Fallout 1 and 2 are awesome games, don't get me wrong, but some of the quest design in FNV is nearly unparalleled. Beyond the Beef being one example. Just wish the gunplay was less clunky and the engine less shit.
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Decline Fallout 2 is a theme park
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For example, iPhone 5S and 5C are homophones.
DragoFireheart
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That wouldn't be fair to Fallout 1. NV would be the greatest game of all time if that happened.
SuicideBunny
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would still need to be turn based and less crashy for that.
DragoFireheart
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Wasn't he implying turn-based with that isometric comment?
Yes, of course. I was actually implying using the Fallout I and II engine.
The Brazilian Slaughter
Arcane
What do you take him for, somesort of unwashed, bad-smelling RTwP consoletard lover?
DragoFireheart
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Ugh, RTwP. I expect better of Irenaeus.
Thankfully, he came to the rescue.
Alex
Arcane
New Vegas has some very nice ideas, but its weaknesses actually build on each other. For instance, it has a more "sandbox" approach than the original fallouts, with huge maps you can explore, with several opportunities for scavenging and exploring. But that side of the game is completely cut off from the way the main faction quests are structured. The faction quests form a nice branching path, with several optional stuff feeding back into it, but you never get to do things your way. You always need to follow how the quests are structured. Even if you decide to side with no one but yourself, it still amounts to doing the quests given to you by the Yes Man. I mean, having to follow these quests paths is annoying normally, and the tight way you are bound to doing what someone tells you already exacerbates the problem. But when you add that to what is supposed to be a free roaming game, it makes the issue even more visible.
The exploration, element is nice, but it never goes anywhere. I mean, maybe it is silly for a supermarket to still have food and pills hundreds of years after the war, but it is far more silly that those things are completely unnecessary and pretty much useless. The awful inventory interface makes using items a chore, but even worse is the fact that crafting and using items is hardly really important. The faction system in the game tries to connect back to the exploration system, and I remember it mentioned how nice it was that two enemy faction members might spawn hunting down the NPC but end fighting each other instead. That is a nice feature, that is something I would like to see more, but these random encounters are simply the most basic stuff someone could come up with. Fallout 1's encounters may have been completely scripted, they may have never done anything as unexpected, for its programmers, as that, but at least they were interesting!
Anyway, I am just commenting cause I think F:NV does try some really interesting stuff, but it unfortunately falls way short of making that stuff really work.
The exploration, element is nice, but it never goes anywhere. I mean, maybe it is silly for a supermarket to still have food and pills hundreds of years after the war, but it is far more silly that those things are completely unnecessary and pretty much useless. The awful inventory interface makes using items a chore, but even worse is the fact that crafting and using items is hardly really important. The faction system in the game tries to connect back to the exploration system, and I remember it mentioned how nice it was that two enemy faction members might spawn hunting down the NPC but end fighting each other instead. That is a nice feature, that is something I would like to see more, but these random encounters are simply the most basic stuff someone could come up with. Fallout 1's encounters may have been completely scripted, they may have never done anything as unexpected, for its programmers, as that, but at least they were interesting!
Anyway, I am just commenting cause I think F:NV does try some really interesting stuff, but it unfortunately falls way short of making that stuff really work.
FeelTheRads
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Drogo just had a head explosion.
Alex
Arcane
Hey man, if you disagree with something or if something I said isn't clear, feel free to point it out and we can discuss it. As it is, I have no idea what your issue with my post might be.
I'm confused because your criticisms seem to apply to nearly every RPG with quests.
Chaotic_Heretic
Arcane
I completely agree with bro Alex.
SCO
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intelligent rpgs hide quest hooks behind more than npcs (ask me about
I think his point is that the problem isn't as noticeable in non-sandbox games. When you add on the
What about it?
SCO
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Conversation/locations were enabled by having items on the inventory, having the right stats, using items, having the right knowledge ... only thing missing is obligatory environmental puzzles and inventory ones. It shied away of making the payers have to use the 'talk with the dead' manually for instance. There are 'quests' in arcanum that have no single npc conversation involved too, or which you try to initiate (like the ogre island situation).
Even Ja2 had simple puzzle quests of a sort (giving items, punching the airport dude).
So you see, his problem with the thematic conflict makes sense. It really didn't have to be like that.
Roleplaying games, which are supposed to be about imagination, should reward it.
Even Ja2 had simple puzzle quests of a sort (giving items, punching the airport dude).
So you see, his problem with the thematic conflict makes sense. It really didn't have to be like that.
Roleplaying games, which are supposed to be about imagination, should reward it.
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I recognize the greatness of Fallout: New Vegas, I mean 3.
But there's no way in hell you can say that it is better than Fallout 1.
But there's no way in hell you can say that it is better than Fallout 1.
Alex
Arcane
Sure, to some extent anyway. The issue is that some elements in Fallout New Vegas make the cons of quests even more pronounced. I think that perhaps a comparison with P&P might make my point clear:
Now, specially after the 90s, CRPGs frequently tried to build more interesting and interactive stories by having more varied, tight linked and interesting quests. Fallout did it to an extent, as did Planescape, Ultima 7 and even Baldur's Gate to some extent. This kind of thing more or less followed how many GMs dealt with P&P games. Make an adventure, create some places where the PCs can make some choices, etc. I think New Vegas' idea was to turn the dials of quest use to 10, for so to say. And it actually managed to make a pretty tight game with it. The way a whole lot of stuff in the game world end up being somewhat important for the main quest is awesome.
But the issue here is that the quests are so numerous and interlacing, that it kind of rubs on your face how artificial it is. There is so much story going on in the game, that it kind of makes it really clear that you aren't part of the story, just a guy who sometimes choose whether it goes one way or the other. It is a bit like an episodic P&P RPG where the PCs never can really decide anything, only choose between two or three options. The kind of game where if you end up in prison, you wait for the GM to give you an opportunity to escape rather than coming up with an escape plan.
Now, while the quests have a lot less choice there, Planescape could suffer from similar problems, but it manage to make the issue a lot less prominent by having a whole lot of interesting exploration. F:NV has a lot of exploration, but it hardly connects with the quests. In fact, the whole of the exploration feel separated. In torment the stuff and random quests you can find kind of add together thanks to the strange feel of the setting. In F:NV, you sometimes find a quest or another that can add to the main quests, like conflicts between the legion and the NCR. But most of the time, all you find is a bunch of crap items that has almost no real bearing to the game, and the absolute freedom you have while exploring makes it even more clear how confined you are to interact with the story.
At any rate, I think a big part of this is because they inherited the engine from Bethesda, and part is because they were trying something a bit different, and thus it can only be understood in hindsight. New Vegas does some very interesting things itself, but it also makes it clear that some stuff that has been left behind in RPGs, not modern RPGs, but even the classic ones from the 90s, is sorely needed.
DragoFireheart
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Clarification.
We need more salt around here.
DragoFireheart
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hoverdog
dog that is hovering, Wastelands Interactive
Why isn't DragoFireFart not dumbfucked yet anyway?
DragoFireheart
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Because DU knows it makes you butthurt that I'm not.
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