Fallout Underwhelmed by Fallout :(

[pippin]

I'm not sure why people treat Luck as a dump stat. With Luck maxed out, you can choose the 'Sniper' perk to gain a 95% critical hit chance. Add the 'Better Criticals' perk, and you've got a juggernaut of destruction. I've found that Endurance and (to a lesser degree) Strength make good dump stats. I love charisma, because every two points allows you to have an extra companion, which is essentially double damage and more than double hit points.

Not in Fallout 1.

There's no upside in hiring companions in FO1, period. I wonder why they decided to include them. Tycho is 100% bro, but the rest? Ian is comic relief, and the Followers girl is too weak when you're one centimeter away from being a space marine.
FO2 is a different story, though. And in New Vegas you could exploit the casinos. Still, Luck and similar esoteric stats are a pet peeve of mine when it comes to rpgs.

 

[Clockwork Knight]

There's no upside in hiring companions in FO1, period. I wonder why they decided to include them.

Because "why not?". From one of the FO Bibles:

A close second in favorites was the party members. The engine didn't really
have support for party members, and the dev team didn't have much of an
incentive to add them (nor did anyone think that it was feasible). I wrote up
a script for Ian, THEN I showed it to Tim Cain. Eight million bugs later, we
had "functional" party members who would shoot you in the back.

Followers in FO3 were a last minute addition too but they managed to do it in an even clunkier way, messing up the ending scene.

 

[pippin]

FO3's followers are weird as well, but I think they can actually die even in normal difficulty. In New Vegas, followers only die in Hardcore mode.

 

[tuluse]

Ian is actually useful if your MC is not so good at combat early in the game. You just have to think as much about positioning wrt Ian as your enemies.

 

[shihonage]

There's no upside in hiring companions in FO1, period. I wonder why they decided to include them. Tycho is 100% bro, but the rest? Ian is comic relief, and the Followers girl is too weak when you're one centimeter away from being a space marine.
FO2 is a different story, though. And in New Vegas you could exploit the casinos. Still, Luck and similar esoteric stats are a pet peeve of mine when it comes to rpgs.

FO1 companions were an afterthought technical addition, but their design fit in with the rest of the game, which is likely why they were left in.

Fallout was a player-centric CRPG with no pretense toward party management, and the companions were the extra wheels that eventually get taken off the bike. Their obsolescence was planned, and losing them was beneficial to the overall feeling of the gameworld.

Fallout 2 went more toward the party management route. Personally not my type of gameplay in a CRPG. It dilutes the player<->character link.

 

[Surf Solar]

I'm not sure why people treat Luck as a dump stat. With Luck maxed out, you can choose the 'Sniper' perk to gain a 95% critical hit chance. Add the 'Better Criticals' perk, and you've got a juggernaut of destruction. I've found that Endurance and (to a lesser degree) Strength make good dump stats. I love charisma, because every two points allows you to have an extra companion, which is essentially double damage and more than double hit points.

Enjoy trying to get your companions through the Forcefields in Mariposa, or the Super Mutant Patrol Encounters Minigunning them down in the first turn.

 

[undecaf]

Fallout 2 went more toward the party management route. Personally not my type of gameplay in a CRPG. It dilutes the player<->character link.

Agreed.

I kinda liked the subtle party "management" in Fallout 2, though, because it was presented more as a sort of personal plea from the PC through dialog (and it didn't always work exactly as planned).

 

[Ninjerk]

I'm not sure why people treat Luck as a dump stat. With Luck maxed out, you can choose the 'Sniper' perk to gain a 95% critical hit chance. Add the 'Better Criticals' perk, and you've got a juggernaut of destruction. I've found that Endurance and (to a lesser degree) Strength make good dump stats. I love charisma, because every two points allows you to have an extra companion, which is essentially double damage and more than double hit points.

Enjoy trying to get your companions through the Forcefields in Mariposa, or the Super Mutant Patrol Encounters Minigunning them down in the first turn.

I just lost everyone in a caravan run to the Brotherhood.

 

[Clockwork Knight]

I kinda liked the subtle party "management" in Fallout 2, though, because it was presented more as a sort of personal plea from the PC through dialog (and it didn't always work exactly as planned).

I liked how "please try not hitting me" is an option. Imagine how safe you'd feel near those people.

"OKAY I WILL DO MY BEST TO NOT SHOOT YOU IN THE BACK UNLESS I NEED TO"

 

[Surf Solar]

I kinda liked the subtle party "management" in Fallout 2, though, because it was presented more as a sort of personal plea from the PC through dialog (and it didn't always work exactly as planned).

I liked how "please try not hitting me" is an option. Imagine how safe you'd feel near those people.

"OKAY I WILL DO MY BEST TO NOT SHOOT YOU IN THE BACK UNLESS I NEED TO"

In a world where there is no cover at all and firefights are spent standing still on certain points, it surely can happen with stray SMG bullet though

 

[undecaf]

I kinda liked the subtle party "management" in Fallout 2, though, because it was presented more as a sort of personal plea from the PC through dialog (and it didn't always work exactly as planned).

I liked how "please try not hitting me" is an option. Imagine how safe you'd feel near those people.

"OKAY I WILL DO MY BEST TO NOT SHOOT YOU IN THE BACK UNLESS I NEED TO"

Yeah.

Sometimes it almost appeared as if they made an actual effort to not hit me. But then, they didn't seem to give a shit about each other. Cassidy wisely moved from behind me only to blast Vic in several little pieces with his Jackhammer... and not hitting the raiders at all.

 

[Clockwork Knight]

There's this bug where Myron will sometimes turn into a red stain on the floor during combat if Marcus is in the party. They never patched that, to my knowledge.

 

[Seaking4]

I'm not sure why people treat Luck as a dump stat. With Luck maxed out, you can choose the 'Sniper' perk to gain a 95% critical hit chance. Add the 'Better Criticals' perk, and you've got a juggernaut of destruction. I've found that Endurance and (to a lesser degree) Strength make good dump stats. I love charisma, because every two points allows you to have an extra companion, which is essentially double damage and more than double hit points.

Enjoy trying to get your companions through the Forcefields in Mariposa, or the Super Mutant Patrol Encounters Minigunning them down in the first turn.

First time I played Fallout that's where I lost my people. I've never cared about a companion living or dying in a Fallout game since. Makes it more fun that way.

 

[Surf Solar]

I didnt care for Katja, Ian or Tycho either. But the doggy man. The doggy...

 

[Zombra]

There's no upside in hiring companions in FO1, period. I wonder why they decided to include them.

That's a rather absolute statement, and ... well ... wrong. My playthrough last month was basically me hiding behind my followers and plinking away with a 10mm for 80% of the game.

And reloading a lot from them shooting each other.

 

[Absalom]

I don't think I've ever recruited Katja, ever. And by the time you get the Sniper perk, the game is over and your stats really don't matter.

 

[Surf Solar]

TBH you dont even need the sniper perk. 4-5 luck and maybe the "more criticals!" perk together with high respective weapon skill is enough to kill most enemies. Only thing that is really dangerous is the occasional critical hit from a minigun.

 

[Sykar]

There's this bug where Myron will sometimes turn into a red stain on the floor during combat if Marcus is in the party. They never patched that, to my knowledge.

Or maybe Myron turns into his true self: a bloody shit stain.

 

[nihil]

Fallout is great, but it should probably be played before Fallout 2, which improves a lot on the tech, scope and mechanics. When it comes to atmosphere, themes and locations, though, I think the original Fallout is the better game.

The thing I probably like most about Fallout is the exploration aspect. Nothing is thrown into your face. There's not much giving away what parts are important and what parts are not. You can go anywhere and you often need to dig a little to find stuff. What follows is a feeling that there is always one more thing to discover, if you dig deep enough. It wouldn't work nearly as well without the excellent atmosphere, though.

Edit: And Shady Sands is not bad for a tutorial area. It's not overwhelming, and the quiet little settlement theme works well as an introduction to the outside world, in my opinion. You get to poke around a little, hear about other cool places, hopefully getting intrigued to explore the world.

 

[belowmecoldhands]

Fallout is great, but it should probably be played before Fallout 2, which improves a lot on the tech, scope and mechanics. When it comes to atmosphere, themes and locations, though, I think the original Fallout is the better game.

The thing I probably like most about Fallout is the exploration aspect. Nothing is thrown into your face. There's not much giving away what parts are important and what parts are not. You can go anywhere and you often need to dig a little to find stuff. What follows is a feeling that there is always one more thing to discover, if you dig deep enough. It wouldn't work nearly as well without the excellent atmosphere, though.

Edit: And Shady Sands is not bad for a tutorial area. It's not overwhelming, and the quiet little settlement theme works well as an introduction to the outside world, in my opinion. You get to poke around a little, hear about other cool places, hopefully getting intrigued to explore the world.

There's this attitude amongst gamers that old games are always worse and new games always improve on the old ones. This attitude has always irritated me because I've often enjoyed old games and hated some newer ones. I think there're secrets buried in the past and everytime I play an old game I'm like a treasure hunter. And yet I played Fallout recently and discovered some problems with it. I relayed them here in a thread. The reception was not friendly. And when I think back on all that, it kind of makes me grin because the things that REALLY bothered me about Fallout were relatively few. Fallout 2 apparently addressed some of my complaints: more hirelings, better party management, more content. I haven't played Fallout 2 past the village you start at, but I'm led to believe it's better. And yet I have the sinking feeling it changed other things which I may have liked in Fallout 1. How many changes in newer games are stealth and almost nobody notices either because most people favor it or because it's such asmall change? I've been bitten in the past by "small" changes or by changes which might sit well with most but not withme.

See, I can understand some things are bad in old games. I've been there and experienced it. One of the things I hate most about old games is they tend to make you save all the time because you die a lot in random or forced ways. Modern gamers call it "fake difficulty". There're so many negative thigns I could bring up and reach agreement with most modern gamers. But asI said already, I don't always agree. That's why I always have a sinking feeling when I play "new" games or sequels to old games. I know in the back of my mind there's probably a change I don't like, if I dig deep enoguh. And it's those changes that get me piss** off.

One area I've disagreed on in the past is first-person versus third. It seems virtually all gamers prefer third person. I tend to like first-person. It's hard to play a MMO - for example - wherein you're severely handicapped if you switch to first-person. And in most these cases first-person isn't nearly as easy to play as it should be BECAUSE it's not given attention. I can - by contrast to new games - start up an old game which was made for first-person and get a much better experience.

What some gamers miss is that gaming is very trendy. It's not just about new games improving on the old. It's more non-linear. It's about new games going in a different direction and improving on different things as much or more than the same things. So what you sometimes get is a throwaway feature in a new game which is actually worse than its older counterpart because it's no longer favored and hence starved. Or you'll get a feature which is barely any better than it was in the past. It's not that modern game makers. can't recreate some of old game features, it's that they don't invest the timeor effort.

More often than not modern games are better, I'll agree with that. Yet the devil is in the details.

 

[nihil]

I'm not sure how what you said relates to the part of my quote that you highlighted. My point was Fallout 2 improves on Fallout in terms of tech and features, so playing Fallout afterwards may be a bit frustrating because you're used to the conveniences and more polished nature (and bigger size) of Fallout 2. I'm quite aware that newer isn't always better. In fact, I said that I prefer Fallout despite the objectively better parts in Fallout 2.

 

[Gnidrologist]

He's probably confusing 2 with 3.

 

[DawnrazorDCLXVI]

I suppose I'll gather hate, not a bad game, didn't snag me either.

 

[MasPingon]

That's your problem.

 

[likaq]

More quality content, not more fetch quests (and yes it has more of those as well and as usual they're shit and add nothing to the game). New Reno alone probably eclipses the entirety of Fallout 1 when it comes to C&C, then there's Bishop-NCR-VC power struggle, Gecko-VC powerplant problem, an interesting conflict between Mutants and human purists in Broken Hills (which becomes more morally ambiguous when you dig deeper), Navarro and multiple ways to get Vertibird plans etc. there's also (as someone already said) overall more connection between different settlements/towns, one nice example is Jet antidote (that can be made in different ways depending on skill checks and whether you use Myron).

Fallout 2 goes full derp in regards to the setting but there's plenty of great stuff in it.

While i agree with most of this post, bolded part is a not true.

This idea that new reno is c&c heavy place, needs to die on codex ASAP.
We talking about place where you can:

1. work for all 4 families at the same time. Sounds like oblivion, no?. So much for awesome C&C in new reno.
2. do every single quest for each family as long as you not return for reward after last quest in each family questline.
3. became a made man of all 4 families at the same time, as pointed in f2 walkthrought:

"It's possible to be listed on your character sheet as Made Man for all four families at the same time, as outlined by Sébastien Caisse: Once you've become a Made Man for a specific family, this family won't attack you any more. First you need to do all the possible quests for them, and not collect the final reward, and not assassinate Salvatore (until you're a Made Man for him). The trick is basically to sneak past everyone and collect your final reward by talking to the bosses before they engage in combat." Ryan P. Fialcowitz and Joshua Jansen then looked into the particulars and found there is another constraint: you must become Made Man for Bishop first, since Bishop's dialogue will change for the worse if you're already with some other family. This means that if you want all four you must end up allied with either the Wrights or the Mordinos. You will need to use a combination of Sneaking and running in combat mode to reach all bosses - saving a lot is recommended. Getting through the door to Salvatore is one of the tricky parts, but John Gaw points out: "If you talk to Mason while on good grounds, you can go into attack mode later and open the door with no problem whatsoever." Two more things should be noted. Firstly, despite what your character sheet says you will only be Made Man for one family at a time as far as the game is concerned, so there's no real reward for doing all this. Secondly, attacking the family you joined last will remove all Made Man labels from your list of reputations, but attacking any other family, including one you joined earlier, has no effect on them.