD sometimes you just crack me up with your posts. You went to another game developers website, read the forums and posted a review from that website about another game, then asked about the original game developers latest game in a forum thread that has nothing to do with it at all (even a different genre of game, not even remotely related to Fallout 3).
To answer your question, Sins of a Solar Empire is a very slow game, and a very tactful one. Multiplayer a game could last 5-10 hours. And it isn't an open world running on its own on a dedicated server either. So yes I have played it. Very nice graphics, but too much time to play one single game with others.
Back to Fallout 3.... I tried the first 20mins last night... and enjoyed the character creation sequence very nicely. Instead of just asking you your gender, looks, stats, etc, the game starts you out in a delivery room. Your father asks, over the nurses shoulder, "Lets see what you are..." and a dialog opens up asking you Guy or Girl. Then some more dialog, and the father asks "What should we call you..." and a dialog opens up with Player Name highlighted for you to enter a name.
I don't want to spoil it further, but the next level where you are 1 year old just about had me in tears laughing. You can walk around going Dadda, Gugga, Daddieeeeeeee with a push of a button. FUNNY!
I didn't play much more; have other games to play at the moment; and by chance tried Dead Space after this one... too bad, as I shouldn't have, because Dead Space puts Fallout 3's graphics back on the shelf, with Jersey in hand, saying "Thanks for coming out, keep the Jersey".
I forgot to mention, this one is a direct port from the 360 version. Even picked up my 360 controller that I have plugged into my PC, assigned all the 360 controls to it, and even the menus were asking me to press Y or B or A to complete transactions.
Only reason I mention this is that, on the PC, you can:
A) Get a higher Resolution than 1080P
B) Are ways to get a "full featured demo" to try before you buy
C) The PC version is the first to fully utilize the Games for Windows Live! features, which allows you to get the same downloadable content that the 360 people get, and I think the Achievement system might exist too (can't confirm that)
D) And the BIG ONE! The PC version is $10 cheaper!
traded Fable 2 for fallout 3 today. Just getting started but the intro has been enjoyable.
The stuffy ol' G&M has even got enough of teh hipness to get someone to review it...
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20081028.wgtfallout1028/BNStory/PersonalTech/
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CHAD SAPIEHA
Special to Globetechnology.com
October 28, 2008 at 7:07 PM EST
Reviewed on: Xbox 360
Also available for: PlayStation 3, Windows PC
The Good: Post-apocalyptic wastelands are stunningly realized. Unique FPS combat delivers gruesomely cinematic action sequences. Engrossing character development system.
The Bad: Character models and facial animations don't quite measure up to those of other top-tier games. Time consuming inventory system can be a drag.
The Verdict: Set it in one of the most dauntingly enormous game worlds yet created, this post-atomic holocaust adventure masterfully combines* role-playing smarts with a slick first-person shooter presentation.
The reviewer "Chad" apparently loves the game, and the commenters agree...
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20081028.wgtfallout1028/CommentStory/PersonalTech/
*dammit, FPS combined with RPG? This Guy With Not Enough Free Time On His Hands immediately thought of the original Deus Ex ... combined with a dark sense of humour, oh how can I resist...
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it's about as close to flawless as I've seen in a game of this ilk. Bethesda Softworks has masterfully melded role-playing game intelligence with heart-pounding first-person shooter action, and set it in one of the largest, most immersive and compelling game worlds yet made. Fallout 3 is a strong contender for best game of the year, and will be seen as a benchmark for open-world interactive entertainment for years to come.
:sweet:
Far deeper and complex than fable 2.
Still not very far yet, finding it a bit hard in places.
I bought it on Friday night thru Steam and tried it this weekend.
I tried to make a smart guy who has proficiency with laser weapons... unfortunately all those attributes are useless for what the game seems to demand (so far).
The urge to make a big fighty jerk is tempting.
The Science skill is generally useful right away for hacking computers, I put skill into laser weapons as well, but so far the laser pistol I found isn't that good.
So far so good!
Character Build
As with any big sandbox game like this it's best to choose a simple build and stick with it. I chose to roll a kind of "gentleman thief". Max Charisma (10), high Agility, high Luck, below average (lower than 5) for everything else. My key objectives in the game are: be able to pick locks with a high success rate, have a very high success rate for convincing NPCs to give me things, and steal really nice hats.
Having a good lockpick skill means that early in the game I had access to lockers, locked boxes, and rooms where ammo and other useful items were stored. I didn't have a problem with ammo starting out because I could load up on things I found in the wasteland. Lockpicking has a minigame feel to it, as does computer hacking. The minigame feel isn't bad in my opinion as it's been fairly spread out for me so far.
Experience So Far
I'm enjoying the western style of the updated Fallout system. Gear has weight in pounds and depending on your strength stat you can carry more or less. My STR stat was only 3 when I rolled because it was one of my "dump" stats. I am now level 4 and can carry an amazingly forgiving 180lbs of gear. When I exceed my carrying limit I can no longer run due to being over-encumbered. This is a pretty big pain because the walking speed in Fallout 3 is slow slow slow. The set walking speed feels more natural while exploring buildings and tight corridors but can be agonizing during exploration of the wasteland. Travel time is at least partly cut by the Pip-Boy instant teleport function that allows you to jump to any previously discovered location.
As far as the Pickpocket ability goes it's interesting and tricky to use at times. You must crouch while out of sight to become Hidden, then you must sneak up on the target undetected to be able to rifle through their pockets. As of level 4 I cannot steal equipped items off a character so I'm thinking it may not be possible to swipe the hat off an NPC's head without disabling them first.
My Fancy Stolen Hats count is up to 4 and includes the fedora of an important NPC who crossed the law in Megaton.
And finally, speaking of stealing here's a big one:
Karma's A B1@*#
Your character interactions can give you positive or negative karma depending on how you answer. Agreeing to help without asking for more Caps generally nets you some positive karma. Stealing or extorting for money nets you negative karma. Your total karma affects how people react to you just as much if not more than how you choose to answer character-type questions. If you've been a goody-goody some people will sneer at you and refuse to team up because your style doesn't "mesh" with theirs. If you've gone and accidentally killed someone in plain sight (a huge karma hit) everyone starts chasing you like you were at 5-stars in GTA. And trust me, everyone has a gun they're willing to shoot at you with. Even the kids.
So far my main use of the positive karma I've gained is to couple it with the Speech ability and get people to give me the keys to locked "stashes" of goodies. Sure I could pickpocket the keys, but in some cases it's too hard to get in the Hidden state around NPCs to swipe anything. For now I'm satisfied to be the goody-goody being pursued by angry bounty hunters because it nets me more items and ammo which in turn nets me more hats per hour of game play.
(Edit: added a little something about the minigame feel of lockpicking and replaced "bumped" with "killed", I am not a gangster geeze)
I love the lock picking and hacking mini games, they feel more real than the goofy puzzles or button mashing memory games most games have.
So I was playing a super goody goody, and then I finally broke down and started stealing. Turns out if you have super karma, and you steal it isn't so bad as long as you don't get caught.
It is possible to get your own place to live and it makes things so much easier. If you get the apt in megaton you can sleep when ever you want to heal, get unlimited secure storage, and access to filtered water (+20hp). Of course if you blow up the town you sort of don't have that option.
Quote from: Lazybones on November 04, 2008, 09:29:49 AM
So I was playing a super goody goody, and then I finally broke down and started stealing. Turns out if you have super karma, and you steal it isn't so bad as long as you don't get caught.
It is possible to get your own place to live and it makes things so much easier. If you get the apt in megaton you can sleep when ever you want to heal, get unlimited secure storage, and access to filtered water (+20hp). Of course if you blow up the town you sort of don't have that option.
How'd you get your own place?
Quote from: Lazybones on November 04, 2008, 09:29:49 AM
It is possible to get your own place to live [..] Of course if you blow up the town you sort of don't have that option.
ROFL
This is sounding like an interesting game... Now to just find some time :(
Quote from: Mr. Analog on November 04, 2008, 09:36:26 AM
Quote from: Lazybones on November 04, 2008, 09:29:49 AM
So I was playing a super goody goody, and then I finally broke down and started stealing. Turns out if you have super karma, and you steal it isn't so bad as long as you don't get caught.
It is possible to get your own place to live and it makes things so much easier. If you get the apt in megaton you can sleep when ever you want to heal, get unlimited secure storage, and access to filtered water (+20hp). Of course if you blow up the town you sort of don't have that option.
How'd you get your own place?
Well if you DON'T plan on blowing up the place, you could always defuse the threat of the bomb.
Quote from: Lazybones on November 04, 2008, 09:52:32 AM
Quote from: Mr. Analog on November 04, 2008, 09:36:26 AM
Quote from: Lazybones on November 04, 2008, 09:29:49 AM
So I was playing a super goody goody, and then I finally broke down and started stealing. Turns out if you have super karma, and you steal it isn't so bad as long as you don't get caught.
It is possible to get your own place to live and it makes things so much easier. If you get the apt in megaton you can sleep when ever you want to heal, get unlimited secure storage, and access to filtered water (+20hp). Of course if you blow up the town you sort of don't have that option.
How'd you get your own place?
Well if you DON'T plan on blowing up the place, you could always defuse the threat of the bomb.
Ooooooh cool!
I killed that guy who wanted me to blow it up, and he killed the Sheriff and I took all their stuff lol
Quote from: Mr. Analog on November 04, 2008, 09:55:25 AM
Quote from: Lazybones on November 04, 2008, 09:52:32 AM
Quote from: Mr. Analog on November 04, 2008, 09:36:26 AM
Quote from: Lazybones on November 04, 2008, 09:29:49 AM
So I was playing a super goody goody, and then I finally broke down and started stealing. Turns out if you have super karma, and you steal it isn't so bad as long as you don't get caught.
It is possible to get your own place to live and it makes things so much easier. If you get the apt in megaton you can sleep when ever you want to heal, get unlimited secure storage, and access to filtered water (+20hp). Of course if you blow up the town you sort of don't have that option.
How'd you get your own place?
Well if you DON'T plan on blowing up the place, you could always defuse the threat of the bomb.
Ooooooh cool!
I killed that guy who wanted me to blow it up, and he killed the Sheriff and I took all their stuff lol
I had the same outcome, the reward can still be achieved, the Sheriff doesn't live alone and the quest accounts for his possible death. Go inspect the bomb and you will know what you need to do. PS Activate = Inspect I was scared to inspect the bomb at first.
Quote from: Lazybones on November 04, 2008, 10:51:32 AM
Quote from: Mr. Analog on November 04, 2008, 09:55:25 AM
Quote from: Lazybones on November 04, 2008, 09:52:32 AM
Quote from: Mr. Analog on November 04, 2008, 09:36:26 AM
Quote from: Lazybones on November 04, 2008, 09:29:49 AM
So I was playing a super goody goody, and then I finally broke down and started stealing. Turns out if you have super karma, and you steal it isn't so bad as long as you don't get caught.
It is possible to get your own place to live and it makes things so much easier. If you get the apt in megaton you can sleep when ever you want to heal, get unlimited secure storage, and access to filtered water (+20hp). Of course if you blow up the town you sort of don't have that option.
How'd you get your own place?
Well if you DON'T plan on blowing up the place, you could always defuse the threat of the bomb.
Ooooooh cool!
I killed that guy who wanted me to blow it up, and he killed the Sheriff and I took all their stuff lol
I had the same outcome, the reward can still be achieved, the Sheriff doesn't live alone and the quest accounts for his possible death. Go inspect the bomb and you will know what you need to do. PS Activate = Inspect I was scared to inspect the bomb at first.
Yeah it is impossible to save the sheriff. If you shoot mister bad guy too soon the whole bar including the sheriff will turn on you. And even if you shoot baddie immediately after his first shot there isn't enough time to save him (at least in my attempts).
My suggestion when building a character, don't forget a lot of strength. You won't do too much melee fighting (or at least that seems to me the very hard way to do it), but you will need all that strength to carry the tonnes of crap you start getting after a few missions further away from megaton.
Yes I took lasers too :). It doesn't help too much in the beginning, but the laser rifle is a good outdoor weapon once you get a bit into the game. For me the most important skill is repair. Your weapons and armor start breaking down pretty fast, once you get past simple rats and roaches. Science, barter, speech, lock pick are important and a bit of sneak and medical also help. I have not put much into weapons because I always seem to need the others more, plus you will be switching weapons a lot so it's hard to specialize.
Just pass on for those that want a list of random things that you might not think you need but you do for the schematics I've found so far:
(*spoiler so I set it to white)
lawnmower blade
tin can
motorcycle gas tank
motorcycle hand break
conductor
fire hose nosel
turpentine
A(something soap) i'll double check that
Quantum nuke soda
lunch box
leaf blower
vacuum
pilot light
I'm sure I'm missing 2, so I'll update this next time.
and save these I won't tell you why :)
pre-war book
sugar bombs (sp? (it's a food))
scrap metal
PS. Listening to NPCs can be VERY important, if you missed it when you get the THEM mission there is an important tip about shooing them in the antenna, makes things MUCH easier if there are a few of THEM together to conserve ammo .
Quote from: Mags on November 04, 2008, 11:28:47 AMYeah it is impossible to save the sheriff. If you shoot mister bad guy too soon the whole bar including the sheriff will turn on you. And even if you shoot baddie immediately after his first shot there isn't enough time to save him (at least in my attempts).
It's
almost impossible to save the Sheriff. I managed to save him by:
- Having a very high karma (Good: Defender)
- Standing next to and slightly behind Mister Burke for an 86% hit rate to his head
- Waiting for the animation where he pulls his gun out before targeting him
- Going into VATS and unloading a full clip of 10mm pistol shots into Burke's head (high repetition, low spread for 0 risk of hitting anyone else, so-so damage)
The timing of it is the key. I had gotten two shots in with VATS mode by the time Burke was able to fire off a single shot. It didn't count as attacking a Friendly so the bar didn't turn on me. And then Burke collapsed on to a table in a hilarious position with his butt up in the air. Then I stole his hat and sunglasses, put on my Tunnel Snakes jacket and the sunglasses and went "Eyyyyyy!".
Amazingly I got no additional karma in either direction for saving the sheriff's life. C'est la vie.
I think everyone is liking Lazers in this game even if they kind of stink at first. Easily lootable ash-piles for the win! The only complaint I've heard so far is they're not so great against Radscorpions. Heavily armoured creatures with no weak point like Radscorpions are more prone to damage from melee weapons and fire (so combine the two with a flaming sword to knock 'em out in 2-3 hits).
(Psssst you'll need an Explosives level of 25 just to interact with the bomb in Megaton so get cracking on raising that skill if you haven't already. The water pipes take a Repair level of 30 to fix and you'll want to hoard Scrap Metal like crazy, after fixing the pipes it becomes a huge commodity to sell back and maintain the pipes with or for schematics.)
Oh and as annoying as the Murlocks are, always scout around on the shorelines of the river for wrecked boats. Boats are wonderful sources of ammo and parts. If you head north from Megaton and cross over the river via the land bridge then start following the far shore north you'll eventually find a wrecked speedboat that has a power generator (not the exact name) that'll be required to make the RAILROAD GUN HECK YEAHHHHH.
Man I'm loving how some of the number crunching is a bit like playing a pen & paper RPG.
Quote from: Tonnica on November 04, 2008, 12:45:11 PM
Quote from: Mags on November 04, 2008, 11:28:47 AMYeah it is impossible to save the sheriff. If you shoot mister bad guy too soon the whole bar including the sheriff will turn on you. And even if you shoot baddie immediately after his first shot there isn't enough time to save him (at least in my attempts).
It's almost impossible to save the Sheriff. I managed to save him by:
- Having a very high karma (Good: Defender)
- Standing next to and slightly behind Mister Burke for an 86% hit rate to his head
- Waiting for the animation where he pulls his gun out before targeting him
- Going into VATS and unloading a full clip of 10mm pistol shots into Burke's head (high repetition, low spread for 0 risk of hitting anyone else, so-so damage)
The timing of it is the key. I had gotten two shots in with VATS mode by the time Burke was able to fire off a single shot. It didn't count as attacking a Friendly so the bar didn't turn on me. And then Burke collapsed on to a table in a hilarious position with his butt up in the air. Then I stole his hat and sunglasses, put on my Tunnel Snakes jacket and the sunglasses and went "Eyyyyyy!".
Nice timing
Quote
Oh and as annoying as the Murlocks are, always scout around on the shorelines of the river for wrecked boats. Boats are wonderful sources of ammo and parts. If you head north from Megaton and cross over the river via the land bridge then start following the far shore north you'll eventually find a wrecked speedboat that has a power generator (not the exact name) that'll be required to make the RAILROAD GUN HECK YEAHHHHH.
Man I'm loving how some of the number crunching is a bit like playing a pen & paper RPG.
Haven't found the RAILROAD GUN quest(schematic) yet, where did you find it?
Quote from: Mags on November 04, 2008, 01:02:06 PMHaven't found the RAILROAD GUN quest(schematic) yet, where did you find it?
I don't have it yet but I know where to find it. You can purchase it in the ghoul city of Underworld further into the DC Capital area. Gob the bartender at Muldoon's will give you a hint about the place if you're chummy with him. I think there may be another place to get the schematic but I didn't see any solid details last night.
Capital Wasteland Map powered by google
http://planetfallout.gamespy.com/maps/1/Capital-Wasteland
Might contain spoilers, but hell I am low on ammo again so I am willing to take a look.
Nice find, Lazy! I've been having a bit of a time with the subway system to get to GNR. Looks like my mistake was going too South or too East along the line. I should be able to find it now. :D
Just a note if you miss it like I did: the level cap in the game is 20. I think I'm no more then half way through the game and I've hit the cap so be mindful of that when updating your stats.
I already messed up my character build by spreading out my stats too much.. It is making the game a challenge, that is for sure.
Zero Punctuation: Fallout 3
http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/view/zero-punctuation/420-Fallout-3
"Yah, it's pretty good." LOL
Quote from: Lazybones on November 19, 2008, 03:49:45 PM
Zero Punctuation: Fallout 3
http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/view/zero-punctuation/420-Fallout-3
"Yah, it's pretty good." LOL
Brilliant! Always my favorite part of Big Videogame Releases. Yahtzee's ripping it a new one. ;D
cf. http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/view/zero-punctuation/75-Oblivion (cuz it's the same game, apparently ;) )
as I was reading the comments re. the review, I noticed the Escapist forums are full of people who are "banned", most of them were banned in this thread (http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/18.76964#925061). Some good (clean!) jokes in there.
PS: best part, unquestionably: 3:19-3:41
Make the game easier by just maxing your robber attributes! ;D
For those still playing I'm going to suggest going to the Deathclaw Sanctuary (*You'll want to go for one of your bobbleheads anyways. )
There is a unique gun in there called Vengeance that just rocks (Though feeding the thing is going to be interesting!).
A few things before you go though:
1) You'll probably want to make sure you have a companion at this point to help carry all the stuff you find in and around the cave. (There are several Traveling Merchants inside full stocked ready to loot, and don't miss the footlocker at the entrance.)
2) Deathclaws are pretty much the toughest mob in the game, so go loaded for bear.
3) See above, make sure you have a few levels under your belt or they will have your assticle for lunch. (I.E. I'm max level and the minigun takes a long while to mow them down.)
I must be crazy because I've zipped thru a lot of the content as a goodie-goodie, I'm about 4/5ths through already.
Granted I will go back and play again as a total badass but I'm surprised how fast things go if you just follow the core missions and only do a few side missions.
Holy crap though man, you were right about the books 100 caps per, I had over 20 books stored up in my locker in Megaton!
Quote from: Mags on November 04, 2008, 01:02:06 PMHaven't found the RAILROAD GUN quest(schematic) yet, where did you find it?
I found it in the small outbuilding in the power station closest (northwest) to Minefield. It's on the workbench.
You'll need a pressure cooker, a crutch and a steam assembly (if I remember right).
It's a pretty good rifle, fast reload, accurate. Doesn't do super damage but there is a v2 and a v3 version of the schematic. Finding railroad spikes is a bitch sometimes though...
Quote from: Lazybones on November 19, 2008, 03:49:45 PM
Zero Punctuation: Fallout 3
http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/view/zero-punctuation/420-Fallout-3
"Yah, it's pretty good." LOL
I laughed at the review. :lol:
Yahtzee had a tough time saying anything bad about the game but that's pretty much expected. It's a good, solid game that's been prettied up. His talk of "Oblivion with guns" and hats implies he was lurking on a certain video stream watching someone play a certain leaked Russian copy before he got his hands on it. That amuses me greatly as I was watching the same feed.
I'm up to level 16 and have joined the Regulators. They are a group of vigilante law enforcers that collect the fingers of evil aligned characters as proof you're bringing Six-Gun Justice in the wasteland. They gave me a neat duster and it matches my Shady Hat perfectly. Forget Lucas Simm's cool hat, I look too cool already.
Funny thing I noticed I was talking about with Mr. A. Sometimes you'll kill someone for one reason or another and get positive karma and you're not sure why. Tenpenny didn't seem like
that much of a jerk but the positive karma I got from splitting his noggin tells otherwise. I can't help but think he was telling me a cock-and-bull story about making an offhand comment to get rid of Megaton. Wily old coot wanting the trade route to himself.
The V2 version of the Railroad Gun is the one you can purchase from Underworld. Not sure where the V3 is.
The game IS very short, beatable in 8 hrs I think someone said if you just speed run the main quest. There are however lots of towns and other quests to do. If you listen to the RADIO you get hints to the start points of a bunch of missions.
According to forum posts the main quest is a very small part of the game, and it sort of ends the game if you complete it.
I just joined the Regulators as well, after getting attacked by four bears and a Mr. Gutsy...
Ah well, good stuff!
Y'know, I've yet to go to the underworld yet.
Quote from: Lazybones on December 01, 2008, 10:01:45 AM
The game IS very short, beatable in 8 hrs I think someone said if you just speed run the main quest. There are however lots of towns and other quests to do. If you listen to the RADIO you get hints to the start points of a bunch of missions.
According to forum posts the main quest is a very small part of the game, and it sort of ends the game if you complete it.
The game is as big as you make it I think, there's a whole ton of stuff I haven't done yet.
Quote from: Mr. Analog on December 01, 2008, 10:08:05 AM
The game is as big as you make it I think, there's a whole ton of stuff I haven't done yet.
Yep, from talking I know I have done several quests you have not, and that you are way further in the main quest than I am. I am surprised you didn't do "the Family" quest through as it is one of the ones you pickup in Megaton. Also by doing the survival guide quest in Megaton you get sent out in several directions which causes you do discover some places.
I guess this is the joy and pain of an open ended game.. Now if you don't mind spoilers the xbox forums have guides for the quests, MOST of them have 3 outcomes! Good, Neutral and Evil. When you think about that there could be a lot of replay in this game.
Quote from: Lazybones on December 01, 2008, 10:26:24 AM
Quote from: Mr. Analog on December 01, 2008, 10:08:05 AM
The game is as big as you make it I think, there's a whole ton of stuff I haven't done yet.
Yep, from talking I know I have done several quests you have not, and that you are way further in the main quest than I am. I am surprised you didn't do "the Family" quest through as it is one of the ones you pickup in Megaton. Also by doing the survival guide quest in Megaton you get sent out in several directions which causes you do discover some places.
I guess this is the joy and pain of an open ended game.. Now if you don't mind spoilers the xbox forums have guides for the quests, MOST of them have 3 outcomes! Good, Neutral and Evil. When you think about that there could be a lot of replay in this game.
Actually I finished "the Family" quest pretty quickly once I found 'em :)
But yeah, there are whole chunks of the world I haven't been to yet (like Paradise Falls). Then again I've wandered my way into some fun places.
I want to take on the "superheroes" in the Commons soon, and I also want to retrieve Lincoln's head...
Ok ok, I know this is an old thread but I've been playing F3 again and trying something totally different. I made a super-strong unarmed character and it's the most hilarious thing EVER!
Basically I wanted to see what it was like relying on fists more than guns and man, it is hilarious!
There's nothing quite as satisfying as chasing around Super Mutants who are running away from you because they are scared of a girl with a Power Fist (well, Fisto! to be exact). In fact, it's easier for my character to run headfirst into the minigun fire a Super Mutant Master is frantically blazing away with and then going all "punchy" on it with the power fist, it changes the game quite a bit. What else is interesting is that the damage done is like a cone so even if I get swarmed by wild dogs or ghouls I can still punch my way to awesome with little effort.
It's lead to a drastically different experience for me, in the past I've been mostly sneaky guy with guns not the run head first and start swinging type (though to be fair I think this was more anxiety driven tactics than anything else).
I've also been finding that if I carry the right combination of clothes I can boost my way through a lot of stuff (like Lesko's lab coat from the Those! quest for hacking terminals and a Raider Blast Master helmet for improving explosives when I have to disarm stuff or fire the Fat Man...)
Arrgh, Fallout 3 is one of those games that, for all its warts, I just keep coming back to. CURSE YOU BATHESDA!
If I'm not doing artwork tonight I'll probably be back in the DC Wasteland punching bad guys in the face!
HOLY GOD the most annoying thing in a long time
As some of you know when Fallout 3 first came out through Steam you still had to activate it through Games for Windows Live, a thing that has become obsolete. Unfortunately you had to buy all the DLC through GFWL. Now there is still a client you can download and it's letting me download the DLC through it but I'm HOPING that I can still RUN IT because I get prompted for a Product CD Key which no longer exists in Steam.
I'm not going to buy the GOTY edition just to get the DLC I already paid for!!
Quote from: Mr. Analog on June 19, 2014, 10:00:13 PMI'm not going to buy the GOTY edition just to get the DLC I already paid for!!
... fool me once shame on you ...
I bought the GOTY Edition (it was marked down, yay Steam Summer Sales)
ANYway I got it installed and went to run from the launcher and ... nothing.
I installed on Windows 7 64 bit edition and apparently there are a whole host of problems (which hopefully I don't run into) but to get things WORKING you have to install the Games for Windows client.
As soon as that was there the launcher ran just fine.
THE IRONY OF ALL THIS is if I was a PIRATE I wouldn't have to jump through all these hoops
...all these new games and I'm playing F3 again hee hah hoo
Quote from: Mr. Analog on June 23, 2014, 10:04:37 AM
...I installed on Windows 7 64 bit edition and apparently there are a whole host of problems (which hopefully I don't run into) but to get things WORKING you have to install the Games for Windows client.
As soon as that was there the launcher ran just fine.
THE IRONY OF ALL THIS is if I was a PIRATE I wouldn't have to jump through all these hoops
(http://treasure.diylol.com/uploads/post/image/642984/resized_rational-divorce-kid-meme-generator-dear-santa-i-can-explain-no-good-deed-goes-unpunished-so-i-decided-to-be-very-good-at-being-bad-965604.jpg)
It just exhausts me, here's a thing I love, Bethesda Softworks knows it, and puts the screws on for the PC release.
The other thing that exhausts me is what a cluster @%&# Games for Windows Live was, why was it so hard when they did it for XBox so well?
This is why you will absolutely not get me into the services offered in Windows 8, sure it works great in that ecosystem, but when W8 is in the bin you'll be buying the White Album again.
I look at Steam as an equally evil DRM overlord but they do more things right than wrong (usually).
Damn, it ain't easy NOT bein' a gangsta