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

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

[ShadowRangerRIT]

More seriously, Fallout was one of the truly great RPGs, particularly in the level of freedom it afforded you. I spent the better part of a summer break playing Fallout 2, over and over, in different permutations. I know I still missed maybe 5% of the missions, including an enormous conspiracy tying New Reno, NCR and Vault City together which my friend found and I only saw the edges of. I'm simultaneously excited about the release, while dreading the possibility that Bethesda screwed it up.

nice graphics

[larry bagina]

it felt like a movie in a couple places. I'm not sure how I feel about the transition to FP (as in first person). Fuck it looks nice.

Re:nice graphics

[Loadmaster]

I'm pretty sure they've stated that you can change it to iso view instead of FP.

An intelligent game is you!

[Bragador]

They mostly want to show the graphics and the combat. They are reviewing that everywhere but I don't care. I'm awaiting this game for its intelligent side. You can actually play it without having to shoot first and ask questions later. This is rare nowadays...

A game that also rewards intelligent actions? Count me in Bethesda! And I hope other games like that will follow.

Re:An intelligent game is you!

[grumbel]

A game that also rewards intelligent actions?

Well, I am currently a few hours into Fallout1 and I am still waiting for that one to reward intelligent actions. So far each and every quest (all three of them or so, quest seem to be incredible sparse in that game) has got me spawned right in front of the enemy with exactly zero choice to an intelligent approach, since the shooting starts instantly. Half the people and creatures I am supposed to fight are not even reachable via the worldmap, instead they exist in magical places that you can only reach when an NPC guides you there (aka. instantly teleports you there and when you exist you get teleported back). Reading through a few FAQs also left me rather puzzles, since most of their "tips" are based on pure try&error and abuse of the save system (save before you steal and if it doesn't work, load and try again..). And given how many times I died just because I tried to talk to the wrong person or asked a wrong question makes it clear that a save before pretty much every action is required for survival.

So far I am not exactly impressed by Fallout1 and quite close to ditching it, since the gameplay just doesn't make a hole lot of sense and the time limit and constant threat of death even on the tiniest misstep of course makes exploration a pain.

Re:An intelligent game is you!

[nomadic]

I've been playing Fallout 1 for the first time as well, and while I like it I have some complaints too. The thing that frustrates me is the character conversation trees didn't make too much sense; I kept getting dialogue options to ask about things I've never heard of. The combat is definitely hard in the beginning until you get decent equipment, and most of the hard fights involve several saves/restores. I won't spoil anything, but I will say the exploration gets a lot better not too far into the game.

Last RPG I played was Planescape so maybe I was just spoiled by that.

There also doesn't seem that much to the game questwise; I think I'm almost done and I haven't really been playing that long.

Re:An intelligent game is you!

[ShadowRangerRIT]

The dialogue trees are generally better in FO2, and the free-form play is on better display there as well.

If you do pick up FO2, make sure to get the unofficial Fallout 2 patch (on top of the 1.02 patch if you didn't buy version 1.02) as it fixes most of the quirks in the second game.

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.

Re:An intelligent game is you!

[Das Modell]

Well, I am currently a few hours into Fallout1 and I am still waiting for that one to reward intelligent actions. So far each and every quest (all three of them or so, quest seem to be incredible sparse in that game) has got me spawned right in front of the enemy with exactly zero choice to an intelligent approach, since the shooting starts instantly.

Not sure what this is about. One of the earliest quests you get is rescuing Tandi from the raiders, and it has the following solutions (taken from here):

* Kill them all and break her out
* Fight Garl in unarmed combat for her
* Buy her from Garl
* Intimidate Garl for her release
* Quietly kill the two guards in back and pick the lock on Tandi's cell.
* This one doesn't work 100% of the time, but if you enter the Raiders area wearing a Leather Jacket, have 10 ST and 10 EN and are male, the raiders will think you are Garl's father who Garl apparently killed to take control of the Khans. You can try and bluff Garl with this ruse and demand Tandi's release.

Half the people and creatures I am supposed to fight are not even reachable via the worldmap, instead they exist in magical places that you can only reach when an NPC guides you there (aka. instantly teleports you there and when you exist you get teleported back).

This isn't the norm.

Reading through a few FAQs also left me rather puzzles, since most of their "tips" are based on pure try&error and abuse of the save system (save before you steal and if it doesn't work, load and try again..).

You don't have to steal things, it's just one option. Obviously getting caught has to have some consequences, so reloading becomes an issue. However, the higher your steal skill is the more likely you are to succeed, and there are also perks that will make it easier to steal. Approaching your target from the side or the rear increases your odds, and the size of the object you're trying to steal is also a factor.

And given how many times I died just because I tried to talk to the wrong person or asked a wrong question makes it clear that a save before pretty much every action is required for survival.

So far I am not exactly impressed by Fallout1 and quite close to ditching it, since the gameplay just doesn't make a hole lot of sense and the time limit and constant threat of death even on the tiniest misstep of course makes exploration a pain.

This is what happens when a game isn't dumbed down for the lowest common denominator. You have to be careful and think about what you're doing.

Re:An intelligent game is you!

[grumbel]

Well, it is ten years old. Games age quickly and you'll never feel the magic we did when it was fresh and new and we'd never played anything quite like it before.

I got addicted to XCom:UFO pretty quickly and that is even older, same with RAMA, Gabriel Knight and quite few other older games that I played recently. I mean, sure, it might never feel like back in the day, but I don't care as long as it still plays well. Graphically I actually like Fallout quite a bit, sure 256 colors make it look a little grainy, but other then that it looks perfectly fine, sound is fine too. Its the gameplay part that gets annoying, since it seems to be based much more around just trying everything till you by chance find something that works, then exploring the world and acting intelligently and well this "How the heck am I supposed to know that?" feeling is just not exactly very motivating.

Re:An intelligent game is you!

[FishWithAHammer]

Ergh. Everyone always says "but Wasteland!" I've played Wasteland. Wasteland is a favorite of mine. And Fallout, sir, is not Wasteland. (Okay, I completely butchered that quote.) Seriously, though--Fallout is a spiritual successor to Wasteland (though far superior in most respects, including the most important one--usability); the developers have said as much. Complaining that they co-opt the background (not the story, the setting) is kind of silly.

I played Wasteland for the first time in 1993 or so. I think Fallout beats it all hollow. And I stand by my previous statement--there was nothing like Fallout before. Nothing with the same sense of panache, humor, and style in a playable package. Not even Wasteland, fun though that was.

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

[Anonymous Coward]

Sorry I don't have an account.. so AC.

Anyhow I watched all the vids and the game looks like a nice bioshock/oblivion cross. Doesn't much look or feel much like fallout. Have to play it to see, but in fallout a fight with 3 equally armed and skilled people was hard... this looks like its just a FPS where you knock out thousands if not millions of enemies for no reason at all.

Also not sure how you can do it all without killing people when its just mini dungeons linked all together (like oblivion) that you have to kill * in etc.. just like oblivion..

In fact it looks like its a dumbed down version of oblivion.

Sigh.. hate seing the best strategy games in the world turn into FPS nightmares. Even if it mkaes for a great FPS game.. its sure as shit no turn based strategy game anymore.
(I would kill 5 children and eat 3 live skunks for one of those).

FPS players

[Caboosian]

I think a lot of FPS players are going to be tricked into buying this ("Wow! Look at those graphics/setting/review score/whatever"), and be very distraught once they learn that it is not an FPS. Sure, there will be those who will like the fact that your shooting skills/power are based upon your stats, but I can see those who are used to guns doing a set amount of damage with a set amount of accuracy being very turned off by this game.

Regardless, I think it looks fantastic, and moves a classic series in the right direction (the isometric viewpoint no longer feels right for this series, IMO). Hopefully it can shake off the "Oblivion with guns" moniker - and properly execute the setting. The new viewpoint/gameplay coupled with the classic Fallout setting/themes (very dark, lots of black humor) looks really promising. There's a lot of ways to mess this one up (especially with regards to the setting!), but it looks like Bethesda did their homework. I guess we'll just have to wait and see.

Re:FPS players

[blackirish]

I think a lot of FPS players are going to be tricked into buying this ("Wow! Look at those graphics/setting/review score/whatever"), and be very distraught once they learn that it is not an FPS. Sure, there will be those who will like the fact that your shooting skills/power are based upon your stats, but I can see those who are used to guns doing a set amount of damage with a set amount of accuracy being very turned off by this game.

You know, I've heard crap like this before and I'm tired of it. FPS players play games from other genres too. We're not all obnoxious 13 year olds who think Counterstrike is the end all, be all. Most of us have longer attention spans than you give us credit for. We can read where it says 'RPG' on the fucking game box and comprehend that it isn't going to be like CS or Quake. Stop looking down at FPS players like we're retards just because we like twitch games. Very few FPS players are going to be "tricked" into buying Fallout 3.

Personally, I think the game looks great and I hope that it plays great. The post-apocalyptic wasteland looks awesome and I think they captured most of the "feel" of Fallout. I loved Fallout 1 & 2, and while I know this game won't be like those, I'm optimistic that this game could be just as excellent. I see a lot of complaints about the new AP system and the character modeling/animations, but we won't know how much those affect the fun and immersion without actually playing the game. After reading a few message boards, I feel like I'm one of the few Fallout fans that are willing to give Bethesda a chance.

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 FPS with stats is still an FPS

[CronoCloud]

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).

Complex 3D worlds, especially those with lots of scenery, are easy to get turned around/lost in. It was either have a compass with objectives and fast travel or have players constantly complaining about getting lost trying to find tiny little dungeon entrances. I'm glad the feature is there, because I hated getting turned around/lost in games without maps/waypoints, some people might consider map making with graph paper fun, I consider it drudgery.

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?).

Well if an NPC tells you they think the Bandits have a secret base somewhere NW of town and if you head NW of town and find bandits and a cave/fort, wouldn't you think that was the secret base?

Because I already have a "103-tab interface" sitting in front of me (called a keyboard),

Yes, but you cannot use them all effectively. If your left hand is on WASD and your right on your mouse, can you hit "\" or "=" without taking moving a hand from either position? Can you easily walk slowly, in a diagonal direction, and then jump, or do you run out of fingers or find the position required cramps your hand.

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.

Perhaps you should play it with a dual analog controller, as the Nine Divines intended. The keyboard is optimized for text entry, not as a game controller. The keyboard sucked as an action game controller back in '83 and it sucks now. Sure, they had to put keyboard controls in because all those cheap-ass PC gamers (meaning not just DOS/Windows, but Apple, Commodore, and Atari as well) without joysticks, but it's not optimal.

Oh, if it's a "greatest hit" it must be good.

On the PS3, a game has to be on the shelves for 11 months and sell 500000 copies to be considered for Greatest Hit status. Now that's not a 100% guarantee of a non-sucky game, but in my personal experience, PS1/PS2/PS3 games that reach Greatest Hits tend to be pretty good games.

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.

If they didn't scale the enemies, it wouldn't be so free-form. And then you'd hear other people complaining about the linearity. "Even if you can walk there, You can't truly go to the fortress of brouhaha right away because there's high level Daedra there" They made a valid design decision to make the game as free-form and non-linear as possible: Any quest at any time. That said, perhaps a bit more testing was in order.

The fact they used the same 5 voices for all

Obvious fallacy in your argument

[Rui del-Negro]

It's not technically possible to dumb down Oblivion.

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.

[cyborch]

If you're thinking about buying extra hardware for a game, why don't you get a consol in stead and keep windows off your computer? You might even go for the slightly less evil PS3 and keep microsoft out of your house that way ;)

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.

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

[tprime]

why don't you get a consol in stead and keep windows off your computer? You might even go for the slightly less evil PS3 and keep microsoft out of your house that way ;)
Did I miss a memo, I thought that Sony was more evil on slashdot this week instead of microsoft? I can never keep up anymore now that Apple and Google have joined the evil fray.