For those who played Fallout 2 before playing Fallout

[bhlaab]

Yep. Quests like "give the ghost its locket", "deliver a meal to Smitty", or "find a book I lost somewhere" always surprise me with the depth of their design.

Oh come on, you can do that for any game. "Kill all the scorpions".

What I mean is that a few of the more complicated quests in Fallout 1 felt tenuous and breakable, the whole thing was significantly less balanced for multiple character builds, etc.

And? The right hand man can't be a villain?

A villain but not THE villain, unless he's actively breaking out of his right hand man role.

 

[Carlos' Bitch1]

I prefer Fallout 1. Despite the slightly clunkier interface, and the small size of the game, it does not break the walls that Fallout 2 does. I still enjoyed Fallout 2 (at least, after the patch finally came out), but Fallout is a much better game that keeps everything within context and gets across the "morbid" feeling a lot better. A much more memorable experience.

Not as good as Wasteland though.

 

[hakuroshi]

I readily admit that FO1 is a better game and has more coherent design. Emotionally it is more "touching".
Still FO2 was more fun to me and I ended playing it twice more then FO1. I wonder if I played FO1 first what I'd say?
Playing FO2 is more "fun" but it is a different kind of fun then in FO1, more like fooling around in good company then following a good story/ setting.

 

[Fat Dragon]

Yep. Quests like "give the ghost its locket", "deliver a meal to Smitty", or "find a book I lost somewhere" always surprise me with the depth of their design.

Oh come on, you can do that for any game. "Kill all the scorpions".

That was actually a well-designed quest since if you actually bother to use your head you'll discover that you don't have to fight a single one of the little fuckers and can instead just simply collapse the cave on them.

As for what everybody has been saying about F2 being better because it has more content...Well, I personally prefer to experience a decent amount of well-designed content throughout the entirety of the game than just have a fuck ton of shit with a few gems buried in it here and there.

 

[1eyedking]

Deep. And in Diablo, the main villain isn't Diablo, but the society which failed to leave the soulstone alone and stay the fuck away from it. I get it now. Your clarification was very helpful.

Btw:
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/villain

"a character in a play, novel, or the like, who constitutes an important evil agency in the plot."

The Enclave isn't a villain. It's an organization [with a really dumb goal]. Do the Enclave troopers give a fuck about this goal? No. Would the Enclave remain a threat as long as a single trooper lives? No. Would killing 100 troopers have any effect on the Enclave operations or the game? No. Does killing Frankie end the game? Yes, it does. Is he evil? Yes, because we are shown how MWAHAHAHA evil he is in the beginning of the game. Ergo, he is the villain.

Your rebuttal.

Discussing with VD is helpless. At no point he will admit defeat. In fact, his unwarranted self-importance and linear thought pattern will lead him to resort to dictionary definitions only proving he can't grasp the concept of metonymy.

Frank Horrigan is nothing but a big muscle of the Enclave. Metagame? A boss fight to end the game in high climax. You can also turn the turrets against him, making it really cheesy.

I now expect your usual servomechanical response.

Yep. Quests like "give the ghost its locket", "deliver a meal to Smitty", or "find a book I lost somewhere" always surprise me with the depth of their design.

So does "Clear the Radscorpion caves". Every RPG needs quick & dirty XP sources, not every NPC needs to be a "Save Modoc"-like quest vending machine.

And? The right hand man can't be a villain?

He is a lesser villain. The true villain is the Enclave, the U.S. government, represented by the President (in a vicious republican sense), with its self-righteous clauses for Vault experimentation, genocide and unfettered extermination.

Methinks you've missed the point of the whole game.

He isn't saying "almost the same thing as the president". In fact - if you pay attention - his points are the opposite, which is what makes his position reasonable and him not as evil as he may appear initially. His position makes sense. The president's position is stupid bullshit that can easily compete with and fit right into Fallout 3 design.

Again missing the point. Jesus Christ, VD, how much can you fail? Take a lookie here.

 

[Barrow_Bug]

+1

 

[bhlaab]

Oh come on, you can do that for any game. "Kill all the scorpions".
That was actually a well-designed quest since if you actually bother to use your head you'll discover that you don't have to fight a single one of the little fuckers and can instead just simply collapse the cave on them.

I don't think it is particularly well designed because that path is all but hidden to people who don't investigate every wall tile (or who have read a walkthrough written by someone who has)

As for what everybody has been saying about F2 being better because it has more content...Well, I personally prefer to experience a decent amount of well-designed content throughout the entirety of the game than just have a fuck ton of shit with a few gems buried in it here and there.

Right, and I think that F2 has more and they're as a whole better. Win/win.

 

[Jaesun]

I still and re-play both of them, despite any flaws in either of them.

 

[Kavax]

Yep. Quests like "give the ghost its locket", "deliver a meal to Smitty", or "find a book I lost somewhere" always surprise me with the depth of their design.

This is just some small stuff in the beggining of the game. There are plenty of good quests (The Gecko nuclear power plant, Ghost Farm, the murder investigation in New Reno, all the business with the Raiders, the politics in places like Redding or Vault 15...)

 

[Silellak]

All this arguing over FO1 vs. FO2, while the obviously superior FO3 is staring all of you right in the face.

Sad.

 

[entertainer]

r00fles!

 

[Fat Dragon]

Oh come on, you can do that for any game. "Kill all the scorpions".
That was actually a well-designed quest since if you actually bother to use your head you'll discover that you don't have to fight a single one of the little fuckers and can instead just simply collapse the cave on them.

I don't think it is particularly well designed because that path is all but hidden to people who don't investigate every wall tile (or who have read a walkthrough written by someone who has)

Oh, I see. So it's not well-designed because it doesn't clearly point out all solutions for you? It's a good quest that rewards those who bother to observe their surroundings and think of what a stick of dynamite can be used for by giving them a quick and easy solution to the job.

Right, and I think that F2 has more and they're as a whole better. Win/win.

While Fallout has a smaller number of quests to take, the majority are all very good across the board. F2, on the other hand, has entire towns full of nothing but shitty content. When you cover up all the shit content in F2 it has about as many good quests as F1, just they're all buried in layers of shit.

 

[1eyedking]

Oh, I see. So it's not well-designed because it doesn't clearly point out all solutions for you? It's a good quest that rewards those who bother to observe their surroundings and think of what a stick of dynamite can be used for by giving them a quick and easy solution to the job.

True. But this also happens on many an instance in Fallout 2: one way to murder Carlson in NCR is to get an explosive, set the timer to 10 seconds, plant the bomb on the senator's son and send him to say hello to his daddy.

Not at all obvious, but genius quest design nonetheless (and much deeper and psychotic than your 'intelligently' collapse cave stuff). Fuck your "F2 had lame quests" nonsense.

 

[Double Ogre]

Fallout 2 has more content

How about quality over quantity? Talk about low standards.

Fallout 2 is more fun

More like it's so randum roflmao xD xD.

This thread is the key to understanding the nature of Codexers and their tastes.

 

[Darth Roxor]

All of Fallout 2's cities are better than the ones from Fallout 1.

 

[Kavax]

More like it's so randum roflmao xD xD.

And randomness is a bad thing? Because if it is, then Planescape is the worst setting ever.

 

[Vault Dweller]

He's saying almost the same thing as the president in Fallout 2, only that you don't get the option of joining him.

No, he's not. I've played the classics quite a while ago, so I may have forgotten something, but while the Master's reasons had that kind of Machiavellian reason behind them, Enclave's reasoning was completely flawed. Master talked about unity and getting rid of divisions, the Enclave wanted to commit genocide on a huge scale just because it deemed the people on the mainland to be 'corrupted'.

Exactly.

I let my evidence speak for itself.

What evidence? Two screens showing the Master when he starts losing his sanity/manifest multiple personalities?

No, it's exactly the same. Both want one "race" (Super Mutants in the case of the Master, "unradiated humans" in the case of Richardson) to prevail over the other.

sigh

The questions are what race and why.

Fallout 1 - a survivor of the nuclear war falls into a vat of military virus that transforms him, making him stronger and smarter, and granting him psionic abilities. The Master thinks that the NEW race is the future, since they are better suited to the PA life. The Unity thing will "finally eliminate the differences and the human fallacies that ultimately brought about the nuclear war."

Fallout 2 - the President wants to eradicate all mutants, and since most life is mutated, it means that he wants to destroy all life on the planet. You'd think that a strong faction that managed to survive the post-apocalypse would have better things to do than trying to exterminate what's left of life in the fucking wasteland. Like, seriously. It doesn't make sense. I can see him thinking that the pure humans are the new master race and all mutants, even the ones that look normal, are sub-humans and slaves, and the Enclave would need a lot of slaves to start rebuilding, but that's not the case, which is why their plan is nothing but "we want to destroy all life because we are teh evil!"

 

[bhlaab]

Oh, I see. So it's not well-designed because it doesn't clearly point out all solutions for you? It's a good quest that rewards those who bother to observe their surroundings and think of what a stick of dynamite can be used for by giving them a quick and easy solution to the job.

No, it's because it doesn't clearly point out the possibility of a solution. There is no visual indication that the structure of the wall is weak, no off texture, not even a rickety support beam. The player is given no reason to click it, unless you click every single wall in the game. That's not rewarding outside the box thinking or supporting multiple character builds, that's making the player do guesswork.

 

[Ion Flux]

I played FO2 first but I agree with pretty much everything VD said because I want him to be my friend. I still think FO2 is an awesome game despite it's flaws, but I think I would feel similar to VD if I had played FO first. So I guess I'm glad I didn't because it allowed me to have more fun with both of them.

 

[Kthan75]

Personally, after many replays, I've learned to enjoy both games for what they are.

FO1: better story, consistent setting, higher emotional impact
FO2: (much) more content, lulz

It's a different kind of fun, depends on what you're in the mood for.

 

[Kavax]

No, he's not. I've played the classics quite a while ago, so I may have forgotten something, but while the Master's reasons had that kind of Machiavellian reason behind them, Enclave's reasoning was completely flawed. Master talked about unity and getting rid of divisions, the Enclave wanted to commit genocide on a huge scale just because it deemed the people on the mainland to be 'corrupted'.

Exactly.

The Master also wanted to commit genocide on a large scale (You even see a gory cutscene if you tell him the location of your vault) How is his speech about unity any different from the Enclave president rambling about the dangers of radiated humans and the purity of the Enclave humans? Besides, the Master's plan is flawed, you can even convince him that it's flawed.

I let my evidence speak for itself.

What evidence? Two screens showing the Master when he starts losing his sanity/manifest multiple personalities?

Yeah, the villains of both games are actually quite insane.

No, it's exactly the same. Both want one "race" (Super Mutants in the case of the Master, "unradiated humans" in the case of Richardson) to prevail over the other.

sigh

The questions are what race and why.

Fallout 1 - a survivor of the nuclear war falls into a vat of military virus that transforms him, making him stronger and smarter, and granting him psionic abilities. The Master thinks that the NEW race is the future, since they are better suited to the PA life. The Unity thing will "finally eliminate the differences and the human fallacies that ultimately brought about the nuclear war."

And kill anyone who disagrees with his plans. And mutating people with a process that makes most of them stupid and sterile.

Fallout 2 - the President wants to eradicate all mutants, and since most life is mutated, it means that he wants to destroy all life on the planet. You'd think that a strong faction that managed to survive the post-apocalypse would have better things to do than trying to exterminate what's left of life in the fucking wasteland. Like, seriously. It doesn't make sense. I can see him thinking that the pure humans are the new master race and all mutants, even the ones that look normal, are sub-humans and slaves, and the Enclave would need a lot of slaves to start rebuilding, but that's not the case, which is why their plan is nothing but "we want to destroy all life because we are teh evil!"

The President also says at one point in the dialogue that the radiated humans and the pure humans can't coexist because of their differences (This was one of The Master's points by the way) his plan is to kill everyone in post-apocalyptic California, yes, but he plans on repopulating the place with the pure humans

 

[dolio]

No, it's because it doesn't clearly point out the possibility of a solution. There is no visual indication that the structure of the wall is weak, no off texture, not even a rickety support beam. The player is given no reason to click it, unless you click every single wall in the game. That's not rewarding outside the box thinking or supporting multiple character builds, that's making the player do guesswork.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but when you first walk into the cave, don't you get a message in your little pip boy screen at the bottom saying something about the cave wall? That's fairly hard to notice, unless you're hyper sensitive to the slight noise that goes along with that, but I thought there was such an indication.

Of course, I never noticed it until I saw someone here mention it.

 

[Double Ogre]

More like it's so randum roflmao xD xD.

And randomness is a bad thing? Because if it is, then Planescape is the worst setting ever.

Not necessarily a bad thing. The Planescape setting was based around randomness (and it worked quite well), although everything had to meet certain standards. In FO2's case, however, a coherent, already established setting got filled to the brim with lame pop culture references, in attempt to make it lulzy and more appealing to the younger crowd. Wanna quotes from movies and shows in every dialog? Check. Wanna gangsters? Check. Wanna aliens? Check. Wanna kung-fu fighters? Check. Wanna talking animals? Check. Wanna lots of tasteless sex? Check. Check. Check.

Sorry, I just prefer a more sophisticated experience.

 

[FeelTheRads]

And kill anyone who disagrees with his plans. And mutating people with a process that makes most of them stupid and sterile.

Except he didn't know. When shown his mistake he gives up. Not really that insane. Plus, the Enclave doesn't even try to work with the rest of the population.

Yeah, the villains of both games are actually quite insane.

LAWL. And the one in Arcanum too!

 

[Vault Dweller]

Yep. Quests like "give the ghost its locket", "deliver a meal to Smitty", or "find a book I lost somewhere" always surprise me with the depth of their design.

Oh come on, you can do that for any game. "Kill all the scorpions".

It's been explained already. The dynamite option, missed by most people, makes it a simple, but very well designed quest.

A villain but not THE villain, unless he's actively breaking out of his right hand man role.

Well, who is THE villain then? The president? The president is an info-dump character. He exists to tell you about what's going on and confirm that the plot is actually stupid. You don't "deal" with him. You listen to what he has to say, get the access code, leave.

The scientist? He's doing what he's told. The real answer is simple. The game is poorly designed and Frankie is the only one who qualifies for the villain role, which is why we are shown what a horrible person he is early in the game. Sad, but true.