Review Edward R Murrow's Dissertation on Fallout 3

[St. Toxic]

The Codex could become a place where anyone can post anything that bags Bethesda, no matter how poorly composed or flat-out inaccurate, and still get nothing but a chorus of head-nodding approval.

As long as it's only Bethesda, I don't see any problem with that.

And where would the fun be in that?

If you could squeeze some measure of fun out of Fallout 3, I'm sure you'd find more than enough in any potential Codex iteration.

 

[Twinfalls]

The Codex could become a place where anyone can post anything that bags Bethesda, no matter how poorly composed or flat-out inaccurate, and still get nothing but a chorus of head-nodding approval.

As long as it's only Bethesda, I don't see any problem with that.

And there you have it, ladies and gentleman! I'd like to preserve the above comment for posterity.

BTW, I liked your post about sandbox games Alex, nicely put.

 

[Vault Dweller]

Just for the record, here are the things VD thought were pointless to reply to...

I thought the exact words were "10% was worth discussing, but it's getting harder and harder to dig it out". So, I appreciate you digging them out and presenting them in an easy to read manner. Needless to say, I'll be more than happy to address them.

Is it so hard to accept that Edward, from his own perspective and for reasons which he's justified, found the schematic weapons useless because of this? Or do you just have to insist he's wrong and you're right? There are even other people in this thread, such as Shannow, who agree with Edward. Is your Fallout 3 experience the only valid one?

Yes, my good sir, it is actually hard to accept. Useless, like I said before, is too strong a word, especially in this context:

"Repair is all about weapon and armor maintenance and building the radically useless schematic weaponry. To be fair however, weapon degradation is completely ridiculous, so it does see a lot of use. But the secondary ability, schematic weaponry is pretty useless. Schematics come into play mid-way through the game due to their nature as mid-level quest rewards, and by the time you can make them, they're mostly obsolete being underpowered, and made useless by the abundance of ammunition for conventional weaponry."

I can practically taste the venom.

He trashed the schematics weapons (mentioning that he isn't sure about the flaming sword doesn't change this fact) completely. Anyone reading it would form an incorrect impression that they are actually useless.

Instead of admitting his, uh, mistake, Edward continues arguing and trying to justify his "opinion", and you are backing him up, trying to file it under "but it's just his opinion, guys! surely he's entitled to his opinion!!!". Not when that opinion is based on nothing but his desire to find faults within the game.

[...] how should someone review a game if not by using their own experiences? What, they have to magically create everyone elses opinion?

If you can't see that Edward trashed the game instead of reviewing and criticizing it, if nothing clicked in your mind when (if) you read that pre-review post, then you're either dishonest or blind.

Considering Edward has attacked the quest design (apparently it's "great" in your mind but not in many others). He said they've improved but still fell far short of the mark. You came at him saying "have they improved or haven't they??!".

I pointed out the inconsistencies:
http://www.rpgcodex.net/phpBB/viewtopic ... 476#636476

He stated that Bethesda didn't get far from the formula and then noted that the game has a trackload of skillchecks and acknowledged that Bethesda "made many advancement in the role-playing department".

Fallout 3 still fails to reach the high water mark. The only justification you have is to exclude every other RPG that did choice and consequence better and limit comparisons to games that had little to no choice and conseqeunce in the first place.

My point was that sandbox games should be compared only to other sandbox games. That's what makes sense. Was Gothic 1, a well liked RPG, loaded with choices & consequences? You choose a camp and then you are railroaded to a very boring "kill 'em all" end. How does Fallout 3 compare to Gothic?

And how would you approach reviewing Sacred 2 or Diablo 3 then? Or Silent Storm? Enlighten me please on Silent Storm's RPG merits, oh wise one.

Saint would compare it to Fallout [...] clearly declare it a "tactical type game". Talk about how a dialogue system would've been nice [...] and compare the combat to Fallout too.

Would compare? Really?

Saint mentioned Fallout twice in the most casual way

"All classes have the same set of skills but vary in Abilities, which act similar to Fallout's Perks."
"For those familiar with turn based games like Fallout, Jagged Alliance 2, and others, you shouldn't have a hard time getting used to the combat system in this game."

There are no comparisons. He doesn't complain that the Abilities aren't as good as the Fallout's Perks, and he doesn't say that Silent Storm offers 10 times more combat options than Fallout. Let's compare it to our boy Eddie's approach:

"I suppose this [skill checks] is a marked improvement for Bethesda, but they're still 10 years behind the curve on this, and I don't rightly see any point in going easy on them."

The main reason why he refused to accept them for what they are is because they aren't as good as Fallout's skill checks. I've never seen Saint doing anything like that in his reviews, and we can all agree that the old man Saint knows more about RPGs and reviewing them than anyone posting in this thread. I'm sure you know better though.

I'm going to assume you're referring to all types of ammo, given that every time Edward said something was rare (based on his experience), you've turned around and said "no it's not". If it's the case that ammo is plentiful, then why use the "top 5" weapon when you could be using numbers 4, 3, 2 or 1 like Edward said? Unless of course, you just like deliberately making combat harder for yourself.

The ammo is everywhere. All types of ammo. However, your guns eat ammo quickly because super mutants, radscorpions, etc take a lot of ammo to kill. Especially in the shooter mode.

For example, I ran into 3 super mutant masters at some point. I had the chinese rifle. Skill 100, the rifle is fully repaired (100%). I went into the VATS mode and shot the first mutant 3 times in the head. The VATS is over, but he's still alive. Took two more burst to kill him. The second mutant took 5 bursts. The last took 3 bursts. That's 13 bursts. Each burst is 8 bullets, so that's 104 bullets on 3 mutants. That was Vault 87. It's loaded with super mutants. I had over 500 bullets when I entered it. 12 super mutants later I had less than 80, so I had to switch to the railway rifle.

Fallout 3 is NOT a one gun game. You'd need at least 3-4.

So if you're going to have "less spikes" than other ammo, wouldn't you logically think that "Hmmmm... I've got this weapon that uses ammo I have loads of vs this other weapon which uses spikes that I have less of (relatively speaking). I may as well not bother with that weapon which uses spikes, considering I'll run out sooner and have to use this other weapon anyway?"

Except for it takes a lot less ammo. See my example above. 100 5.56 rounds to kill 3 mutant masters. It took less than 20 spikes to kill the next 3. So, while 500 5.56 rounds sounds like a lot more than 200 spikes, 200 spikes mean a lot more dead bodies and a lot less pain for you. If we are talking about raiders and other low level scum, then 1 spike is enough to drop anyone dead (vs at least 8 rounds (one burst) of 5.56)

Here's the fun part, Edward didn't say it was "the" easiest either. Again, Edward made the comparative statement. He defined the weapon as "useless" based on his comparison to other weapons. As I said, other weapons are easier to repair (never did claim it was "the" easiest, again that's your mouth-stuffing hyperbole, like you did with "I never said it was the best"). You've admitted that other weapons had greater ammo availability. You've now admitted that other weapons are easier to repair. http://rpgcodex.net/phpBB/viewtopic.php?p=636516#636516

You sure you've got the right quote? Anyway, the game throws guns at you in waves. Early on the mutants favor hunting rifles. So you get a shitload of those. IF hunting rifles are your thing, you're in luck. If not...

Later on the mutants switch to the chinese rifles. That was around lvl 15 and Vault 87. Until then I found maybe 10 broken chinese rifles. Hardly enough to keep one in decent condition for a long time.

From that point of view, the railway rifle is better because you don't depend on the game supplying you with exactly what you need.

The Railway Rifle seems pretty useless as it's a slightly stronger hunting rifle, except that it doesn't gain the benefit of being easily repaired/resupplied

Notice how he never said "easiest" either? So far, you've agreed with Edward on every point he's raised.

Uh, no? And it's not a slightly stronger hunting rifle. It's a much better gun. You have 3 extra shots and you have 3 times the critical chance.

Incidentally, the Hunting Rifle is one weapon Edward compared the Railway Rifle too (the quote's right above here, just before the large easily readable text for your benefit). If you use your brain, you'd note he's inferring (yup, it means you have to *think* about what they're saying) that the Railway Rifle is useless because it's not that much stronger than the readily available Hunting Rifle (hence the "slightly").

For fuck's sakes. Do you think that maybe, just maybe, 3 times higher critical chance is a really, really good thing to have?

Edward didn't use the rifle, so he didn't notice it. He compared the "main" damage to that of other guns and assumed that it sucked. It's very fucking simple, so why are we arguing about it?

In the second half of the game the chinese rifles are on every super mutant and repairing them gets much easier.

So for the second half of the game, the Railway Rifle is pretty much useless unless you just like carrying inferior equipment around and for the first part of the game, you're using the Hunting Rifle simply because it's more readily available.

See above. I explained about both the chinese and the hunting rifles.

... after you compared it to the best weapon in the game. And again, you cried out "I never said it was the best!" before I said anything of the sort. I pointed out the 7 weapons Shannow listed as being superior...

Not everything is black and white. Some weapons are superior only under certain conditions (enemy type, scale level (i.e. regular super mutant, brute, or master), number of enemies, distance, weapons' supply, etc). I don't think anyone can say "this here is the best gun; get it and you would never need another one". I believe that the railway rifle more than deserves its spot in the top 5.

And in conclusion, let's deal with what Shannow said, since it's the foundation of your "platform":

Built a 100% Railway Rifle. Used it for two enemies and put it away since it wasn't as good as smuggler's end, laser rifle, eugene, combat shotgun, sniper rifle, plasma rifle or the special smg. All of which either were better at long range, short range and/or damage + being easily repaired. Not to mention all the other special weapons I didn't stumble over.

So the RWR is one of the most difficult weapons to come by and to up keep but definately not one of the best weapons. Making it pretty superfluous.

Smuggler's End is available at the Citadel, which is only accessible after 3/4 of the main quest (it's locked until that point). If you are not doing the main quest, forget about it. Its damage is only 18 and the critical % modifier is 1.5; 18 points of critical damage. Hardly a better weapon.

Laser rifle does 23 points of damage, 1.5 crit % modifier, 22 crit damage. Better than 30 damage, 30 crit damage, 3x modifier?

Plasma rifle is pretty damn good. The shotgun is ok. Great up close and personal, not so good over distance. Eugene is nice, but it's a big gun, which brings us to a good point. To use all the big guns and energy weapons that Shannow liked so much efficiently, you need to invest a lot of points into those skills, while the railway rifle feeds off your small guns skills, and considering that you won't get enough energy/big guns in the beginning, you'd have to have a decent small guns skill (if you're into guns to begin with).

So if making a weapon from easily available parts is such a pain, how come investing at least 60-70 extra points is overlooked when determining the usefulness? Or is it because the energy weapons look cool, wicked, and awesome?

Anyway, sniper rifle is great, but slow. Good for sniping, not so good when you are dealing with fast approaching multiple enemies. Special SMG is very good, but it's a unique (available only at a specific location, you'd have to either do quest or kill a non-hostile person who has it) weapon. Any questions?

 

[Hory]

The amount of detail that you guys go into for what ultimately is an unsatisfying game is starting to scare me. What's the purpose of all the stat-comparing if there isn't really a tactical context which requires it? The problem isn't that custom/standard weapons are balanced or not, the problem is that in the end they're all the same: straightforward, repetitive and overpowered. My combat experience consisted of shiskebab-ing everyone in melee 75% of the time, with no buffs, a CHA/INT based character, on "hard" difficulty. And for the few tougher enemies that I couldn't beat in melee, I'd just insta-cripple the legs with the crossbow, which pretty much made me invincible. Awful gameplay.

 

[Shagnak]

Special SMG is very good, but it's a unique (available only at a specific location, you'd have to either do quest or kill a non-hostile person who has it) weapon. Any questions?

Or have the stupid character get itself killed right in front of you by getting stuck on some furniture and providing a meat shield between you and arocket toting mutant
I was tempted to reload immediately, too. Glad I checked their body first.

 

[Vault Dweller]

That was often the case in Bloodlines. You were given a bunch of different options in one dialogue and it didn't really matter which skill you used. Don't recall this particular aspect being criticized and studied under a microscope.

Did we play the same Bloodlines? That almost never happened, mostly because both intimidate and seduction were niche skills compared to the might of domination and persuasion.

I mean this:

I don't remember many people using this to defend Baldur's Gate 1 and it's awful fetch quests, and if someone did, the response was other games have done better already and raised the bar.

It wasn't a sandbox game. For a story-driven, dialogue-heavy game like BG fetch quests are a sin. For a sandbox game they are not. Still, I dare say that FO3 quests were much, much deeper and better than BG or Mass Effect quests.

First off, I'm going to assume that the playthrough in which you had those skills was not your first, and you probably planned it out to have a bit of a "power-gamey" experience.

My first. I didn't plan it. I simply had a trackload of points (more points that I knew what to do with), and when I opportunities presented themselves, I bumped up the relevant skills. For example, I had 40 points in Doctor when I accessed the medical computer and it said that I didn't find anything useful but in such a manner that it was clear that I could have found something useful. So increased the skill until I hit it. It was even easier to figure out what you need to get the synthetic brain.

My point was that there weren't a lot of skills to spend points on in FO2, so you either keep increasing gun skills way past the point it stops making sense, or sit on a pile of points and look for something interesting to do with them.

And second, that's pretty much as broken as Fallout 2 gets. Fallout 3 already has people who have figured out how to max all the stats and skills without hacks.

Assuming that's possible, it requires exploring everything and getting every bobblehead and skill book, which are all over the place. If someone is willing to spend 100 hours (unless you know exactly where to go and is able to get there) to max all skills, who cares? I'm pretty sure you could do the same in Morrowind and you could get all skills and stats very, very high in Gothic. It kinda comes with that whole sandbox - do whatever you want for as long as you want - thing. Keep doing it long enough and you'll max everything. Same goes for Wiz 8 too.

Plus, why is a mistake or flaw in an older game not still subject to criticism?

I didn't say that. However, I couldn't help but notice that you didn't mention that Fallout 2 had a truckload of flaws in your reviews and that many things you weren't happy with in FO3 were also present in FO2. You did mention that the first few locations were poorly done and that the game felt rushed, and that's pretty much it.

No....many of them are "useless" because the benefit they provide is worth so much less than other perks.

Unlike Fallout perks? Kama Sutra master? Empathy? Gambler? Fortune Finder?

Take for instance any of the radiation related perks. Rads are such a non-issue, because radiation poisoning deals so little "damage" and rad away is abundant, that you'd be silly to waste a perk. Add in the joke perks like Mysterious Stranger and it makes things worse.

You do know that it was an original Fallout perk? Anyway, radiation and Rad-Aways weren't a problem in the first two games either. There was no reason to take the Rad Resistance perk.

Ultimately though, the perks can really be taken by just about anybody. Instead of being additional ways to differentiate and build your character like in the originals, now they're just a buffet anyone can grab anything from. They needed a lot more restrictions on a lot of perks, a la the originals.

It wasn't that restrictive. There were a handful of perks that required character planning and high stats.

Still not seeing it. And even if that was absolutely stupendous, it's still outweighed by all the idiocy, namely Moira, Burke, "Steel be with you"...

In other words, you are too focused on the beginning of the game and unable to see beyond that.

-Assuming of course I went to the Underworld early on.
-Assuming I checked the shops and wasn't distracted by one of the two (perhaps three) quests that were there.
-Assuming I thought 500-1000 caps on a schematic was worth it when I already had the knowledge that money of that quantity could let me buy enough beat up combat shotguns, chinese assault rifles, magnums, and combat armors at Flak and Shrapnel's in Rivet City to repair my arsenal up nicely.
-And assuming I hadn't gone through the back-rooms of the Museum of History before entering Underworld proper and found Lincoln's Repeater, which almost certainly obsoletes the Railway Rifle (and most other weapons for that matter), and had been content with my arsenal's strength.

Oh shit! Oh no! Did you just say that Lincoln's Repeater make most guns obsolete? Even though it's not on the Shannow's list? Run! I'll distract Dark Underlord!

Btw, that "assuming I checked the store and wasn't distracted" line was lulzy. An adventurer who doesn't check all stores? Riiight.

Anyway, there is a difference between "I've never bought any schematics because I was more than happy with my existing arsenal" and "schematics weapons are shit! Shit, I tells ya!".

So I'm at fault for not powergaming to the max and constantly checking the internet to maximize my potential...when I've emphatically stated I was breezing through the game already? Kinda silly, no?

Kinda no. You were reviewing the game. You weren't supposed to breathe through it, missing shit and replacing it with false assumptions. Your job, when you decided to write that review was explaining little Timmy what the game was like and helping him form an accurate opinion of the game and decide whether the game is for him.

How would you rate your effort? I know I'm giving you a hard time, but that's because you could have done so much fucking better. I expected more from your review. Better style, better flow, better arguments, more open mindedness and less bias.

And this would totally defeat your argument for the Railway Rifle as well. With full knowledge, going and getting weapons like Old Painless, Lincoln's Repeater, The Kneecapper, The Terrible Shotgun, A-23's Plasma Rifle, Firelance, Alien Blaster and Blackhawk could happen as soon as you got the Railway Rife, if not sooner. With full knowledge, then a powergamer will seek out the absolute best weapons as early as possible, weapons that destroy the railway rifle.

Really? I've played the game for 40+ hours. Not a lot for a sandbox game, but enough to beat it and explore quite a few optional locations. I found only the Lincoln gun. You have to kill non-hostile NPCs to get the Kneecapper and the Terrible shotgun. I didn't want to do that. I did the replicated man quest differently and didn't get A-23. Old Painless isn't as good as the Railway Rifle. It has the same damage, but no critical modifier and smaller clip.

I don't think you really wanted to open this can of worms.

I think I did ok.

Are my impressions somehow worth less than yours or anyone else who happened to get the railway rifle early on?

No. You should have realized (when you have found the schematics) that you could have found them earlier and that someone who's doing the main quest definitely will. Doesn't really take a rocket scientist, does it? Hence, my previous analogy with someone beating Fallout in 15 minutes and trashing the game for being too short just because his experience is as good as someone else's. See what I mean?

It seems like Bethesda kind of "balanced" the weapon skills, but not in a good way.

Agree.

Okay. I just don't remember anyone calling Ultima 7 a sandbox, Daggerfall a sandbox, or Baldur's Gate a sandbox. I'll take you word for it though.

BG isn't a sandbox game.

I think we can agree that in both Fallout games quests & dialogues represented at least 75% of gameplay. In Fallout 3 this aspect is reduced to 15-25%. The rest is exploring, looting, and killing.

And this is where my problem is with Fallout 3, as a game. You'd agree Fallout's strong points were it's writing, quests, and dialogue, right? And it did them well, right? So by making them the focus of the game, it was a good game. You were doing the good stuff most of the time. You'd probably also agree that Fallout's combat was pretty mediocre. The developers realized that, and didn't make it a focus (or the other way around) and played to their strengths.

Agree with pretty much everything, but I don't think the combat was mediocre. It was good, in my opinion.

That's where I don't get Fallout 3. I think you'd agree that the strongest Fallout 3 was at were during the good side-quests (Replicated Man, Shoot Em In the Head, Vault 101 Part 2). That was what Fallout 3 did well. The thing is, that wasn't the majority of the game. The majority of it, was, as you said,"exploring, looting, and killing". And I don't think they did this so well. Most exploration is about finding more stuff to kill.

That's the sandbox. That's what Daggerfall, a top 10 Codex RPG, was all about. Killing and looting. That's what Morrowind, a game on many Codex admins' top 10 list, was about. That's what the Gothic series was about. Exploring to find more stuff to kill and loot.

It looks like you simply aren't a fan of the sub-genre.

I don't have a problem throwing Fallout 3 in a sandbox genre, but I don't get why I can't critique it's individual elements with games outside the narrow scope of the genre as you define it.

I think it's fair to say that this question has been answered quite a few times already.

To go back to my Mercenaries example, it's fun to get into fights because shooting is solid, vehicular combat is outstanding with a wide range of military machines at your fingertips, and airstrikes are a blast, and open up tons of new gameplay avenues. The fundamentals are good. It's good quality sand in the box to play with.

Really? That good? I should give it a try.

You know, assuming people's thoughts and playing mind reader based on internet posts is pretty shaky business.

Never claimed that it wasn't. I made a guess. If you say that I'm wrong, I'll say that I guessed wrong and that it's just a coincidence.

If I have to guess a bit more, I'd say that you were certain that Fallout 3 would be a shitty game because everything pointed to it and the setting looked really fucked up. Then you saw that people whose opinion you couldn't ignore are seemingly enjoying it and definitely not hating it. That confused you. You tried to understand, you asked questions, but you just couldn't accept the answers. Then you played the game, but you looked for proofs that you were right and the game was bad, thus ignoring or dismissing most good things about the game.

Plus, playing Internet Detective is a really underhanded kind of arguing tactic; and one that might just come to bite you back.

It's teh intarnets. Anyway, I meant no offense. If you think I crossed some line, I apologize. Honestly. I hope that you won't stay away from our forums in the future. I do like your posts.

 

[Hamster]

For a story-driven, dialogue-heavy game like BG fetch quests are a sin. For a sandbox game they are not.

Awesome.

 

[DarkSign]

I've been thinking about the psychology of the Codex response to FO3.

On one hand, you've got the Codex Faithful who've been wallowing in and identifying themselves with the FO will never be good again idea. A kind of "hatred makes us elite" crew.

On the other hand you've got the "the masses blindly hate FO3, so we're elite if we actually give it a chance" crew.

Not that anyone gives a fuck, but I've finally put my finger on why people dont care for VD and the "It's a decent game, but it's not a FO game" crew....where's the outrage? VD, I'll admit that it's not really thinking for yourself to hate FO3 just because people have been hating it for years and never thought it would be any good. But I hope you'll admit that it feels like betrayal for you to make light of the critical fact that it's not a FO game. Accepting for the moment that it's a decent game on its own (not at that point yet myself but ok), NOT to protest and get angry that the game has pissed on FO canon (been reading various posts from people with much more FO trivia cred than myself) feels like a slap on the face.

I agree that to GET angry feels spoonfed, childish and worst of all obvious...but sometimes isn't the right answer the obvious one?

Not sure I've made any sense with this post...just think there's a lot of psychological bullshit getting in the way of people thinking clearly about the game. But oh well...it's just a game after all.

 

[DefJam101]

Some people still don't see anything above mediocre about the game, although VD is correct in saying that FO3 shows promise. I don't understand his POV, the game just didn't interest me. L4D is much more fun and that says a lot if you ask me.

The question is why everyone has their panties in a bunch over a fucking game, it could've been much worse. Really, it could have.

 

[Vault Dweller]

Not that anyone gives a fuck, but I've finally put my finger on why people dont care for VD and the "It's a decent game, but it's not a FO game" crew....where's the outrage? VD, I'll admit that it's not really thinking for yourself to hate FO3 just because people have been hating it for years and never thought it would be any good. But I hope you'll admit that it feels like betrayal for you to make light of the critical fact that it's not a FO game.

We've had 4 years to adjust to the idea that it won't be a Fallout game. Did anyone really think that Bethesda is capable of making a proper Fallout game? Seriously? The dream was over the moment Herve said " Yoink! Sold to the highest bidder!".

The time for the outrage was 4 years ago. Now it's time to accept the reality and stop screaming at Fallout 3 boxes on store shelves. It's not Bethesda's fault for making the only thing they knew how to. It's Herve's fault for spitting into the fans' cuddly little angry faces and giving the license to the wrong people.

 

[DarkUnderlord]

No, it's Ed's. I didn't post a large negative post about F3 before actually trying it for myself, I kept an open mind.

So if everything Edward heard about Fallout 3 before he played it, made him think it was bad and he said so publicly, and then all of that was confirmed when he played it, he's prejudiced? Does this mean the only way Ed could wrote a non-prejudiced review is to come out in praise of Fallout 3?

But if he did that, wouldn't he be ignoring his own opinion which, after all, is what a review is supposed to be about? Play a game and write your opinion on it, right? (Actually the definition of review itself is fun "a critical article or report", go look up the definition of critical for more fun). In Edward's opinion, the schematics were useless. In Edward's opinion the quests were mostly bad. In Edward's opinion, Stealth was poorly done oh and by the way, he added in lots of reasons in the review for why he reached these conclusions. I'm sure he could've added in more.

Take the Vampire thing for example, Edward reached that quest and groaned. Apparently, so did everyone else who "disagrees" with him. He wrote it up in the review ultimately saying it's really dumb because that's the impression it left with him. Now everybody seems to agree with Edward's assessment but just can't get over the fact he said "actual vampire people". Which incidentally, doesn't make any sense because we all know vampire's aren't people. Who's ever referred to "Vampire People"? I'm now going to get hung up on his choice of words for one example like VD and Twinfalls here (even though I agree with Edward's main point) and complain that Vampire's != People.

People are alive and they don't drink blood!

We'll also conveniently ignore that it was in a paragraph about "how inconsistent the game is with itself" and cited other examples which nobody seems to mind, nor does anybody seem to disagree with that main point that Edward was trying to make. We'll also ignore the bit right before it where he talked about "people thinking Ghouls are Zombies", how it upsets the Ghoul because its "untrue and people need to understand things beyond myth, ignorance, and superstition" only to turn around and have a bunch of people who think they're Vampires with all the "myth, ignorance and superstitution" that entails.

It just seems a handful of people here are prejudiced against Edward's review. Do you, or do you not agree with Edward's point in that paragraph that the game is inconsistent with itself? People who focus on that one tiny "actual" word seem to be looking for faults to find.

Just for the record, here are the things VD thought were pointless to reply to...

I thought the exact words were "10% was worth discussing, but it's getting harder and harder to dig it out".

Actually, the exact words there were "you started replying but realized that it's pointless". Nice to know you see the point now. And just for good measure: FLIP-FLOP.

Yes, my good sir, it is actually hard to accept. Useless, like I said before, is too strong a word, especially in this context:

"Repair is all about weapon and armor maintenance and building the radically useless schematic weaponry. To be fair however, weapon degradation is completely ridiculous, so it does see a lot of use. But the secondary ability, schematic weaponry is pretty useless. Schematics come into play mid-way through the game due to their nature as mid-level quest rewards, and by the time you can make them, they're mostly obsolete being underpowered, and made useless by the abundance of ammunition for conventional weaponry."

I can practically taste the venom.

Here Naked Ninja, see what I was talking about? We have a classic case where someone is ignoring all the points and focussing on just one tiny word they disagree with. You can see how Vault Dweller skips right passed the part where Edward throws in the "pretty" adjective ("pretty useless" means not quite the same as just "useless" on itself). He then hops, skips and jumps over the fact that the schematics are mid-level quest rewards, meaning you get them mid-way in the game at which point "they're mostly obsolete being underpowered" and made useless "by the abundance of ammunition for conventional weaponry".

That's a classic example of venom and prejudice of someone ignoring the point that Edward was making. Again, he didn't say you couldn't kill anything with them as every weapon in Fallout 3 can kill anything (depending on what level of the game you're at, obviously). He made the point that to get these weapons, you have to jump through a few hoops and by the time you've done that, there are better options.

Sadly, the people who disagree with Edward get hung up on that one word (when it's taken out of context) because they agree with every point he made. For example, here's what someone else said about ammo availability in this very thread:

Scarce means rare. FO3's ammo is anything but.

Here's what someone else said about the schematics weapons combat potential:

I didn't say it was the best.

See how these people agree with Edward and yet their prejudice blind-sights them to the points Edward was actually making?

[...] how should someone review a game if not by using their own experiences? What, they have to magically create everyone elses opinion?

If you can't see that Edward trashed the game instead of reviewing and criticizing it, if nothing clicked in your mind when (if) you read that pre-review post, then you're either dishonest or blind.

Someone did the same thing to Oblivion once too. Their review is here. You can just feel their prejudice seeping through. They've taken quotes which they used to develop an opinion before the game was released and compared them to what the actual game was, rather than playing the game for what it was. They're clearly just there to trash and criticise it because a lot of people did enjoy Oblivion for what it was, not what they thought it should be because of their prejudice.

I hate double standards.

Considering Edward has attacked the quest design (apparently it's "great" in your mind but not in many others). He said they've improved but still fell far short of the mark. You came at him saying "have they improved or haven't they??!".

I pointed out the inconsistencies:
http://www.rpgcodex.net/phpBB/viewtopic ... 476#636476

He stated that Bethesda didn't get far from the formula and then noted that the game has a trackload of skillchecks and acknowledged that Bethesda "made many advancement in the role-playing department".

Overall, it's too negative and filled with mistakes and false assumptions, which creates an assumption that the goal of the review was not to provide an analysis or a detailed opinion, but to tear FO3 a new one. A noble goal, I agree, but I expected a better style from an "esteemed critic and world-renowned philosopher", whom I personally respect.

See Naked Ninja? Clearly this person's prejudice has affected their judgement of Edward's review. They "expected a better style" so rather than reading Edward's review for what it was, they judged it instead by their own prejudice. They even make wild claims like "filled with mistakes". Even though they only point out a handful of items and actually agree with a lot of what Edward says (ammo is anything but scarce etc...) meaning Edward's review is anything but.

Filled is just far too strong a word to use. These kind of words creates an assumption that the goal of this person is not to provide an analysis or a detailed opinion on Edward's review, but to tear Edward a new one. It's almost like they're "arguing for the sake of arguing". A noble goal, I agree, but I expect a better style.

The standards around here just keep doubling up on themselves.

Fallout 3 still fails to reach the high water mark. The only justification you have is to exclude every other RPG that did choice and consequence better and limit comparisons to games that had little to no choice and conseqeunce in the first place.

My point was that sandbox games should be compared only to other sandbox games.

So why didn't you do that for your Oblivion review? EvoG and may others at ESF have all said "Oblivion is great at what it set out to do", it's "fun for what it is". So why didn't you judge it on what it was, rather than what you wanted it to be? Why did you set out to tear it a new one?

Personally, I think it's justifiable to go into a review after a certain type of game. Particularly here at the RPGCodex where we are after those "one in a century" games that can really call themselves RPGs. This isn't the "Open sandbox, 5 stars!" Codex. If you came here expecting a good review of GTA, you'll be sorely mistaken.

There are no comparisons. He doesn't complain that the Abilities aren't as good as the Fallout's Perks, and he doesn't say that Silent Storm offers 10 times more combat options than Fallout. Let's compare it to our boy Eddie's approach:

"I suppose this [skill checks] is a marked improvement for Bethesda, but they're still 10 years behind the curve on this, and I don't rightly see any point in going easy on them."

Which is a statement you agree with, correct? Are they or are they not 10 years behind the curve?

I've never seen Saint doing anything like that in his reviews, and we can all agree that the old man Saint knows more about RPGs and reviewing them than anyone posting in this thread. I'm sure you know better though.

I don't want to speak for Saint because he's more than capable of doing that himself if he wants to. All I can say is what I understand the Codex to be, is that angry site that demands more from RPGs. If I recall correctly the original conversations with Deathy, who had the idea for the site, were all about setting a high standard for RPGs and wanting that high standard. It was about reviewing games to that high standard, not whether they were good games or not but whether they were good RPGs. What made them good RPGs? What makes them bad RPGs? It wasn't about going "Hey, this is an awesome sandbox game", it's all about whether it's an awesome RPG.

And yes, for the bleeding obvious, we've reviewed other non-RPG games. Games that are "tactical role-playing games" we're generally kind on. People around here are generally smart and know what Silent Storm is and what it isn't. People know what Mount & Blade is. It doesn't mean we're not going to criticise them. It just means that when a new game comes out like "Doom 3", we're not going to complain about how bad an RPG it is.

However, when games that are part of a series come out, we'll compare them to the rest of the games in that series. That makes sense. Like we didn't compare Fallout: Tactics to Fallout 1 & 2 so much (it happened but not to the degree it's been done for Fallout 3). But compare Fallout 3 to Fallout 2? Sure. Compare Gothic 4 to Gothic 3? Absolutely. Compare #N to #N - 1? Done.

And when people come out and say:

Bethesda Softworks announced today that it will develop and publish Fallout 3 -- a sequel to the highly popular Fallout role-playing game franchise.

... and that their goals are to:

What are your goals for Fallout 3? To return Fallout to RPG prominence. To do the series justice while also bringing it into the current day. This is as big for us as an Elder Scrolls title, so we're not going to skimp on it.

and...

The reason we wanted to make a Fallout game in the first place, was just how much we loved the first game. But we weren't the ones online posting all the time about a game from 97. Think about that...8 years later and they still haven't gotten a decent Fallout RPG, and people keep shoving crap at them. I'd be pissed too. I'd be wary of the new guys from Bethesda too. Hopefully when they see our game they'll give it a shot.

Question: Is Fallout 3 a decent Fallout RPG? Here's what a review over at NMA says:

It’s a good and entertaining action RPG provided you can ignore the fact that it was supposed to be a Fallout game and mentally block that aspect of it.

Compared to the first two Fallout games, Fallout 3 is a pale imitation that may anger many fans of the original games.

Why shouldn't we be critical? After all, we were with Oblivion when that failed to meet the promises that were made.

The ammo is everywhere. All types of ammo. However, your guns eat ammo quickly because super mutants, radscorpions, etc take a lot of ammo to kill. Especially in the shooter mode.

Just posting this again to be really sure that there is loads of ammo everywhere for every weapon, so that you'll certainly be using the best weapons you have available without any issue.

Fallout 3 is NOT a one gun game. You'd need at least 3-4.

... and obviosuly people's opinions differ on what those weapons are. Certainly if I'm taking a range of issues into consideration, like ammo being everywhere and there being a number of very powerful guns which you can find mid-game a lot easier than other weapons, I'd certainly be using those ones that I found are easier to re-supply and repair.

Oh, by the way, nice to see you dropped that "easiest" crap you made up.

So if you're going to have "less spikes" than other ammo, wouldn't you logically think that "Hmmmm... I've got this weapon that uses ammo I have loads of vs this other weapon which uses spikes that I have less of (relatively speaking). I may as well not bother with that weapon which uses spikes, considering I'll run out sooner and have to use this other weapon anyway?"

Except for it takes a lot less ammo. See my example above. 100 5.56 rounds to kill 3 mutant masters. It took less than 20 spikes to kill the next 3. So, while 500 5.56 rounds sounds like a lot more than 200 spikes, 200 spikes mean a lot more dead bodies and a lot less pain for you. If we are talking about raiders and other low level scum, then 1 spike is enough to drop anyone dead (vs at least 8 rounds (one burst) of 5.56)

So what you're saying then, is that in your opinion and depending on your chosen play style (VATS vs Real-Time) and your character skills and the ammo available and what you're fighting, you'll use whatever the best weapon is you have available.

Edward's point appears to be that even so, there are still better weapons. For example, he didn't single out only the Chinese Assault Rifle, he's also listed "Old Painless (1), Lincoln's Repeater (2), The Kneecapper (3), The Terrible Shotgun (4), A-23's Plasma Rifle (5), Firelance (6), Alien Blaster (7) and Blackhawk (8)" among others that also Shannow listed.

In short, you appear to have had very difficult combat because you hadn't found the better weapons yet. While Edward had "piss-easy" combat because he was able to find the superior weapons earlier on. It seems to me that's it not so much which weapon is better or not but which one you manage to find first. Edward found the better ones first and reached the opinion he did based on that experience. Certainly subsequent play-throughs by Edward would result in him having to deliberately ignore the better weapons to play with the Railway Rifle instead. Maybe then he'd find combat more difficult.

Anyway, the game throws guns at you in waves. Early on the mutants favor hunting rifles. So you get a shitload of those. IF hunting rifles are your thing, you're in luck. If not...

Which raises another interesting point about the game. It appears a guns usefulness depends on what you're fighting and where. As Edward said when facing hoardes of enemies, your guns break-down very rapidly and you need to repair them. You're ultimately going to use whatever weapon you're being faced with, pretty much rendering other weapons useless. IE: When Edward talked about the waves of Hunting Rifles himself, a weapon which is only "slightly" (according to Edward) less powerful than the Railway Rifle and yet has all the advantages of being all around you, with plentiful ammo.

The Railway Rifle seems pretty useless as it's a slightly stronger hunting rifle, except that it doesn't gain the benefit of being easily repaired/resupplied

Notice how he never said "easiest" either? So far, you've agreed with Edward on every point he's raised.

Uh, no? And it's not a slightly stronger hunting rifle. It's a much better gun. You have 3 extra shots and you have 3 times the critical chance.

According to Edward, combat isn't that difficult. Several people have said you just have to run backwards when you run out of AP. I'm not certain what that means for re-loading and what-not but it doesn't sound like it's the hassle it is in Fallout 1 & 2. Certainly doesn't appear to be enough to worry about 3 extra shots. Critical Chance I'm also assuming is still based on Luck, meaning someone with high-luck and a critical chance * 3 is more meaningful than someone with low Luck? Of course, you still also have to hit a critical. So a weapon like Lincoln's Repeater with its 40% extra basic damage of 50 (vs 35), 15 ammo clip (vs 8), and higher crit damage of 50 (vs 30) would be better. Edward appears to have found that before or at about the same time as the Railway Rifle, so it makes sense as to why he'd dismiss the Railway Rifle.

Certainly if I'm playing through, I'll be sure to pick up that weapon when I find it.

Incidentally, the Hunting Rifle is one weapon Edward compared the Railway Rifle too (the quote's right above here, just before the large easily readable text for your benefit). If you use your brain, you'd note he's inferring (yup, it means you have to *think* about what they're saying) that the Railway Rifle is useless because it's not that much stronger than the readily available Hunting Rifle (hence the "slightly").

For fuck's sakes. Do you think that maybe, just maybe, 3 times higher critical chance is a really, really good thing to have?

For fuck's sakes. Do you think that maybe, just maybe, there are other things to weapons than just critical chance? The Chinese Assault Rifle for example has a really shit critical chance and yet according to some people, it's even better than the Railway Rifle and in fact is the best weapon in the game.

Edward didn't use the rifle, so he didn't notice it. He compared the "main" damage to that of other guns and assumed that it sucked. It's very fucking simple, so why are we arguing about it?

... because your prejudice has seen you get hung up on a simple thing which Edward justified perfectly well. And by justified, I mean you agree with him. Again, ammo is scarce, fighting a lot of monsters who use weapons so you'd use theirs, weapon break-down, finding better weapons etc...

Not everything is black and white. Some weapons are superior only under certain conditions (enemy type, scale level (i.e. regular super mutant, brute, or master), number of enemies, distance, weapons' supply, etc). I don't think anyone can say "this here is the best gun; get it and you would never need another one". I believe that the railway rifle more than deserves its spot in the top 5.

So what you're really saying is, you just disagree with Edward's choice of top 5 guns as Edward said he didn't consider the Railway Rifle in the top 5. Did you use all the other weapons that were available or did you just use the Railway Rifle and assume that was the best?

For all the reasons Edward outlined, the Railway Rifle does sound pretty useless to me:

• By the time you can make them, they're mostly obsolete being underpowered;
  Made useless by the abundance of ammunition for conventional weaponry.

And in conclusion, let's deal with what Shannow said, since it's the foundation of your "platform":

Built a 100% Railway Rifle. Used it for two enemies and put it away since it wasn't as good as smuggler's end, laser rifle, eugene, combat shotgun, sniper rifle, plasma rifle or the special smg. All of which either were better at long range, short range and/or damage + being easily repaired. Not to mention all the other special weapons I didn't stumble over.

So the RWR is one of the most difficult weapons to come by and to up keep but definately not one of the best weapons. Making it pretty superfluous.

Smuggler's End is available at the Citadel, which is only accessible after 3/4 of the main quest (it's locked until that point). If you are not doing the main quest, forget about it. Its damage is only 18 and the critical % modifier is 1.5; 18 points of critical damage. Hardly a better weapon.

Which means Shannow didn't get a high enough skill to make a 100% Railway Rifle until late in the game, rendering it useless. It's also interesting that you keep pulling out stats to say how bad the weapons are, saying it's "hardly a better weapon" and yet Shannow found it to be better when he actually used it (along with the other stats you pulled out)? Particularly after you've said that the best weapon in the game (Chinese Assault Rifle) wasn't all that useful considering how much ammo you had to use. I can't speak for Shannow but it's clear what weapons are good or not depends on how you played. Edward and others obviously have a play style which found the Railway Rifle and other schematics useless. They obviously did the quests or found the parts that put these better weapons in their hands and found no reason to go back. Does that mean their experience is invalid?

 

[Hamster]

That's the sandbox. That's what Daggerfall, a top 10 Codex RPG, was all about. Killing and looting. That's what Morrowind, a game on many Codex admins' top 10 list, was about. That's what the Gothic series was about. Exploring to find more stuff to kill and loot.

Exploring to find more stuff to kill and loot? Yes, BG1 surely wasn't about this...

 

[Vault Dweller]

That's the sandbox. That's what Daggerfall, a top 10 Codex RPG, was all about. Killing and looting. That's what Morrowind, a game on many Codex admins' top 10 list, was about. That's what the Gothic series was about. Exploring to find more stuff to kill and loot.

Exploring to find more stuff to kill and loot? Yes, BG1 surely wasn't about this...

Exploring, killing, and looting is a part of every RPG. BG1 was mostly about the story. It's a fine example of a story-driven RPG with lots of dialogues and adventures.

DU, I'll reply to your post tomorrow.

 

[Hamster]

BG1 was mostly about the story.

BG1? Mostly about story? Are you sure we played the same BG1?
BG1 that i remember was about exploring big world made of conjoined locations. Exploring was the best part of the game, not clearing boring mq dungeons.

 

[Edward_R_Murrow]

Oh boy.....

You were wrong. Mmmkay?

Again, it's very simple.

-Neither VD or I have the full information on the amount and kind of speech checks.
-I threw out numbers casually, he took them extremely literally.
-He argued based on the literal notion, whereas I didn't.
-Thus it looks like I'm wrong to you.

Thing is, there's no way of knowing yet. I'm fully open to the fact I could be wrong. I can keep an open mind. I'd appreciate it if you could too.

And the bottle cap mine.

I tried using a few, and just like other mines, enemies didn't seem to trigger them. Maybe it was because I had low explosives skill or maybe more physics glitches. Though if a mine doesn't blow up, it's not very useful. I explained why I didn't have success with it, so it's not a piece of misinformation to the readers. Maybe I am just inept with the mines, but it certainly isn't wrong in the way 2+2=7 is, although you seem to think it is.

They weren't 'actual vampire people'.

Actually they were. "Actual vampire people" are not the same thing as "actual vampires", though you just jumped to that conclusion.

the cult leader is helping them in a way as they are cannibals otherwise. But he is inflicting his vampire fantasies onto them and demeaning them.

Sure about that? Ian West gives an interesting account when you press him about how, when he was very young, went into a frenzy and bit a raider (or traveler) on the neck, killing him and drinking his blood/eating him. See, I don't know about you, but people who have an innate craving for people-flesh that is sated elsewise only by blood is pretty darn close to "vampire people". Again, this statement being "wrong" is dependent on the taxonomy of vampires, or more specifically "vampire people". Hell, in some cultures vampires are mythical undead, in others they're lawyers. This isn't wrong.

based probably on second-hand evidence.

More of this nonsense, eh? Guess what.....I actually did play the game.

Only you didn't mention this when bagging stealth as being more uselessness.

Yes I did. I guess you mustn't have read the review...probably operating off of second-hand knowledge, no?

Hey, you're being fawned over by the new Codexers!

You might want to look at things a little better instead of just assuming, as reactions to Fallout 3 are mixed among old-schoolers and new-schoolers. And I am by no means being fawned over by the new Codexers. Just look at the thread.

Oh....and thanks for automatically lumping me in with the brainless Bethesda bashers because I'm highly critical of their work. Real classy.

That link to Ed's post on ITS is fairly telling. It has a lot of what his review had in it...just with the words "seems" or "I heard" or "looks like" thrown in everywhere.

Fairly easy to see he reached a conclusion before playing the game and then just went forward from there.

That's a bit of a leap there, no?

You're basically saying that it's "easy to see" that I went into a game with completely negative thoughts (which I didn't), and played it for the sole purpose of digging up information to trash it. That that post about Fallout 3 that Vince posted, which I later clarified, wasn't me genuinely asking for clarification. Because, obviously, if my mind was already made up, I would make some elaborate scheme like feigning innocence and asking of things. Because this is obviously easier and more effective than just saying "Fallout 3 is going to suck, convince me otherwise Bethesdrones" like the stereotypical glittering gem of hatred.

Or I could have just been asking for clarification on some of the reports I had gotten from my more trusted sources.

That you believe more in the first possibility speaks volumes. You either have some preconceived biases against Codexers, or a really negative outlook on people. I'll tell you that I went into Fallout 3 with the intention to have as much fun as possible, however I could. If this meant avoiding content or activities I found not to be fun, and repeating ones I did find fun, then so be it. For instance, I stopped looking in more than half the containers, because clawing through procedurally generated junk for a few caps or junk isn't very fun after awhile. Just like I savored The Replicated Man, You Gotta Shoot Em In The Head, and Trouble on the Homefront by saving/reloading to check out some different options and outcomes, because I thought that was fun. I don't find traipsing around in poorly designed dungeons using a sub-par combat system against boring enemies fun, however, and that's what Fallout 3 seemed to offer much more than half the time. Going to the Mercenaries example I used with VD, I can enjoy a random "Rambo-style" exploration, if the fundamentals are done well. Mercenaries did them well. Thing is, Fallout 3 didn't do the fundamentals well. Thus, it's not very good, and not very fun. If Fallout 3 wasn't mainly that, the good parts, like the good to brilliant quests, would have stood out a lot more and I think I would have been a lot more forgiving of other things.

Edward, I just wanted to comment a few points. I am sure VD can say this better than me, (and probably will, in a long reply going through each point you made), but maybe this is faster.

Fair enough.

Right here, you seem to assume some bad will from VD. I think that all he was trying to say is that you should have checked in the wiki before your review.

I did....turns out the wiki wasn't very useful though. I guess I should have checked NMA or Gamebanshee.

That you should have made sure that the schematics are useless before saying so in your review.

To an extent, that's sort of what I did. I feel that my word choice is what really sparked this whole thing though. I suppose my comments were a bit hyperbolic in nature; radically useless may have been better replaced with . I still think that schematics, unless you get them immediately, or are going melee with the shishkebab, don't seem as useful as other things that you can get easier, and earlier. It seems like their usefulness is dependent on way too many coincidental events. Perhaps, unreliably useful would have been better than radically useless...you live and learn I guess.

If I get the correct idea of what sandbox means, then I think the biggest difference between a normal rpg and a sandbox one isn't even how much time one spends doing quests, but on the focus of the game's story. I am having some trouble defining it, but I think the term cinematic fits well here. For example, in PST, there is a single moment where TNO is able to learn and cast a curse on another character. The player isn't able to go casting curses in order to blackmail other characters. It is a single moment, where it makes sense in the story. This shows how a story driven, non sandbox game works with plots.

On the other hand, take most towns in Ultima 7. Most NPCs are semi generic supporting cast. Yet they are all given some personality, even if they have no importance to the story. There is a finite number of these npcs, and a finite number of dialogue lines. A few even have unique quests and actions available to them. Yet, because they don't stand out, because it is the player who needs to pry into their lives to get to the unique content, because much of the conversation, while interesting, seems like chit chat. Talking with these npcs work as a kind of exploration.

The end result doesn't look like the player is in a movie where he needs to escape from new York or save private Ryan. It feels like the player is in a normal town (as far as a fantasy medieval town can be normal) with normal people in it. While the game has a story that the player needs to follow (in an exact order, by the way), there is a lot to explore in the towns, talking to the people and finding what they are like, what they want.

In fallout, the people and their stories seem much more centered on the storyline. While the player is given a lot of choice in who to speak and what to do in the quests, the actions that the player can take in deciding any one quest and what he finds exploring each town is much more driven by the narrative. Even subquests inside a town are frequently tied to the narrative of the town, like shady sands, where most quests show how the small community has trouble surviving.

In daggerfall, everything is made so that the player seems to be inside a world rather than a story. Countless small, irrelevant cities are strewn about the huge territory, giving the impression of a real world. Many of the quests are randomly generated through templates, and although it gets really repetitive after a while, it allows for the impression that you are exploring a world rather than going along with a story. I have heard that some quite awesome features that were cut would have made the game even stronger in this department, like having cities under siege and a more involved politics system with the guilds. This would have added even more to the sandbox aspect, making the game world look like it was a living, progressing along history.

Sorry if this got too long, but hopefully these examples help to set the difference between sandbox and non sandbox games.

This is an interesting definition of sandbox, and I might just want to adopt this as my new definition. It pretty much perfectly describes Darklands, Ultima 7, Daggerfall, Morrowind and Gothic. Sandbox games that I either enjoyed, or at least could easily recognize as being a good game, even though I didn't like it (Darklands).

Thing is though, Fallout 3 doesn't seem to fit very well in this, at least in a lot of ways. Especially in your point about original Fallout, and how the fact that settlements tended tohave all their quests revolve around a certain "town narrative". It seems like Fallout 3 does that as well. Paradise Falls is about the slaving quests, Arefu revolves around Blood Ties,Big Town around the Big Trouble In Big Town quest and so on. Maybe this is Bethesda trying to blend Fallout style with the sandbox RPG? Maybe not such a great idea, at least in Bethesda's case?

The problem with comparing things outside of the genre is that it can create completely unreasonable expectations. Games have a limited amount of resources, and sometimes the things that aren't the focus of the game get shafted.

Oh, I agree. Thing is, Bethesda essentially shafte the design of the stuff that was the focus of the game, and that's why I don't think it's anything more than mediocre as a whole.

Furthermore, features in a game frequently depend on other features also present there. If taken outside of context, they might simply not work well.

In this example, the dialogue is a small part of this kind of game (sandbox rpgs). Comparing it then, to rpgs where it is very important, like fallout, is obviously expecting too much. It would work better to take examples of good dialogue inside the very game of fallout 3, and show how most of it isn't that good, or how the better parts of dialogue aren't where they should be (main quest). That way, instead of criticizing Bethesda for not being something, you would be criticizing it for not having its priorities straight.

I don't know about this one. It seems like it's not a big part of sandbox RPGs, but it was a big part of Fallout 3, and one that I feel was done poorly. I know I shouldn't be taking Todd, Pete, and Emil seriously, but they promised lots of dialogue, and lots of good dialogue, and it did seem like they made it a focus, or at least a half-assed one.

Here we get at the core of the opinion divergence (I think). You separated the meat of the gameplay in fallout, and explained why you didn't find it fun. VD, and other people that had fun with fallout probably found it at least bearable. It probably would be more productive to discuss how or why this part of the game isn't fun (which I think you did to a good extent on your review) and how the other, less important features (the exotic dishes) connect to them.

Agreed. I'd much rather talk about the main point of my review rather than go round for round about stuff like predisposition, the definition of a vampire, and the railway rifle. Might be interesting to get a better understanding of what standards a sandbox should be held to as far as overall quality, and such.

Also, to parrot others, nice post.

 

[DarkSign]

Yep. DU's post just goes to prove that there's a strong contingent of people who think they're cool because they're anti the anti-Bethesda people. He pretty much nailed VD with it, showing how Ed's post made sense while VD's critique of it was more about nitpicking Ed's review than proving FO3 was decent.

Damn. I should be a psychologist or sumthin.

 

[Tintin]

This is a good fight, better than most political matches. But you need to get someone else to play Bethesda defender though, I've seen VD trash Bethesda far too much for this to be a credible performance.

 

[Vault Dweller]

You probably shouldn't.

Do you really think I'm trying to be cool by being anti- anti-Bethesda? My argument with Edward is indeed about the review and not about Fallout 3 though. I really don't give a fuck whether the Codex likes or hates Fallout 3. Considering that the Codex's favourite pastime was about criticizing poor reviews, I thought that both Chefe's and Edward's reviews were very flawed and explained why.

Looking forward to Section8's review to show the kids how it's done.

 

[DefJam101]

Vault Dweller is typing this from the seat of his shiny new Ferrari, complete with vibrating leather seats, a mini bar, and a vagina-shaped muffler.

 

[DarkSign]

You probably shouldn't.

Do you really think I'm trying to be cool by being anti- anti-Bethesda? My argument with Edward is indeed about the review and not about Fallout 3 though. I really don't give a fuck whether the Codex likes or hates Fallout 3. Considering that the Codex's favourite pastime was about criticizing poor reviews, I thought that both Chefe's and Edward's reviews were very flawed and explained why.

Looking forward to Section8's review to show the kids how it's done.

Everyone wants to be cool. And by cool that means whatever wonderful word epitomizes what you define as credible, educated, intelligent, thoughtful, etc. etc.

So on one level "being cool" sounds a bit dumb and childish, but "being cool" means you trying to be your ideal self. Everyone wants to "be cool."

 

[Murk]

I am... shocked, amazed, inspried, and at the same time utterly nauseated by the endurance and stamina you guys have shown in this pissing match.

I applaud you gentlemen, I applaud you all.

 

[Edward_R_Murrow]

Snipe.

I mean this:

Oh. Err...is that the same thing? That seems to show redundant persuasion (or is it intimidate that's blue?) checks. While it's kind of silly and pointless if they both lead to the same outcome, I was more criticizing the fact that dialogue checks related to different skills did the same things. I just think it's lazy design, that's all. And it really shows through in light of real alternatives like the science method in Trouble on the Homefront, another excellent quest. I mean, they did a great science alternative or two there that played very differently from the other options available, but when dealing with President Eden in the big climatic showdown, science, speech, and everything else feels exactly the same and has pretty much exactly the same outcome.

It wasn't a sandbox game. For a story-driven, dialogue-heavy game like BG fetch quests are a sin. For a sandbox game they are not.

This....is interesting. Can you say "another wall of text at the end of the post"?

Still, I dare say that FO3 quests were much, much deeper and better than BG or Mass Effect quests.

Some of them, yes. Many of them, however, were your typical Mass Effect (only two real choices) quest, and a handful were straight out of the Baldur's Gate 1 playbook.

My first. I didn't plan it. I simply had a trackload of points (more points that I knew what to do with), and when I opportunities presented themselves, I bumped up the relevant skills.

Alright, I can buy that, especially with Fallout 2's goofy game design in many areas.

For example, I had 40 points in Doctor when I accessed the medical computer and it said that I didn't find anything useful but in such a manner that it was clear that I could have found something useful. So increased the skill until I hit it. It was even easier to figure out what you need to get the synthetic brain.

That's a pretty impressive first run getting into Vault 8 and the Sierra Army Depot. Maybe I'm just really clumsy in RPGs though. I pissed Lynnette off and blew my chance at citizenship, screwed up with Bishop's man in Vault City, and became a made man with the Salvatore family, nixing any chance of getting in with the Wrights.

I can believe it though. Fallout 2 had too many experience resources.

My point was that there weren't a lot of skills to spend points on in FO2, so you either keep increasing gun skills way past the point it stops making sense, or sit on a pile of points and look for something interesting to do with them.

Yeah, Fallout 2 really needed a level cap or a little less of an experience tidal wave for combat characters.

Assuming that's possible, it requires exploring everything and getting every bobblehead and skill book, which are all over the place.

Sort of. With max intelligence, educated taken ASAP, and some wise perk/skill selection it wouldn't be that hard to max most of the skills. Especially if a player took the perk that doubles skill book rewards, seeing as skill books are everywhere. You probably wouldn't even need the bobbleheads to max the skills. The stats would probably require them though. This a pretty pointless piece of info though.

If someone is willing to spend 100 hours (unless you know exactly where to go and is able to get there) to max all skills, who cares?

My point was just that Fallout 3's character system, even when not pushed, becomes too much of a jack of all trades thing. I felt that was bad, and criticized it. Just like Morrowind/Oblivion gravitate way too much to the fighter/mage/thief characters being way too good, and way too easy for any character to fall into, Fallout 3 kind of makes it so every character can be a smooth-talking Rambo with a penchant for repairing, hacking, and lockpicking. Kind of kills the idea of replay value if all characters feel very similar, and tend to make most Bethesda games an affair where you explore as much as you please with one character and then drop the game forever.

Daggerfall combated this with it's unique trait system that could make characters radically different. It's something Bethesda would be wise to pick back up if they're going to keep making the same style of games.

It kinda comes with that whole sandbox - do whatever you want for as long as you want - thing.

Yeah, but it's one element where the RPG side clashes greatly with the sandbox side, wouldn't you agree?

I didn't say that. However, I couldn't help but notice that you didn't mention that Fallout 2 had a truckload of flaws in your reviews and that many things you weren't happy with in FO3 were also present in FO2.

This wasn't a Fallout 2 review though. I could go on and on about some of the boneheaded design decisions in Fallout 2, but I had plenty to discuss with just Fallout 3. And I still don't see how that makes Fallout 3 any less flawed, in that it shares flaws with the previous installment. Maybe I should have sounded a little harsher on Fallout 2 in the intro?

Unlike Fallout perks? Kama Sutra master? Empathy? Gambler? Fortune Finder?

I don't know, when Awareness was usually the top pick early on, a lot of the low level perks seemed less useless in comparison. A perk with a few dialogue options (kama sutra master) when compared to something that let perceptive characters see HP totals is a little less useless seeming than a skill perk compared to Gifted V2 (Intense Training) or Black Widow/Lady Killer.

Anyway, radiation and Rad-Aways weren't a problem in the first two games either. There was no reason to take the Rad Resistance perk.

I know. It's just that when Todd Howard and crew made a big fuss about survival elements and how radiation would matter, and it didn't really matter it sems like a huge missed opportunity.

It wasn't that restrictive. There were a handful of perks that required character planning and high stats.

There were a few perks in Fallout that, depending on what you chose at the beginning, you might never be able to get. No perk, save the gender dependent ones are really out of reach in Fallout 3. Is that a good thing? I tend to lean on the side of no.

In other words, you are too focused on the beginning of the game and unable to see beyond that.

Not really. The dumbness cuts through all parts of the game. Early on with Megaton, Three Dog, the Family, the supervillians, and Dr. Lesko. Mid-game with the Brotherhood (though the part about the Pit was kind of a cool backstory, I will admit), Lamplight, the stunning failure to live up to potential in many of the locations, replicant freedom activists, nuka cola museum, and such. And the ending with Raven Rock, the Enclave, and Project Purity is some of the most sloppy writing I've seen in a game. So many holes....

Sure, there is some decent writing, and a few snippets of generally good writing, but it's buried in bad stuff. It just seems like they had a potluck writing session around the offices.

Btw, that "assuming I checked the store and wasn't distracted" line was lulzy. An adventurer who doesn't check all stores? Riiight.

I don't know. I walked in the clinic to cure an addiction and picked up two quests, Reilly's Rangers and The Replicated Man. One was supposedly urgent, so I went to do that, and I didn't come back to Underworld until much later to pick up You Gotta Shoot Em In The Head. I mean, I guess it's probably silly of me to expect Bethesda to actually put a real time limit on a quest, but I was really trying that open mind thing....

Anyway, there is a difference between "I've never bought any schematics because I was more than happy with my existing arsenal" and "schematics weapons are shit! Shit, I tells ya!".

And there's also a difference between "Schematic weapons were useless in comparison" with a little backup of why I found them to be and "Schematic weapons are shit". A chinese pistol or pool cue is shit; schematic weapons, not so much. I'll admit my language may have been a bit harsh, but I still can't see them as anything but marginally useful, save the shishkebab, which is the top melee weapon apparently.

Kinda no. You were reviewing the game. You weren't supposed to breathe through it, missing shit and replacing it with false assumptions.

Errr....by "breezing through" I meant I was encountering no opposition; no difficulty. I did go at a rather brisk clip later on, but that was because I was getting bored by the dungeons.

Your job, when you decided to write that review was explaining little Timmy what the game was like and helping him form an accurate opinion of the game and decide whether the game is for him.

Uhhhh, no. The reason I wrote this was because I didn't get why everyone and their brother, including you, seemed to like this game a lot. I didn't like it that much, so I decided to organize my impressions and write them up. I figured it might fit on the Codex, and sent it in to be checked up on and maybe posted.

How would you rate your effort?

Honestly, not anywhere near herculean, but not a total hack job. Somewhere a little above average maybe?

I know I'm giving you a hard time, but that's because you could have done so much fucking better. I expected more from your review.

Whatever you say. Maybe had I more of an opportunity to do some of the debating we're doing here beforehand to flesh out and check my impressions I could have. Maybe had a been less of a bonehead and made a few slight errors, whether factual or lingual. Guess I'm kinda a dialectical guy.

Better style, better flow

That's one of those things that either comes or only kind of comes when writing. The faucet was a little clogged I suppose.

better arguments

Errr, I think I had this one decently down. I mean, I was arguing it wasn't a good RPG or Fallout sequel, and that it wasn't a very good game by the fact that a majority of gameplay lie in doing something the developers don't do well.

The arguments seemed solid, just whether or not they are in the proper context is the debate right? The whole judge as a sandbox versus judge as an RPG versus judge as Fallout we have going on, no?

more open mindedness and less bias.

I did go in with an open mind, but asking me to leave the game with one defeats the point of a review, doesn't it? Aren't I supposed to argue and exposit why or why I didn't find the game good/bad/indifferent?

Really? I've played the game for 40+ hours. Not a lot for a sandbox game

Really? That's a lot to me for one playthrough of any game that doesn't have SirTech on the box. I go very quickly through games though. Not rushing, per se, just cutting a lot of small elements that add up out, like not looking through containers that won't have anything useful.

I think I did ok.

I'm just saying, with full information from the Wiki or such, all but the absolute best weapons become useless.

No. You should have realized (when you have found the schematics) that you could have found them earlier

I guess. But wouldn't I realize that with just about anything then? I mean, to get either of the two schematics I would have had to either fight through two floors of mutants and a floor of tough robots, or if I could fight through to Underworld, it wouldn't have been much of a leap to off a few Feral Ghouls for Lincoln's Repeater, would it?

It still seems like the railway rifle is only useful in a certain game position assuming a few coincidental events.

and that someone who's doing the main quest definitely will.

How? Stealing Independence and the Underworld location aren't connected in any way.

BG isn't a sandbox game.

Wait for it.

Agree with pretty much everything, but I don't think the combat was mediocre. It was good, in my opinion.

I guess. It's was good in small doses (which it was delivered in), but quickly became boring seeing as it didn't have much depth compared to other turn-based tactical combat systems. It needed a lot more stuff to do, like "power"/"aimed" attacks with more AP, or quick attacks with less a la Jagged Alliance, and maybe some more disabling stuff besides hitting and shooting, like flashbangs, smoke grenades, or maybe nets. Basically, if it did what AoD was doing (last time I checked), it would have been a lot better.

That's the sandbox. That's what Daggerfall, a top 10 Codex RPG, was all about. Killing and looting. That's what Morrowind, a game on many Codex admins' top 10 list, was about. That's what the Gothic series was about. Exploring to find more stuff to kill and loot.

It looks like you simply aren't a fan of the sub-genre.

Well....no....the problem isn't that I don't like killing and looting, it's that killing and looting is done very badly in Fallout 3, just like it was done badly in Morrowind and Oblivion. Oblivion didn't have anything else to offer, so it was a wash, and Morrowind could be broken so much that killing became either unnecessary or merely 1 click, allowing you to explore the other goodies it had, like the lore, characters, quests, and story. Fallout 3 doesn't have that much else besides the looting and killing, and it can't be skipped like Morrowind to let me have fun with the rest of it.

And what of other sandboxes outside of the Bethesda style, like the Ultimas, with a huge focus on world interactivity and detail? Did they need killing and looting as their bread and butter?

I think it's fair to say that this question has been answered quite a few times already.

Really? That good? I should give it a try.

I'm talking about the first one, as I haven't yet touched the second. It's good, like a wartime GTA with the really cool ability to buy stuff and get it airdropped in. Vehicles are fun to drive around in and shoot stuff, and missions are well done. Coming up with your own solutions is fun too. Maybe utilize a sneaky approach to an assassination by taking a helicopter up to a hill to snipe a target, or if you don't mind factions being pissed at you and paying money to cover up collateral damage, call down an airstrike on his location. It's a console game though, and has a lot of their annoyances. There's definitely flaws too, like your merc being able to take goofy amounts of damage, suicidal North Korean AI, wonky physics, and an easily broken faction system.

It's pretty cheap now, being a previous generation console game. Though the console issue may be a problem for you. I assume you might not have one.

Never claimed that it wasn't. I made a guess. If you say that I'm wrong, I'll say that I guessed wrong and that it's just a coincidence.

Fair enough.

If I have to guess a bit more, I'd say that you were certain that Fallout 3 would be a shitty game because everything pointed to it and the setting looked really fucked up. Then you saw that people whose opinion you couldn't ignore are seemingly enjoying it and definitely not hating it. That confused you. You tried to understand, you asked questions, but you just couldn't accept the answers. Then you played the game, but you looked for proofs that you were right and the game was bad, thus ignoring or dismissing most good things about the game.

Not exactly. I had negative expectations. Saw some people liking it, wondered why, and asked. Got an opportunity to play it,and took it, while trying my best to enjoy it. Ultimately, a lot of the flaws built up, and it left a negative impression at the end.

It's teh intarnets. Anyway, I meant no offense. If you think I crossed some line, I apologize. Honestly. I hope that you won't stay away from our forums in the future. I do like your posts.

It just opens a pandora's box that seems to make everyone eventually suffer some ill effects. Don't worry though. I can easily take it, I just don't want to have to start digging through post histories and all that. I'm lazy....

Now back to...

BG isn't a sandbox game.

See....this confuses me a bit. See, according to you, Fallout 3 is a sandbox game. Let's assume I accept that. Now I start thinking, and I realize BG and Fallout 3 are markedly similar to one another in terms of some higher level design decisions. I mean, both are RPGs with a small, linear main quest with a few points of non-linearity woven in. Both get the meat of the gameplay from hack and loot exploration. Both have a majority of the areas unlocked, with some additional areas unlocked via quests. Both games end upon completion of the main quest, and both sort of nudge the player into putting it off until they've done everything they want to do.

The focus on storyline thing would make sense, except that BG1 and Fallout 3 seem to have an equal amount of focus on their respective main stories, and more focus on creating a lot of stuff to adventure around in. Since I liked, Alex's definition of sandboxing so much, I'm going to pull some of his ideas out into this to maybe help me clarify my confusion.

It feels like the player is in a normal town (as far as a fantasy medieval town can be normal) with normal people in it. While the game has a story that the player needs to follow (in an exact order, by the way), there is a lot to explore in the towns, talking to the people and finding what they are like, what they want.

In fallout, the people and their stories seem much more centered on the storyline. While the player is given a lot of choice in who to speak and what to do in the quests, the actions that the player can take in deciding any one quest and what he finds exploring each town is much more driven by the narrative. Even subquests inside a town are frequently tied to the narrative of the town, like shady sands, where most quests show how the small community has trouble surviving.

This really seems to kind of parallel your ideas on how sandboxing and story-driven are different, and it explains it well. It makes me understand why certain games are "sandbox" and others aren't. I can see why BG2, despite a huge focus on exploration, isn't a sandbox, because most of the locales are deeply intertwined with a narrative. Like the Windspear Hills is all about the Firkraag quest, the Temple Ruins all about the Shade quest, and so on. His Fallout examples make a lot of sense here too. All the quests in the Boneyard revolve around the gangs and not really on just checking in on individuals in a world.

But Baldur's Gate 1 seems to go starkly against this. Side quests aren't tied to area narratives, they're just kind of there. It's the player interacting with people and things that just so happen to be there. I go into a building in the city for shits and giggles, and I could stumble upon hostile magical constructs that seem very out of place. If I choose to fight this hard battle, and explore enough, I find a mage who demands to know what I'm doing here. I can potentially get a job, some information, or kill the mage. Or maybe I go thieving, break into a house, and find other thieves there; thieves who aren't happy to see me. Plenty of stuff like this that is completely unrelated to anything story-wise and begs to be explored is strewn throughout Baldur's Gate 1. Whether or not it's good is a matter for another 10-page megathread, but is this not the definition of good sandboxing? Stuff to explore, lots of it, and a focus on it?

It's this intangibility of what exactly sandbox is that seems to make me a little wary of comparing Fallout 3 to only "sandbox" games because it might not tell very much and it could mean a lot of different things to different people. What is not sandbox to you, could be sandbox to others. Or perhaps sandbox is not a genre or sub-genre, with demands of it's own, but a design element, like "choices and consequences". Maybe sandbox elements are in just about every RPG, but some choose to be heavier on them than others just like some choose to go heavier on choices and consequences. Seems kind o reasonable to me, and a decent enough reason to maybe consider not partitioning a few games off as their own genre without a real solid basis.

 

[St. Toxic]

Everyone wants to "be cool."

I'm too cool to be wanting to "be cool".

 

[DefJam101]

 

[Andyman Messiah]

While this thread entertains me, definitely even more than the FF7-debacle, I fear for the future. Will there be enough material left for ten pages more? I think you should leave some arguing for later, just in case you run out.

COME ON, THREAD!! YOU CAN DO IT!! TEN MORE PAGES, TEN MORE PAGES!!