It’s the video game we’re all playing, all talking about. How are you finding Fallout 4 so far?
The reviews have been uniformly positive, but players have been complaining about bugs, about niggly little details like voice acting, controls, user interface. My feeling? This is a Bethesda game. A lot of this is par for the course, but it pales in significance when you consider the positives: a sprawling, gorgeous universe dripping with detail and intrigue.
I’m loving Fallout 4 so far and I didn’t really expect that. I played a little Fallout 3 but quickly abandoned it. Not quite sure why but I never went back to that universe. Fallout 4? I see myself playing that for months to come. I’m not sure what the difference is — it could just be timing and context — but I’m having a real blast with the game. Even aspects of the game people tend to complain about — the combat for example — I’m completely fine with.
I’m sort of getting to grips with the crafting aspect, despite the fact I hate crafting in video games. I’m enjoying tailoring my gun to my own needs and building up my home base. I’m even enjoying the process of levelling my character despite the fact I’ve heard complaints about that area of the game as well.
How are you enjoying Fallout 4 so far?
Comments
90 responses to “Community Review: Fallout 4”
M8.
Actually though, have been reading a lot of hate for the voice acting?
I’ve had no issue with it, and have in fact thought to myself that the writing and voicing is excellent. Dunno wtf people want.
Also some framerate issues on PS4 but nothing too major, also surprisingly few bugs for me. Haven’t had any freezes/crashes.
People wanted to create their own character and shape their own story. That’s what these games are about. Instead we’re given the role of a concerned parent with a dialogue system and voice acting that breaks immersion. My character’s voice does not fit his appearance.
Okay, I understand when you put it like that. Would almost be nice to have the option (though I know that’s unrealistic 😛 )
I personally want to just play the story that Bethesda has written for me, so I’m actually finding myself much much more immersed than in previous games. The conversations are fantastic imo.
I see your point, but at the end of the day this is a story-driven RPG, not a total sandbox. The way I see it, Bethesda have sacrificed ‘immersion’ for much better storytelling, and I think it’s made for a better game.
Glad you’re enjoying it in that sense 🙂
Just wish we had the option to turn it off!
Yeah, I think it’d be a lot of work to make both systems work, but would certainly make everyone happy! Hope you’re still managing to enjoy it 🙂
I appreciate the effort of voicing the protagonist, but it just wasn’t necessary. Was not a selling point and some people find it offputting. Shouldn’t have bothered. :/
I usually play a male character but the voice just didnt fit the type of character I enjoy making. I am quite enjoying the female voice though. I dont know why but it just makes me laugh playing as a 50s style housewife and when picking up a minigun or something she goes “Sweet!”
I love that she’s Jack from Mass Effect.
Yeah well Bethesda broke that level of immersion in Fallout 3 already when they delivered a silent protagonist. Gone were the dialog options that actually indicated what your character was saying in favour of simple one line options.
I agree that an option to turn of the protagonist’s voice would be nice. But gosh it’s so refreshing to be able to play as a character who says more than one sentence at a time. The dialog trees feel much closer to FO1 and FO2 in FO4.
As someone who’s been playing the Witcher 3, the characters all move and sound like cheap animatronic robots.
That said- it’s still a great game.
Given the realities of creating a game this complicated, I’m happy to deal with bugs and randomness in order to enjoy the freedom that the game offers.
Just being presented with problems that can be resolved with stealth, speech, violence or a difficult moral decision so regularly is awesome.
Sometimes you’ll do something that you think was totally out of the box of what you were expected to do, only for the game to come back hours later and reward you with an acknowledgement or your actions and a branching quest. That kind of experience is worth the “clunkyness”.
It started off a bit meh, but I’ve stuck with it and so far it has gotten better. At this point in time TW3 is still a better game in my opinion.
I really enjoy the crafting, but I get the idea that the perks system is a bit meh.
I wouldn’t have levelled up my lockpicking or hacking if I realised that I can gain a companion with those skills for instance. Sneaking doesn’t seem to be overly effective either.The perk system is probably my biggest complaint of the game so far outside of the technical issues and bugs I have had. I much preferred having actual skills that I could put points into at any point I want.
If I want to be a combat failure with all my points in utility/crafting skills then let me, don’t make me level to 40 to get rank 4 of armorer.
I think even just removing the level requirements for specific perks would really improve the perks system from what it currently is. I mean, in Fallout 3, if I wanted to be able to pick Master Locks, I could do it around level 3 or 4 if I only levelled up specifically towards lockipicking, but in FO4, because of the rather high level requirements, I would have to be Level 18 at least, which really kills any types of drastic role-plays.
It’s … good. It feels like a prettier Fallout, but with extra stuff that doesn’t (appear) to force you to do (crafting, etc.)
It’s very buggy. VERY buggy. I play with subtitles (so I can have the volume down while BJ Jr. sleeps) but it usually freezes on one line of dialogue even while the conversation continues. I’ve also lost a couple of saves to game-ending freezes.
I’m playing on both Xbox and PS4 so I’m still slow going storyline wise, but I’m enjoying my time in the wasteland.
I’ve had the same problems with the subtitles, nothing too bad though just gets annoying. And I’ve had one game crashing bug that happened last night.
Finally a game I’m playing!!!
It’s very good. In enjoying it immensely. Much improved all around. Can’t put it down.
Inon Zur has made an amazing soundtrack!
The soundtrack is fantastically ambient and powerful when it needs to be — best soundtrack for me this year!
I’m 12 or so hours in. I reckon about 6 of those have been spent building my base at Sanctuary. Garvey and his little crew sleep on sleeping bags in one of the derelict houses whilst I overlook them in my 3 story mansion.
I’m 15 hours in and spent most of that scrapping and building with abandon. Now have 6 people living in Sanctuary and 1 at the truck stop. Woot, trade route!
Yeah I spent ages on this as well. Got 11 or 12 settlers in sanctuary. I managed to build this crazy monstrosity for fun times the other night.
http://xboxdvr.com/gamer/HairBandReject/screenshot/2715216
http://xboxdvr.com/gamer/HairBandReject/screenshot/2715215
How do you setup trade routes?
You need to have the Local Leader perk from Charisma 6 and then you go into build mode, put your crosshair over a settler with no job and then at the bottom of the screen it should tell you what you need to press to open supply lines.
I did the same. Built a barracks for my settlers, me and Dogmeat got a 3 story shack mansion with a mirror ball.
Loving it. Big time.
There was spate of releases last year (Dragon Age, Farcry 4, Borderlands the PS), choc full of pre-release hype… that on reflection were disappointing to me. I never finished any of em – though in the case of Borderlands PS and Farcry 4 they both, in my opinion, had very hard acts they were trying to follow.
Was starting to think my interest was waning.
Not sure what it is in the Bethesda formula? But when it comes to Elder Scrolls and Fallout … they just grab me. Every second I’m not at work I’m currently playing Fallout 4 (even to the exclusion if the cricket… which is as shocking as it is un-Australian!).
No issues with bugs.
10/10
Will play 350 hours…
Other than the interface being a bit of a pain when trying to organise my scavenged materials (because almost everything is useful now) it is great.
Oh and the fact that I can’t just keep playing all day every day and still have to go to work, but I guess that’s not the games fault.
This, my only complaint is that I can’t play more 😛
I’m enjoying it a lot. So many huge improvements from Fallout 3, it’s crazy. Yes, FO3 was a long time ago, but the comparisons are night and day.
As a long time Fallout fan, as well as an Elder Scrolls fan, I must say that this is the most enjoyable Bethesda game I’ve ever played. That may get poo-pooed by the purists, but I have my reasons:
Variety – I found Fallout 3 (and to a large extent the Elder Scrolls games) to be rather bland. This feels vibrant and organic. From locales, to people, to architecture, to combat encounters. Nothing seems repeated.
Freedom – Bethesda has always harped on how they cherish player freedom, but I’ve always found that to only operate within a very strict framework. FO4 now finally feels like it’s allowing for meaningfully different choices, in terms of quest lines, combat styles, player builds etc.
Perks – I think the way they’ve structured the perk chart is quite clever. It’s an interesting compromise between the stat and number heavy roots of the franchise and the current meta of more arcade-like RPG’s. The perks themselves deliver the impacts to gameplay that they originally allowed, while being easier to translate than a stat heavy skill system.
Story – I always tend to get through about 90% of a Bethesda game before losing interest in the main quest, and usually all other quests too. I even lost interest in Skyrim as a place in the end. But FO4 and Boston are really captivating my attention this time around. It’s so dense, and everything feels logical.
I’m not entirely sold on the base building stuff though, but I’m really enjoying the weapon system. The flaw I felt with FO3 and Skyrim was that, you can butcher 100 guys and find only a handful of different weapons. Everyone seemed to buy their gear from the same shop. But in FO4, every gun from every raiser is different. Not massively different, or even meaningfully different, but cosmetically and thematically different. And that’s where it counts.
I’m sorry but I have to disagree entirely with your statement about player freedom. It is completely dumbed down, and I’m extremely disappointed. Role playing is non-existent, as you are forced into a concerned father who doesn’t have a lot of personality, and voice acting again limits player choice.
The dialogue wheel takes away all choices, as all options will likely lead to the same outcome. The sarcastic option is stupid, as you don’t know whether you’re going to sound like a suave dude or a complete asshole.
You say it’s improved, but it really hasn’t. In New Vegas and Fallout 3, you could kill almost anyone, and there would be significant punishments for doing so, like whole factions turning on you. Now everyone’s invincible save for a few nameless NPCs. Also, in New Vegas more prominently, you could actually be ‘a bad guy’. In this game, you are forced to become the saviour of the realm, and everyone idolises you beyond belief, apart from a few companions that don’t like it if you pickpocket too much.
All in all, there are no meaningful choices, bad who you side with in the end (3 of which get a very similar ending). Heck in other games, at least you could say “no” to a main quest. Rant ended.
I’ve thoroughly enjoyed FO4 so far. I took the week off work for it (keen, I know) and managed to rack up about 60 hours.
Judging on what others are saying, it seems that for the first time ever with games, I’ve been on the lucky end of bugs/crashes. I’ve had zero crashes, no corrupt saves and only occasional graphical glitching which I am perfectly content with.
Love the new Power Armour system and I enjoy the new Armour system overall but something feels off about it. I think that the armour pieces layering over your Vault Suit (for example) needs to connect together better so only hints of the clothing underneath are showing. It just feels unconvincing that the chest piece to combat armour is made up of a little plate over your chest.
All in all though, I love this game. 60-ish hours in and I feel like there’s still a good chunk of story to go.. not to mention the dozen or so hours I’ve already spent on three settlements. Can’t wait to hook into the rest.
So got it thursday. I’m super underwhelmed. It’s just more Fallout. The gfx are pretty average. Lots of ppl are saying they’re great but I can’t see it. After playing Batman, COD V and Battlefront, the visuals look really bad to me. And those games all run at a faster framerate as well (this is on PS4).
I’ve already played Fallout 3 and New Vegas and I’m just not in the mood for more scavenging, bad combat and bad dialogue. I can’t see why. What’s the goal? The story is so badly implemented.
I played the female character and she almost had no reaction at all to seeing her partner shot in the head and her baby kidnapped. And when she was told she’d been frozen for 200 years there was no reaction at all! She just grabs a weapon and starts shooting people. I don’t know about you guys but for me, I would need to spend some time getting to grips with the whole murdering people thing but my character took to it like a duck to water. Killing people and stripping corpses is apparently a natural progression.
And I’m really over the time wasting tasks like building a settlement. That’s just more hours of my life that I can’t get back.
So yeah. I just can’t see the point. I listed it on ebay today. It’s not for me. I need more of a story. And I need a strong purpose. Fallout seems to do nothing well, just many things poorly.
Thanks for the spoilers, chump.
Pretty much every review has outlined that…. Chump.
Not the ones I’ve read.
Maybe not, but those details get revealed within the first 30 or so minutes (depending on how much time u spend mucking around in the initial setting.
It happens in the first 15mins of the game. Chump.
Twat
I thought the combat and dialogue of FO4 to be much improved to FO3.
Combat feels more intuitive and snappy. FO3 always just felt like I was gaming the system with every shot/grenade/trap.
I like how the conversations now just happen, no switching to a specific locked interface. And the actual dialogue that the characters say is, well… it’s Bethesda. They don’t do fantastic dialogue. But I still feel it’s improved.
I did get the feeling that the main character’s progression from “Doe-eyed vault dweller” to “Famous wasteland killing machine” was a bit fast, but that depends on how the player wants to take their progress. By leaving it open ended, I think they’ve had to down play some of that motivation a bit. I’m assuming you didn’t play til you get to actually tell someone the whole story of what happened in your vault. That was where some of that shell started to wear away and the desperate parent could be seen.
I’m slightly amused he’s complaining that his “character” took to killing and stripping corpses too readily, when he as the player is 100% in control of that. He could have taken more time to explore or try and talk to people, or play a character that avoids combat. But he didn’t.
Hey, I just ate a whole cake! Must be the fork’s fault!
Lol. To be fair though, the game doesn’t really give you any options to play as a pacifist. Which fits in the game world – the wasteland is an unforgiving place.
I was going to say there weren’t any big story moments for the character to say, “OMG, this place is messed up! Everyone’s crazy and deadly.” But I do recall there being dialogue options to say that sort of thing. I tend not to, for my character, but it’s there.
That’s true but I was waiting for my character to say it herself really. It really bemused me how she took everything in stride. Like, this is my life now. Okay. I better kill a few people and cobble together some weapons. Oh power armour. Sweet. I’ll be using a mini-gun now. Of course.
There aren’t any other options. One of the first quests I got was to take out the raiders who killed the farmers daughter. As in kill all of them. I tried talking to them first. They attacked me on sight.
Then I guess the logical thing to do when you approach a group of armed raiders who open fire on you is to return fire. Or not do the quest, though that limits your options in-game.
I’m not saying it’s a perfect RPG by any stretch but I mean, it’s a shooter with RPG elements. I do have to question what you thought you were getting into.
“It’s just more Fallout.”
Oh really. Its called Fallout 4, what the hell did you expect?
“I’ve already played Fallout 3 and New Vegas and I’m just not in the mood for more scavenging, bad combat and bad dialogue.”
Yet you bought it. Why. Clearly you were never going to like this game. Maybe actually look at the games you are going to purchase first.
So pretty much you like the story part in games and you dislike the game parts.
Maybe stop playing games. Movies and books would suite you better.
New Vegas had amazing dialogue. The story was sooooo much better than this.
And clearly I bought the game because I thought I would like it. That’s generally why I buy things. I can’t remember ever buying something I knew I’d dislike. That makes no sense.
And TLOU had the best story in an apocalyptic setting I’ve experienced so far. And it was 100% a game so I’m gonna keep playing them thanks. I just won’t spend time on a game that I don’t love. That’s not a crime, that’s being smart with my time. If you like the game then I’m happy for you. Enjoy your gaming.
I agree with a lot of this but I am enjoying this game Immensely. I love my story driven games (I’m a fan of the Metro games) and I hate people going on and on about open world games being the best and people need to stop making linear games. To be honest I think we need both.
I didn’t spend much time with skyrim, I liked it a lot but once I finished my first play through it was just dull and I think that’s because I didn’t let it amaze me with the variety in the game. I’ve let Fallout 4 do that, I haven’t done any of the story in my first 20 hours I’ve just gone and explored and had crazy encounters with all the different monsters while finding cool loot. I’ve already planned how I will build my character for my next play through and these are fallout’s strengths. You need to make your own fun inside it. The worlds so random and that helps you have fun experiences if you allow it. Just before I finished playing last night I 1 shot a weak raider and found out he was carrying a 50cal sniper swapped it out for my .308 sniper and walked away laughing right into the arms of a super mutant and promptly died. I had a good laugh at that, then I did it again and 1 shot the super mutant with my new sniper and then killed a legendary enemy by blowing up the mini nuke in another super mutants hands. The world is so random that the weaker elements of the game can be ignored and you can still have loads of fun.
I agree with you entirely on the town building, as I see it if I’m not required to defend it from raiding super mutants every time I return what really is the point of it.
Pretty much exactly how I feel, although I didn’t play any of the other fallouts for these very same reasons.
Returned it and got Mad Max. Similar wasteland but a lot more fun.
Pip Boy UI feels like a step back since they’ve overhauled how certain perks work and how rads affect health, etc. Didn’t like the perk chart at first but it’s grown on me – all the important stuff is there. I like that there’s no magic karma spectrum and “morality” is based on how you interact with factions and earn approval/disapproval from companions.
I don’t mind the settlement building stuff but I had to look up a guide to figure out how to use the workbench because the game gives you NO guidance, and kind of springs it on you really early. I like the idea of an open quest chain you can farm for XP but I still find the constant stream of “go here and kill some ghouls or whatever” to be frustrating to have hanging over my head, especially since those periodically time out and I’m made to feel like a failure because I feel like my time on the main quest is a little more precious than killing ghouls for the 500th time.
Voiced protagonist seemed like a good idea on paper but in retrospect it wasn’t necessary. It seems to have been done just to justify the dialogue camera, which in turn allows us to see our character’s face occasionally, which we probably spent an hour meticulously crafting. Granted, I’m wearing a helmet with a full face so I still never see it. Maybe just don’t bother next time?
Story is solid. I like the interaction with the various factions. It feels like less of a balancing act than New Vegas, which again ties in with the absence of a karma system. I have no idea where I am in the main campaign but I sort of feel like I’m getting to near the climax, or at least a major turning point in the story.
For the record, I’m about to proceed with
The Battle of Bunker HillI imagine there’s a chunk of side content I haven’t hit upon, not to mention plenty more random stuff to discover (some of my favourite things from FO3 had no quests attached to them at all, and FO4 has been no exception).
Exploration feels exciting and well-rewarded. Many aspects are clunky but I easily forgiven. Glitches have been few and far between, and can usually be solved by leaving an area and re-entering. Only once have I had to revert to a previous checkpoint to avoid a game-breaking glitch. Most glitches are of the visual variety, and pretty hilarious (like Dogmeat ascending into the sky while doing battle with a molerat).
The world feels pretty well realised, the people in it are slightly more interesting this time around. Combat feels tougher and less forgiving, especially when you die from a mini nuke lobbed at you buy a raider with a Fatman so far away you didn’t even know you were under attack, and get sent back to a checkpoint from 20 minutes ago.
A great upgrade across the board from Fallout 3, great sound track about 90% lifted from Fallout 3 and New Vegas which I have no complaints about. Overall, very pleased with the game. I’m already planning my second playthrough.
I agree that its a direct upgrade from fallout 3, the main things that i’m missing are from New Vegas.
I really liked how you could break down garbage ammo and make custom bullet types with unique effects. or how you could sneak around with certain factions if you wore their armour.
Im not a fan of how you have no idea what your character is going to say when you are in a dialog. Someone asks you what you think of a settlement and your options are some nonsense like (SETTLEMENT?) (SARCASTIC) (PORK AND BEANS) (DOORKNOB?) and you just sit there thinking, whats going to happen if I choose doorknob? Is doorknob good or bad?
I was going to go with “Aunt Clara appears” but that’s probably a bit obscure (she’s the character in Bewitched that collects doorknobs).
“You don’t seem to have many doors so I guess you have a few doorknobs going spare?”
It doesn’t take long to figure out that A (or X on PS) is the “positive” option, B (circle) is the “negative” option, Y (triangle) is the interrogatory, and X (square) is the sarcastic/asshole/positive option – apart from the few times you can just make a series of enquiries before ending the conversation with an awkward “well, I have to go now” a la Mass Effect.
But sometimes asking a question can end the conversation, and I’m not used to conversation trees ending as abruptly as they do here.
It just felt more immersive back when I knew exactly what I was saying to someone down to the letter.
I liked it when dialogue wasn’t as simple as Positive Negative Sarcastic, I like having branching trees that actually talk about things rather than just saying the same thing but in a positive or negative way.
I still have no idea what happened to the Minutemen because I didn’t immediately go to that dialogue choice, I wanted more information first. Then the convo moved on and I’m like “But wait…”
Doorknob is always good.
I climbed to the top of a building and the first thing dogmeat did was fly off the side into another building. I laughed.
Overall I have been loving FO4 so far, but full disclosure I am a big Fallout (and elder scrolls fan) so I knew what to expect.
Played 30 odd hrs on PC and only found a couple of minor gripes, 1. sometimes there is a small delay when switching weapons via hotkey 2. rarely the weapon will be invisible before popping in a second later and 3. I do see the occasional frame rate drop when in the big city.
About 30% through the main quest and loving it but spending most of my time pimping out settlements, exploring and doing side/faction quests, which have been varied, interesting and rewarding.
I love my crafting but it can be overwhelming at times with the sheer number of options (still better than too few), the map feels sufficiently sized and filled with random events/meetings as well as unique locations, loving the random legendary enemies and the loot they drop and have found the gunplay to be tight enough without being amazing.
I tend to play as a lone wolf so I like the fact there is a perk that rewards this style of gameplay however the limited interactions I have had with companions is a step up from New Vegas and Fallout 3. Perks as a whole have been enjoyable and I can see value in almost off of them, would have enjoyed a couple of extra SPECIAL points though.
I modded the cr&p out of FO3 and NV so looking forward to doing so as they come out and once I’ve finished the ‘vanilla’ experience fully first.
Final thoughts are that this is the best Fallout to date, time will tell if this remains to be the case once I’ve finished exploring, questing and it isn’t all new and shiny.
Absolutely loving it so far. Sure there’s glitches but you just can’t help but laugh, particularly when your terrifying first encounter with a deathclaw results in it getting stuck in the road and doesn’t move. Thanks bethesda.
Randomly investigating a room where i find 2 decapitated bodies and a raider dead in a bed hugging a mannequin. Then get my head blown off by another raider that snuck up behind me while i wasn’t paying attention. 10/10.
I’ve played about 20-30 hours and am loving it so far. I’ve barely done any of the main quest line, mostly been doing side quests and exploring (and collecting literally EVERYTHING).
However, there have been a lot of bugs. Everything from clipping errors to subtitle errors to weird LOL moments (dead bodies spinning on the ground, mama murphy’s chair hovering above my head complete with mama, her legs dangling in my face.) I’m also not terribly impressed with the graphics, considering it’s a 2015 game on a current gen platform (PS4 for me) and there are older games on PS3 that I think had better/similar graphics. But I haven’t had any issues with the acting and all that said, the negatives are all stuff I’m willing to overlook because the game is just so much FUN. I’m losing track of time playing it, which speaks volumes imo.
Got into a firefight with a zombie, a robot, a mutant and a giant scorpion all at once. 10/10 would run away again.
I’ve only played for 23 hours, so I am barely scratching the surface, so I’ll keep it short and pick two things to make a comment on. One positive, one negative.
Positive: The game does live up to the hype. Much like The Witcher 3 lived up to the hype, so does Fallout 4, so far. I’m thoroughly enjoying pretty much every major aspect of the game.
Negative: Why is it that my on-screen radar can show all these wonderful things, including things I’ve yet to discover.. and yet it can’t display corpse directions. Too often I find myself killing something in the wastelands only to misplace the corpse and spend a good amount of time searching for the corpse. That’s probably my biggest frustration with the game at this point.
Oh wait.. yes.. I do remember a bug now that I find very annoying. It’s to do with changing weapons.. sometimes it takes like 5 to 10 seconds for the weapon to appear and become useable. Sometimes the weapon never appears and I have to open and close the pip boy. It’s like it is having trouble loading the weapon models or something as it seems to happen less often with pistols than it does with complex rifles. It’s not so bad when you’re just walking around, but when you’re in a fight, especially a boss fight, and it is taking 5 to 10 seconds to switch weapons… yeh.. you get the idea.
It’s not the invisible gun bug that others are reporting.. it doesn’t matter if I go in 3rd person or not.. it just takes it’s time to display the weapon and I can’t use the weapon until it appears.. so it’s not just invisible..
PC interface is terrible and inconsistent, tutorial delivery (in case they’re there but I missed them) is inadequate.
Trying to run it killed my PC.
I’m having a blast anyway. It’s Fallout 3 with more toys to play with. Going to be spending a long time on it.
It killed your PC…? Specs/details of how please?
I found that the Interface was horrible – as in having to hit Enter for most of the “Enter” options. Then I remembered that “E” does the EXACT SAME THING. Facepalmed after 10 hours into it on Thursday.
And then Tab is back… Unless you’re in workshop, then escape is back and Tab stashes a thing.
I was running a Core2Duo that I overclocked to 2.7GHz a few years back so it’s been on borrowed time for a while. Something fried and power actions (on/off) no longer function, could be the CPU, mobo or PSU, and might as well upgrade instead of spending any money on it. Got a good 8 years out of that setup though.
(Full disclosure, the frying may have been due to me tweaking it to 2.83 from 2.7 to be able to handle the game)
Ahhh Yeah, that was a pain in the ass to get used to. I try not look at anything major before I tab back. Works rather well. On that note, if you hold Shift and use the WASD keys, they function as the Arrow Keys for navigating through it.
Ooooh OC eh. I tuned my 3.6 Quad to 4.2 when ARK came out. Realized that might be why my CPU is now consistently running hot. Turned it back down to 3.6… OC can be a nightmare without Water Cooling, imo.
I was enjoying it (playing on PC), even though the game has felt a bit lacklustre in places. However, my save game has now contracted the fast travel bug. No fast travel = too much of a slog. Hopefully it gets fixed soon…
Loving every second of it! Have racked up about 30 hours so far. Mostly side quest stuff.
Playing on xbone and, yeah, that frame rate dipping is noticeable. Hasn’t ruined the experience for me yet.
I’m enjoying the voiced protagonist. I prefer it over text only.
Need to play moar now pls.
So far I am only about 6 hours in but it all seems pretty good to me. The only criticism would be with the crafting/upgrading items, there doesn’t seem to be any explanation on how that is meant to work? It just says press A to craft things……good luck! I will probably google it and get a simple explanation but I would expect some sort of explanation in game how to make this happen.
I had to do a lot of googling, if there was an in depth tutorial I didn’t see it. Luckily google saved me fairly quickly each time!
I couldn’t figure out how to assign people to buildings or supply lines
There is an in-game help guide that deeply explains all of this, FYI. It’s accessible from the Pause Menu.
Hah! I had no idea, I have learnt it all the hard way now anyway :p
Well in that case the game is perfect and I will just shut my hole!
Yeah the crafting system is not explained well at all. As with the Pipboy interface, those are the 2 places I think the game lets me down the most.
I think I’ve completed 3 actual missions so far, only 1 has been central to the story. The remainder of my time has been spent making a kick arse fort at the servo. There’s only one entrance its boobytrapped to all hell and has a secret machine gun turret facing it from a hidden room. That being said, it’s as broken as you would expect from a bethesda game. Lots of tiny scripting or collision things, a few bigger things I’ve encountered with the quicksave option not working correctly and the occasional crash. So it’s actually one of the better AAA releases in recent history because nothing’s been a game breaker.
I appreciate the voice acting and having characters call me by name is rad, I feel like because it’s a voiced character a lot of the dialogue options play it safe and it’s kind of a roll of the dice as to what they’re going to say. Stealth is still one of the funniest things in this game where I can be buried into a ghouls withered crotch with an axe at the ready and they can’t see me/are having too much of a good time to say anything and then I crouch walk my way outside and a bloatfly eyes me off from it’s hive 12 houses over.
The main story is kind of meh and reminds me of the start of heavy rain except now it’s press x to SHAUN!!!
I’d give it a 7/10. It runs well enough, the inventory system still sucks dick and there’s enough bugs where it’s getting slightly harder to just shrug it off because bethesda and it loses more points because there’s a chameleon deathclaw.
Absolutely loving this game, haven’t had a single issue or negative momeny apart from the scrapping mechanic (but once understood its fine) I wish people talked about the soundtrack more, it gives the game so much atmosphere, the radio is fantastic (miss 3 dog) but the actual soundtrack is amazing. Does anyone have ANY vague idea about when bethesda will issue a patch? A week? A month? I dont feel like I need one but I am curious as to when the first will be around
Just curious to hear but would this game be better on PS4 or Xbox One? Would the different controllers make for a better experience when playing? I used to play Elder Scrolls on PS3 and wasn’t too bad but yes i know in terms of game play this is different
All i have to say is i have racked up over 40 hours in the first week and i have ran into very few bugs that stop the game from running, mostly it is the pipboy not opening which can be fixed by going to the start menu and back out again.
End of the day this is not a simple game and for anyone who wants to complain, i don’t see you making anything. Appreciate what has been built, it is a great game.
Also, my name’s Shaun. Was super weird seeing it in game.
Same thing happened with Beyond Good and Evil…. and I smashed that in an all night binge the first time. Imagine hearing a game say your name unexpectedly at 3 in the morning….
The only “Major” Bug I’ve had with FO4, is with running the game at 100+ FPS on a 144hz monitor. After using ANY Terminal, I would get locked in place and could not move out of place. I was stuck in position. This required multiple quicksaves at times to just get around. Then I found out that I had to lock in my FPS to around 70. Good grief does that make a huge difference to EVERYTHING in this game. Running is faster at 100+fps, as is every animation. It’s hard to say asides from just – the game runs *faster*.
I’m just under 35 hours in at level 40. About 12 hours have been spent on Settlements- making a few major ones in key places in the map and connecting them all via Settlements.
Story so far:
Beat Kellog a while back, looked freaking amazing when the Prydwen flew in overhead. Seeing Vertibirds roam around Boston and getting shot down is a really cool experience. Bit confused/disappointed on how the Brotherhood vs Institute mesh in with *your* story – as it feels kinda tacked on.Either way, still got plenty to go. Loving it so far, can’t wait for mods.
I’m ~35 hours in (PC), and absolutely loving it so far. I’ve only done the first mission after reaching Diamond City story wise, but I’ve done a lot of exploring and a fair few of the various faction quests.
It’s essentially Fallout 3.5 with improved combat, but that’s not necessarily a bad thing.
Positives
– An actually interesting main story, for a Bethesda game.
– Classic Fallout characters, little touches to the world etc.
– The graphics are actually fairly nice, faces aside. The lighting and such adds a lot of atmosphere that makes up for the relative lack in sheer graphics horsepower.
– Crafting is really nicely done with the weapons and mods.
– Faction quests have been really good so far, especially the ones after you follow the Freedom Trail.
– General world-building, feel and atmosphere is top notch – if a little dead in comparison to something like Witcher 3 (yes, I do realise it’s the post-apocalypse).
– Limited glitches in my play through. I realise I’ve been lucky in not having the elevator bug and so on.
Negatives:
– A bit of a weird difficulty curve. Starts off pretty punishing (in my opinion anyway), but then after you start unlocking enough perks and decent weapons you become sort of overpowered.
– I know it’s a small thing, but I hate having to choose between (subjectively) good looking full outfits or powerful-but-crap-looking undergarments with armor pieces. I’m rocking the BoS Field Scribe outfit despite it’s crap stats, purely because I like how it looks. #fashionout4
– I do miss some of the more in-depth mechanics from New Vegas like craftable ammo.
Absolutely loving it! About 50 hours in and barely touched the surface of exploration. Love the complexity of the design of the urban areas, the external fire escapes, high rises etc. The character animation is a bit janky but the scenery and lighting/weather effects is incredible. There’s nothing much better than being stuck outside in the wasteland as the green fog rolls in and lightning cracks all around you. To me it seems the perfect combination of the crafting of Skyrim and the gameplay of Fallout 3/NV. I’m also loving micro managing my settlements, making improvements to the settlers lives here and there, adding more and more services. Looks like my summer activity has already been assigned. Four and a half rubber chickens
13 hours in, with about 3 spent scrapping everything in various bases. I’m not the greatest builder (never played Minecraft,) but something about seeing raiders throw themselves against a wire fence while my machine gun turrets mow them down is deeply satisfying.
As I’m going through the areas, I’ve noticed a lot of advanced/expert/master terminals scattered all over the place. Its disheartening that you’re exploring what could be deemed a low level place yet you need to level higher and have either Agility/Intelligence high enough to unlock these goodies. There’s a quest which, to complete with the best outcome, you need to be able to unlock an expert terminal. At the time, I was level 10, and could only do novice terminals. I can’t help but feel how many more locked doors/containers/terminals I’ve missed and whether I’ll actually be bothered to backtrack and unlock them. It feels as though I’m going to have to get pen and paper and write down each location with things I need to unlock.
Bugs are not too bad on PC for me anyway: I’ve had the usual repeating subtitles, getting stuck after exiting a terminal, my weapons/character models disappearing, and sometimes VATs won’t let me target certain body parts even if I wave my left controller stick around. It took me some time to master the controls, which work out fine.
Picking your weapons, crafting mods and looking out for legendaries is decent. It adds a borderlands/diabolo twist without being too in your way. I’m still unsure as to why some legendary enemies will magically mutate and some won’t. Its also slightly unrealistic. After dying once to a legendary mirelurk that mutated, I reloaded my save, pulled out a missile launcher and blasted it in one go. Maybe I just need to go for one shot.
Melee bashing with weapons, and having bayonets, is a big plus.
Workshop crafting, while great, will really get on your nerves if you don’t hover your crosshair over a blank spot before selecting. Why there isn’t a ‘construct’ mode that is separate to ‘place’ mode is frustrating, as you will find yourself selecting the building you want to be put furniture or decorations in and moving it rather than building something there.
I could think of more, but still having fun with the game. Now need to get trade routes down.
Enjoying it immensely, but have nowhere near enough time to play. Graphics have their moments. Dialogue is improved, if nowhere near the extent of other titles…
But you FEEL like a wastelander. Scrounging for useful garbage. Shooting without question. It’s kill or be killed. Amazing stuff.
Before I do mine can someone tell me how to do the spoiler tags.
Put your words in between this:
The PC controls are terrible and really took away from my initial impressions of the game. Having switched to an xbox controller I am now having a lot more fun (aside from the hit to aim accuracy).
The settlement crafting is pretty cool but is also an incredible time sink! I also like that not everything is explained just because researching the mechanics gives me something Fallout related to do while at work 🙂
The amount of variety in weapons and armour is really nice. I am not 100% convinced with the new V.A.T.S, it seems like the kills are not as satisfying now.
I wish I had more time to play this game!
The perk system was better then the one in the witcher 3 it was terrible in the witcher 3
I loved the previous Fallout games but I have to admit, that since playing the Witcher 3 they just aren’t comparing.
I picked up Fallout 4 over the weekend and it’s good. But it just doesn’t feel upto the same level anymore. Bethesda have been at the top of their game for a long time so I suppose that it makes sense that they could have stagnated somewhat.
I found it a little shocking that the same issues still persist such as object collisions, AI pathfinding (I have 5 settlers who are attempting to walk through the side wall of my first building, when there is a door a scant few steps to their right) and poor combat animations amongst other things.
I did find it enjoyable, but it didn’t feel like a new game. It feels like an expansion pack or a re-release of an old title. There’s no innovation here, they’ve improved some small elements(e.g Interacting with containers) but there is still so much left that they haven’t even attempted to improve(no easy use of items during combat).
If it was from any other smaller developer I might be more understanding but this is from Bethesda(they have the funding, they have the talent), they were innovators and here we are just seeing very minor changes from a system they developed back for Morrowind back in 2002.
I will continue to play the game as I have always enjoyed the Fallout games and maybe it’s my fault for expecting too much, for getting too hyped, but this doesn’t feel like innovation it feels like Fallout 3.1 HD Edition.
Really didn’t like it, despite trying really hard to get into it.
I tried to play fallout 3 a while a go and 4 seems exactly the same, just with slightly better graphics (in some places).
Characters (player and NPC) all move like they’re from a 90s PC game and generally act like wooden planks. 90% of the time their mouths and actions in dialogue scenes don’t match up and reactions to things happening in gameplay are just as bad.
Combat is frustrating and extremely buggy and the ai is incredibly stupid. They will either ignore you or just run straight at you, which made me act cheaply to get stealth kills, which after playing MGSV is a big disappointment as I was hoping for similar gameplay (free roaming/stealth gunplay). VATS was really inconsistent and just annoying, I had way more luck actually connecting shots just shooting normally, although that was still frustrating and awkward.
not to mention how buggy the graphics go when transitioning in VATS, and those HORRIBLE sound bites that happen sometimes on a kill shot (which were bad in skyrim) that are waaay too loud and sound compressed to hell and just generally stick out like dogs balls.
I was really hoping they would work on the gameplay/combat and update it to bring it in line with other next gen titles as I really wanted to like F4 and explore the wasteland, but it doesn’t seem that’s the case.
Ended up returning it for Mad Max and I’m much happier. Also getting back into TW3 and loving it again. Playing a buggy frustrating game has made me appreciate how well TW3 and MGSV were made. Silver linings i guess.
I’m really enjoying it but one thing I wish it has was better management of your settlers. I can’t remember who is there and whose been assigned what half the time and when someone new shows up I’m like “Which one of you buggers is it?”
Walking along in the wasteland, come across a half destroyed house and head upstairs. There is a Brahaim just sitting there, I thought that was hilarious!
But I get the feeling within the industry you either have an immensely narrative driven game or a sandbox, you rarely get both.
TLOU was a standout for an amazing grabbing narrative but the gunplay and general gameplay wasn’t anything to write home about. But that’s not what made it fantastic.
Fallout sits in a genre (sandbox) that has difficulty presenting a narrative. The sandbox encourages you to play the way you want, but at the same time it tries to present you with a predetermined character trope; the concerned parent.
I won’t say games can’t do both, but they rarely do both well.
It is nice to think though that the John Cena character in this weeks highlight reel, was just a concerned parent trying to get his kid back though.
“I’m just trying to win the title, and do right by my kid”