Fallout 4 - it's official! Coming Nov 10, '15

[KentState]

Somewhat off topic, but found this in my Loot Crate.

 

[zinfamous]

All of that stuff though is just filler without substance to me though. Some of it makes the game worse not better IMO but it is what it is.

The settlement stuff for example is just poorly done and I honestly have no reason to care I am doing it. There wasn't any big motivational reason to do the building. I guess people like me are different. Lots of stuff tossed in a game with no driving force behind it doesn't make a compelling experience and I guess I just am not as much a fan of the setting as others. I played the major storylines and it didn't feel like there was enough. I feel like skyrim had more story to explore for the various characters which is probably why I spent 10x more time with it than fallout.

Agreed. I really do like this game, but it's honestly nothing more than a well-packaged FO3 with the best community mods.

It makes for a great game, but if one suffers from burn-out rather easily, then this isn't going to feel that much different from what came before for players for players that spend time working with community content. I don't see this as a hugely negative criticism, just an observation based on the state of these games for the previous 7 years or so. It is what it is.

 

[Blue_Max]

Is there a Demo version of the game?

Next time there's a sale, pick up one (or both) of those previous games for $5-10. It'll introduce you to an awesome game worth the price of admission, then you can make the big investment into FO4.

 

[zinfamous]

Next time there's a sale, pick up one (or both) of those previous games for $5-10. It'll introduce you to an awesome game worth the price of admission, then you can make the big investment into FO4.

It's the best advice, really. Especially as the community work on those games is so very well developed...but then if one has little or no experience with the mods for these Bethesda games, it takes some time getting things "fixed" from startup. Even so, a couple of the necessary universal unofficial bug patches are mandatory (never expect Bethesda to do this for you )

Also recall that FO3 is notoriously evil to get working on Win7+ systems (I think Vista was pretty bad as well). I believe this is still the case, but even the steam version required at least one community patch to get it running consistently on most hardware.

 

[Markbnj]

Also recall that FO3 is notoriously evil to get working on Win7+ systems (I think Vista was pretty bad as well). I believe this is still the case, but even the steam version required at least one community patch to get it running consistently on most hardware.

Yeah the community bug fix patch is a must, but other than the usual save-hangs and occasional crashes the steam version of F03 runs great on Windows 7.

 

[facetman]

MY biggest glitch i get is my weapon wont draw/activated or appear. So I have to run around retrying to draw my gun while the bad guy is chasing me. LOL- funny but frustrating.

Also irritating is that I cleared an area of raiders and then after a few hours of game play a settler comes up and asks if I can help with a problem = "clear the raiders out of XYZ" - wait, I just did cleared that area- and it still says the area is "cleared" on my Pipboy. huh........

 

[PrincessFrosty]

Agreed. I really do like this game, but it's honestly nothing more than a well-packaged FO3 with the best community mods.

It makes for a great game, but if one suffers from burn-out rather easily, then this isn't going to feel that much different from what came before for players for players that spend time working with community content. I don't see this as a hugely negative criticism, just an observation based on the state of these games for the previous 7 years or so. It is what it is.

I dunno, I think that's a little harsh. Clearly the game has had an overhaul, the number of unique locations and the uniqueness of the "dungeons" gives the game a lot more depth than FO3/NV which both suffered the kind of copy/paste areas, the towns especially feel very hand crafted. The graphics have had an overhaul which I think goes further than a lot of the graphical mods for FO3/NV. No one was really providing huge swaths of higher poly models and higher quality textures, some people replaced some textures or revamped very specific things, but there's no modded FO3/NV that looks anything close to FO4.

That's not to dismiss what great work the modding community does, but to compare the 2 things isn't really fair, they've obviously put a huge amount of work into improving the game on just about every facet.

I love it after getting drawn more into the game from about 15-20 hours of play, it takes a long time to really adjust to the new mechanics and learn everything (due to lack of tutorials), the game absolutely has its faults but I think so far it's an overall success, but I've yet to complete it so it's hard to comment completely.

 

[zinfamous]

Yeah the community bug fix patch is a must, but other than the usual save-hangs and occasional crashes the steam version of F03 runs great on Windows 7.

I also had no problems with it after the most cursory patch, but for people with no experience with these Bethesda games, let alone using mods and working through how all this works with community-created content, it is not something that would be initially apparent. At the bare minimum, this one thing shouldn't be acceptable for any AAA release from any dev company.

As much as I like Bethesda games, there are legitimate criticisms where I think nearly everyone agrees

1) Whether by laziness or simply budget/size of dev teams, their games are always a hot mess on release and generally throughout the duration. Too much reliance on the community to fix things.

2) The skin may change from game to game (D&D fantasy world of TES games vs. Dystopian wasteland of modern FO games), they are pretty much all the same games at their core. Not much ever really changes with each new release from game mechanics, plotting, loot system character development, etc.

To their credit, the engine is fully released and allows the community to do nearly anything to these games, which makes them completely unique imo (to the shear extent that these games can be modded, I don't think any other franchise compares). So community work is both essential to fix their messy releases, but also adds a tremendous amount of value for players that really want to spend countless hours immersed in these gameworlds, playing however they want. Honestly, it's a nice problem to have if you are a developer.

 

[Face2Face]

I got my T-Shirt today; Best of both worlds :thumbsup:

http://www.textualtees.com/products/nuclear-winter-is-coming-fallout-3-4-tshirt#.VlSmOPmrTIU

 

[Markbnj]

but for people with no experience with these Bethesda games, let alone using mods and working through how all this works with community-created content, it is not something that would be initially apparent.

I agree. These games have always appealed to a fan base. I modded the shit out of Skyrim and both Fallouts. And I think many of the things I would rate lowly in FO4 are a direct result of trying to broaden that appeal, as they did with Skyrim. But I can't fault them for that, since it got me a new open world game to explore on the PC.

 

[el-Capitan]

Beta patch is out

http://steamcommunity.com/games/377160/announcements/detail/128712951172870673

Changelog:

Beta Update 1.2.33

New Features
Number pad keys can now be used for remapping
Remapping Activate now works on Quick Container
Fixes
General memory and stability improvements
Fixed issue where equipped weapons become locked after completing Reunions
Fixed issue with When Freedom Calls where the quest would not complete
During Confidence Man, fixed issue where player's health would continuously regenerate
Fixed crash related to jumping into water and reloading saved games
Fixed issue where Launcher would not save God Rays Quality setting properly

 

[Markbnj]

Beta patch is out

http://steamcommunity.com/games/377160/announcements/detail/128712951172870673

Changelog:

Beta Update 1.2.33

New Features
Number pad keys can now be used for remapping
Remapping Activate now works on Quick Container
Fixes
General memory and stability improvements
Fixed issue where equipped weapons become locked after completing Reunions
Fixed issue with When Freedom Calls where the quest would not complete
During Confidence Man, fixed issue where player's health would continuously regenerate
Fixed crash related to jumping into water and reloading saved games
Fixed issue where Launcher would not save God Rays Quality setting properly

Pretty small patch, actually. I'd say it's been a good launch for the team so far.

 

[pontifex]

wtf, i just fast traveled to a place and while the screen was still black i hear a mine beeping and as the game loads in it explodes right under me....

 

[StinkyPinky]

MY biggest glitch i get is my weapon wont draw/activated or appear. So I have to run around retrying to draw my gun while the bad guy is chasing me. LOL- funny but frustrating.

Also irritating is that I cleared an area of raiders and then after a few hours of game play a settler comes up and asks if I can help with a problem = "clear the raiders out of XYZ" - wait, I just did cleared that area- and it still says the area is "cleared" on my Pipboy. huh........

I get the weapon problem as well. I select a weapon and...nothing. I find if you wait for 5 seconds it will appear but there's a lag. It only started happening about 20 hours in so not sure what happened, and it doesn't happen all the time. Maybe 20% of the time which is still annoying.

 

[el-Capitan]

GMG again has 20% off of Fallout 4 (and others).

 

[cbrunny]

GMG has a constant 20% off. It's very rare that their code doesn't apply to a game.

 

[pontifex]

is it just me or is lockpicking even with a high skill inconsistent?

for example, i'll pick a master lock no problem but a novice lock i'll break 3 picks, sometimes by just barely moving the pick!

 

[Markbnj]

Somewhat off topic, but found this in my Loot Crate.

Pretty awesome. I have a colleague at work who'd love one of those.

 

[Blue_Max]

I love how every once in a while you're treated to a S.P.E.C.I.A.L. video upon game loading.

 

[pontifex]

Once in a while? It does it every time for me.

 

[Dahak]

is it just me or is lockpicking even with a high skill inconsistent?

for example, i'll pick a master lock no problem but a novice lock i'll break 3 picks, sometimes by just barely moving the pick!

I have noticed that too.. I had found it odd, you would thing the lower the lock, but higher the skill it should have wider "sweet spot". This is even after picking up one of the books to give a boost to the "sweet spot" area

 

[Dahak]

I love how every once in a while you're treated to a S.P.E.C.I.A.L. video upon game loading.

Once in a while? It does it every time for me.

It always seems to load the same 2 for me, so I went into the video directory and renamed all the special videos

 

[XiandreX]

I have noticed that too.. I had found it odd, you would thing the lower the lock, but higher the skill it should have wider "sweet spot". This is even after picking up one of the books to give a boost to the "sweet spot" area

Not sure on the Master pics and maybe I have more patience with picking but I almost never (99.99999%) break a pin.
Does the problem only arise once you level up to master level?

 

[Mem]

Pretty small patch, actually. I'd say it's been a good launch for the team so far.

Surprised it's so small, game is very stable however lots of little bugs around, hope they are fixed ASAP.

 

[PrincessFrosty]

wtf, i just fast traveled to a place and while the screen was still black i hear a mine beeping and as the game loads in it explodes right under me....

I had that fast traveling to the school near the start of the game the one with an...interesting...basement. You spawn on a mine there and it cripples your legs, dunno how they missed that lol.