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I'd play the hell out of another Obsidian Fallout game (the word Fallout there is optional). I thought Bethesda were outsourcing the game to another company though, at least when the notion of one existing was raised ages ago they didn't specify the developer. I guess Obsidian could fit as their schedule is almost cleared (at least with those titles its announced).
The South's a blank slate for the most part. Fallout: Tactics 2 would have had the area as a crocodile infested jungle (on behalf of a malfunctioning G.E.C.K.), but I kind of doubt that they'd take that. If the game does exist though, I really fething hope Bethesda doesn't screw Obsidian again with the lack of development time (New Vegas was supposed to be larger - i.e. the East bank of the Colorado - Caesar's territory - was going to be playable, as were the Shi to have a limited role) and arbitrary bonus payments (which Obsidian are rather bitter about as they had to lay off a load of good staff as a result).
But man, a Fallout 4 with some actual structure and decent writing (plus a shred of consideration for the canon)? Phew...
What I'd really like to see it a Fallout game that moves away from the USA entirely. Head to somewhere like Paris or London or Berlin (you could do some cool stuff with an alternate history East/West Berlin), or even to somewhere completely removed like Australia which presumably would've been affected very differently by the radiation as (so far as I know) it wasn't part of the nuclear exchange.
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2017/01/19 13:34:20
Paradigm wrote: What I'd really like to see it a Fallout game that moves away from the USA entirely. Head to somewhere like Paris or London or Berlin (you could do some cool stuff with an alternate history East/West Berlin), or even to somewhere completely removed like Australia which presumably would've been affected very differently by the radiation as (so far as I know) it wasn't part of the nuclear exchange.
You really want mutated Australian wildlife? Isn't it bad enough already?
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Paradigm wrote: or even to somewhere completely removed like Australia which presumably would've been affected very differently by the radiation as (so far as I know) it wasn't part of the nuclear exchange.
I think its major cities would still have been on China's target list; chances are Australia would still have close ties to the West and America. I'd picture it a lot like the Mojave's landscape post war - not particularly affected directly by the Great War, but still affected.
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2017/01/19 13:50:28
Paradigm wrote: What I'd really like to see it a Fallout game that moves away from the USA entirely. Head to somewhere like Paris or London or Berlin (you could do some cool stuff with an alternate history East/West Berlin), or even to somewhere completely removed like Australia which presumably would've been affected very differently by the radiation as (so far as I know) it wasn't part of the nuclear exchange.
There was a Fallout game in the works by Josh Sawyer set in Europe. This was around the time Black Isle still had it in their gameplan to make Fallout 3, and had the plot of Fallout 4 written, along with Fallout Tactics II greenlit and an FPS being penned. The game would have been set Pre-War, and involved the character being a British special forces operative in Europe. Europe at the time had descended into warring states and sub-factions, so the player character would need to break through these, stealing vehicles along the way (abandoning each in turn as they broke down or ran out of fuel - fuel being what the whole war in Europe was over) until they eventually made it back to the UK.
Something Bethesda really, *really* downplays (but it is still quoted in their canon) is just how screwed up the world was. The America we see in the Fallout 4 opening scene is reflective of the ignorance the American people had been indoctrinated into, but the actual intro cutscene implies what the real America was like. Marshal law was declared months before the bombs fell. A third of the population were dead from an American created super plague (though they blamed it on the Chinese. F.E.V. was created to combat it, till the army found it could make super soldiers too. They wanted the Super Mutants to look like Captain America, but then the bombs dropped and radiation got into it). Its even implied that it was the US who shot first, having been losing the war (all the information we have about the rest of the world comes from US propaganda).
Main problem I still have with how Bethesda presents it all is we find these apocalyptic logs, skeletons, intact loot stashes and whatnot, even though it is 200+ years after the war. A lot of what they want to show off would work so much better if it was set a few decades after the war, instead of centuries.
I'd love to see a game set closer to post-war than these, feth I'd even settle for a remake of the first game, as stupid as that may be.
I also stand by an earlier statement that Bethesda has become the new id Software: they put out a game, it is okay (or just plain old mediocre) but works better as a demo of what you can do with their stuff, so other companies use it to make better games. Thankfully id has left this all behind with DOOM and the latest Wolfenstein game.
We could also do with more voice acting talent damn it! It's like the Elder Scrolls all over again, with a handful of voice actors doing all the voice lines, with not a lot of variety in delivery.
I don't think the world is ready for a version of America that managed to become such a massive, egotistical donkey-cave of a nation that it stands alone against the world. I mean, they annexed Canada forcefully, hoarded all resources for itself and yes, it is strongly implied that they launched first.
BrookM wrote: Main problem I still have with how Bethesda presents it all is we find these apocalyptic logs, skeletons, intact loot stashes and whatnot, even though it is 200+ years after the war. A lot of what they want to show off would work so much better if it was set a few decades after the war, instead of centuries.
I'd love to see a game set closer to post-war than these, feth I'd even settle for a remake of the first game, as stupid as that may be.
I think the 200+ year gap was to give them a lot of breathing space lore wise. They didn't want to be restricted by setting their games at the same time as past games.
Also, keep in mind that the very first game was set almost a century after the Great War, so your criticism of Bethesda must surely apply to Interplay too? I don't think its fair to blame this on Bethesda alone, this goes all the way back to the very start of the series. Fallout is a series that has ALWAYS required a great deal of suspension of disbelief. Its always been a bit wacky.
I also stand by an earlier statement that Bethesda has become the new id Software: they put out a game, it is okay (or just plain old mediocre) but works better as a demo of what you can do with their stuff, so other companies use it to make better games. Thankfully id has left this all behind with DOOM and the latest Wolfenstein game.
Can't argue with that. I think what Bethesda does well, is breaking new ground and developing new tech. As far as the Fallout series is concerned, I think it'll work well if Bethesda comes up with new engines and experiments with game mechanics (Fallout 4 engine, new perk system, settlements, dialogue system and the fully animated real time dialogue, voiced protagonist etc) then hands Fallout off to another developer like Obsidian to do a spin off game that refines and builds upon Bethesda's work.
We could also do with more voice acting talent damn it! It's like the Elder Scrolls all over again, with a handful of voice actors doing all the voice lines, with not a lot of variety in delivery
I quite like the voice acting, but more variety in voice actors is always good.
I wouldn't mind seeing a Ghoul or Android character turning up from Canada one day. It'd turn out that the British weren't too happy about the whole invasion thing and'd had been sabotaging the Americans as well.
Oh, and remember the US annexed Mexico as well.
As for the general lack of disrepair. Aye, mods tend to go in and remove all the random loot which is literally just lying out there (I was mildly pissed that one gun store in 4 has guns and ammo still on the counter. FFS at least have a locked armoury or something as the excuse why nobody's broken into the place). However the first two games weren't as bad for it, perhaps because of the lack of detail in the graphics. Though on that note, the West Coast setting is much more progressive than Bethesda's. Whilst the world is screwed, out there we still see plenty of trees and people were forming proper settlements rather quickly. Instead though Bethesda wanted a mass market appeal post-apocalyptic setting, so everything's stuck in a kind of limbo out on the East Coast for the most part oddly (I'd take their excuse of the Super Mutant Vault, had they actually bothered to give the Super Mutants any sort of development. That still doesn't explain what they're doing in Fallout 4 though).
Whilst Fallout 4's enjoyable enough, having the Black Isle/ Obsidian games out there tends to spoil it a bit for how low effort it comes across in comparison. The same goes comparing any of the recent Elder Scrolls games with the Witcher series. :/
I loved the gun store in New Reno(?) in Fallout 2, where the shopkeeper was smart enough to keep everything locked away, though he was also far off enough that you could kill him and rob his store with nobody noticing.
Fallout has gotten awfully generic though yes. It would probably greatly benefit from having someone in control of the fluff again, like a certain someone who wrote an extensive document on the whole thing..
Although he doesn't touch on the building side of things much, and that's just as divisive as the voiced protagonist.
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I liked the settlement building, its a fantastic feature. They just focused far too much on it and tried to substitute it in place of doing more Quest content and well developed pre-existing settlements with named characters and actual scripted quest lines. The Commonwealth feels rather empty and lifeless to begin with, and yes, I get that rebuilding the Commonwealth is your job, but it ends up being very shallow. None of your settlers have personality, you can't have conversations with them.
i.e. More Cabot House style locations with in depth characters and quests would have been great.
I think having the settlement building having fewer places, but much more complicated would be great. I quite like the settlement building (at least in concept), but it's too shallow to support the entire game, IMO. And the lack of unique characters/settlements really hurts it.
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kronk wrote: Every pizza is a personal sized pizza if you try hard enough and believe in yourself.
sebster wrote: Yes, indeed. What a terrible piece of cultural imperialism it is for me to say that a country shouldn't murder its own citizens
BaronIveagh wrote: Basically they went from a carrot and stick to a smaller carrot and flanged mace.
If they did 20-40 years since the war, sure, but 200 is way too much. It was even worse with FO3 as well. But they were still stuck in the ES mindset, in which the 3rd era along was more than 400 years.
Homosexuality is the #1 cause of gay marriage.
kronk wrote: Every pizza is a personal sized pizza if you try hard enough and believe in yourself.
sebster wrote: Yes, indeed. What a terrible piece of cultural imperialism it is for me to say that a country shouldn't murder its own citizens
BaronIveagh wrote: Basically they went from a carrot and stick to a smaller carrot and flanged mace.
I think they only went with the 200 years thing to keep the setting similar yet disconnected to the originals. Though I haven't played them, just seemed lazy as well.
It's mostly so they can use the Brotherhood again. I'm surprised they managed to keep the Enclave out aside from a single cameo / reference (as far as I can tell).
Though they no doubt fear that a departure from the established factions (BoS, super mutants and raiders) and bits of fluff (blue jumpsuit and bulky wrist computer) will result in it not being Fallout enough.
Co'tor Shas wrote: I've never liked the wrist pip-boy. Give me a good old pip-boy 2000 any day.
No way. The newer models with the dials, buttons and knobs is much better, it can organize your inventory better and even comes with a built-in geiger counter. You'd be crazy to want a pipboy 2000. Did it even have a light?
Co'tor Shas wrote: I've never liked the wrist pip-boy. Give me a good old pip-boy 2000 any day.
No way. The newer models with the dials, buttons and knobs is much better, it can organize your inventory better and even comes with a built-in geiger counter. You'd be crazy to want a pipboy 2000. Did it even have a light?
Well, I am talking aesthetically here.
Homosexuality is the #1 cause of gay marriage.
kronk wrote: Every pizza is a personal sized pizza if you try hard enough and believe in yourself.
sebster wrote: Yes, indeed. What a terrible piece of cultural imperialism it is for me to say that a country shouldn't murder its own citizens
BaronIveagh wrote: Basically they went from a carrot and stick to a smaller carrot and flanged mace.
It would probably greatly benefit from having someone in control of the fluff again, like a certain someone who wrote an extensive document on the whole thing.. 
