This is something that has been on my mind for awhile. I personally enjoy Fallout 3 quite a bit. Most of the people I know do aswell. I don't think it's perfect, but I love wandering the wasteland and creating characters with a set personality and backstory. I like it because I can actually roleplay to a degree instead of being spoonfed a story and only getting the RPG feel from levelling and stats.
Not to mention that there are no elves in sight.
Now I've played both the original fallouts, and I like them both for much the same reasons as I just stated for the 3rd.
What I don't get, and my question to people out there is pretty much the topic subject. Why do the Fallout die hards hate it so much? I just don't get why at all. I mean sure, there is no game made that everyone enjoys but Fallout 3 seems like such a labour of love to me. From reading the dev blogs, to the details in the game I think they tried their very best to modernise the franchise while staying as true to it as they could.
Is it because they modernised it?
Is it because it uses an upgraded oblivion engine and has moments of feeling a bit like oblivion that you just can't ignore?
Please don't flame me! I'm really just curious as to why the fallout heavies damn it so much when my own experience, and the experiences of others I know have been so positive.

The SPECIAL stats in FO3 mean almost nothing.
Too much focus on the graphics not enough on the storytelling.
The ending was done in a stupid way.
Major lore inconsistencies (Jet for example)
Dumbing down of everything Fallout related.
Made it real time and then threw VATS in as if it was going to make a whit of a difference.
Harold, just Harold.
Bethesda tried too hard and failed miserably or they didn't play the originals or something.
Todd Howard was involved in it.
Obvious rip off from Fallout 2 (Hey we got our own mobsters in our Fallout! W00t!)
Please pick a reason any reason....
To some people it feels like someone resurrected their dead grandmother and made her walk around to prove she was alright.
EDIT: Just so people know, these are not my sentiments but ones I have heard or read about. Sorry for the mix-up.
I am butthurt about this game because I cannot play it on my PC so yeah...

Pick a game. Any game. There will always be people that hate it.

You can get together a group of 100 players who have played any game you care to mention but the only ones heard wil always be those who hate it.
Bad news ALWAYS travels faster and those who spread that bad news will always shout the loudest in protest and make spurious claims and comparisons in order to convince others.
WELL I BLOODY WElL LIKED IT AND AM CURRENTLY PLAYING IT AGAIN

Yep I enjoyed it alot too. I wouldn't say it was a vocal minority in general, just maybe on GoG.com. As I said, I've mostly had good responses from friends.
But when you see comments like 'travesty of a game' it makes me wonder hence this thread.
I disagree with what you say about SPECIAL and VATS, one made a noticeable difference between my characters the other does make a difference in combat, atleast it does too me.
The storytelling/graphics thing...well. The main quest isn't a tour de force in story writing, though there are some great moments. Some of the side quests are very entertaining and well written however. I agree with what you say about the ending though. It was an utter cop out.

While there are always going to be people out there who 'hate' something, even just for the sake of hating. Sometimes, it's almost justified when said something is simply bad or really deviates from the originals.
All the changes and 'improvements' Bethesda have made to this game made me loose any interest in playing it. (And I should not have to play anything).
It's not Bethesda itself I dislike for said changes (unlike some people out there on the net), but rather the combination of everything they have done.
The disclaimer here being that I have not played it, and thus have little opinion on yay or nay. I simply can't be bothered until it hits bargin-bin time and I have a console or PC that will run it decently.

Its fallout and its not interplay. That made many of the original fans detest it without a further thought. The fact that it's different only magnifies that hate. Add pc elitism / anti-console fanboyism into the mix and you've got a bubbling fondue of hatred.
Then double that because it's on the internet and you can get away with being a fuckwit because noone has invented the ability to hit people through a computer.
Peronally I liked it, pretty much the same amount as I liked the first 2 & tactics. They do the job they're supposed to do well and I don't feel ripped off for buying them.

Yeah, I really don't understand some peoples.
For example, there was a person on Youtube that used to upload videos of old games and considerings how those games were hard to record (let alone run), I respected him. However, it ended when I read some comments from Fallout 3 saying something like "this unpolished bugfest, with this shitty story can only appeal to retards and stupid 14 years old."
I love old games, but I despite elitism.
Note that I haven't played Fallout 3 (nor any of the Elder Scrolls series except Arena), but it seemed interesting. I'll probably get a copy once the price drop and/or I get a better computer.

I don't see it.
They say they never even considered making the game isometric and turn-based, while the original developers never even considered making a sequel anything but. Kind of like saying "Planescape: Torment didn't really need that much text and should be set in a more generic world" or "X-COM doesn't need tactical squad combat, it'd be better and more modern if it was an FPS with a single supersoldier blasting through thousands of aliens".
That they're admittedly making it for the "what's cool this week?" demographic is also telling. They say they know the ending sucks, but are perfectly okay with it - that's just lazy, as if they don't care. For those wondering, the ending has you or another character die of massive radiation poisoning, neglecting that you have followers that are immune to radiation. This mostly results from their design philosophy of having them tell their own story, instead of letting the player write his own.
And in any case, even if, as you say, they put their hearts into it, that doesn't mean the game won't suck. (That's the very definition of "crappy fanfic", after all)

They should have made the ending in FO3 an alternate or "bad" ending like you had in the previous 2 Fallouts. In the first Fallout you could tell the supermutant lieutanant(sp?) where Vault 13 was and you would get the ending that you chose through your actions. In FO3 you get one ending and that's it. No figuring out a way to do it otherwise *especially* with a follower who's immune to radiation. If that was me and FO3 was real that follwer would have been the one to go in and turn the switch. And the worst part is that Bethesda admits that it was a bad ending .....what the phuque??

the final DLC product is supposed to continue the main storyline, i don't think you're dead

Because it's essentially Oblivion with a Fallout modpack, rather than a proper Fallout game.
Having said that, I loved it. It has the Oblivion gameplay without the COMPLETELY EFFING RIDICULOUS levelling system.

why to hate failout 3 ? I have CE of fallout 3, i have played it quite a long, from start i enjoyed it, but...
that game is bugfest (CTDs are the worst)
SPECIAL is useless - no real influence on game (I have tried this with many characters just to prove it, only real influence was on battle)
skills are useless - pick one weapon skill and science or lockpick, nothing else needed
dialogues are "retarded" - i am oldschool RPG player, so I expect from RPG game real dialogues not what bethesda created
inconsistency in game world - that bomb in megaton, radioactive water WTF?, geck, jet on east coast, supermutants with reinforcements on east coast........
missing mainstory - 6 hours in first play if you dont know what to do, 3 hours max next time if you do everything in order, 1 hour or less if you go just for ending, not mentioning that bethesda don't know what is GECK supposed to do.
vaults - did they read anything about vaults ?
harold
oh, that game is too hard on easy for you ? there is god mode, but we call it vats....
little or no backstory, informations, holodiscs
personaly i do not like graphics of weapons (look at mods with old fallout weapons, laser rifle finaly looks good)
movement in 3rd person
jumping
game is way to easy even on hard
inconsistencies in quests
unlogical quests
missing logic in whole game
ending of game (me or that brothershit soldier)
brotherhood of steel is now just band gooddoing idiots
powerarmor looks like... eh... how to say it and not be rude....
oblivion syndrome of repeating dungeons
no real enemies, just tons of raiders
no outro (just 4 or how many pictures made by some monkey in corel)
diferent ending differs in one word actually ?
fallout 3 is good shooter, or good "console RPG for american kids" game, but it IS NOT FALLOUT, it is just good game in wasteland, nothing less nothing more. Hmm even oblivion datadisk shivering isles took me twice longer to finish then failout 3.
btw i am not mentioning things like perks, traits, tagged skills and other stuff that i hate as fallout fan.

I already posted this over in the Fallout forum, but reposting here cause it's probably more relevant in this thread:
Fallout 3's a good game, don't get me wrong. On it's own it's fine. But... I believe I would have a lot less of a problem with Fallout 3 if there was no "3" involved. Possibly as a Fallout : <Subtitle here>.
It's not a Fallout. It's literally Oblivion with guns. Try playing a melee character and you'll shit yourself on how it feels like you're playing Oblivion...with a sledgehammer. All the gameplay is the same, all pretty visual elements aside. Remember how Oblivion got way too easy and you were a god character by level 40? You were good at EVERYTHING? Started out as an archer character and now you can swing a sword and wear heavy armor? Well minus about 20-25 levels off of that and you have Fallout 3. Replace archer with "Small Guns" and swing a sword and wear heavy armor with "Swing Sledge" and "Big guns". Even on Very Hard it was still easy. SO somewhere between level 16-20 skills and stats are pointless and the game becomes a shooter with people who talk alot. Just how Oblivion became a game where I stopped bothering to sneak and arrow enemies in the back, and just ran in with a big sword and slaughtered everyone w/o breaking a sweat.
The stats? Pointless. It may matter when you're in VATS, but if you just hold down that "Fire" button with the crosshair anywhere near the enemy, eventually they'll die. Especially since I have a retarded amount of stimpaks that i never get addicted to, can use as many as I want in one sitting, and drugs that I can just head back to my house and clean up the addiction in a 1/2 second flat.
The main storyline doesn't make sense if you know anything about Fallout. I'm pretty forgiving if it's a good game, but some things are just too much. I can accept the Brotherhood of Steel back story in D.C., I could see that happening. GECK as a water purifier? Really? Forced sacrifice? Get the hell out. Some of the things they said in the game is up there with "Vault 0" on my "that doesn't make any damn sense" meter. There's way too many inconsistencies that aren't explained / don't make sense.
The best thing I can compare it to is taking Halo, making it a Real Time Strategy game, changing the story to say Master chief is a heroin addict who found a suit, and then calling it Halo 4.
PS: Not to mention I wanna pop my eardrums with pencils when I hear Liam Nieson sleep through his lines.