If I had to define my Fallout 4 Review in one word it would be “Outstanding!”
I’ve been playing Bethesda games ever since “The Elder Scrolls: Morrowind”. And they have been getting better and better with each new instalment. Some good mechanics have been lost along the way, like the need to repair weapons and apparel, but the new features have more than compensate for those losses.
The beginning premise of Fallout 4 is completely new, just like all the previous fallout games. Once again you start as a Vault Dweller, but this time, you’re not someone that runs away from the Vault (Fallout 3) or you’re send in a quest by the current Overseer (Fallout 1). In Fallout 4, you’re frozen in cryogenic suspension for 200 years, coming out just after you see your spouse murdered and your baby child been stolen away by two mysterious figures.
And from here on out, the world is your Oyster! The game is huge and despite the fact that there is some sense of urgency, you’re free to explore Post-War Boston at your leisure.
Two major additions to the game, from previous versions, are Settlement building and an amazing in-game mod system.
I don’t call Fallout 4 crafting system a pure craft system because you can’t actually build armour and weapons. You can only modify armours and weapons you have on your inventory, and not all armours are modifiable. You can, however, create the almost any chemical compound present in the game and you can cook food. I don’t know what future patches will bring, but I would definitely like to see a full crafting system, directly implemented by Bethesda, like we had in Skyrim. And I say this, because in Fallout: New Vegas, you could have recipes for weapons and armours, but they were from the modding community, not directly from the producer. The modding interface is quite good and when you change a mod on a weapon or armour, you don’t lose the replaced mod. It’s saved in your inventory for future applications, which is a great way to save resources and have several variations of the same weapon type available.
Settlement building is a great idea but poorly implemented. The concept is simple. You either go to an already established settlement and perform a task for the settlers there. After the task is performed they join you. The other method is you are sent to a “good location” to start a settlement, clear any hostile creatures/NPC’s in the area and you can start building stuff and broadcasting a signal for would-be settlers to join you. And this is where it gets weird. Building is instantaneous. You simply select what you want to build and if you have the required resources, it’s built. However, you have to move to the place where you want the contraption to be. I’m sure that in the future, construction can be improved, if not by Bethesda, then by modders.
True RPG setting, where everything, and I mean everything, matters!
As in previous games, Fallout 4 gives us an in-depth RPG experience from the first or third person perspective. There are moral choices with some grey areas. Sometimes it will not be clear as water the choice between good and evil, sometimes there will be bad choices, and bad not in the moral sense, but bad because the end result will not be what you’re expecting.
Everything that it’s not nailed to the floor can be useful (much to the annoyance of Codsworth) and when you’re in Settlement Building Mode even some of the stuff that seemed like nailed to the floor is useful.
Loot is like in previous games. You can basically loot everything that an NPC carries with him, being the end result you’ll be over-encumbered in no time, luckily your faithful companion is there to carry your burden. And keep in mind that each companion can only carry a certain amount of weight and that amount is not equal to every companion.
And speaking of companions, so far I found 3, but you can only have one at any given time (modders will solve this for sure), and as you adventure with them, we’ll develop your relationship with each of them, gaining a special perk that is only active while you’re with that specific companion.
Not all is well in Paradise, or in the case, in the Commonwealth.
Fallout 4 has its shortcomings. Some are really game wrecking while others I think are more related with my personal taste as what an RPG should have.
Starting with the game wrecking stuff.
Settlements. As I said before, Settlements are one of the greatest new features of Fallout 4, but they are highly incomplete. While you can assign settlers to task like keeping defence positions or taking care of the plants, they don’t build anything by themselves. I would expect that some level of basic build would be applied, or at the very least, cleaning up the settlement area. No luck there. You have to do everything by yourself. Also, a building shouldn’t be instantaneous. It should take time, and you would need to assign settlers to the building task, settlers that would improve at that task over time, creating specialisation.
Crafting system. The fact that you can only modify weapons and armours that you have in your inventory is really annoying. And the fact that you can’t modify full armours or the “under-armours” really shows some short-sight from Bethesda. Also, you can’t use your companions and settlers perks and S. P. E. C. I. A. L. to craft thing. For instance, in Neverwinter Nights 2, if you wanted to create something but you didn’t meet the skill requirements, you could simply use a member of your party to craft that item, as long as he met the requirements. Here, you’re stuck to the stuff you can personally build.
Companions. What’s with this single companion policy? Really, Bethesda, by now you should have at least taken a peek at Nexus Mod Community and realise that mods that allow you to have more than one companion are among the most downloaded in all your RPG games. At the very least, we should be able to travel with one animal/robot and one sentient companion.
Dialogues. As in previous games, all dialogues are voice acted. This is, as usual, awesome. However, this time Bethesda decided that with only need to have 4 dialogue options at any given moment, and those options can be selected with the arrow keys on the keyboard, or with the direction keys on a console gamepad… Am I the only one to find this suspicious?
And now for the stuff that annoys me.
Repairing. So basically I can shoot a minigun until the pipes melt and even so, after cooling the weapon is more than ready to start shooting again? Or I can take a beating from a Super Mutant and after I’m near dead several times, but by the time the fight is over, I take a look at my armour is it’s good as new? Sorry guys but this doesn’t make sense at any level.
Enemies all-around. Almost everything in the Wasteland is set out to kill you, quite really. Traversing urban areas is like playing the Russian Rollete. Every other street is packed with raiders, gunners, scavengers or some other type of NPC that kills you on sight, and so far, I haven’t found a way to make some areas more secured.
Conclusion
Fallout 4 is an amazing game. It improves on every winning aspect of previous instalments of the serie and also implements some mechanics that were made popular with mods, like the Settlements, certainly inspired from the mod Settlers of the Wasteland for Fallout 3 and Fallout: New Vegas.
The game doesn’t hold your hand and guide you through a safe experience. It’s a dog’s world and you will be very aware of that at every corner. Just to give you fair warning, about one hour of starting the first game you will have a Boss fight.
So, if you want an in-depth RPG experience with a rich open world, in a post-apocalypse environment, then this is the game for your
Christmas.
If you liked this review and want to buy the game you can support me by buying the game from one of the links below.
Amazon.com Fallout 4 – PC
Amazon.co.uk Fallout 4 (PC)
