Every bethersda new game.... over and over again the same posts and complaints.
It is sufficient to change game title, and the posts still applies.

Wonderful.

Not that I really need it (because I have two suits already), but how do you get the power armor in the cage on the train car? Doesn't seem to be an option to pick the cage door, and I didn't see any switches or terminals in the area... ?

Nevermind: There's a terminal inside one of the train cars. Missed it on my first pass. :|

:)
nice review, thanks! I have Rage, but i've only played a little bit of it. Liked it a lot, but then I got to the racing challenge and went, "aw crap" b/c i'm terrible at those. I never use cars if I don't have to in Borderlands b/c of this, lol.

Maybe I'll go back and play some more to see if I feel the same.

And yet people will still buy and play them because more times than not, their games are fun to play no matter what the title says. Most people could give a damn what 'Fallout' is supposed to be.

My favorite copy and paste Bethesda complaint is, "The modded version of *previous game* looks better than *new game*!"

That one has been coming up for nearly 10 years.

OK, I dived in yesterday and already have around 12 hours of gameplay.

It's surely not the successor of Fallout 1-2 but taking it as a "Skyrim with guns", it's quite good actually.

*** What I hate ***

* the shooting aspect coupled with graphic bug (PC version) which doesn't show the weapon you're holding and the delay when you change weapon, add to that the new slo-motion VATS and you get a gameplay which is not convincing in terms of action or strategy

* the PC interface, navigating the menus is horrible. period.

* The building system: It's so messed up to navigate and build up settlements. I pray for a mod to "traditional building with some sort of top-down or isometric view with some kind of grid and snapping system. Oh well, at least that gives me an excuse to roleplay as the lonesome cowgirl holed up with her dog in the deserted gas station :o)

* the dialog system: most of the time I wouldn't mind but in some cases it's really unnerving to have to guess the "correct answer".

*** What I like ***

* Freedom : I barely bothered with quests in my 12 hours of gameplay but instead I spent my time exploring the map, killing foes and gathering ressources. This is how I generally play and like this type of game :o)

* The craft system : I really love it, so much stuff and variations to make ^o^

* The world/map : lots of stuff to do and explore and the map is way more "open" than the one from New Vegas (unless you knew how to speedrun NV, you have to follow a single "pathway" in the first half of the game).

All in all, certain aspects of the game makes me cringe but the rest of the experience compensates largely the flaws.

***PRO-TIP***
In the first few hours, look out for the "Covenant", a kind of "safe haven" in the midlle of the map (next to the lake at the east of Trudy's diner), there you can buy a kick-ass shotgun and a pretty helmet which will greatly help in combat.

*** QUESTION ***

Is there a cowboy hat in the game? I'm trying to make the same kind of outfit than in New Vegas

That pretty much sums it up, yeah :P.

I've just started running into the weapon switching delay quirk, and yeah it can be really annoying if you're trying to rapidly switch between weapons during combat. Possibly it's because the game is trying to load weapon models when you switch them? I'm not sure.

I also really wanted to like the new slo-mo VATS, but... I don't. VATS is already significantly less useful, at least in my experience. Which isn't necessarily a bad thing considering it was basically a "kill all the things" button in Fallout 3. But when you add in the fact that you don't really have time to think while in VATS, and the fact that it's far too easy to accidently select the wrong bodypart... it's basically worthless. Maybe the VATs-specific perks make it better. I haven't invested in any of them.

Those issues aside, though, I think combat feels miles better than in Fallout 3. Close range firefights can actually be quite a lot of fun, and sniping feels a lot more... "snipey" I guess. Melee combat is WAY more satisfying. It actually feels great to slice through enemies with a machete.

I haven't found any cowboy hats yet, but there's a yellow fedora. Looks sharp, wore it until I found an army helmet. Might switch back later, but the helmet is an extra 10 damage resistance iirc, and at lower levels practicality often beats looks for me. ;)

---

My town is growing! Eight peeps there now. I usually build or plant something whenever I drop off the latest haul. Despite the initial tedium, I'm starting to like the place.

Building stores requires Charisma 6 and two perks, which sucks for me: Charisma 3 right now. But on the plus side, Carla the trader has been visiting the town.

I guess I can see some similarities to Rage, but for me the big difference is the amount of freedom you have in Fallout 4. Rage was very much a linear FPS with some minor non-linear elements. Fallout 4 is, like, non-linearity the game.

I think that's one thing that's really unique about Bethesda. There are a lot of AAA devs making big games with lots of sidequests, but I don't think there's another AAA dev that puts this much emphasis on ACTUALL freedom in a handmade world (not procedural), if you know what I mean. What makes Fallout 4 work for me isn't the fact that there are a lot of sidequests you can do, it's the fact that is pretty much just lets you do whatever, whenever. Even when it has to choose that philosophy at the expense of traditional "good" design (giving you the power armor so early, making it so easy to stock up on resources etc).

In terms of both environmental layout and gameplay, it feels like it has very few barriers. Even traditional progression blockers (needing resources to craft items etc) are overcome more by player will (want to build something? It's easy to find junk and/or weapons to scrap) than by skill/time/effort. It's kinda the same reason I find Morrowind so enchanting despite its many flaws. I just love the idea of a playground where the governing philosophy isn't "what challenges are there for you to overcome?" but rather "what do you want to do?"

The way they implement sleeping is a great example of this, I think. You absolutely don't have to sleep, ever. There's no "exaustion" meter like in Pathologic, nights aren't deadly like in Call of Pripyat. But if you WANT to sleep, you get a little stat bonus. So if you're involved in questing or exploring, you don't have to stop to sleep if you don't want to. But you CAN, if you decide "you know what, my character would probably want to sleep right now," and get a small little mechanical reinforcement of that role playing decision.

It's not Garry's Mod or something like that, but it's definitely leaning in that direction while still keeping one foot in traditional game design. And honestly, I didn't like Bethesda games until I realized this, then suddenly everything just clicked. They're like the videogame equivalent of going to the playground. And it's really rare to find a game with that philosophy that's still very mechanics-driven.

If he works the same way he did in Fallout 3, he's able to pull weapons/items out of locked containers. So that's probably true!
Have you been storing your look in the workshop? I was storing everything in the workshop for awhile, but eventually it became to big a hassle to sort through everything when I wanted to switch to a different weapon etc. So now I just store junk at the workshop, and store important items on the floor. Seriously, it's actually way better. Just dump all your stuff on the floor of your house :D

I'm all about "looks" in fact, that's why I'm just wearing jeans&t-shirt&aviator sunglasses (with some added light leather armor parts) for 80% of the game. It's a more interesting roleplay when you limit yourself in some ways (but hey, I can still use the power armors for a tough fight ^o^).

Too messy :o) I personally have a "container" for each type of items. A suitcase for clothes, a trunk for chemicals/aids, a tool drawer for weapons and ammo and the "milk vendor machine" (at the gas station) for food.

In a weird way I actually find it more immersive, since I can actually SEE my stuff in the world, acting like solid objects, instead of it just being a name on a list. But yes, it is a little messy :)

I love all the different outfits in the game too :)

I like how you pronounced it GOG instead of G-O-G.

it will always be gog to me. g-o-g is just silliness. SILLINESS!!! :)

and thanks for watching
I tried it, first thing I did in my latest twitch. no love on the xbox. dogmeat just whined and whined at me. :(

I can agree with pieces of what you said. Fallout 4 seems like Rage gone off the rails, coupled with Skyrim's sense of freedom and some RPG elements. I'm not even saying it's necessarily a horrendous thing, either. If you're going to shift genres, you might as well get the expertise of some people who defo know how to make a good shooter. (id)
Would I still prefer an actual Fallout RPG? Most assuredly, but it's not like I'm not having a bit of a blast with what they gave us. (Heck, even Black Isle had plans for a Fallout FPS at one point, so it would have happened either way.)