GamingTrend Answers part V

You can read Part 1 here, part 2 here, part 3 here and part 4 here. Again good work Ron Burke of GamingTrend, now from Bethesda Games Fallout 3 Forum:

Including Liam Neeson’s father character, where there any that intrigued you? Made you laugh? Creeped you out?

Mr. Burke (shocking, I know) was pretty well done. He seemed incognito yet very obviously out of place at the same time. Sorta faded into the background, but demanded attention should you happen upon him. His voice work was well done as well. I think he’ll be a standout character if he gets enough face time.

What about the system of initiative in Fallout 3 ?

Didn’t seen any indication of an initiative system. We happened upon some creatures, they attacked us. We initiated V.A.T.S. at will.

I live in DC, any idea if they’ve tried to make its layout anywhere similar to its real life layout? At least realistic distances in between monuments, big streets, etc. I understand its post apocalyptic but just wondering if you could tell.

We didn’t get to see DC. They have the tech to make a massive world, but in the interest of time they may need to shorten those distances. Just guessing here.

From NMA:

This may seem a bit nit-picking, but I was wondering what your opinion of the blatant disregard for the laws of physics is Mr Burke? I’ve noticed an awful lot of previews where the writer wet himself at the thought of miniature “nuclear” explosions (meaning the mushroom clouds that are caused by sufficiently large explosions/heat and not automatically by nuclear explosions) everywhere, but I don’t recall you mentioning much about them in your preview.

Nope. Not much to mention. They looked neat and showed off the great particle system pretty nicely, but I don’t feel like they should be fawned over. If pretty made a game great, we’d have all liked The Bouncer.

So what’s your opinion on this? Is it acceptable to do something like this if it looks “cool”? Or does it really not matter and I’m being far too fussy and nerdy Wink ? Or do you agree that they should put much more thought into such things, as these explosions are neither realistic or “Fallouty”?

I give a little latitude on these things as long as they are well explained. If they just show up without an explanation then I might have some questions. I pose a counter question – did we ever see an energy cell that powered the car in F2 explode? What would that look like? Would it look like what was described as a mini-nuke? Hmmmm

See RadiantAI – for Oblivion again 😉

If I ever hear about another mudcrab it’ll be too soon. I want it to improve, but I’ll be waiting with the rest of you guys to see if it does. J

What do you personally think about the PipBoy3000? We just saw some pic of it, and I think it can’t capture how it might really look.

That is pretty much it. It looks like a crummy green monochrome monitor. I think it captures the crappy Vaul-Tec and modern tech combo pretty nicely.

Did you discuss with other journalists about the Fallout 3 Demo? If you get into some discussion: Did you get into some discussion about Fallout1/2? Did you get the feeling that the other journalists were big Fallout 1/2 fans? – A lot of journalists claimed that in the last weeks and some of them seemed to became fans just after they saw the demo. (No need to answer the second part, as it might not to cool about being critical about colleagues).

I talked to a lot of developers and press about F3. They all seemed pretty impressed with what was built thus far but were also adopting a ‘wait and see’ attitude. Wasteland defined this genre, Fallout locked in the formula. This is a pretty wide departure, and fans of the aforementioned games are well aware of that. I didn’t see anyone ‘rabidly excited’ about the game, most were in ‘wait and see’ mode.

As mentioned here earlier, what do you think about Beth not being to fond to being in contact with NMA?

Not with a 10 foot pole. 😉

What kind of retarded leader who tries to keep everyone *inside* the vault is going to kick someone out?

I said in my preview that the Overseer thinks you are ‘in on it’ so you bail rather than face his wrath.

And finally:

At the moment after the end of the 50 min presentation, did you have the sensation that, what you saw has the Knack for being the next Fallout title?

The moment after the demo ended, E3 ended. I had the sensation that I needed to get something to drink and fast. 😀 Seriously, I think the game still has a ways to go to really ‘nail’ the Fallout world, but I think they have the right mindset to do it. What they are doing is a good start and that is encouraging.