Fallout 3

Berkeley yeah!

I'm not sure I need to go on past that. I fired up my new copy last night

It is scary gorgeous. Does a better job of making you feel like you're in a wasteland than the old games did. It seems to keep the same tongue-in-cheek sense of humor. Combat rocks.

The tweaks to character creation are interesting. Tag system works differently. I was laboring over which skills to tag, but apparently it's not as big a deal.

My only semi-frustration is that there isn't a quick transportation method like there was in the older games.

I watched Chuck play his copy last night. It's very cool looking, reminds me of Bio-Shock a little bit with the Steam-Punkesque nature of it.

I'm just hoping it can have similar goofy random encounters and geek jokes as the first two.

I loved things like the Bridge of Doom and the Mr. Nixon doll in #2. All the goofy stuff like that.

Although the poem you get for your birthday is pretty funny.

Salanis wrote: My only semi-frustration is that there isn't a quick transportation method like there was in the older games.

You're half right. Once you "discover" a location, you can bring up your world map and travel to those locations instantly. I think it's a better system than the car in Fallout, because you only have to hoof it to places you've never been.

And yes, it's berkeleying awesome.

therex wrote: You're half right. Once you "discover" a location, you can bring up your world map and travel to those locations instantly. I think it's a better system than the car in Fallout, because you only have to hoof it to places you've never been. And yes, it's berkeleying awesome.

Oh. That makes tons of sense. I hadn't noticed that or played with it yet. I'm just running around Megaton right now.

So which skills did you tag, and which are you finding to be most valuable? I always tag Speech and Small Guns (always the two most useful), and decided to grab repair, so that I can keep my equipment functioning.

Salanis wrote:

therex wrote: You're half right. Once you "discover" a location, you can bring up your world map and travel to those locations instantly. I think it's a better system than the car in Fallout, because you only have to hoof it to places you've never been. And yes, it's berkeleying awesome.

Oh. That makes tons of sense. I hadn't noticed that or played with it yet. I'm just running around Megaton right now. So which skills did you tag, and which are you finding to be most valuable? I always tag Speech and Small Guns (always the two most useful), and decided to grab repair, so that I can keep my equipment functioning.

I think I did speech, small guns, and medicine. I LOVE the lockpicking system, (if you haven't done it yet, save your game and go pick someone's lock) and small guns is very useful. I didn't find any big guns until I stumbled across a trio of supermutants (And almost pissed myself) and even then, I didn't have enough inventory room to keep the big gun I...appropriated handy.

TIP: Learn VATS. Use VATS. Love VATS. VATS is your friend in an unfriendly world. And when you first run into the Brotherhood of Steel (it'll happen pretty much as soon as you leave Megaton) DON'T SHOOT AT THEM. Because you will die.

therex wrote: TIP: Learn VATS. Use VATS. Love VATS. VATS is your friend in an unfriendly world. And when you first run into the Brotherhood of Steel (it'll happen pretty much as soon as you leave Megaton) DON'T SHOOT AT THEM. Because you will die.

VATS rocks. I love the ability to switch immediately between a FPS and a very RPG style.

Also, since I'm used to the older games where getting 10 Dex was the way to go. So I built my character kind of similarly: 4 Str, 4 End, 8 Dex. I spend copious amounts of time in VATS, literally taking heads.

This is the last thing I need to read with an essay due...

Berkley you all.

When I get home I'll give you my stats, but I always thought Dex was wasted in Fallout.

I tell you what though. I've never played a game where I was afraid to go near water until this one.

Osterkraut wrote: This is the last thing I need to read with an essay due... Berkley you all.

Dude. Seriously, it's amazing. Just buy it and play it as a half hour reward. There's enough action that will probably be sufficient, and there's (I think) at least 50 hours of gameplay just to finish the main quest, plus another 30-40 in side stuff.

By the way, the side stuff is so much better than a typical RPG: "I'm an old man and I need you to fetch me 10 hufflerump skins for my dickwarmer. Would you do that for me, sonny?"

Way better than that. Well thought out, and not overly onerous. (At least not yet.)

I always figured that Strength and Endurance were wasted. Endurance gets you hit points. But you still end up taking the same amount of damage that you need to heal. Strength is only good for melee attacks (which I tried to avoid) and inventory, which you can just be clever at managing. Plus, you get a huge bump to it when you find power armor.

The quests have always rocked. They seem just as good in F3. "Wait, you built your town around a Berkeleying nuclear bomb? And you never defused it? Are you crazy?!? I'll defuse that for you if you'll pay me."

I love it, mostly because the bobblehead fits in among my desktop BS well.

I've got maybe two hours wrapped into the game; I wish I had spent more time thinking about my stats. Very fun, but the explicit dialog keeps me from being able to play until the kids are in bed. It's okay, it adds to the feel of the game.

I need to spend some time earning caps and building stats before I trek across the wasteland; I die during combat with raiders. It seems that flamethrowers are very effective against my character.

Tom Heath wrote: I've got maybe two hours wrapped into the game; I wish I had spent more time thinking about my stats.

So what would you people have gone with for Stats, now that you've got more time in the game?

Something that would give me more AP. That seems to be what's killing me. I dunno, I guess that's dex.?

Tom Heath wrote: Something that would give me more AP. That seems to be what's killing me. I dunno, I guess that's dex.?

Yeah. AP is all Dex. Or Agility, since I normally think in DnD terms.

It's not as invaluable as in the earlier games though. I don't know what Rex was talking about with it being useless in the earlier games. I always made sure to end up with 10 dex (for 10 AP) and take "Quick Shot" in the first two games. That would let me pull off 2 aimed shots every round and generally kick ass.

I guess by "useless" I just never saw the need for it. I always felt like Int was a better place to put it, since you'd have more dialog options, which generally means more XP, which generally means better everything, plus then I'd just snag the action boy perk for a tenth AP.

Intelligence is definitely the second most valuable. High Agility isn't as obviously useful until you get those 10 AP. Two called shots every round essentially doubles your combat abilities.

I might go back to bump my intelligence up. I gave myself a 7 this time. I might take a point out of Luck or Perception to bump that up for the extra skill points.

mmk I never played one or two but this game looks badass, i want it, should I go out and buy it even though I've never played the first two? What systems did the first two come out on? Sounds and looks awesome though.

Well, I can already see I'm going to have to do a second playthrough. I mean, I decided to go the "Goodie two shoes" route the first time through, (Like I did with Mass effect) and the Karma system is really effective. I already had one guy tell me to berkeley off, that he didn't like me because I was "Too nice." Crazy. Crazy good. Plus I really want to explode that bomb.

DirtyBird222 wrote: mmk I never played one or two but this game looks badass, i want it, should I go out and buy it even though I've never played the first two? What systems did the first two come out on? Sounds and looks awesome though.

There are definitely some jokes and references that you'll miss, or won't be as funny, if you haven't played the first two (e.g. GECK, and the Enclave). But you can play this without playing the first two. This does not follow the story arc of the first two.

The first two were PC titles. I don't think they were ported to any console. You should be able to find them cheap and they will run on any PC. Play them.

Salanis wrote: The first two were PC titles. I don't think they were ported to any console. You should be able to find them cheap and they will run on any PC. Play them.

If you've got the taste for a proper old-school PC RPG, you won't find better than fallout:

http://www.amazon.com/Fallout-Bundle-Jewel-Case-Pc/dp/B00004ZBSX

Just don't bother with any title but Fallout, Fallout 2, and Fallout 3. Everything else with "Fallout" in front of it sucked.

therex wrote: If you've got the taste for a proper old-school PC RPG, you won't find better than fallout:

Definitely. Fallout ranks just behind Half-Life as my favorite computer game of all-time. Actually, it might even win that contest, since I've enjoyed going back and replaying Fallout more times.

The next best CRPG I've played was probably Planescape: Torment. Also produced by BlackIsle. Fantastic voice acting. The main character was voiced by Ron Perlman (who has done the intro and closing for all the Fallout games).

It also has the most twistedly berkeleyed up main quest: to regain your mortality (your character can not die, and is trying to figure out why not).

Torment has the most interesting characters you run across. It also does the best job with CRPG alignment that I've seen. Most games you walk a line between a completely anal dudley doright, and a puppy kicking megalomaniac homicidal thug. And the dialogue options are obviously bent toward one or the other cliche.

In Torment none of the options really seem wrong. Sometimes you really just want to do some of the goofy E36 M3. Like arguing with your buddy Morte about which of the two of you that zombie was flirting with, or making swishing noises while you play with a mechanical doll (the mighty Cube Warrior).

My favorite was when I started badgering some stupid academic who was discussing the philisophical experience of dying. I couldn't stand his stupidity and, even though I was playing good, explained to him that he didn't know jack E36 M3 and that I'd prove it. So I killed myself right in front of him, stood back up, and explained that he would need me to do the same thing to him so that he could experience what he was talking about. I did let him run away.

Torment also uses the DnD Good/Evil and Law/Chaos dynamic to good effect. It might give you an option of several different ways to say the same things, like:

• Do what I want or I'm going to kill you (true).
• Do what I want or I'm going to kill you (lie).
• Don't worry, I won't hurt you (true).
• Don't worry, I won't hurt you (lie).

And your action doesn't have to follow your dialogue, but your alignment will be affected if your actions don't match what you just said.

You can also do weird things like bite off your own fingers, pluck out your eye, or have a crazy blind mortician remove your intestines.

I just picked up a copy of it today along with an Xbox 360. Sadly I have a chem test I need to study for and only played up to the point where you find the tunnel.

I'm waiting to get F3 until after finals, because once I get it I know I'll be a complete waste of skin like I was for the first few weeks after getting 1 and 2.

Compare Fallout 3 to:

Elder Scrolls: Morrowwind, which is currently my favorite RPG.

Mass Effect: Which I'm currently playing. ( And am enjoying a lot [I punched a reporter yesterday! Though I generally am a good guy.]).