Gameplay Videos Released For Fallout 3

Today Bethesda released walkthrough videos for their upcoming action RPG, Fallout 3. Joystiq has posted the trailers, which contain gameplay footage from the starting area and the city "Megaton," as well as combat scenarios and other features. One fight showcases the targeting system, which they demonstrate by targeting and then shooting off an enemy's arm. Another shows off the ability to create and use improvised weapons. Also shown are the lock picking and computer hacking mini-games, pickpocketing (or depositing something nasty in somebody's pocket), and general nuclear mayhem. Further detail is available at Shacknews.

Comments

Fallout or Oblivion?

[Anonymous Coward]

To me, that just looked like Oblivion with different skins and maps?

An FPS with stats is still an FPS

[Rui del-Negro]

You mean like RPG players were tricked into buying Oblivion with talk of a "living world" and "revolutionary AI", only to get a first-person combat game with auto-levelling enemies, quests designed for 8 year olds with ADD and an interface designed for the Xbox?

I hope I'm wrong, but I suspect that, with Fallout 3, the FPS gamers "tricked" into buying it will turn out to be the ones that weren't tricked at all.

The demos show a cross between Oblivion and Half Life 2 with a hint of Max Payne. Might be fun to play, and doesn't look bad (then again, there are better-looking games out now), but it's definitely not looking like an RPG (and that has nothing to do with the POV; many milestone RPGs had a 1st person perspective - Dungeon Master, Ultima Underworld, etc.).

Hopefully this time Bethesda will at least have the game properly playtested (Oblivion was only tested internally), and catch the most obvious design / gameplay bugs.

Re:An FPS with stats is still an FPS

[Rui del-Negro]

Could you explain that reasoning?

Let's see, maybe it's the fact that, through 99% of the quests, you have a great big arrow pointing at your next objective, and can basically complete it without even looking at the game world (except to kill monsters).

Maybe it's the fact that even when a quest consists of something like "You must find the secret code to open the door... which is two plus two.", some character standing by the door will tell you "Hi there. The code is four.".

Maybe it's the fact that, each time you complete an intermediate objective, a dialog box pops up with your thoughts ("I have found the door that leads to the secret base." - How the hell do "I" know that? The door looks like any other door! Shouldn't I have to actually explore to see if the secret base is there or not?).

The game doesn't just "hold your hand". It picks you up, carries you around and keeps yelling at you, telling you what's happening in case you suffer from short-term amnesia.

Why have one button for character stats, another button for quest log, another button for inventory when you can have ONE button and use a tabbed interface.

Because I already have a "103-tab interface" sitting in front of me (called a keyboard), I have more than one finger, and would like to be able to get to the screen I want without having to move the cursor, look at several virtually identical icons, and click 4 or 5 times each time I want to change a spell or look at the map.

Hell, the game won't even let you add a description to your saved games or add comments to the map (even Ultima Underworld let you do that, and UU came out in 1992), that's how "anti-keyboard" it is.

I'm playing the PS3 version myself, which is a "Greatest Hit" now, it's a fine game.

Oh, if it's a "greatest hit" it must be good. Glad you're enjoying it. And thanks to the auto-levelling enemies and loot, you can be sure that the experience you're having now will be exactly the same experience you'll have through the next 400 identical quests of the game. Never too easy, never too hard. Why feel vastly superior to an enemy or why feel afraid of a big monster when they can all feel exactly the same? There's nothing quite like improving your magical abilities by 10% and knowing that all the enemies just had their magic resistance increased by 10%, too. The fact they used the same 5 voices for all NPCs also helps give the game a sense of comfortable "unity".

Speaking of which, I've just noticed some of the exact same voices in the Fallout 3 demo, so the transition should be easy.

Don't get me wrong; I think Oblivion looks very nice and is a pretty decent "medieval combat" game. Just as I'm convinced that Fallout 3 will be a decent shooter. But Oblivion is not even close to the believable, consistent, "living" RPG that Bethesda spent years promising, and - I'm convinced - neither will Fallout 3 be.

Oblivion is a 3D Diablo clone with some serious balancing issues and Fallout 3 will be a nice-looking first-person shooter with "stats", (repetitive) dialogues and a bigger world than Half-Life 2, but inferior to HL in every other aspect (because Bethesda simply don't have visionary designers like Origin had, and don't spend three years playtesting and refining like Valve does).

Re:An intelligent game is you!

[LurkerXXX]

Why just because as someone raised his entire life in a fallout shelter, as were generations before him, a safe place to shelter from the horrors of nuclear war and the wasteland it wrought, you don't think his immediate reaction to a nuclear weapon would be "sweet, let's set it off!"?

Uh, yeah, me neither. The storyline sounds pretty bad. It's doesn't seem like it's going to be a good installment of the Fallout serices. Ah well, at least the graphics are pretty.

Blah, blah, blah.

[Runefox]

"Oh, no, it's an FPS, it's not Fallout!"
"Durr, it's a tactical shooter now!"
"This game sucks because it looks pretty!"
"Additional generic fanboy 'they castrated it' comment"

Whatever. First of all, the game hasn't even been released yet. All we have is a gameplay video (which actually shows that you can go third-person, as well), teasers and screenshots to work with. To immediately discount the game because it's first-person (or third-person) instead of isometric is simply moronic, and completely disregards any semblance of intelligence that many people believe the game lacks simply because of its first person perspective. Even more silly is the concept that the graphics look good, and therefore the gameplay must be shit. What the hell? Does it have to be isometric sprite-based 256 colour graphics for it to be a good game? For it to be Fallout?

Stupidity. Wait for the game to be released and make your decisions then - Don't knock it based on a couple-minute long video that shows the very beginning of the game (wherein you have no interaction with anything but a vending machine and whatever you decide to randomly shoot). From what I've seen so far, the level system and the perks system looks more or less identical to the old Fallout games, and the general motif definitely seems in tune. I see nothing that immediately jumps out at me as "non-Fallout", and so until I've seen the game in action, I won't say it is or isn't. But, it certainly does look like Fallout.

Re:Cedega, or a VLA key, here I come.

[TempeTerra]

That's generally good advice but Fallout 3 may be a special case, as Oblivion was, where the PC version has access to a HUGE community mod base that will be unavailable for the console versions. Worth looking in to before making any commitments.

Re:I know this will get me modded off-topic, but..

[CronoCloud]

Considering that Bethesda already had a homerun with Oblivion, wasn't it smart they based Fallout 3 on it. You have to remember, that although the original Fallout was well regarded, it didn't actually sell all that well. Which is why that are no games like that anymore.