What really kills Fallout 4 "immersion" for me (no spoilers)

[cossayos]

 

6) Immortal companions, don't worry about suiciders, dogmeat will tank that mini-nuke for you!

 

 

 

They were already immortal in FNV. And frankly, behaving like they do, they have to be. Otherwise you would run through companions very fast. Their AI stands for Absent Intelligence.

[morvo]

 

 

6) Immortal companions, don't worry about suiciders, dogmeat will tank that mini-nuke for you!

 

 

 

They were already immortal in FNV. And frankly, behaving like they do, they have to be. Otherwise you would run through companions very fast. Their AI stands for Absent Intelligence.

 

If you played hardcore mode, they very much could die in NV

[Saviorsrd]

 

 

I just dont get why the 200 years was even necessary? surely 2 or three decades would have been enough?

 

 

Pure laziness combined with an 80s mentality to nuclear war.  

 

Addressing the latter first - While we're not sure what would happen (and no one's eager to do the testing that would be involved!) I think it's now believed that nuclear winter, destruction of the ecosystem entire, and so on are actually pretty unlikely to result from a large-scale nuclear exchange.  It would still almost certainly be the end of human civilization, and very likely a mass extinction event, but it's probably not the end of life on Earth.

 

Now, as for laziness - the sole purpose of setting the game 200 years After The War is because, put simply, Bethesda couldn't be bothered dealing with picking up from the prior franchise.  What they really wanted to do was take the aesthetic of Fallout, along with the copyrighted terms, and repackage them with the Oblivion engine to sell.  But keeping all that continuity straight.  Pfeh, why bother when we can just do a massive timeskip and location change so we can do whatever we want!

 

Except it turns out, well, you can't do that and maintain any kind of internal consistency.  New Vegas, at least, makes some sense as a scavenger's paradise that late in the game.  There isn't a whole lot IN the Mojave to rebuild with.  The only two things the surrounding factions care about are New Vegas itself and the Boulder Dam, and it took about a century for civilization to get back to the point where it was seriously considering the kind of logistics needed to hold territory that hostile.  The natives are mostly exiles (or the descendants of exiles) who couldn't adjust to the return of civilized rule, and so headed out into the wilderness to try to make a living as raiders and tribals.  

 

The Capitol Wasteland?  Shouldn't even be there.  Boom.  Crater.  The Commonwealth?  Makes a LITTLE more sense but not a whole lot.  But Bethesda would rather make setpieces and point at how they're so clever integrating real life locations into them rather than doing the work to write a coherent world.  It's not impossible to do - a team their size should have a grasp on this, but they're too busy congratulating themselves for strapping rockets to a 300-year-old ship for a chuckle.

[Guest Mogie56]

I guess no one does the slightest bit of research. yes Hiroshima and Nagasaki are inhabited after only 60 years BUT the big difference is that there was only one bomb per city. one city is higher then the other and those were air detonations. Fat Man was much smaller the Big Boy with less yield. The after effects of Chernobyl are expected to be seen for the next 100 years. Now you take the amount of bombs dropped/ICBM during the Fallout time line, some states had as many as 70 bombs sent down on there asses and this isn't just a localized incident, it's worldwide. thousands of ICBM's were tossed. If you listen to the Vault 101 PA system it states 2377 is the Estimated year that the United States will be habitable again, Fallout 4 begins October 23 2287 so it is actually 90 years too soon and growth has already begun in the wasteland. plus there is still a large amount of radiation mostly due to all the low lying water systems. and depending on what was actually used in these nuclear bombs it's more then likely those that have survived would be damn lucky to be out and about even after 500 years. Plus the fact that Fallout 4 2287 only starts 10 years after Fallout 3 2277 and only 7 years after Fallout: New Vegas. 2281. 200 years is a short time considering the half life of uranium-238 is about 4.5 billion years, uranium-235 about 700 million years, and uranium-234 about 25 thousand years. Of course we don't know what they used in the Fallout series Bombs, it could of been Bazooka Joe's bubblegum. 

 

Big Boy - uranium gun-type fission bomb. Fat Man - plutonium implosion-type fission bomb.

 

even now (in the real world) there are an estimated 15,700 nuclear warheads worldwide as of 2015 with around 4,100 of them considered "operational" (ready for immediate use). A sobering thought.

[DocClox]

A minor nitpick, but the bomb dropped on Hiroshima was codenamed "little boy". Although I can see why Beth might have been reluctant to reference that directly.

 

 

Especially with the plane that dropped the bomb being the "Enola Gay"...

[Guest Mogie56]

That is correct, I only went with the in-game name of "Big Boy" because of the stink caused by the naming convention in Fallout 3. Mr. Burke was taken out and also "Fat Man" and the option to detonate the bomb in Megaton. at least in the Japanese version. 

The Enola Gay is a Boeing B-29 Superfortress bomber, named for Enola Gay Tibbets, the mother of the pilot, Colonel Paul Tibbets.

It is also referenced by the Bomber you float up in lake mead for the Boomers although a recon B-29 actually did crash into Lake Mead in 1948.

[Gameplayer]

What kills it for me is the crappy Weapon balance.....

 

Don't care for Role Playing Game mechanics that make weapons just suck and not behave properly.

 

 

There are no such things as "sit in my lap shotgun range weapons in real life"

 

Minigun weapon sucks

 

Your not going to eat a missile to the face in Power Armor

 

Legendaries are an excuse to not properly balance the game.

 

Weapons are just a hooky joke it may work well in the Fantasy of TES but it just sucks ass in Fallout.

[Mondo80]

In Skyrim, Oblivion and New Vegas your character could be anyone, your past was a blank canvas to paint your life's story. 

 

In Fallout 3 you're the child of a scientist who wants to fix the capitol wasteland.  In F4 you're an ex-soldier avenging your wife's death or you're a lawyer (who knows how to handle all possible firearms and military tech for some reason) avenging you husband's death all while looking for your son who may not even remember you if he saw you. 

 

This somewhat limits what you should be able to do in game or game mods.   Oh noes my husband died!!  But wait, there's a dog by an abandoned gas station, I'm gonna get fucked by it!   or...     I need to find my wife's killers! but first I'll chain a bunch of female bandits to milking machines and for use as sex slaves!  (These mods will be made)   While this would be fun it makes no real sense to do it if you look at the backstories of your characters.

 

 

[Bemoteajh]

When you telling me after 200 years these people have not had a chance to build more than a shanty town I would be scratching my head but when I see a supposedly a 200 year old poster still on the wall thats about communists or whatever I just lose my shit...

 

It makes no sense! Come on! Ok guys. The bombs fell 40 to 50 years ago. That's as far as I will go.

200 years? I must have misheard!

 

 

My friend... what causes the break down of paper and such things... microbes... that my have been affected by the fallout from HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS OF NUKES!

But I get your point people would have a much more developed city or town structure by now

 

[Guest Mogie56]

I doubt Super Mutants or Raiders or the many mutated animals, insects, sea life are really concerned with building anything, actually they'd rather screw up, blow up any and everything anyone else builds and take their shit. Fallout 4 is actually 210 years after the bombs fell, Fallout 3 is 200 years after the bombs fell and Fallout New Vegas is 203 years after the bombs fell. The Divergence happened between 1945 and 1961 and the Fallout Universe was fully diverted from our timeline by 1969. after that nothing of note happened until 1992 than 2009 then 2016 and than little by little more and more things happened closer together. plenty happened between 2016 and 2287 just not in the scope of the games but in the timeline between games and some during the games. You can't fit reality into a fantasy game no matter how you slice it. Weapons used are only halfass based on realworld weapons. there is no 5mm minigun, there is a 7.62x51mm NATO Minigun which is about 35lbs without ammo. Standard 3,000 rounds: Full 208 lbs. so your looking at around 243 lbs. realistically you could never even lift it much less carry it without the hydraulics of the PA. which doesn't exist. depending on the mfg. it can go from 35lbs to 62lbs and 3,000 to 6,000 rounds of ammo.

Nothing in the fallout series is realistic and isn't meant to be. well except for their locations and liberties are taken there as well.

[Revuu]

So no for me 200 years pass and man is unable to recover that doesn't even phase me......Cause that has literally happened to mankind undeniable fact that the Dark Ages happened.  The real kicker is....This has happened more than once.

 

The issue is no-one's cleared up the corpses or shovelled the rubble.

 

"Oh, there's a pile of garbage under my bed and a pile of rubble in the corner! Oh well, I'll just keep living here and never EVER bring a shovel into my humble abode!"

 

"Wow, this is a lovely drivethru! Shame about the skeletons everywhere. Oh well, they add a certain... 'appeal' to the place."

[Gameplayer]

 

So no for me 200 years pass and man is unable to recover that doesn't even phase me......Cause that has literally happened to mankind undeniable fact that the Dark Ages happened.  The real kicker is....This has happened more than once.

 

The issue is no-one's cleared up the corpses or shovelled the rubble.

 

"Oh, there's a pile of garbage under my bed and a pile of rubble in the corner! Oh well, I'll just keep living here and never EVER bring a shovel into my humble abode!"

 

"Wow, this is a lovely drivethru! Shame about the skeletons everywhere. Oh well, they add a certain... 'appeal' to the place."

 

 

It is surprising that you cannot simply remove the skeletons with the build menu feature..... derp moments brought to you by video games haha.

 

[Gameplayer]

In Skyrim, Oblivion and New Vegas your character could be anyone, your past was a blank canvas to paint your life's story. 

 

In Fallout 3 you're the child of a scientist who wants to fix the capitol wasteland.  In F4 you're an ex-soldier avenging your wife's death or you're a lawyer (who knows how to handle all possible firearms and military tech for some reason) avenging you husband's death all while looking for your son who may not even remember you if he saw you. 

 

This somewhat limits what you should be able to do in game or game mods.   Oh noes my husband died!!  But wait, there's a dog by an abandoned gas station, I'm gonna get fucked by it!   or...     I need to find my wife's killers! but first I'll chain a bunch of female bandits to milking machines and for use as sex slaves!  (These mods will be made)   While this would be fun it makes no real sense to do it if you look at the backstories of your characters.

'

But first I'll start a Mad Max Utopia milk farm so that my kin can grow up big and strong huffing O2 right from the can.

[KainsChylde]

All points made here are interesting, but the one thing that bugs the shit out of me is within the Fallout game timeline. Not the lore, in game events. And that thing is Jet.

 

Jet was invented during the events of Fallout 2 by a kid named Myron in New Reno. Its primary ingredient is brahmin dung.

 

So why in the name of atom is it being found in so damn many safes and pre-war sites that haven't been accessed in over 200 damn years!

 

Also, on the subject of settlements. I'm no engineer or architect, but isn't repairing an existing building easier than building a new one from scratch right out front? I kinda understand Diamond City, the stadium makes decent fortifications, so building a settlement from scratch in the infield kinda works rather than using the buildings outside. But even there, stadiums have so many corridors and such in them that are fully enclosed with limited access that would make much more defensible settlements rather than a shantytown in the infield that can be hit from above by thrown/launched explosives and whatnot. And rad-storms! Not to mention just straight-up regular rain.

[Guest Mogie56]

Well the problem there is it would have to be open. meaning jumping over the outer walls and actually have a thriving city not a husk of nothingness to get stuck in. like going over the outer wall of Imperial City only to have nothingness. it would have to be built inside and outside no changing cells. no transitions. which if you go there one time (go in with piper) then any time you go back the steel gate is already open but there is still a transition into the city.

I doubt they gave much thought to Jet and it's origins and how it would look to someone who actually pays attention to those things as to what lists they put it into for spawning.

most people probably wouldn't care nor have they read much about the timeline. Quoting from the timeline as I've found out personally you might as well speak to that wall next to you.

Deaf ears and all that you know