Fallout 3

8.8
Good

Gameplay	8.0	"Graphically Fallout 3 is brilliantly depressing"
Graphics	9.0
Sound	9.0
Value	8.0

By Angus Deacon

I have always considered myself to be more of a casual gamer. I still haven’t clocked GTA IV and I usually prefer to muck around than to try and unlock an extra costume or cut-scene in other titles. So when I find myself playing one game through to 3am in the morning - it usually means it’s pretty captivating stuff.

Fallout 3 is a very difficult game to put down and the strange thing is, the game isn’t even all that brilliant in terms of gameplay alone. It’s basically just a typical mash-up of RPG elements and plenty of first-person shooting thrown in. Yet it’s the overall presentation, level of detail and good old fashioned story-telling in Fallout 3 that cause it to be extremely addictive.

Fallout 3 takes place in 2277, years after a nuclear war that has devastated our planet Earth. Just prior to the man-made apocalypse, large cities known as Vaults were built underground for a select few citizens to live in. Outside of the Vault, the world is now contaminated and lies in ruin thanks to the atomic destruction of war. As the mantra that has been taught to you for years goes, “Nobody enters and nobody leaves the Vault”.

Your character was born and raised in a particular Vault simply known as number “101”. Vault 101 is located underneath what was once Washington DC, but is now known as The Capital Wasteland thanks to the nuclear fallout. You are the offspring of one of the Vault’s doctors and through a series of cleverly incorporated child-hood sequences, you get to create your own custom character. The game opens up at the time of your birth (it’s all very tasteful really, but still a bit gory) that allows you to choose your gender and your name. The game then skips to one year later where you’re an infant and here you can further customize what your character may grow up to be. Much like an extended tutorial, these stages of your child-hood teach you the basics of gameplay and give you some background information about your fellow Vault inhabitants. But even your decisions at this early stage in the game will have consequences so careful thought is required. Finally the game brings you into young adult-hood where the comfortable sanctity of Vault 101 is about to be shattered forever.

You wake up one morning to find the Vault in chaos. Your father has disappeared for reasons unknown and the authorities have turned against their own people. Grabbing what few possessions you can find, you must leave the confines of Vault 101, the only world you have ever known, and venture out to the outside world. This is essentially where the adventure really begins and the transition to the desolate surface world is literally stunning. From the dimly lit and repetitive corridors of Vault 101 you emerge to blinding sunlight and a sepia-toned wasteland that stretches into the distance as your eyes adjust to the glare.

Graphically Fallout 3 is brilliantly depressing. The Capital Wasteland is both visually and physically a harsh environment, filled with radioactive hazards, crumbled ruins, mutated creatures and survivors that are both hostile and friendly. With Bethesda behind the works, many people were concerned that this game would be just like Oblivion, but with guns. However Fallout 3 has a completely different feel to the Elderscrolls titles. For starters the Capital Wasteland is much smaller than what was presented to us in Oblivion. This isn’t a bad thing however, as the area is packed full of decayed towns and eerie cities. No more trekking for miles trying to find something of interest. The Capital Wasteland is still epic however and Bethesda have captured the tone of the previous Fallout games while giving them a major facelift at the same time. Simply walking around will cause you to stop just to admire the landscape… or to try and spot deadly landmines or raiding parties in the distance.

Fallout 3 also differs from Oblivion thanks to the V.A.T.S feature. This often talked about Vault-Tec Assisted Targeting System allows the player to freeze the action mid-combat and to enter a complex targeting sequence. With it you can specifically target different parts of your foe, from a headshot through to possibly aiming at their arm that’s brandishing a weapon. Strategically crippling a limb like an arm or a leg can disarm or slow down your opponent, giving you time to asess your situation and to conserve ammo. Each of these areas that you can target is given a percentage rate of success that will vary depending on your distance, angle and your skill with the weapon. For example you may enter the targeting mode and find you have a 61% chance of a headshot, but an 88% chance of hitting his right leg as it is extended with his stride. The choice is yours. But you’ll need to use it wisely as you only have a limited number of shots that you can use with V.A.T.S at any one time. Each time you use it (even if the shot misses completely) you will drain your tally of action points. These points do restore themselves but if you are faced with multiple foes you will need to use the traditional crosshair free-shooting method plenty of times as well. Even in free-mode, head-shots will still do more damage but with some foes moving at speed you will need an excellent aim to pull them off. You can also line up multiple shots with V.A.T.S and each time you use it you will be presented with a stylish slow-motion view complete with massive amounts of gore. You’ll never get tired of watching your headshot decapitate your opponent’s head and watch it fly off into the distance. Or watch a mutant explode into a pile of bloody lumps after an explosive is lobbed into his face.

Another vital piece of equipment that you’ll need constantly is the Pip-Boy 3000. Gifted to you when you were ten years old, this electronic arm gauntlet gives you access to your status, equipment, inventory, maps and quests. It’s essentially a futuristic PDA and using it in game is quick and seemless. Throughout your travels in Fallout 3 you will come across hundreds of items and pretty much anything that isn’t bolted down can be picked up and stored in your inventory. This has more importance due to the ability to construct your own items and weapons if you find blue-prints and have some knowledge in repairs and basic engineering. If you don’t, you can track down a merchant to make it for you and one of the best weapons you can hope to get is the Rock-It Launcher. This handy little thing allows you to fire any item you can fit into it as a projectile, so all those ash-trays and empty bottles you have in your pocket can finally be put to good use. There are dozens of weapons to try out in Fallout 3, from melee types (baseball bats, pool cues, police batons, wrenches) to long range weapons (pistols, shotguns, grenades) but finding ammo can sometimes hamper your trigger happy desires. Further to this, every weapon has it’s own lifespan as well. Everytime you fire a gun or strike something with your baseball bat, it deteriorates in condition eventually forcing you to repair or discard it.

Fallout 3 is filled with so many variables like this that the gameplay is virtually limitless. Every decision you make has consequences and your actions will affect the world around you. For example you may need to drink some water to restore health, but doing so from the local well exposes you to radiation. This is fine if you have some Rad-X or RadAway handy, but otherwise you will encounter the long-term effects of radiation poisoning. Even taking too many pain killers or medications may prove to be addictive and you will experience withdrawal symptoms without them. There is even a karma system that keeps track of your personality traits, essentially giving you the choice to play as the hero or the villain. Or a bit of both if you want.

When you encounter a neutral person in the Capital Wasteland you can determine your relationship with them with your positive or negative dialogue. But regardless of your dialogue, your physical actions will still have an effect. For example I befriended a desperate young lady taking refuge in a decrepit hut. After a quick chat I was thinking that we were best chums so I decided to help myself to some of her medical supplies from her pantry. But as I turned around with my hands full of syringes she shot me in the face. Needless to say my newfound friend was soon a corpse on her own kitchen floor and my karma took a bit of a nose-dive. So I proceeded to take everything in her house, trashed the place and ran off.

Fallout 3 still has plenty of RPG elements to back up the action too. The game revolves around a S.P.E.C.I.A.L role-playing system where you can allocate points to seven attributes that make up your character. They are Strength, Perception, Endurance, Charisma, Intelligence, Agility and Luck. Experience points are earned from exploring new areas, killing enemies and completing missions. On top of your standard leveling-up process there are also Perks that help to refine some of the more, well colourful attributes of your character. For example “Bloody Mess” increases your ability to strike devastating hits to your opponents, often causing them to explode all over the place. Another Perk is “Cannibal” that allows you to eat the bodies of your corpses to gain some extra health, but with a clever decrease to your karma with every bite. “Black Widow” and “Lady Killer” are gender specific abilities that allow you to be more effective against enemies of the opposite sex. “Animal Friend” can present you with aid of nearby animals to help you in combat and so fourth.

The options presented to you in Fallout 3 are so numerous and complex that you are likely to want to replay the game just to experience them. Surprisingly enough, the main central quest in the game clocks in at only around eight hours. But players can spend this time again just on side-missions and exploring the Capital Wasteland before they see everything the game has to offer. Likewise, the presentation of Fallout 3 is just as impressive as the amount of scope in the gameplay. Often you will find yourself laughing awkwardly at a humourous sign on the wall, or at a line of dialogue from a fellow survivor. Even the retro 50’s styled cartoon stills create an excellent juxtaposition to the overall dark tone of the game. The music and voice acting is superb and coupled with a brilliant plot, you will find yourself attempting to explore everything and to talk to everyone that you see. To really appreciate the atmospheric graphics, this game should be experienced with the lights dimmed and with little distractions if possible. Although this title may have a few too many elements for a pure first-person shooting fan, Fallout 3 was still surprisingly accessible to even this casual gamer. Recommended. But now I’m off to start building my own nuclear fallout bunker in my back-yard.

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ReplyPosted by Ruptunex on 10 November 2008, 12:08PM

"Fallout 3 takes place in 2077"

Nah it doesn't. That's the year the nuclear war happened. The game is set in 2277. 200 years after the war.

But this is a fantastic game.

 

ReplyPosted by Ron on 10 November 2008, 12:48PM

RE: Posted by Ruptunex on 10 November 2008, 12:08PM - Good spotting, this is a typo!

 

ReplyPosted by itachi27 on 10 November 2008, 06:38PM

Yes it is.

 

ReplyPosted by Gazza22 on 11 November 2008, 08:59AM

Ive still got to pick this up.

 

ReplyPosted by Lisa3x3x3 on 11 November 2008, 04:05PM

woa this game sounds intense! maybe just a rent tho

 

ReplyPosted by Wozza on 11 November 2008, 04:30PM

Sounds slick, will have to play after... everything else I am playing.

 

ReplyPosted by Flea17 on 12 November 2008, 05:43PM

It's an 8.8 - a decent score. But what is bringing it down from a perfect 10 isn't mentioned, only good things are talked about in the review. Was this just a overall thing, that it isn't perfect but there's no place you can actually pin down why?

 

ReplyPosted by kaz on 12 November 2008, 11:55PM

2 words "MAD MAX"

 

ReplyPosted by marbig on 13 November 2008, 07:02PM

I don't like the sound of the level twenty level cap, so I might have to wait a while until I pick this up.

 

ReplyPosted by Genocide on 14 November 2008, 12:18AM

How was it a typo...2 is on the other side of the keyboard to 0... Lol :P

 

ReplyPosted by alienhominid on 14 November 2008, 09:44AM

Reply to post by Genocide on 14 November 2008, 12:18AM
How was it a typo...2 is on the other side of the keyboard to 0... Lol :P

not if you use the num pad.

 

ReplyPosted by KravenMore on 14 November 2008, 10:58AM

Brilliantly depressing is a great description. I've never seen desolation look so good!
And even though the wasteland is comparatively sparsely populated, it's balanced to a tea. Love it.

 

ReplyPosted by mattfluffit on 14 November 2008, 04:59PM

is this game worth the $140 pricetag?

 

ReplyPosted by IAMMAFIAGIMMEFABLE on 15 November 2008, 08:51PM

fallout 3 is da man

 

ReplyPosted by -Unknown- on 16 November 2008, 10:50AM

Sounds great.
But i would probly only rent it.

 

ReplyPosted by primeelfkilla on 16 November 2008, 02:11PM

I would like to buy a copy but my wife tells me Not till I play all of the games in my collection ahhhhhhhhhhhh she took my bank card off me.

 

ReplyPosted by Mach1_9pants on 17 November 2008, 06:05PM

I am playing this at the moment on my Triple Head set up (5040x1050 res)and it is awesome! I'm gonna loose at least 50 hours on this :)

 

ReplyPosted by Mach1_9pants on 17 November 2008, 06:51PM

Reply to post by primeelfkilla on 16 November 2008, 02:11PM
I would like to buy a copy but my wife tells me Not till I play all of the games in my collection ahhhhhhhhhhhh she took my bank card off me.

Sorry to laugh at your misfortune but man that is funny!

 

ReplyPosted by Moneyshot on 18 November 2008, 02:29PM

I rented this game...and Im hooked,its dark and very well designed and the level of detail is massive.
With its good or evil path you can take and the amount of weapons and skills you can aim for.
The fifty's style and music is great...few gliches with ghosting and frame rate but bugger all.
Very high end PC's are suppose to be the best for running it but you would need a very late machine for that.
PS3 and Xbox are fine and the game looks sharp...not many games you start when you are born and makes you a toddler etc.
Great game mirrors edge got 9.0 and I cant see it living up to the lifespan of this 20 hours plus.

 

ReplyPosted by littleboyl33t on 18 November 2008, 06:02PM

I love a game with great graphics!!! Now I'll definitely buy a copy of Fallout 3 on PC!!

 

ReplyPosted by Bunnny on 19 November 2008, 03:02PM

With all the hype I thought it would get a higher rating?

 

ReplyPosted by Shuyin on 22 November 2008, 12:03AM

Its got so many 10 out of 10s that its not funny so i wouldnt worry much about this reviews score. Plus its a nominee for game of the year.

 

ReplyPosted by That_Boy on 4 February 2009, 01:33PM

A Fantastic game, good review, Fallout and Fallout 2 were my favorite games when I was younger and were really what turned me into a gamer and this lives up to the expectations its predecessors set whilst moving forward enough to make it one of the best games of last year. Well worth it. (Plus if you buy the collectors edition you get a pip-boy bobblehead!)