Fallout Fries

French CanardPlus Emil Zoulou is asking for questions from fans about what he saw in the Fallout 3 demo, here’s something from NMA:

Here’s some chances to scratch out some more info from the meager offerings of this E3. First, Canardplus (who you may remember from this preview) contacted us to extend the offer to try and clarify any questions we have based on what they’ve seen:

This morning, we had the opportunity to try the 360 version of Fallout 3. The cheats weren’t enabled. So ask your vicious questions and we will try to offer some honest answers.

If you know French you can ask them here, if not place them at NMA or in this blogpost and we’ll try to translate them for you.

Meanwhile he already started answering the first batch of questions, and NMA got a (very good) translation from Vaultaire with the help of Mr.Bumble and posted them in English:

Is the gore associated with violent death logical or over-the-top?
That is the problem with E3. During the Fallout 3 Demo, Bethesda wanted to emphasize the games “adult” content and pushed the gore through the roof. During the initial demo, Peter Hines did the same: using the “Bloody Mess” trait, which makes every death really bloody, really pushed the gore over the top. Shoot someone in the foot and the entire body explodes in a fountain of blood. When actually playing it is a lot less impressive, the enemies die without too much fuss. On the other hand, the inconsistencies are apparent, like when a mini-nuke just cuts off an enemies foot.

Is playing Fallout 3 with a controller a good experience? How will the interface be adapted to mouse/keyboard combination?
We are not big FPS aficionados, I had a lot of trouble controlling my character and aiming was really hard. VATS helped with this a lot, something I was not expecting. When confronted by a group of enemies, it seems like the most sensible solution. On the other hand, I was much better on the PC. The mouse/keyboard interface allowed for more accurate aiming. One can imagine that the RT aspect will resemble Quake 3 where the player strafes around his enemies; avoiding their shots while simultaneously emptying clips into them – totally negating the need for VATS. Like Oblivion, character skill along with line of sight plays a factor in determining to-hit success but the translation to FPS must be tempered with the next question:

If the PC version is exactly the same as the one tested for the Xbox 360) ; it is very likely that this is the case, will the interface be marred by this (interface, save/load, …)
Oh yes, I think that on the PC the interface will prove unwieldy. Bethesda has chosen to put all the menus inside the Pipboy affixed to your arm. If it is a question of immersion, the intention is commendable, ergonomically it’s an absolute disgrace: A stick to switch between 3 large menus (stats-item-data) the other to navigate within the window and all the sub menus. On top of that, the inventory is reduced to simple lists of names, a miniature picture of the item appears to the right for each item. Also, forget about the two quick items found at the bottom of your inventory (in the originals) as Turn-based is completely dispensed with. In this system, one is faced with equipping a single thing or weapon at a time.

With real time combat, Is the concept or use of Action Points ala “Turn Based” useful or even captivating?
Like I said on the 360, the VATS system is indispensable for survival. Often, melee enemies get within range very quickly and VATS allows the player to get out of tight situations. I did not feel it was over-powerful and I was often forced to close the gap to improve my chances of hitting the target. In addition, aiming for specific body parts will appeal to the jokers amongst us: Fire at a super-mutants weapon and it will fall from his grasp. Such accurate shots are difficult to reproduce in real-time mode. In practice, we find ourselves using all our APs to fire at an enemies chest not even trying for the head. APs recharge in real-time mode but don’t affect ones ability to access the inventory. It seems to me that AP could be used for so much more than aimed shots. It is a terrible blow for the tactics of combat that existed in the franchise previously.

Adaptive difficulty Yes or No (Level Scaling)
Big question. The Bethesda lot have assured us for months that level scaling; railed against by Elder Scrolls Fan; was out. Permit me to cast strong doubt on this. See: towards the end of my half hour, whilst wandering through Washington DC, I fell upon a group of three super mutants. One was equipped with a Gatling. I was level 3 and I was only equipped with light Raider armor. For weapons, I had a baseball bat and a basic 10mm pistol and an ammo-less laser piston. I switch to VATS and aim for the Gatling mutant in the hopes of making him drop his weapon. I miss and the other two mutants head straight for me. I grab my baseball bat and alternate between VATS and real-time whilst waiting for my AP to recharge. The first mutant is downed, I loot a bat with a nail in it and kill the second mutant in much the same fashion. During this some sort of mutant spider joins the fray and attacks me. I kill it with my bat. The third super mutant fell to a combination of grenade and 10mm pistol. I’m a half hour into the game, level 3 and I manage to take down three super mutants and some unidentified thing without much trouble and find myself in possession of a Gatling fun. All is good.[...]

Once again, it is not easy to get a fair idea of what Fallout 3 will be like on release. All in all, the development team has a pile a bugs of all types to fix. It is in all cases certain that this will not shine on technical merits, with empty interiors, outdated and badly used character models, “Rigor Mortis” animations..
Disassociated from the gameplay of the preceding Fallouts, Bethesda try to impose their view of an action RPG, in the same vein as Oblivion. It is impossible for me to guarantee that this will be a good fallout game, or even a good game at all…

A must read, there’s a lot more there.

Canard PC Eight Pages Preview Yet Again

I still couldn’t get the CanardPc magazine but, with the reservations that I haven’t seen it by myself, others did and here are some impressions, starting with Seboss at RPGCodex:

Seboss:I have the preview right here. It’s 6 pages long so I won’t do a full transcript but I could give you guys some more excerpts if you’re interested.

[right after the ability points allocation] Daddy comes back in the room, is very pleased by your agility [...] and cites an excerpt of the Apocalypse (“I am the Alpha and the Omega”), a passage of the Bible your former Mom used to like a lot, an element not so insignificant that should play an important role in the main quest.

Fade to black and you’re now at your tenth birthday, ready to get your Pipboy3000, “the indispensable companion of the modern man”. This scene introduces your first social interactions.
You’ll go then from a little flirt with a girl your age through the confrontation with a little bully desiring to strip you from your birthday cake, to a surrealist discussion with a schizophrenic Mr Handy.
And there, I feel reassured. The dialogs and the argument with the dumbfuck in the making come right into the series spirit. During your conversation with the little scum, the game offers you ten different dialog options: immediate cowardly capitulation, insult leading to a brawl, lies, [...] spitting on the cake before offering it to him. The list is more than satisfying.

Seboss: The author states that many dialog options have tags like [Lie], [Charm], [Intimidation], [Science] and so one. Very Biowary.

A little later, you’ll eventually receive your first AirSoft Gun, the famous RedRyder that allows you to familiarize with the combat system, then you choose your skills on the benches of the Vault’s school.
Teenage hood will also be the occasion to solve a number of optional quests that influence the perception the other vault dwellers might have of you, as well as your karma and your personality. Undoubtedly, these first minutes make me comfortably euphoric.
[...]
While I was expecting an outright treason of the Fallout setting, more because of ineptitude than vice, I have the feeling the game is spot on. The ambiance, scenery and lighting of the Vault seem perfectly faithful to the series, with just the right dose of rust to enhance claustrophobia.
[...]
In opposition to Oblivion and Morrowind that just kicked you into the game without bonds of any sort, this time Bethesda clearly states its will to make you a part of a community, to create relationships right from the beginning. [...] What is the better way to make the player feel lost in the irradiated desert and make him realize the importance of his mission than create a genuine bond to his home just before kicking me out.

Seboss: Well, kicking him out right away worked pretty well in FO1 if you ask me.

About the SPECIAL system:

First satisfaction, the SPECIAL system have really been kept, no facade without substance. Every actions in the game, from the combat to bluff attempts through gambling are resolved by dice rolls against your skills and abilities. However, we can observe a whole lot of discrepancies, starting with this confession painfully extracted from the demonstrator: atypical character builds, like very low intelligence characters, won’t have as many options as in the previous games. Some dialogs are heavily influenced by your IQ, however you can forget about your project of roaming the wastelands with a complete moron barely able to string two syllables together . What’s more shocking for hardcore integrists like me, you can forget about beating the game as a cowardly pacifist weasel: most combats will be inevitable especially during travels and desert and ruins exploration.

Seboss: The wastelands are 65% the size of Cyrodiil, blah blah, the game is supposed to have a lot of landmarks like collapsed buildings, junkyards, diners, motels and baseball fields. These places are inhabited by people influenced by the nature of the location. Baseball fields should have descendants of the Baseball Furries from the movie Warriors, stuff like that.
The author hopes these places won’t feel as generic as the bandit/goblin/wraith tombs of Oblivion , but he seems confident about that.

The game will have a significant dose of level scaling for the main quest. There are three difficuly levels (as you already know), but that seems a bit cheap.

Stimpacks won’t have any side-effects anymore. There are just the regular “Cure Light” potions now.

To this point, the author was pretty confident about the quality of the game. Now there’s the negative part:

Now here’s the point where things get messy. We’re going to get onto the thorny problem of the combat. [...] We’ll note that the developers repeated ad nauseam that the efficiency of your shots depend on your statistics and that the FPS skills of the player don’t have any importance, and that all shots fired in real-time mode will be automatically aimed to the torso. [Here goes a lengthy description of the VATS system]
The idea seems to stand theoretically, but in facts I’m far from convinced. Firstly, during the presentation, either he was wearing a Power Armor and holding a Gatling gun and fighting hordes of super mutants armed with heavy machine guns, bakookas and supersledges or fighting ghouls with a 9mm and wearing just a leather armor, the demonstrator was just standing there, shooting long bursts without using any kind of tactics.
Besides, aimed shots, possible even with a minigun, looked far less effective to me than just “run right next to the baddy and empty my magazine in one burst”.

Seboss: Ouch. He also says that “bullet time” death animations are just as pleasant as stuffing rusty nails in your urethra after the third one. Or something like this.

Canard PC Eight Pages Preview and Follow Up

French magazine CanardPC number 170 has an eight pages Fallout 3 preview that contains some interesting info, for a change, here on a summary by Mr.Bumble:

¤ Teen age gives you access to a few quests which will have an impact on how you are perceived within the Vault

¤ While travelling across the Wasteland, you can come across a few caravans, each heading to precise locations.

¤ There are three difficulty levels, as well as an “autolevelling difficulty” mode.

¤ A few new weapons : Cryolator allows you to freeze ennemies while you can hypnotize them with your Mesmetron.

¤ Also a new perk, Daddy’s Little Girl, which gives a Science bonus to female characters.

Later the author of the article went to the Canardplus forum and added his impressions about the music on the Fallout 3 demo, saying it’s “a f#&#=*&% catastrophe”, with all the “Call of Duty and Wagner” style music replacing Mark Morgan’s atmospheric tracks. He also says he is going to “piss on the composers mouth” after hearing that nonsense. Ouch.

Thank you Mr.Bumble at NMA.fr and NukaCola.