Fallout 3 - Review @ The Crypt

5 Llamas is the score.

Bugs aside, there is no doubt in my mind that Bethesda has crafted a spectacular instalment of the Fallout universe and their best game to date. While the main story can be finished in a rushed 20 or so hour stint, you’re doing yourself an immense disfavour by not exploring the rest of the wasteland, an exercise that can probably take close to 150 hours! The four years of development Todd Howard and his team have lavished upon this magnum opus have given birth to a game true to the world’s canon and abundant with all the original elements that have made this franchise the cult classic that is. The Fallout universe has always exhibited a combination of dark humour, ridiculous pop culture references and disturbed individuals co-existing within a blighted land rife with bloodshed, death and utter devastation. This is a world where you will experience emotional extremes from minute to minute, where the horror of walking through a raider’s torture chamber is counterpointed by the last few computer log entries of survivors, stricken with radiation sickness over two hundred years ago. Walk through Arlington National Cemetery amongst the headstones of the fallen, as the dust billows around you and faint trumpet wails echo off the shattered surroundings. Scour the countryside and ruined townships north of D.C. as you listen to various radio stations broadcasting the latest news or popular tunes from our 1950’s. Rest assured that over every hill and around every corner there will be something fresh and unexpected waiting to absorb another hour or two of your life. And at the end of it all, when you’ve seen and done all that you can, climb to the top of Tenpenny tower at dawn and savour the view one last time as the Washington Monument pierces the horizon in the distance.
This is the world of Fallout at its immaculate best.

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I bought Fallout the day it was released... I remember showing my family and friends the opening cinematic whenever I could, trying to show non-gamers how far the medium had progressed.... because, say what you will, that Perlman-narrated introduction and the game that followed it, was some pretty great art.

I say this only to show I am a fan; and as a fan of Fallout, I have to say I'm enjoying the hell out of a Bethesda game for this first time in my life.

1. VATS is a HUGE step in the right direction for combat in a real-time crpg. I would have played Oblivion or Morrowind with more than a passing interest if either contained something resembling VATS. It's nowhere near what it should/could be, but with a little tweaking this system could easily satisfy a lot of gamers concerns about real-time crpgs.

2. Skills are by-and-large done VERY well... lots of skill checks done in lots of clever and meaningful ways. Perks are imaginative and numerable.

3. I wish I could strrrrrrrrrrretch the gameworld out in all directions... if I have a chief complaint about Fallout 3, it's that the much-vaunted "uber-huge" game world, is pretty tiny, akshually. I think the whole game might be smaller than a couple of zones in WoW, for comparison. Apples and oranges, I know... but I wanted a WASTELAND... I wanted mile after mile of nothing... then something interesting. I wanted vehicles, and desert driving. If they kept the same content and just stretched it out 100-fold in all directions... not what would be something to explore.

4. Adding the music from the original games has been huge in my enjoyment of Fallout 3. http://www.nma-fallout.com/forum/dload.php?action=file&file_id=1201

5. If Bethesda ever hires some capable writers and animators, makes VATS truly strategic, and learns to space things out better... ya, that's probably too much to hope for.

Fallout 3 is a great game. Bethesda finally made a game, instead of a sandbox.

Off-topic but anyway:

i wonder why the Asian PC release of Fallout 3 been pushed to the end of November (a nice one month delay ). It was available on retail shelves from October 31 in Europe, Australia and New Zealand. Why the different?

My local Software Boutique said the distributor push back the release without given any reason. Because the small market due to piracy? If that's the case then the winner here are the pirates, because the pirated copies are selling like hot cakes. And people like me who pre-ordered the original game still waiting like an idiot.

The distributor should learns what the Hollywood big movie studios did, release greatly anticipated like Iron Man and latest James Bond here early or same date as elsewhere to avoid tons business gone to the pirates.

&%$#*! to whoever handling F3 distribution here...

Your point is well made and valid. For example, we used to get US TV shows anything from 6 months to a year after they were shown there. Now due to people downloading them instead of WAITING, we usually get them the same week!!

I know the version for Japan was changed to rename the 'fat man' and make it so you can't blow up Megaton but would that hold back the entire Asian release?

Regarding the pirates - I doubt that's the reason. You release it on time or late, they steal it. You release it early, one person buys it and the rest steal it. So why would they hold back?