Editorial Escapist Magazine on Fallout 3: It's just not that great.

[DarkUnderlord]

Tags: Fallout 3

<a href="http://www.escapistmagazine.com/articles/view/editorials/op-ed/5569-Fallout-Boy">The Escapist Magazine have a bit of an editorial type thing about Fallout 3</a>. They get all nostalgic like:
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<blockquote>At the start I was prepared to divorce all my other games and devote my time to a richly developed world full of emergent gameplay and endless distractions. After a night or two, I began to feel the hollowness of the relationship running ragged at the edges, and by the final climax with a bad guy I cared nothing about - a trivially simple encounter - I was just glad to be done with the whole thing.
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It's not you, Fallout. It's me. I was just looking for a different kind of relationship right now, and sure we had some fun for a few nights, but I don't think you're really the kind of game I'm looking to settle down with.
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Here's the problem. Like I said, I'm a Fallout fan, and along with my occasionally ill-tempered peers I remain unable to get past my infatuation with a PC gaming industry that is by all measures entirely different. I realize the popular thing to say here is that PC gaming is dead, but if we're going to impart anthropomorphism on such a nebulous concept, perhaps we would be better served by saying that PC gaming has had plastic surgery, hormone therapy and new age psychotherapy. For those of us that liked PC gaming's old identity and personality, disfiguring scars and all, this new and clinically improved identity is tough to reconcile. After all, it's sleeping with the consoles now, and I'm a jealous and jilted lover of the more traditional concepts of isometric viewpoints and turn-based play.
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Bethesda was unapologetic in saying that it wasn't really making Fallout 3 for Fallout fans, exactly. To be fair, the Fallout community, already known for being a tad on the unstable side, reacted with a kind of venom and incredulity that only reinforced the validity of Bethesda's decisions. Even now, combining the ideas of Fallout 3 dissatisfaction and being a Fallout fan runs the risk of seeming anachronistic and hysterical, so let me say this: Fallout 3 is not a bad game.
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It's just not that great.</blockquote>
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Deep.
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Spotted @ <a href="http://www.gamebanshee.com">GameBanshee</a>

 

[Vibalist]

And this is probably coming after a glowing review, right?

Don't get me wrong, it's still a cool piece and all, but I can't help thinking of all the gaming journalists pointing out Oblivions flaws prior to Fallout 3's release while doing nothing of the sort in their reviews of the game.

 

[Claw]

I'm too busy testing Bethout mods to read this.

 

[Disconnected]

What I don't understand, is why everyone and their damn dog keeps repeating that "you just can't do TB today, but it was cool back then".

As far as I know, the only things that have changed, are:
1. PCs have become many times more powerful.
2. There are now many times more TB implementations to learn from, get inspired by & rip off.

Shouldn't people be saying the opposite? Or am I missing something?

 

[flushfire]

because console kids will not like it. which makes me wonder why final fantasy tactics was a big hit and why robot wars spawned a gazillion sequels.

 

[Disconnected]

because console kids will not like it. which makes me wonder why final fantasy tactics was a big hit and why robot wars spawned a gazillion sequels.

Indeed. It's funny how TB never seems to be a problem until someone needs to divert attention from the lack of good arguments* for RT.

It's like fucking creationism. "But everyone knows evolution is just a theory!" Eh... Yeah. Now what exactly does that have to do with anything?


*Not implying RT isn't perfectly nice, just that it isn't always preferable.

 

[Turok]

because console kids will not like it. which makes me wonder why final fantasy tactics was a big hit and why robot wars spawned a gazillion sequels.

Because the anime girls with little skirts.

 

[Lurkar]

because console kids will not like it. which makes me wonder why final fantasy tactics was a big hit and why robot wars spawned a gazillion sequels.

Because turn based doesn't fit the formula for making games that most western game companies use. There's plenty of money to be made in turn based, but companies are growing more and more conservative with what types of games they fund, and they think turn based is too risky.

 

[Turok]

All industry is just trying to reach the moment when a video card (or a chip of video card inserted on a cpu) can imitate how we see the reallity, after that, who know what comes. All kind of simulations posible? :D

There is no place for turn based on reality.

brb going to read what offer directx11, i guess we will see real stuff when directx92 come out.

 

[pkt-zer0]

because console kids will not like it. which makes me wonder why final fantasy tactics was a big hit and why robot wars spawned a gazillion sequels.

For something called Final Fantasy Tactics, it's not hard to see the reason. And doesn't SRW pull stuff from various anime and manga franchises?

Maybe branded games are the way to go? Batman: The Dark Knight Tactics? An X-COM clone based on the Aliens franchise? Tom Clancy's Jagged Alliance?

 

[Talby]

An Aliens Tactics game would actually be pretty cool. Still, we've already got Incubation.

 

[Shoelip]

Hm, the Front Mission series seems to do pretty well. Same with Advance Wars, and many of Atlus's titles. Kessen, and other Koei turn based tactical games did well as far as I know. Kessen had two sequels released over here.

From my experience it seems like Lurkar is on the right track.

 

[Seboss]

King's Bounty.

 

[Herbert West]

All industry is just trying to reach the moment when a video card (or a chip of video card inserted on a cpu) can imitate how we see the reallity, after that, who know what comes. All kind of simulations posible?

Rapelay 3000 with full sensory feedback.

 

[Worm King]

The absence of TB combat and isometric view doesn't make FO 3 a bad game. It's the lack of towns, diplomacy and an over importance of combat and dungeons.

 

[Lightknight]

An Aliens Tactics game would actually be pretty cool. Still, we've already got Incubation.

Incubation isnt really Aliens-alike, but Space Hulk is. "Aliens Tactics" indeed, be it two real-time commercial games, one turn-based freeware, or turn-base tabletop original.

And doesn't SRW pull stuff from various anime and manga franchises?

So ? Its the mechanics that matter. Do you know just how many games Gundam franchise has ? About 50. Any of them good ? Maybe 5-6 on the consoles and a couple on the arcades, not counting SRW.

 

[Drakron]

why don't they releace FFX on PC i would paly it :>

:shock:

 

[BethesdaLove]

^
Yeah, you dont say. And the Codex is full of those 15 year old "i like kotor morrowind and ff" fucktards lately.

 

[hiver]

The absence of TB combat and isometric view doesn't make FO 3 a bad game. It's the lack of towns, diplomacy and an over importance of combat and dungeons.

But that what is replacing it - does.

 

[Herbert West]

It's just not that great.

BEHOLD THE NEW MESSIAH OF TRUSTWORTHY GAMING JOURNALISM!!!!!!

 

[Drakron]

^
Yeah, you dont say. And the Codex is full of those 15 year old "i like kotor morrowind and ff" fucktards lately.

Its more about wanting to play FF X ... I did and even if it had several good points there are better games with better voice acting, I still shiver when I recall "the laughing".

Heck you can experience the horror of that ...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BU8-e-C4Uy0

Of course it have delicious Rikku that gave birth to many ero doujin so it all balances out in the end.

 

[Disconnected]

The absence of TB combat and isometric view doesn't make FO 3 a bad game.

Neither the article nor I said so. The article asserted TB combat was cool 10 years ago, but not now. That's what I question.

Though in the case of FO3, the absence of decent combat and encounters, surely helps bring the game down. Not that TB in and of itself would help. The encounters would still suck, and of course, Bethesda have a fairly long & pretty consistent history of creating mind numbingly dull combat mechanics. I have no reason to think they'd be better at TB.

Finally, about the emphasis on various aspects of gameplay: we're talking about an Oblivion TC, not a sequel to the Fallout games. As such, it's pointless to discuss it in terms of the legacy of the Fallouts.

I don't believe there's such a thing as too much combat or too much dungeon crawling. What I do believe in, is having sufficient gameplay. Oblivion & the TC desperately lacks the latter. They have enough to keep a player entertained for 30 mins to an hour at a time, assuming long periods between play sessions. But that's it. Anyone who plays either for two hours straight will start to get bored. It's what happens when the gunplay is sloppy as fuck, the encounters mindless and repetitive, and the sum total of dungeon gameplay is "walk down corridor". The only surprise the game ever throws at the player, is the vault entrance of Lamplight, and that's nothing to do with gameplay, it's surprising simply because one doesn't usually expect to find obviously unfinished bits of dungeon in AAA titles.

 

[Demnogonis Saastuttaja]

Critics of turn-based mechanics are propably people who think that perfect games would be like tv series with reaction tests.

 

[DarkSign]

I'm waiting for VD and BN and others to come back around to the flip-flop of how it's not as "decent" as they first said it was.

Once a few thought-out reviews pointing out the real flaws (like this one sort of does), I'm sure the "we're cool because we're not hating the game" bit will die down.

 

[poocolator]

HO HO SO THE TRUTH COMES OUT