I think a lot of us are forgetting that the developers are not the writing team. Bethesda has about 270ish developers and 30ish writers, bethesda is an amazing studio that puts out quality gameplay and worldspaces. Their writers however seem like they work two months out of the year. Fallout 4's story felt very lazy. All they had to do was avoid: father-son focused story, and a story about revenge. They hit both. The first half is 3/4th Im going to kill the guy that did this. And the second half is you helping out your scientist family member purify something and it involves the brotherhood of steel somehow. Like, come on.

@VeteranAlpha

Spoiler:

@Doggo Very good point. It's not the devs that are to blame. It's the writers.

And the sad part is, as hackish as the main story of FO4 was, it still seems like it would be good on paper. But the delivery, both in the written dialogue and a lot of the voice acting, was just soooo lack luster. You could feel the laziness. Hell, half the lines sounded like initial script reads of a first draft. Some of them have the completely wrong inflection. Some have no inflection. I just... Ah...

Not to be disparaging against any mods out there, but it sounded like the voice acting and dialogue of a novice modder with good equipment.

Say what you want about Bethesda's writing they make some pretty dope environments, but yknow it'd be nice to have good writing and an amazing world space for once. If only Bethesda and Obsidian would join forces and make the next Fallout with Bethesda's world building and Obsidian's writing, but that'll probably never happen

Not to be rude, but... guys, there is ALOT of threads like these already, can't we just stick to one thread where all people just put their opinions on it? instead of making individual topics explaining the same thing? can we stop making individual threadss posting the same thing? i've seen too much "bethesda ruined fallout 4" "my toughts about fallout 4" "the new fallout is this and that", guys please stick to one thread. not wanting to be rude or off topic or anything, but i am suggesting that all these threads regarding FO4/FO opinions should be combined into one.

In all fairness, I typed this up while drinking and trying to entertain myself while my wife watched some trashy tv show.

If any admin reads this, feel free to archive, merge, or delete this thread at your will.

the most important thing about the whole topic in my opinion is that with out bethesda we would not be talking about fallout anymore. lets be honest - without F3 nobody would even remeber the first two (and tactics) they were great but old and anybody younger then 30 coukdnt careless. bethesda brought it back and damn they did an awesome job to get new gamers hooked. i played morrorwind and oblivion until my girlfriend all most left me (different story;)) but F3 was so much better because it was completely different. every open world rpg (western rpg) iever played was about knights dragons orks and so one.. F3s opening with the sun shining while the vault openend and let me run around shooting stuff like an fps (never used VAT) that was one of my biggest gaming moments ever. after New vegas came out i actually still preferred F3. after a while new vegas grew on me but without the mods i wouldhad never ever spent so much time asni did and still do. i played F3 on my xbox 360 without any mods and was blewn away and did allmost every quest and side quest. F4 was too much of the same for me and i didnt like to settlement part at all (never liked building games beside xcom enemy unknow from microprose) too few guns and too few enemies. just as it was in new vegas before the mods. so i wait for mods and hopefully bethesda gets what makes these games great for me:loot, loot and more loot. i dont care about the story (my life has enough story so i enjoy games withou too much story;)) (ecxept mass effect) all i wanted to say is without bethesdas F3 obsidian would never have made New Vegas. the ratings for New Vegas were even lower but over the years people started to love it more and more. not sure if there is a bit of nostalgy and back then everything was better involved as well. i enjoy both and plan on reinstalling F3 soon:)

@onowrouzi: A blank slate isn't more complex (if anything, it's lazy in my books). FNV kinda threw the book of storytelling and just said 'we'll let players decide'. While I can see the merits of that, I personally hated it. Backstory? What's that?

The most memorable parts of FO3 and FO4 wasn't the gameplay, but the characters themselves. I still remember quite a few characters from FO3. FNV? Survival and ironsights. All I remember from FNV in terms of the characters is Veronica and the Doctor in the beginning of the game.

If Obsidian wants to appeal to mainstream more, they're going to have to abandon the tabula rasa approach and instead have engaging characters at least, and then a good story. I reckon that FO4 took a bit out of FNV's book in terms of story development: as opposed to FO3's singular approach in the ending, FO4 let you decide which faction comes out on top.

Regarding dialogue, I'd disagree with you for the majority except for Preston Garvey's voice actor. That one was particularly bad: everyone else did a great job IMO, especially Piper, Scribe Haylen and Valentine. Female PC's voice actor was much better than the male PC.

dazzerfong wrote:

@onowrouzi: A blank slate isn't more complex (if anything, it's lazy in my books). FNV kinda threw the book of storytelling and just said 'we'll let players decide'. While I can see the merits of that, I personally hated it. Backstory? What's that?

The most memorable parts of FO3 and FO4 wasn't the gameplay, but the characters themselves. I still remember quite a few characters from FO3. FNV? Survival and ironsights. All I remember from FNV in terms of the characters is Veronica and the Doctor in the beginning of the game.

If Obsidian wants to appeal to mainstream more, they're going to have to abandon the tabula rasa approach and instead have engaging characters at least, and then a good story. I reckon that FO4 took a bit out of FNV's book in terms of story development: as opposed to FO3's singular approach in the ending, FO4 let you decide which faction comes out on top.

Regarding dialogue, I'd disagree with you for the majority except for Preston Garvey's voice actor. That one was particularly bad: everyone else did a great job IMO, especially Piper, Scribe Haylen and Valentine. Female PC's voice actor was much better than the male PC.

While I respect your opinion totally, I have to disagree. You need to look at fallout for what it is: a role playing game. The original fallouts gave you a goal and a world, your backstory is irreverent and your future is what matters. New Vegas's storytelling may not be memorable to you, who seems to be looking for a more linear game like uncharted, but for everyone who wanted to be their character it was a dream come true. When you were a kid did you ever take an action figure from an established universe and pretend they were something else? I had storm trooper action figures and I would pretend they were bounty hunters going after some villain, who was most likely spiderman. However if every time they talked to someone I was reminded they weren't actually bounty hunters and instead were storm troopers, that'd kill the fun a bit wouldn't it? New Vegas and 1/2 style storytelling is for people who want to project their ideas onto the game and mold it to their imagination. Fallout 4 and 3's style projected the character and world on you and bent your character to fit in with the world. There is nothing wrong with liking one more than the other, however most people prefer 1/2/NV's style because of 1) The roleplaying that I mentioned 2) Quests and options. New Vegas had A LOT of side quests, and almost all of them had different ways to do them and different outcomes, which affected not only you, but the world itself, they all changed how the Mojave would be after the battle of hoover dam.

I prefer no voice actor in fallout/TES because I like to play one playthrough as myself, I'm welsh so I have an accent. And while there is a race in TES that is literally named after a welsh tribe, the same cannot be said for Fallout. And that makes sense, fallout is very Americana, but there are immigrants, there is no sea wall built. But I think comparing the voice actors is pretty unfair. The male voice actor Brian Delaney is pretty new to voice acting, and really was not given a whole lot to work off of. I believe he is a great voice actor and I would like to see him return as an NPC and in different games. I'm glad he got a lot of exposure since he is a genuinely great person. Courtney Taylor on the other hand is very experienced with years of work under her belt. Of course she is going to know what she's doing more than he is, however I think part of it is that he is still feeling out to use context to project himself.

Edit: I forgot to address characters. I really can't recall any characters from 3 besides Dad, the lady that helps dad, and the weird mid western crazy lady. In fallout 4 I can name most of the companions, the leaders of the factions, and thats it. In New Vegas I can name all the faction leaders, Boone, Boone's wife, Arcade Gannon, Cass, Sunny Smiles, Doc Mitchell, Victor, Boxcars, Veronica, Dog/God, Ulysseus, Rotface, Benny, Prim Slim, Fisto, Santiago, Marcus, Vulpes Inculta, Joshua Gram, the Survivalist, Ed-e, and Lily.

@Doggo: Great, and this is where the conflict occurs: a blank slate, as opposed to a well-natured character. It's a change in direction, for sure, but it's one I (and most people) welcome. The crux of the 'hatred' behind Fallout 4 is that it's too radical a change for hardcore fans of FNV.

Here's the thing I don't quite understand: Fallout is a setting, a universe. It's not a defined set of rules that the game must follow. Just as the game has progressed from an isometric POV to what we have now, so must the narrative advance to modern standards. FNV was the exact opposite: it gave 'feel-good' endings which are inconsequential (except, well, give you a feel-good feeling) for the most part.

So, to conclude, it's not so much that Obsidian ruined Fallout for us: more that it utilised a more 'old-school' approach to RPG which most love (dare I say, circle-jerk) here, but otherwise is not so much liked elsewhere. However, one thing Obsidian did very right was the multiple resolution to quests, even the minor ones (despite me always going for the same one every time). I do wish that FO4 had a bit more levity with that.

However, I'm a filthy casual: I hate complexity for the sake of complexity. I like things sleek and (in the infamous words of Todd Howard) "it just works".