Fallout 3

[Harrison]

I played for 7 hours now and still there's no real fun coming up Travelling through the Wasteland is just boring, why don't I get a car in the beginning?

Yes, that is a downside to begin with, but once you have locations marked on your map you can then instantly jump to any location without needed to manually travel there. Once you can do this it makes the game much nicer because you can cut out a large chunk of time wasted for quests.

However the V.A.T.S. system turned out to be nicer than I thought, but on the other side, when you can't use it, aiming and shooting is just painful. And using the V.A.T.S. system all the time, which is crucial, also gets boring, how many heads have I already seen be blown of, come on, let me play, no need to replay slow motion over and over again (or can you skip that??).

That is true. The slow motion replays every time can get a bit annoying, and the VATS system isn't actually as accurate at long range compared to manually aiming and firing. Specially if you have a gun with a scope. Close up though the VATS system is definitely needed. Just need to keep picking skills and putting more points into giving you more uses of VATS each time you level up.

And then there's the problem with the side quests. I cannot disarm the bomb because my explosion skill is not high enough. I cannot repair something because my repairing skills are not high enough. I simply can't do nothing at the moment.

The reason for this is so you don't wipe out a large number of quests and useful locations early on in the game. If you could detonate the bomb and wipe out the town at the beginning then you would definitely be without much to do early on in the game. Skill restrictions is really a way to introduce a learning curve and difficulty level into the game. It is annoying sometimes though I have to agree.

[quote[Then I begin one quest, the Lucy's letter f.ex. and I have to go from place to place to talk with people, and if I encounter a fight, they're so tough, that I'm instantly dead. So I pick up another quest and now have several unfinished quests, which I don't like, I want to have my job/work done![/quote]

I don't mind lots of queued up quests. Many RPGs are like this. And all MMOs are definitely like this. The advantage of having lots of quests on the go is that you always have something to do. And when in an area there might be some unfinished quests near you to continue. I think that is quite good as it stops the game getting boring.

Then I thought, let's explore the Wasteland, which in the beginning is fun, but after a couple of minutes I thought, man, this one is a waste land. If there are some creatures, whether they are blown away easily, or they are just a pain in the ass, like the mutants with their big guns or flame throwers, or the ones I met coming out of the water, gladly I could run away from them.

The super mutants are quite tough to begin with, but after a bit of leveling up and a good arsnal of weapons it gets easier and more fun. I've managed to take on 6 super mutants within the capital and kill them all. It just takes some tactics, finding ways to split them up and then work out the best way to disable them. I find shooting their weapons is a good tactic because it quickly degrades it and they are then defenseless other than a bat they are often carrying, so running backwards so they can't engage you in melee combat is a good move.

And the limited uses of the VATS system is actually there for a reason when you think of fights like this. If you could engage loads of powerful enemies, activate the VATS system, and then stay in it queuing up actions, it would make fights too easy. The fact you can gain a small initial advantage with the VATS system at the start of a fight is what the VATS system is all about, then you have to think on your feet and fight for real. It adds to the sense of danger and panic, which you would feel in a real life combat situation.

But as I mentioned before, if you prefer srpg and turn based combat then FPS style real time combat isn't going to be fun. For me, taking on a few super mutants feels like playing Quake 2 again. It's great fun!

Although the Pipboy is a great idea, I sometimes find it confusing, as I have to browse several times to find what I need, it looks nice, but again, it's not very helpful.

Many people had said the same thing about the Pipboy and I have to agree. It is fiddly to navigate and find the right page of information that you need. Ane the map isn't accurate or clear enough to navigate locations within quests. I've often got stuck trying to locate a destination and have been travelling parallel to where I should be. However this might be part of the design because I think you would be a bit disprientated in the wasteland. The first time I tried to navigate the main city I kept getting lost or reaching dead ends and blocked routes. But that was because the game was designed to force you to navigate though the metro system to bypass the blocked areas.

I also have problems spotting enemies, I often get shot at, then look around who's shooting at me, and when I finally manage to see him, half of my health is already lost. I can just imagine how it is when you encounter hordes of enemies.

Being a fan of FPS games and WWII games especially, with Return to Castle Wolfenstein being my all time favourite, this is something that is very common in such games. In real life you wouldn't be able to easily locate a sniper or entrenched enemy, and I think the game does this really well. Walking between some building and bullets suddenly coming at you from some unknown location is great. It makes you jumps and run for cover, just like real life.

It is however fairly easy to locate the hidden enemies. Just activate the VATS system and skip though the possible targets. The hidden enemy will soon be highlights as a target and their location given away.

Sometimes I just run around and feel lost, don't know what to do next and sacrify a lot of time doing absolutely nothing.

I had a few moments like that early in the game. I think if you just go out into the wasteland to explore, without a quest or goal then this can easily happen in the game. However I di this after playing for a couple of hours, and decided to explore the main city and had great fun running from Super Mutants, shooting raiders, finding underground metro entrances, collecting loads of weapons and getting lots of locations logged on my map.

I don't know if I'm gonna give it another last chance, to see if it finally gets better, or if I just play another game and sell it. Sadly I bought the special edition of the guide, which was a waste of money if I don't play it.

I suppose it all depends if you like the style pf gameplay Fallout 3 is offering. It is definitely for fans of First Person Shooters and RPGs, rather than one or the other. And I don't think anyone who doesn't play FPSers will enjoy it if they prefer turn based combat and time for stategy.

Personally, from about an hour into the game, when I went into the school and had loads of fights with raiders inside I knew I was going to like the game.