Where the Radiated Ether is So Good…
In the glut that is this year’s biggest releases, Fallout 3 will stand out. It’s an open-world RPG throwing in shooter elements in a huge setting that pits you on a search to the deepest reaches to find your father. From the moment you break out of Vault 101 into the scorching, sun-bathed wasteland you know you’re in for a treat.
Unfortunately, your love affair with Fallout 3 will not be immediate as it takes a few hours to get into the groove of the game — especially if, like this writer, you haven’t played Oblivion before.
Don’t let it deter you, though, because as you start getting a grasp of the RPG elements and VATS system (which keep it from being played as a true FPS), you’ll slowly level up to take on the mutants infesting the Washington, DC expanse.
And what an expanse it is. Every building and landmark shows signs of being touched by a realized nuclear war. The Capitol building has numerous walls caved in and passages are guarded by ghouls or mutants who’ve taken it up as their personal outpost.
The feeling of exploration and discovery is felt throughout your quest and it makes it very easy to stray off the beaten path. Abandoned towns and empty drive-ins are only a few of the dozens of towns you’ll come across made up of scrapyard parts in all their beautiful, post-apocalyptic glory. And this is away from the main story thread!
Fallout 3, also, feels very much like a PC game in that everything in the world is either interactive or movable. You can pick up every item you come across and it’ll serve a purpose whether it be used for ammo, forging new weapons, or to be sold to the highest bidder.
Its RPG inner-workings quickly show in the detail that’s put on weapon/armor deterioration (upgrade or get a new one!) and the VATS system which slows the game down for critical shots, but lets you know that everything is a dice roll. Even when you’re out of VATS.
Which, brings us to some of the negatives in the game being that it can’t be played like a straight shooter. If you come in expecting that, you’ll come out sorely disappointed when you shoot roaches point blank and still miss!
Storywise, Fallout 3 doesn’t hold up very well either. The atmosphere does its best to immerse you in a realistic disaster report world where you’re afraid to go out at night, but the story fails to do the same. It might be tied to the fact that you can make town-destroying decisions, but its still a short, linear path with a weak, anticlimactic ending that fails to conjure up any type of sympathetic emotion; something the atmosphere, as mentioned, excels at.
Add to that the numerous glitches, save corrupts, and crashes we encountered during our playtime and it keeps the game from being a true masterpiece.
The end product still is, undoubtedly, great and besides the lackluster story it proves to be an addicting experience — which this writer can attest to having roamed the world aimlessly for 25 hours for not noticing the Rivet City intercom!
Fallout 3 provides huge, bleak “I Am Legend” style surroundings, plenty of memorable encounters (Vault 112 and The Statesman Hotel come to mind), an addicting leveling system (which gives a few nods to CoD4’s perk system), and it’s likely you’ll get distracted enough to go exploring unmapped territories for hidden goodies putting the adventure at 40+ hours of fun — easily.
9/10
November 12th, 2008 at 11:55 pm
Great review Carlos. I was wondering how attacking was going to be. In Oblivion, fighting with a bow and arrow or with a sword was not it’s strong suit, but it made due. I found that the story, the characters and the scenery made Oblivion enjoyable.
The real question is, can we get “this writer” (you) to pick up Oblivion and join us? There really are 2 sets of people, those who’ve played Oblivion and…
November 13th, 2008 at 1:20 am
…those who don’t!
Oh, but I will
Fallout has made me a fan of Bethesda,
and I’m gonna head back into the game
to uncover the rest of the lands — as soon
as the “gaming season” is over.