Nice read @ original post! I'd like to add my critics about the game here. <Minor spoiler included.>
- The engine would need some major upgrade for the upcoming games. Moving around is a bit awkward, I'm still missing fat people (or hell, some crippled ones!). Weather was missed badly! Some acid rains or wind-storms to make life harder and force you to hide for a while. Yeah, too bad that with this engine it would still rain on you if you are under shelter.
- I reached level 20 too fast, too easy. There are some totally useless perks, and some utterly broken (Finesse, Better Criticals, Sniper combo -> I got bored after a while aiming at heads and watching them pop like an acne). Don't bother with picking skills, you really end up topped at almost all of them (the ones that count). And while fast travelling: why, oh why did they take Outdoors out?! The guy shouldn't avoid every ambushes. Bottomline of this: More Skills, Please! Not all of them might be uber-kickass but they might give some spice to the otherwise tasteless character.
- The repair system is lame. The devs could have really found some use for all that junk out there... Imagine how great it would be to set up own missions like going out scavenging for rare parts to fix your sniper scope. Anyway, weapons shouldn't degrade fast as they do and you definately shoudn't be able to take apart and add parts to your AK while three ghouls are charging at you. Also it would be more realistic if a visual inventory would appear to backup the weight allowance to avoid packing up five armors and nine guns and still jump around with ease.
- Music could have been better, I can recall one track that got a cool industrial tone and a sinister impression, yet I was disgusted to hear some Oblivionish tunes. Apart from these and the main menu score is there any other? Even if there are they didn't leave much impression on me. Same with NPC voices. There is some improvement from Oblivion, but encountering that gay "imperial" voiceover again trying to act tough in Fallout 3 is a bit embarassing. Cut all the audio-dialogs if needed and employ more actors for important NPCs, but not this dull **** please! How cool Sulik was for an instance! :thumbs: (I have to mention Harold here, the ghoul with a branch growing on his head from F2, who is the funniest character in this episode.) Has been mentioned, will double it: more people in settlements. That includes more junkies, more *****s, more thugs, etc.
- Quests and static AI: The game could use some factor that would urge the player to set up missions for himself and while the wastes are "neat" and catchy some friendly interaction would've been fun there. To pinpoint out the soulles mechanism of the AI reaction and conversation options, I can mention my character's companion, Fawkes. When the two rushed in to the Citadel no one really gave a **** about him, not even at the final decision. Fawkes got the GECK out of the radiation-polluted room, you know. And maybe might be too much to code, but I checked on Three Dog after Doc James died to see if there's any note from him on the occasion. Guess what. :notrust:
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These all might sound too harsh, but generally I enjoyed the game. The great features are the incredible map, especially DC, the great graphics, some really good quests (Reilly's Rangers, Project Imputity and the march before, and any other that dragged you to some authentic/funny places like Nuka-Cola factory). VATS and its animations are basically great, monsters could scare the crap out of me. The Fallout atmosphere is genuine. But I didn't see the dirty towns coming alive like they did in the previous sequels. Remember the remarks from the *****s and thugs popping up when you walked by them? The authentic music for every major settlement, with occasional gunshots in the background? THAT is the way to make a town come alive! Then the options the player had to chose from when creating a character: diplomat or grunt. It made a difference there. Good game, but if have to pick 2 or 3, I'd say Fallout 2 was and is better.
7 / 10 here.