It was a week ago today when the reviewer embargo on this game was lifted. It was also six days go today that this game was available to us proletarians to play. Since then everyone and their head-lice has discussed this game. Alas: I must join them...
It's never a good sign when any company tries to control critics. When movie studios only let a select few watch the preview screenings, and only after buying them all drinks first, then you know the studio's nervous. The alarms rang for Metal Gear Solid V when reviewers were only allowed to play a few hours in a carefully controlled environment overseen by Konami executives. It's even more suspicious when the five star reviews all come pouring out despite the fact that the game hasn't been released and the only people who have the game are being groomed by the publisher.
And now I finally get to see what Bethesda were trying to hide. Fallout 4 is a first person/third person sandbox RPG set many years after a nuclear war has devastated the US. You play as some hapless nobody emerging from one of several 'vaults' built to protect societies elite come the nuclear apocalypse. Civilisation has since taken a downturn, as the land is plagued by hideous mutants as well as natural anomalies. What's left of humanity has split off into various factions, all of which are either trying to either re-build the planet or claim this new world for their own.
You may have noticed this is the same plot as Fallout 3. It's also the same plot to Fallout 2 and Fallout 1. In fact, the box-art also looks eerily similar to Fallout 3. A key question I asked last week was "why did this game need to be made?" What more could be added to this franchise? Why do we have this and not a new Elder Scrolls game when the Elder Scrolls franchise constantly builds upon its lore whilst Fallout's kind of stuck. The world's ended. You can move the story forwards by about a hundred years...but the world's still ended. But I'm prepared to open my mind and see if I can be proven wrong.
First impressions were, quite honestly, terrible. I bought the PC version of the game (because a Bethesda game isn't a Bethesda game without needing to load sixty mods just to get the damn thing running properly) but I bought it on disc because of how well Skyrim worked with a disc. I just popped it in, typed in the code, clicked 'Install,' and after a painless 20 min wait the game was on my system ready to go. I don't even need to put the disc back in whenever I want to play. Meanwhile, recent games have taken anything from four to seven hours to download on Steam.
So I didn't want to go through all that with Fallout. Thus, I popped the CD in and noticed it contained 5GB of data. "Fair enough," I thought. "That's probably the .exe file that'll install the game."
Nu-uh. That was 5GB of the game. All the disc does is dump 5GB of data on your system before kicking you to your Steam library and forcing you to then download the rest of the game...which is 24GB. I'm not sure if this is worse than the games where the disc is just a 10MB link to the Steam page, but it's up there as a humongous middle finger to the consumer. What if I don't have fibre-optic broadband? What if I want to play a game without waiting half a day for it to load whilst my entire household can't use the internet? Skyrim somehow fitted onto one disc. The PS4 version's only on one disc. Why are you being so lazy this time round, Bethesda?
Six hours later, I was finally able to play the game. Well, after some tinkering with the settings. The game couldn't detect my video card settings despite it being an NVIDIA card which I made sure I'd updated the drivers to so this game would be able to run properly. This game is also clearly designed for consoles judging by how clunky and large the UI is, how low the FOV is, and that crappy mouse acceleration. You can adjust the latter two - but rather than the game having a convenient option in the menu, you have to fiddle around with the config files just to get the game running how us PC gamers are used to our games running. Even after all this tinkering, the pre-rendered opening cutscene actually suffered from a dodgy framerate.
I don't get it Bethesda. You release these blank-slate games filled with bugs, really dumb choices, and unbalanced gameplay. You're clearly expecting modders to come along and fix things for you, to the point where you stupidly tried to charge people for it...yet your PC ports without fail suck. But even Skyrim gave you the option to change the FOV in the developer console, and it paused whenever you used a menu - so it didn't matter how long it took to select a weapon. Already there's a mod to fix the lack of options available in the menu, and I expect to see many more in the upcoming weeks.
This is all a shame, because once I was actually in the game my first impressions instantly changed from frothing anger to delightful surprise. You're thrown into a character-creator where you can play as either the husband or wife of a family. At first I only thought you could play as the husband and so begun customising him before finding out that you can change to the wife. I customised her too, and had to eenie-meanie-miney-mo as I couldn't decide which one to ultimately play as. I picked the wife eventually, and walking round I was very glad to have picked her. Her husband's a military man who she's had to depend on for many years. Suddenly the world ends and she's left to fend for herself. This is much more interesting than playing a former soldier (which is the plot to every other game in the world), and it means that when your main objective is revealed (which is also the plot to every other game in the world) then it's much less sexist.
Most amazingly, you can talk in this game. Both the husband and the wife are fully voice-acted, meaning that when you interact with objects they'll sometimes say something. They also talk back in conversations, meaning dialogue is an actual exchange of words rather than spouts of exposition. Combine this with the fact I'd customised both the husband and wife then you've already made this story your own whilst also playing characters. They talk, they have names, they're people. Not just a blank slate that you're supposed to project yourself onto. This all meant that when things went wrong, I cared because I was emotionally invested in these characters. I'd hand-crafted both the husband and wife. Whilst I didn't get to know either for very long, in the brief time we shared conversation I managed to form a bond I didn't want broken. Also, I really want my husband's hairstyle.
The characters all-round are varied and fun. I like how everyone has a story to tell, but they keep it short and sweet. You can tell what these people have been through just by looking at their unique appearances and mannerisms. Real effort has clearly been made to avoid the plague of clones that populated Skyrim. Interaction is hugely aided by the fact you can actually talk. It means conversations truly come to life, and aren't just a case of scrolling through a menu and sitting through paragraph after paragraph of exposition.
Then again...talking isn't exactly a new innovation, is it? Ever since 1928 we've heard people talk. Games all the way back in the 80's gave you dialogue trees to sift through. I don't know precisely when games let you hear the player-character speak. The earliest one I can think of is Duke Nukem 3D.
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| "Are you my mummy?" |
Bethesda is like the Metal Gear series. For all it's admirable creative energy, the whole franchise is at least five years behind the rest of gaming. Morrowind, in 2002, realised that you can do the whole 3D thing. Skyrim, in 2011, realised you can do the Half Life 2 (which came out in 2004) thing of starting the game with a scripted event where you run around with no weapons before slowly easing you into each gameplay mechanic. Now, finally, Fallout 4 has embraced actually giving your character a voice in this world.
This isn't a bad thing. Despite the horrid combat, shoddy PC optimisation, and being made by EA, I love Mass Effect. Any time you didn't have a gun in your hand was brilliant. The game expertly kept a balance between telling the story of a character and letting you really make said character your own. My Shepherd was a President Coin-inspired, no nonsense veteran hardened by a previous mission where she was forced to sacrifice her men to complete the objective. This made her stone-faced, calculating, and completely supportive of any and all authority. It was up to the gorgeous Kaiden to chip away at her and reveal a woman who never forgets those she has to see die.
Anything that tries to be like Mass Effect in terms of it's characters and their interactions is doing something right. I was also delighted to find that whilst there's moral choice, the game doesn't keep score of this. Killing innocents will only affect your conscience, rather than tally up on some bar like you're trying to earn a boyscout badge. There's none of the game telling you you're sad because you nuked a whole village, and there's none of the game telling you that you've got over all this by giving people bottles of water.
There are other new features as well. You get a dog; because for some reason all games these days have dogs. There was Call Of Duty: Ghosts, Metal Gear Solid V, and now this. Whilst Dogmeat is adorable, I never managed to get him working right. I kept sending him off on errands looking for supplies, but he would just wander a few feet away then come running back as soon as I begun to walk away. He also keeps getting involved with combat even though he's terrible in it and merely ends up draining my precious stimpacks. He's buggy too, continually trying to interfere with conversations and occasionally levitating across the ground. I appreciate having a flying dog as a pet, but he spent most of the game at home. I felt awful about doing this, though...
You can also build settlements. These take the traditional town setup and instead make it the 'build' part from Sims. By gathering resources found in the environment, you can tear down houses and re-build them from scratch. You can add walls, gun-turrets, water, electricity, and a number of other features to turn your settlement from a wasteland to a shining new neighbourhood.
I never cared for crafting in Skyrim. Maybe it would've improved my stats, but I never felt the need to smith new armour when I could just raid a dungeon and get a complete wardrobe change. And I never needed to improve on my existing armour because I never felt it impacted the gamplay enough, and every time I raided a dungeon I got better gear anyway. Obviously, Fallout 4 doesn't have dungeons, (well, not in the traditional sense) so if you want the best items then it's time to remember your woodworking lessons from school. Since you craft materials by salvaging materials from random stuff lying around then you'll find yourself snatching at every single item you pass. My inventory became filled with frying pans and rat poison, like I was a 1960's housewife.
Because this is 'that' Bethesda game that Bethesda has been making for years, there's the same bull crap with limited carrying capacity. This put me off crafting even more since crafting requires you to loot every single thing you see. But you can't carry round all the junk, so it's inevitable that you're not going to have enough supplies to erect that new patio. Couple this with the even more bullcrappy fact that merchants run out of money, so you can't sell everything you're carrying, and the fact that vendors are surprisingly rare and I hardly crafted anything. I didn't care that my weapons and armour sucked. I didn't care that my settlements were ruins. I will not partake in pointless busywork when I can instead be busy shooting ghouls in the face. Besides, the bandits will only tear it all down again...
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| Can someone please mod in 'The Sims 1' music when you build stuff? |
The difficulty fluctuates. Again; some enemies level whilst others remain fixed - and the game makes no attempt to tell you precisely how tough the person you're about to fight is. This time, at least the game sometimes places a star next to 'Legendary' enemies that'll be a challenge and a skull over enemies that are several levels higher than you. But you're still going to get the same problem where you face a group of foes - half of which go down in a single headshot and the rest of whom take five point-blank shotgun blasts.
The nadir of this comes right in the middle of the first mission when you're politely asked to take down a massive beast despite having only just met these people (meaning they have no idea how good/bad you are in a fight) and despite being both under equipped and under-levelled. The monster hits like a freight-train and even grenades only shave off a fraction of it's health. I only killed the beast after taking advantage of nearby explosive gas canisters to amplify my grenade's damage.
This is particularly annoying since I'd mostly levelled my character in Stealth and Charisma, because that's what suited her character. She has no military background, so it makes sense that she'll be cunning in her approach. However, almost immediately she's being asked to kill armies of bandits and giant monsters. A mere hour into the game, I had to fast-travel away and level up for a bit because there was no way I could kill such a strong foe at such a low level. I'm reminded of Morrowind where if you haven't sunk all your stats into combat then it's possible to get killed by a slug right at the start of the game. This is the reason why I've never made it far into Morrowind.
It doesn't help that the 'sneak' system just doesn't seem as refined. Compared to Skyrim's 'eye' that clearly indicated how visible you were, this new system is far too vague. It's also more difficult to tell if there are enemies nearby. I guess the game's trying to make you use the VATS aiming system to detect targets, but who goes round hammering the 'Q' key every few feet? And I hardly used the VATS system because it was just so clunky (even with a controller). I'm fine just using my ironsights to aim, and until you've upgraded the system then it's actually quicker and easier to use the traditional method to shoot.
The story missions don't accommodate for multiple playstyles. The game assumes you're sinking points into automatic rifles, and so the level design and general layout of combat arena's don't give you higher ground to snipe or cover for stealth or the option to talk your way out of situation. Compare this to Deus Ex where every mission has multiple pathways and there are only two moments I can think of where the game forces you to go guns-blazing. This is a roleplaying game. I should be choosing a role that works for both me and my character - not which one the game wants me to do. That defies the very purpose of a roleplaying game.
There's also no skill tree. The 'perks' menu is just a random grid of various bonus attributes you can apply to yourself. This means that despite the fact you're now clearly playing a character rather than a projection of yourself, there's no roleplaying. You can specialise in automatic weapons whilst also being really good at stealth. Choosing one pathway won't lock you out of any others, and it's a chore determining if your perks will compliment your current build, or if your other stats make the upgrade redundant.
Since you level-up on an XP basis rather than a skill-use basis then it's possible to pour all your points into a skill you'll never use. This has its advantages and disadvantages. On one hand, you can save up your points in preparation for when you get a more powerful weapon later on, or are required to pick more advanced locks/hack more advanced terminals. This is great if you've already played through the game once before. RPG's such as System Shock 2 and Dark Souls expect you to do this; somehow predicting what's going to come up before it's even happened - and that's why those games improve the more times you replay them. On the other hand, first-time players can accidentally blow your precious upgrade points on a useless skill. Whilst most Bethesda games seem to encourage re-rolling your character if you make a mistake, here I don't want to do that because I'm already attached to her. Also, I don't want to have to sit through the opening section all over again.
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| "YOU. SHALL NOT. PASS!" |
This is still 'that' Bethesda game that they've been making since Morrowind. Ultimately, whether or not you like this game will depend on whether you like Bethesda's other games. Fallout 4 does enough to perhaps entice sceptics; but if you're craving for something brand new then sorry. You can still get enough XP to level up in everything, you'll still be fast-travelling around desperately trying to flog piles of obsolete loot, the story will ultimately be detached from the overall experience, and you'll end up with enough resources to own every pixel the world has to offer.
That all being said....this is still a Bethesda game. It's still completely absorbing. It's still going to drain hours and hours from your life, and if you've ever sunk time into any other open world game then you'll almost certainly have fun.
