Sometimes, Fallout 4 feels less like an RPG than it does a straight-up horror game.
I’ve gone on missions that took me well beyond the main map, to a hellish inferno where nobody treads. I’ve gotten caught in storms that turn the entire wasteland into a dangerous, irradiated netherworld. More than once, I’ve gotten ambushed by a pack of wild, relentless ghouls. At its best, Fallout 4 is a tense affair — the kind of game that raises my heart rate and makes me grip my controller in fear.
It doesn’t help that Fallout 4 is swarming with powerful enemies. Some are classified as legendaries, and these monsters are so strong, they can “mutate” mid-battle. If you’re lucky enough to kill these baddies, though, the game rewards you with a unique weapon. Like so:
lmao pic.twitter.com/ItREZSIGxY
— Patricia Hernandez (@xpatriciah) November 12, 2015
Every so often, though, you’ll come across a full-fledged boss. And no other boss is seared into my memory as strongly as the one I encountered while cautiously wandering the Boston Common on an eerie foggy night:
Needless to say, I wasn’t expecting that enormous super mutant to pop up from the middle of the lake. I was just minding my own business, looking through the nearby ruins, hoping to find something good. Surely, I thought, all this radiation is actually hiding some nice goodies? And they were. Goodies of the murder variety, that is.
I should have known it was way too creepy and quiet around there; it was a telltale sign. I think Bethesda expected players to explore in the nearby shack, which acted as a set-up for the perfect opportunity to have Swan burst forth, catching the player unaware. What bastards!
The first time I encountered Swan, it wasn’t even close. The super mutant rushed me down, closing in far enough to stun me repeatedly with attacks so vicious, they pretty much one-shot me at the start of the game. It wasn’t until I returned much later, at level 17 and equipped with Power Armour/a very modified laser weapon, that I could actually stand my ground.
Sure, Swan might have scared the hell out of me at first, when I wasn’t expecting him to be there. But now? The brute is dead. I earned my trophy:
Hell yeah.
Comments
15 responses to “A Fallout 4 Boss That Scared The Crap Out Of Me”
Shame you can’t use the power fist while wearing power armour 😉
you can mod your power armour arms though to increase unarmed damage though
I’ve gotten used to using VATS to scope out an area beforehand (looking for mines etc) and the first time I was in the commons it somehow picked up Swan in the lake. Fortunately I had my Fat Man with me so just nuked him back to hell!
I found this guy last night. Get recked pretty bad the first time. I was hiding in the little boat house taking shots at him without noticing how high the RADs were. Did a runner and he got me.
Reloaded for a retry and had a bit more success by baiting him out and tossing down bottlecap mines on his approach. It was still a losing fight though when suddenly he was at about a third health remaining I queued up some VATS shotgun blasts and on the last one the Mysterious Stranger shows up and fires some magical bullet through Swan’s spine, finishing him.
That guy has actually helped me out a few times now when I needed him, he took down two legendary Triggermen in quick succession. There is a detective NPC who has a great little line of dialogue about the Mysterious Stranger too.
Wish I could have the same amount of fun you’re all having, but i get a ctd after 5 minutes of play.
shame fallout 4 is just a fps with ‘some’ rpg elements.
What RPG elements do you think are missing from Fallout 4?
no moral compass. There are no acts or scenarios that can make you feel like a badguy at all. Complete of Karma.
You’re not given the freedom to play what type of character you want. It’s either good guy or good guy, nothing in between and nothing you do affects the direction or outcome of the game.
dialogue wheel is horrid, limited and just ass in its implementation.
I’m actually liking that there’s no real “good-bad” spectrum. The cloest thing to “karma” is how your traveling companions feel about certain actions, which feels more organic to me.
None of those things are hallmark RPG elements though. There are plenty of RPGs that don’t include any of them. That aside, there are plenty of decisions you can make that make you a bad guy, and factional choices make a difference to the direction of the game.
There’s this one point in the game (no spoilers!) where it gives you some dialog choices and then if you succeed in the dialog choices, you’re essentially let go to go away.. the game doesn’t force any kind of suggestion of what you should do next on you.. you need to role play your character at this point.
The dialog itself is linear/fixed role-play.. you choose the dialog options that appeal to your character and the way you think you want the story to go and you follow along. After the dialog is over though, you’re back into free-form role playing mode… do you just walk away, leaving these people to their lives, do you come back later and try to steal from them while they’re not looking, or do you take justice into your own hands are splatter their brains all over the inside of the office your sitting in. There’s no hand holding you or pushing you one way or another.. you need to play the role you feel.. and you choose the reason why you do the choice yourself..
I think that this mixture of linear/fixed role-playing and free-form role-playing is what has me coming back for more with Bethesda games and in particular Fallout.
I miss karma too. Is my only grip with the game to be honest. Is not ruining it for me, but really do wish it was still there
To be fair, this is to be expected. The last good RPG Bethesda released was Morrowind, and with the extreme casual lowest-common-denominator tilt of their games since then… FO4 is exactly what’s to be expected.
That’s only half a dig at Bethesda. Sure, they stopped making good RPGs more than 10 years ago, and they’ve always made crap action games and told awful stories (well, again, after Morrowind) with terrible writing and even worse execution… But they know how to NAIL atmosphere and worldbuilding. That’s what made Fallout 3 work and it’s what makes Fallout 4 work.
Yeah, I never really cared for the moral level, hardly made a difference except for a few different lines. People like to bitch though, so let them bitch, and just enjoy the game as they slowly die inside from the “it use to be like this” bullshit
Yeh.. stumbled across that boss last night. I played around with him for about 5 or 6 reloads before moving along. When I’m stronger, I’ll come back. I did almost kill him once, but figured I’d come back with my power armor and minigun later on.
Really enjoying the game so far in any case.