Marathon baby. Actually some good sites in here. RPGCodex, 3rd review and I think they're doing more. Quite a Fallout 3-centric site, that Codex (:declineofthecodex
.<blockquote>I'm coming to my biggest gripe about the game. To properly explore any work of fiction, you have to suspend your disbelief. It's as true in case of video games as when it comes to movies or books. So let's take Fallout 3. Gigantic flies and fire-spitting ants roam the ruins, while crickets happily chirp among the concrete blocks of a destroyed city? Ahaha, that's the outcome of a nuclear war for you, right? Some mutations have to occur, move along. You decide to help a poor girl and deliver a message from her to a far-off settlement in which her family (which she's obviously very concerned about) may or may not be alive, encounter an apparently murderous clique of blood-drinkers who have a certain relationship with the family in question, deal with the whole situation (which can be done in a few ways, btw), but come back only to hear a „kthxbye” line from her? Well, hehehe, she obviously tricked you and wasn't actually concerned about anyone, it's your fault for assuming too much. Every second raider hideout looks like Butcher's place from Diablo, with contorted bodies impaled on any protruding thingamajig available. But, uh, after an atomic holocaust some people are bound to get a little twisted, ain't they?
The problem is that the more you play, the higher you suspend your disbelief. Eventually it's suspended so high it gets frightened and screams in terror. And then it hits you. It's supposed to be 200 years after the war. And to cut a long story short, the game world is designed as if a lot, lot less time has passed since the apocalypse. Why the hell are all those wooden buildings standing in such a state 200 years after the war? How on earth are all those computers running? Why didn't anybody loot all the first-aid boxes and vending machines? Why are all the food items still edible? To borrow a phrase from one of our forum posters, shouldn't the game be "post-post-apocalyptic" if it's to be set two centuries after the war ended?</blockquote>Firing Squad 91%.<blockquote>Pros
Graphics and Audio: From a purely technical perspective, Fallout 3 is an achievement itself. The world’s destruction is beautifully rendered and the audio immerses the player in a world brought to its knees. The attention to detail continues to amaze us, whether it’s the rusted out town of Rivet City or some stray alley in Downtown D.C.
Humor: Fallout 3 has some of the funniest lines of dialogue since Portal and the cynically humorous way that Bethesda has approached the world only works to draw the player in.
Scalable Performance: The Gamebyro engine powered Oblivion 2 years ago and has seen some pretty good upgrades that not only keeps it visually interesting, but also helps it to perform on a wide range of graphics cards at satisfactory levels.
Deep Gameplay::Like Oblivion, you can beat the main quest in 10 hours or simply ignore it, playing side-quest to side-quest, exploring the Capital Wasteland at your leisure.
Simple DRM…. Like many contemporary PC releases lately, Fallout 3 utilizes SecuRom technology as its DRM. Now, unlike its contemporaries, Fallout 3 does not limit the number of installs or run programs in the background, instead relying on a simple CD-Check.
Cons
…But DRM is still DRM: While it may not be as bad as Spore or Mass Effect, DRM is still a bane to the legal PC gamer. Anyone who has the littlest bit of PC knowledge knows that many cracking groups release NO-CD cracks within days (if not before) of a major games release, therefore defeating the purpose of DRM entirely. In fact, DRM doesn’t do anything but annoy the very people it’s meant to protect, the consumer who buys his copy legally.
Bugs: During our testing we documented at least 3 bugs that prevented us from completing side-quests and it appears we aren’t the only ones to experience this. From disappearing NPC’s to random crashes, it looks like Fallout 3 has its fair share of annoyances to go with it. It is also worth noting that a lot of these bugs are not limited to the PC version, but infest the 360 and PS3 versions as well.</blockquote>411mania, 8.9.<blockquote>After you complete the Escape level you will be thrust into what is quite possibly the largest and most expansive map you have ever seen. I have beaten Oblivion 100% and I can say with confidence that this map and the amount of locations possible to be discovered is probably at least five times the size.
While Fallout 3 entered the market as one of the games that will compete for game of the year, it does fall just short of those expectations. A confusing game pace combined with aggravating lock picking and computer hacking drags down what is otherwise a perfect game. The future of this franchise is bright, and while you can do somewhat better on games this year, you can do much worse. Overall, don’t rush out and buy this game, rather wait until you can pick it up used somewhere. </blockquote>IT Reviews, recommended.<blockquote>The Fallout series is famed for its rich storylines, depth of characters and dialogue choices, and number three doesn't stray from this philosophy. There are always choices to be made and quests can be completed in multiple ways depending on the sort of character you've built. Thief types can pick locks and sneak into areas others can't, while charismatic chaps receive extra dialogue options such as lying and bluffing.
For example, one task is to enter and reach a location in a landmined town, disarming and retrieving a mine to prove you've been there. But we happened to find a mine on a dead mutant and, presenting it to the NPC, bluffed our way into convincing her we'd completed the quest.</blockquote>XCGN, 9.4.<blockquote>Fallout 3 was a game that had mass anticipation surrounding it, yet a lot of fear about whether the Fallout series would be tarnished. Fans badmouthed Bethesda prior to release, now they will need to eat their words as this is truly a brilliant RPG that exceeds all expectations.</blockquote>Resolution magazine, 93/100.<blockquote>But when the rest is this good, it’s difficult to stay mad for long. Some will moan about the difference in tone from the previous games, or the heavier emphasis on combat. Comparing Fallout 3 with Black Isle’s titles is a little futile, though. It reeks of nostalgic arrogance to expect a modern developer to create a title in line with decade-old expectations, and anything less than a dramatic shift of approach would have undoubtedly alienated the rest of its target audience.
It all amounts to Fallout 3’s main aims: atmosphere and immersion. On the whole, it succeeds so remarkably well that, when you’re snapped out of your trance on a few occasions, it becomes all the more frustrating.
Mainly, we’re talking about bugs here. There are a couple of dialogue issues, but largely the script and acting are perfectly adequate. It is slightly silly, though, that it’s possible to skip entire quests by simply turning up at a later location in the game. If you’re creating a large, open-plan world that encourages heavy exploration, you need to make sure the plot functions tightly and efficiently within this world. At times, Fallout’s doesn’t, which can create severe problems. With this in mind, stay away from Rivet City until someone specifically tells you to go there. </blockquote>NowPublic.<blockquote>While the interface is simplified and ‘themed’ for an Atompunk world instead of the fantastical Morrowind universe, you'll feel right at home if you’ve played one of Bethesda’s Elder Scrolls games before. Firing weapons, picking up objects, and ‘becoming over-encumbered’ call back to their digital ancestors. This made it, at least for me, much easier to start the game and get going much faster.</blockquote>
.<blockquote>I'm coming to my biggest gripe about the game. To properly explore any work of fiction, you have to suspend your disbelief. It's as true in case of video games as when it comes to movies or books. So let's take Fallout 3. Gigantic flies and fire-spitting ants roam the ruins, while crickets happily chirp among the concrete blocks of a destroyed city? Ahaha, that's the outcome of a nuclear war for you, right? Some mutations have to occur, move along. You decide to help a poor girl and deliver a message from her to a far-off settlement in which her family (which she's obviously very concerned about) may or may not be alive, encounter an apparently murderous clique of blood-drinkers who have a certain relationship with the family in question, deal with the whole situation (which can be done in a few ways, btw), but come back only to hear a „kthxbye” line from her? Well, hehehe, she obviously tricked you and wasn't actually concerned about anyone, it's your fault for assuming too much. Every second raider hideout looks like Butcher's place from Diablo, with contorted bodies impaled on any protruding thingamajig available. But, uh, after an atomic holocaust some people are bound to get a little twisted, ain't they?The problem is that the more you play, the higher you suspend your disbelief. Eventually it's suspended so high it gets frightened and screams in terror. And then it hits you. It's supposed to be 200 years after the war. And to cut a long story short, the game world is designed as if a lot, lot less time has passed since the apocalypse. Why the hell are all those wooden buildings standing in such a state 200 years after the war? How on earth are all those computers running? Why didn't anybody loot all the first-aid boxes and vending machines? Why are all the food items still edible? To borrow a phrase from one of our forum posters, shouldn't the game be "post-post-apocalyptic" if it's to be set two centuries after the war ended?</blockquote>Firing Squad 91%.<blockquote>Pros
Graphics and Audio: From a purely technical perspective, Fallout 3 is an achievement itself. The world’s destruction is beautifully rendered and the audio immerses the player in a world brought to its knees. The attention to detail continues to amaze us, whether it’s the rusted out town of Rivet City or some stray alley in Downtown D.C.
Humor: Fallout 3 has some of the funniest lines of dialogue since Portal and the cynically humorous way that Bethesda has approached the world only works to draw the player in.
Scalable Performance: The Gamebyro engine powered Oblivion 2 years ago and has seen some pretty good upgrades that not only keeps it visually interesting, but also helps it to perform on a wide range of graphics cards at satisfactory levels.
Deep Gameplay::Like Oblivion, you can beat the main quest in 10 hours or simply ignore it, playing side-quest to side-quest, exploring the Capital Wasteland at your leisure.
Simple DRM…. Like many contemporary PC releases lately, Fallout 3 utilizes SecuRom technology as its DRM. Now, unlike its contemporaries, Fallout 3 does not limit the number of installs or run programs in the background, instead relying on a simple CD-Check.
Cons
…But DRM is still DRM: While it may not be as bad as Spore or Mass Effect, DRM is still a bane to the legal PC gamer. Anyone who has the littlest bit of PC knowledge knows that many cracking groups release NO-CD cracks within days (if not before) of a major games release, therefore defeating the purpose of DRM entirely. In fact, DRM doesn’t do anything but annoy the very people it’s meant to protect, the consumer who buys his copy legally.
Bugs: During our testing we documented at least 3 bugs that prevented us from completing side-quests and it appears we aren’t the only ones to experience this. From disappearing NPC’s to random crashes, it looks like Fallout 3 has its fair share of annoyances to go with it. It is also worth noting that a lot of these bugs are not limited to the PC version, but infest the 360 and PS3 versions as well.</blockquote>411mania, 8.9.<blockquote>After you complete the Escape level you will be thrust into what is quite possibly the largest and most expansive map you have ever seen. I have beaten Oblivion 100% and I can say with confidence that this map and the amount of locations possible to be discovered is probably at least five times the size.
While Fallout 3 entered the market as one of the games that will compete for game of the year, it does fall just short of those expectations. A confusing game pace combined with aggravating lock picking and computer hacking drags down what is otherwise a perfect game. The future of this franchise is bright, and while you can do somewhat better on games this year, you can do much worse. Overall, don’t rush out and buy this game, rather wait until you can pick it up used somewhere. </blockquote>IT Reviews, recommended.<blockquote>The Fallout series is famed for its rich storylines, depth of characters and dialogue choices, and number three doesn't stray from this philosophy. There are always choices to be made and quests can be completed in multiple ways depending on the sort of character you've built. Thief types can pick locks and sneak into areas others can't, while charismatic chaps receive extra dialogue options such as lying and bluffing.
For example, one task is to enter and reach a location in a landmined town, disarming and retrieving a mine to prove you've been there. But we happened to find a mine on a dead mutant and, presenting it to the NPC, bluffed our way into convincing her we'd completed the quest.</blockquote>XCGN, 9.4.<blockquote>Fallout 3 was a game that had mass anticipation surrounding it, yet a lot of fear about whether the Fallout series would be tarnished. Fans badmouthed Bethesda prior to release, now they will need to eat their words as this is truly a brilliant RPG that exceeds all expectations.</blockquote>Resolution magazine, 93/100.<blockquote>But when the rest is this good, it’s difficult to stay mad for long. Some will moan about the difference in tone from the previous games, or the heavier emphasis on combat. Comparing Fallout 3 with Black Isle’s titles is a little futile, though. It reeks of nostalgic arrogance to expect a modern developer to create a title in line with decade-old expectations, and anything less than a dramatic shift of approach would have undoubtedly alienated the rest of its target audience.
It all amounts to Fallout 3’s main aims: atmosphere and immersion. On the whole, it succeeds so remarkably well that, when you’re snapped out of your trance on a few occasions, it becomes all the more frustrating.
Mainly, we’re talking about bugs here. There are a couple of dialogue issues, but largely the script and acting are perfectly adequate. It is slightly silly, though, that it’s possible to skip entire quests by simply turning up at a later location in the game. If you’re creating a large, open-plan world that encourages heavy exploration, you need to make sure the plot functions tightly and efficiently within this world. At times, Fallout’s doesn’t, which can create severe problems. With this in mind, stay away from Rivet City until someone specifically tells you to go there. </blockquote>NowPublic.<blockquote>While the interface is simplified and ‘themed’ for an Atompunk world instead of the fantastical Morrowind universe, you'll feel right at home if you’ve played one of Bethesda’s Elder Scrolls games before. Firing weapons, picking up objects, and ‘becoming over-encumbered’ call back to their digital ancestors. This made it, at least for me, much easier to start the game and get going much faster.</blockquote>
