I try not to get too picky when it comes to games.
Well I am, got fed up with wasting money on stuff that everyone and everything praised... and then turned out to be mediocre, or the same crap I had played 2 months ago.
Deus Ex was fantastic, but c'mon, can you really say Fallout 3 is worse without even playing it? Besides, the two games are completely different in so many ways the comparison is not very valid.
There comes "not even playing it" again... If you can't make up your mind about a game with plenty of non-playing samples, fine. I can, however.
Deus Ex was a better a game when it came to merging FPS with RPG because the mechanics made more sense. For example, in Deus Ex your skill with guns affects your crosshair accuracy. In FO3 it affects the damage you do with a weapon... except in VATS where it does indeed affect your chance to hit...
I'm not going into the "and I felt more engaged in Deus Ex" thing, because well, its subjective 100%.
As for Bloodlines, my memory on that is a bit fuzzy. I do recall hating the combat system, I think I got stuck fighting some tentacled boss monster. I never found the dialogue or the quests particularly special, though the whole setting was very interesting.
Why did you hate the combat system? I think I know the answer but I'll reserve my answer untill I know it for certain.
The dialogue wasn't special. Wasn't it miles better than FO3's? Just 1 Malkavian line could level any line I've heard in FO3. Please let's try to keep it fair. You may not apreciate subtle and well thought of dialogue, but really I can't conceive that anyone wouldnt find Bloodline's dialogue special. Same goes for FO1 and FO2
Other examples can be your persuasion and seduction lines. But Bloodlines is full of good lines, so its hard to pinpoint just one.
I get the feeling that you started out with the preconceived idea that the game will suck, and picked every screenshots and video apart to reinforce that. And again, watching videos is never, ever the same as actually playing the game. Especially when you need to judge the quality of writing and how deep the decisions you have to make are.
You get the feeling wrong, you should attune yourself better with the Force
Seriously now. I actually adopted a "wait and see" attitude, and have let some horrid stuff pass by me, untill I watched the first gameplay videos, and then some more.
You can say I'm biased, which I am (but then again, so are you and everyone else here
). I wasn't however, very patient and open minded.
And out of curiosity, how deep were the decisions you made so far? How unforeseen were they as well?
As for the visuals looking outdated, I have to disagree. It may not stand up to games liky Crysis, but it doesn't have to. The post apocalyptic wasteland looks great.
It doesn't stand up to Crysis, UT3, Unigine. At best the visuals can rival Source... so their outdated. Fact. I did say they were good though...
And the animations, albeit improved from Oblivion are extremely outdated.
Back in FO1 and FO2, you only had to voice act the important characters; no such luxury with FO3, just imagine the amount of complaining had Bethesda left a majority of their NPCs mute. With that in mind, I accept that the voice actors are of mixed quality, as you yourself said. I do dare you to call Liam Neeson and Malcolm McDowell bad though Big grin
Back in FO1 and 2 they didn't spend 1\10th of the money Bethesda spent on FO3, so its no excuse really.
And no, Neeson and McDowel aren't bad, but then again, Patrick Stewart and Sean Bean aren't bad either, yet they sounded awfull in Oblivion...
The original Fallout characters were mostly sprites maybe 80 pixels tall. Turning those convincingly into 3D is very hard and I think Bethesda managed to do it fairly well. I especially love what they did to the Deathclaws, those things are scary as hell.
Erm... stay true to the original design perhaps? Its the same story as having a FS3 with yellow glowed Shivans... Would you accept it?!? You don't have to answer, I already know for sure.
If you need examples:
Super mutants resembling The Hulk in terms of anatomy, hunched pose, enormous chin (compared to forehead) and upper lips being held up by something (on the dumb ones, so most of them
). Cancerous growths and dry skin. There's 3 Super Mutant talking heads in FO 1 and 2 so there's plenty of reference for the faces. As for the body, even those "80px" are enough to show how they are supposed to look like...
http://images3.wikia.nocookie.net/fallout/images//thumb/9/9b/Harry.jpg/250px-Harry.jpghttp://images1.wikia.nocookie.net/fallout/images//thumb/c/c0/Marcus.jpg/200px-Marcus.jpghttp://images4.wikia.nocookie.net/fallout/images//thumb/a/a3/Lieutenant.gif/120px-Lieutenant.gifhttp://images3.wikia.nocookie.net/fallout/images//0/0e/Supermutant.gifEnough reference? I'm sure you can spot the diferences...
Deathclaws, all I have to say is this:
http://images3.wikia.nocookie.net/fallout/images//thumb/a/a6/Deathclaw2.jpg/250px-Deathclaw2.jpgOn this one they actually almost got it right... they had to turn the horns around and make it look like a demon though...
Humans: oh wait they got it right... must've been hard though
everything really looks and feels like a nuclear wasteland should. I really dont understand what the game should look like to please you.
Again... stay true to the original?!?
Yeah it does look like a great
generic nuclear wasteland... Yet fallout's wasteland wasn't generic in the least.
Molybdenium was spot on when it comes not being Fallout. He was also spot on on what Fallout was about (atleast on the small things he mentioned).
Again, yes I'm biased. I never said FO3 is a bad game... IMO its mediocre. Good at best. It has the same flaws Bethesda always had in their games (and I was never particularly interested in their games... I had the misfortune of playing Oblivion though...).
But it doesn't have any resemblance to Fallout, and that alone is enough for me not to play it.
If it was called something else, then maybe I could look at it with other eyes (but probably I wouldn't like it still for its blandness).
If that's so hard to understand, imagine FS3 with yellow Shivan pacifists and spiky Vasudans, and all should be clear to you
Thanks for the spoiler!
Ooops sorry
Want some more? Oh wait I can't I haven't played the game