I am one of the few souls that didn’t agree that Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion was that great. It had a lot of problems, particularly the auto-leveling and no variation of the world. I also never played the prior Fallouts. Gone are the original developers and isometric turn-based style for a first person RPG game just like Oblivion. Coming into this game I really wanted to like it but the parallels with Oblivion and the yawn inspiring early showings, made me reluctant to get my hopes up. So has Bethesda shaken off my negative perception or is it just Oblivion in the future?

You start the game being born into Vault 101, where no one enters nor leaves. Tragically your mother dies from birth complications and your father raises you alone. Once you reach your late teens, your dad mysteriously leaves the vault. Which inevitably causes you to follow him and explore the world and unearth what is going on and what caused him to leave. Bethesda took a really neat risk where if you encounter main quest locations you were not penalized and you essentially skipped a quest. Some people might have issue with this but it makes the search for your father feel much more like a search rather than following some predetermined path but once you get on track, it’s pretty linear. Unfortunately the main quest makes doesn’t make much sense. Perhaps in an expansion they will explain certain key pieces and it will all click but there is no excuse as you why they weren’t included. But do not fret; the main quest is but a tiny piece of the game. The story of Fallout 3 is your story of exploration. The quests usually have multiple ways to complete them and have several parts. For example you might save a city and then have to find and deal with the bandits, peacefully or violently. Depending on your choices in the world you’ll get good karma or bad and this has ramifications for if people like you or not. Walking along the wasteland you might see something interesting in the distance and that will lead to a dungeon that you’ll spend an hour cleaning it out or you’ll stumble onto someone who will give you a quest and you’ll spend another hour doing that. If you only do the main quest, you’ll only see a small fraction of the world and miss out on some really cool places and quests. So while the main quest isn’t that great, just exploring will flesh out the back story of the world and ultimately make the game rewarding.

The beginning of the game is pretty neat; the first half hour is basically your character creation and tutorial. You start by being born and designing the look of your male or female character. As a baby crawling around your playpen your baby book is used to assign points to your base attributes. And later in life you take test that helps assign points to your skills but if you don’t like its choice, you have the ability to place them wherever you want. Overall this works very well but for the character design, the little box that you work in is too dark and makes it very hard to see your character. It also has the depth of Oblivion to fiddle with every possible little thing but it streamlines the process if you don’t want to do that. But be warned, if you choose one of them; be prepared to see your twin elsewhere in the world. It is unfortunate that this happens but considering the amount of characters in the world and the fact that you pretty much never see your character. Back to the RPG elements, this system works extremely well. When you level up, you place a certain amount of skill points (determined by your intelligence) into your various skills and then pick a perk. The perk system is awesome and it gives you a further way to specialize your character. The perk options you have will be dependent upon your base attributes, skills, and overall level so if you see one you like you can see what requirements you need to get it. Some will even be out of your reach depending on what base attributes you chose. There is a level cap of 20 in the game which means you won’t be able to master everything and lends itself to multiple playthroughs for different character builds. The combat certainly can’t be misconstrued for a traditional shooter because everything is based upon your attributes. Therefore you cannot run through the game doing one shot kills to the head, some enemies will take a while to take down, just like any other RPG. To help you in combat, you have actions points that you can spend in VATS, basically a system that lets you target any part of an enemy. If they have a rocket launcher, you might want to shot the weapon out of their hands, if you have a sniper rifle, you might want to go straight for the head, or if they are really fast, how about shooting their legs. Surprisingly, VATS works wonderfully and chances are you’ll play most of the game using it. As you continue to use your weapons, they start to break down. You can repair them with similar items, which also improves its damage and worth. It sounds like it can become annoying but it works really well. But alas, the game is not all combat. You can hack computers and pick locks which are accompanied by minigames that are pretty good and rarely get annoying. The shops have been improved over Oblivion whereas you can typically sell all your loot at one vender and not have a problem, you might have to buy some unneeded ammo but it almost serves as a secondary currency. Depending on your attributes you will have unique dialogue choices and your speech skill can help manipulate conversations in your favor. Overall the main quest can be beaten in about 15 hours but if you take time to explore that number will easily reach into the 100s. Most people will probably clock around 30 hours. The gameplay rocks, pure and simple even after countless hours. The main force is of course combat and leveling up but they are supplemented with several other rewarding gameplay choices which mix it up to make a fun and addicting title.

The game takes place around Washington D.C. and you can tell immediately when you step out of your vault. You can look in the direction of downtown and boom; you see the iconic capital building top. No, you’re not in downtown. It is miles away. The draw distance is that amazing. Most people will admit that they are tired of all the grey and brown in games these days, but Fallout 3 makes it cool again. The graphics are amazing and the world is so large, chances are you won’t even approach its edges. Unfortunately it does suffer from some of the same problems that Oblivion had, particularly cities and dungeons are not distinct. There is a wide amount of variety, much more than Oblivion, but once you get somewhere, it is like a perpetual feeling of being lost hoping you’ll eventually stumble onto where you need to go. For example you’ll be in a city and want to go to the store, even though you’ve been there a million times before and know exactly where it is at, you’ll still be a little off because everything looks so similar. Or you’ll find yourself getting turned around in dungeons and thinking you’re going the right way and all of a sudden encounter dead bodies and have to turn around and trek back. To compound this issue, dungeons are incredibly dark and sometimes your Pip-Boy light isn’t enough. Another issue is after a big fight with several enemies, you’ll want to go loot the bodies but sometimes they blend so well into the wasteland you will have to spend a couple minutes trying to find them. Overall those are the biggest graphical issues and disappointing that they exist. There are of course some minor issues like things floating or a flickering texture but they are few and far between and forgivable considering it’s such a large world. The models and animations are also fairly mediocre but they are redeemed by the awesome death sequences for enemies, especially if you use the bloody mess perk. Overall though, Fallout 3 prevails against the brown and grey stereotype to create an awesome post-apocalyptic world. Sure it may suffer from issues endemic to open world games, but you’ll look past them and fall in love with the look and amazing amount of variation.

One of the criticisms for Oblivion was that they only used a couple voice actors so talking got very repetitive over awhile. I am glad to say they increased the amount of voice actors for this one. They all do a decent job of delivering their lines but nothing special, even with the addition of Liam Neeson as the voice of your father. But on a positive note there are so much unique pieces of dialogue in the game it’s really nice not to have the same lines repeated all the time. The music is a selection of songs from the 1950’s and work great into the atmosphere. One of the radio stations you have an option to listen to is particularly awesome. The DJ will actually talk about what you are doing out in the wasteland is very rewarding. Unfortunately there selections of songs aren’t that high and you’ll start hearing the same tracks over and over pretty quick. The sound effects on the other hand are pretty good, especially when their bodies are exploding into a million pieces. There are some minor problems though like tapping a barrel accidentally will cause a huge ruckus for no apparent reason. Therefore overall the sound is pretty good, with tons of variation.

Bethesda has won me over; Fallout 3 is highly addictive and very entertaining. The beginning was a little rough but once the game clicks, you’re in for one hell of a ride. Unfortunately the main quest isn’t that great but the story and atmosphere of the world is very intriguing. As you explore the wasteland you’ll find dungeons and people that will flesh out the world. Very rarely does anything feel random; it all has a purpose for being there. People may try to approach this as a first-person shooter; it is not so you won’t be killing everyone in one blow to the head. You’ll be spending most of your time in the surprisingly good VATS system which makes combat feel good and rewarding. The lock picking and hacking minigames are pretty good and it’s nice to see special conversation options based upon your base attributes. The graphics are pretty good, especially the draw distance. Unfortunately dungeons and cities still do not feel very distinct and can cause you to feel lost. The sound has to be the weakest link in the game, everything else is pretty much stellar and while the variety and wealth of dialogue options are nice, it would’ve been nice to have some voice acting on the same level. Overall though Fallout 3 is not Oblivion, it’s far better. Bethesda clearly went back to the drawing board after that game and fixed most of the issues I had with it and have produced an awesome immersive game worthy of your $60.

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