Dynafire has 132 chronicles

1. Fallout 3
   

   Player Chronicle -- Posted on Nov 07 2008

   Well damnit, I'm addicted to this game. Over the last week, I've logged 40 hours on this game. Ho-lee crap, it didn't even feel like that much time. I haven't even beaten the main quest yet, and there is still a significant portion of the map to explore. For the sake of reviewing though, the main quest would have been left out to prevent spoiling it.
   
   This game is a must-buy for fans of Oblivion or Bioshock. Put those two together, and Fallout 3 is the result. First and foremost, Fallout 3 is not a shooter. I've seen lots of people that complain because they feel they were "duped" into buying this game, thinking it to be something like Halo or perhaps Gears of War. This is an RPG with shooter elements. You need to worry more about the strengths and weaknesses of your character and keeping your armor and weapons in usable condition more than running around and getting headshots on enemies. This is not a game for you if you expect instant gratification - you have to put time into this game.
   
   Now for what I liked about the game:
   
   There are exactly zero useless weapons. Everything you find can be put to use - even tin cans and empty bottles. Both can be used as ammo for the Rock-it-launcher. Even the BB gun is good for dealing with radroaches instead of wasting ammo for your decent guns. likewise, melee weapons are actually pretty good once you up your skill in that department. They help conserve ammo, and deal quite a bit of damage too. If you find you have multiples of the same kind of weapon, you can use those extras to repair another one, and you'll need to do this A LOT. It always helps to carry a pair of your most-used weapon(s) into the field with you, so you can keep one in good condition. Since better weapon condition equals more damage and better accuracy, this is actually pretty important to get used to.
   
   The World is massive. If you like exploring, this is right up your alley. Supposedly, it is roughly the same size of Oblivion's landscape, but there is definitely a lot more content in this world. I can't recall a single point in my exploration where there wasn't a location marker on my compass. To be honest though, I wish there was an option to disable location markers. It's just a matter of opinion, but I think that's the reason I love Morrowind so much - there is nothing that tells you a location is nearby until you are literally 10 feet away from it. It gives you more incentive to explore, and you actually have to look around the landscape for places to go. I find myself looking down at the compass a lot more than I'd like to, but overall, it's okay.
   
   The HUD. That's right, the heads up display in this game is incredibly simple, yet very detailed at the same time. Rarely do I care about the HUD in any game, but in this game, it is perfect. The whole thing consists of two bars at the bottom of both sides of the screen. The one on the left shows HP, as well as the compass. The compass itself shows 3 different things, all in a very confined space. Nearby locations are marked with a small triangle that will be solid green if you've already discovered that location, or it will be black if you haven't. Your current objective is indicated by a large, green bar that indicates if your objective is above or below you, as well as how close you are to it. As you get closer, it will begin to flash faster and faster until you find where you need to go. Oh yeah, the compass also shows which direction you're facing, obviously. On the right hand side, you have another bar, separated into 3 spaces. Imagine an "T" shape that is elongated horizontally. The top portion shows your AP, which is used in VATS combat (read my initial impressions chronicle for details about VATS). The bottom left shows the condition of your equipped weapon, and bottom right shows ammo for it. These two bars make up all you really need to know about your character, and they never get in the way. Most of the time when I'm not looking at the compass, I don't even notice the HUD is there.
   
   
   What I disliked about the game:
   
   No game is perfect. This is another matter of opinion, but I feel that no game, regardless of how good it is, deserves a 10. Why? Because there is always something that could have been done better.
   
   Bethesda's games seem to always have the same problems, though thankfully, none of them are (usually) game-breaking. For one, character animations are pretty stiff looking. Try playing the game in 3rd person and you'll see what I mean.
   
   Also, it is still possible to get stuck in certain places of the landscape, with no way to get out. Sometimes you may get lucky and be able to fast-travel your way out of it, but if there is a nearby enemy, or this happens inside a building or something, you're screwed. This happened to me once inside a Raider cave, after I had neglected to save for an hour. I pretty much had to find a way out of the situation, so I made a save, and re-loaded it over and over again until I was finally able to fidget my way out of it. They should really add an option in the menu that you can choose if you get stuck, and it teleports you a few feet forward or something, and that would remedy this problem.
   
   Other than that, nothing really bothered me too much. I had the game crash once, but that's acceptable. I've had all of my games crash at least once, so this wasn't really a surprise.
   
   Anyway, I hope you had fun reading all that, and I hope I've convinced some of you to get it.
   
   Overall score on a scale of 1-10: 8.5
   (with a possibility of +0.5 pts depending on how the rest of the story is.)

   
   

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Dynafire has 1 comment on this chronicle.

1. Silent Bob
   Posted On Nov 07 2008

   You've got way more time into this than I've personally seen played up at the game center. I've only seen about 3 hours worth of play.
   
   Excellent initial review. What kinds of things will cause you to raise it that half point? I'm curious because a lot of professional game critics have this one pegged as a Game of the Year contender.