Introduction

The game that will be looked at is Fallout 4.  Fallout 4 is a RPG (role-playing game) shooter developed by Bethesda Game Studios and released in 2015.  While the game is technically the fourth in the series, it is only the second Fallout game by Bethesda and the fifth main RPG game in the fallout universe.  Like the two games before it (Fallout 3 and Fallout: New Vegas), Fallout 4 strays from the original game’s top down turn-based gameplay for the more popular shooter type of gameplay.  Bethesda is well known for their Elder Scrolls series, and Fallout 4 has quite a bit in common with that franchise.  The biggest part being it’s massive open world and emphasis on exploration.  The game has a few downloadable content (DLC) packs that add additional activities, missions and stories.

This article will give some analysis of Fallout 4’s core storytelling, gameplay, exploration, and the game’s settlement mechanic.  The author’s perspective is being taken from over 200 hours of time spent in the main game, as well as one of the game’s DLC (Far Harbor).  The author also has many hundreds of hours in the two previous titles (Fallout 3 and Fallout: New Vegas).

Storytelling

Fallout 4 has the same background story as all previous Fallout titles.  The world has been devastated by a nuclear war between the United States and China roughly 200 years ago.  Before the war, a company called Vault-Tec created hundreds of underground shelters to try and save (as well as experiment as you can later learn) a portion of the country’s inhabitants.  The player character is one of those who was saved by getting into a vault in Massachusetts before the bombs fell.  The player is placed into cryostasis against their will at the start of the game, along with their spouse and son.  The game allows the player quite a lot of customization options for what their character looks like, including picking male or female.  After being placed in stasis, the player is woken up by some unknown people and forced to watch as their spouse is murdered and their son is kidnapped before being placed back in stasis.  The main part of the story focuses on trying to find the man who murdered your spouse and reunite with your son.  While a bit cliche, this premise gets the player more invested in the outcome, and m

The game allows you to ally yourself to different factions, with each faction having a unique quest-line to follow.  The end of the game makes you choose one of these factions to complete the game with, but while there are 4 main factions in the game, only one of them offers an ending with a lot of variety from the rest.  A unique ending for each of the factions would of added replay-ability without drastically increasing the game’s budget.

The main story of Fallout 4 is fairly decent.  While the last 2 Fallout titles had a story that sometimes failed to keep the player engrossed, Fallout 4 does enough to make you want to know what is going to happen next.  It also has a couple more interesting twists and turns, that may surprise the player, something previous Fallout titles were not as prolific at.  While the story is certainly passable, it still has a lot of areas it could be improved on.  Even if players usually don’t play Fallout games looking for captivating storytelling, a better story would help attract the audience looking for a riveting story.

Gameplay

     VATS SYSTEM                       SKILL TREE

              

     Fallout 4’s gameplay has a lot in common with its primary predecessor, Fallout 3, but with a fair bit of changes as well.  While the two previous titles had more of a focus on RPG elements with shooter aspects being less prominent, Fallout 4 strips some of the RPG aspects away for a more streamlined experience.  This makes the shooter portion of the game stand out more than in previous titles. While this makes the game less complicated for newer players, it also reduces the depth that some players enjoy in an RPG.  The player is also able to switch between third and first person.

With Fallout 4 being a shooter, all of the game’s combat revolves around fighting using guns or melee weapons to do damage to your enemies.  The game has a plethora of weapons the player can use, with a fair mixture of both guns and melee weapons available depending on the player’s choice of style.  While the aiming system in Fallout 4 has improved from previous titles, it still feels a little clunky compared to more pure FPS (first person shooter) games such as Doom or Wolfenstein.  The most unique part of combat is being able to use the game’s use of a mechanic called VATS (Vault-Tec Assisted Targeting System).  This allows the player to slow down time and target a specific part of an enemy’s body.  The likelihood of hitting is based on the player’s perks (more on that later) and the accuracy of the weapon being used.  This is slightly different from previous titles’ use of VATS, as time would previously be completely stopped instead of slowed down.  While VATS can be fun to use, it makes the game very easy on all but the hardest difficulties.

Of course, Fallout 4 is also a RPG, so gameplay also has many RPG-like elements as well.  Like many RPGs, the player earns experience points (EXP) doing various activities.  The two main ways in Fallout 4 being through the completion of quests, or by killing enemies.  Quests give a large amount of EXP and is the fastest way to level up in Fallout 4.  The gameplay revolves around 7 major skill trees with each varying the way the game should be approached.  When the player levels up, they are given a single perk point to spend on a large variety of different skills and abilities in those 7 skill trees or to increase the level of a tree itself.  The player also gets a small increase in max health every time they level.  Since the game has no level cap, you can eventually unlock everything, this makes your choices feel more irrelevant the longer you play.  As stated previously, while this system is easier to understand and use, it takes away a lot of the customization the player is able to make compared to a more RPG focused system.

Dialogue is another major part of Fallout 4.  The player can talk to any non-hostile NPC and some of them can be bartered with.  The player can also progress certain quests or dialogue trees if they can pass a speech check.  Whether or not you are able to pass a speech check depends on how difficult the check is, your speech related perks, and some randomness.  The randomness can be annoying at times, perhaps a system that just looked at if the player had the perks to pass the speech check would have been better here.  While the dialogue in Fallout 4 is all well voiced and decently written, the dialogue choices you make are extremely limited.  The player is always limited to 4 choices, which are usually yes, no, give me more information, and be sarcastic.  They make each conversation feel the same as all the rest and hamper the amount of choice a player feels he has.  They also do not give a good description of what your character is going to say, you make think you are saying yes, but your character may instead be sarcastic and insulting when you were not intending to be.  In an RPG, it is important to let a player feel like they have a choice and allow them to put themselves in their character’s shoes.  This system hinders the player’s ability to feel that way.

The game also has a pretty in-depth crafting and modding system for your weapons, something new to the Fallout series.  Every weapon is able to be modded to change its efficiency or even playstyle.  In order to craft the best items and mods, the player needs certain materials and to have enough perks points placed into your crafting skills.  This gives items that had virtually no purpose in previous games a reason to be collected, to break them down and use their raw materials to craft items or mods with.  This is arguably the best change made to Fallout 4, and hopefully will be used again in future titles.

Exploration

FALLOUT 4 MAP

     Exploration is the foundation of every Bethesda RPG, and Fallout 4 does not disappoint in this area.  The map is vast and there are dozens of side quests and unique items scattered around the game world to discover.  Bethesda games have always been great at putting content ‘off the beaten path’ that is still just as engaging as the main game.  A player could spend dozens of hours simply exploring the world and finding mysteries and background stories in tons of different buildings.  Even with all the bugs, one is bound to find in a game this size, the exploration portion of Fallout 4 is one of the games best and most interesting elements.  While the game has tons of towns to visit (and build in, more on that later), the one thing the game could use would be more large city like locations.  Fallout 4 only really has 2 locations large enough to be considered a city.  One or two more of these types of locations would go a long way to keep things varied, since the player will end up visiting these ‘cities’ quite often.

Another positive point for Fallout 4 is its enemy variety.  Along with the raiders and mutated creatures from previous titles, the game adds some additional creatures and enemy types to make things interesting.  The first time you run into a giant crab queen, hopefully you can keep your panic in check enough to stay alive.  Enemies also react differently to different combat tactics.  For example, some creatures are much easier to fight if you aim for their legs, reducing their ability to move.  Even if more creatures to fight would obviously be better, Fallout 4 has more than enough to make the keep the player on their toes.

Settlements

BUILDING MENU

Along with quests and exploration, the game has other types of activities involving settlements.  The main part of settlements is being able to create your own town.  The player is able to construct buildings, plant crops, build defenses, and generate water to keep their town alive.  There are over a dozen locations on the map that the player can claim and build on.  People will also move into settlements on random occasions.  In order to keep people happy and safe, you need to have enough food, water, and protection for the number of people at each location.  Their happiness is also determined by the buildings and decorations of the town.

The biggest flaw with the settlement mechanics is its lack of explanation.  The game gives no tutorial on how any of it works and forces the player to figure everything out on their own.  Without online guides, most people wouldn’t know how to keep a town happy, or even realize that towns can be linked with a ‘provisioner’ system that is never mentioned or explained.  Constructing items or buildings can also be very glitchy, as there are many times where it looks like something should work but it doesn’t.  The entire settlement system feels tacked on, and while the game is better with it, a lot more polish could of gone into settlements.

Summary and Final Analysis

The game has a pretty linear learning curve with a lot of the difficulty being found in the first few hours of the game, when the player is a lower level.  Later on, as the player figures things out and becomes more powerful, the game doesn’t do as good of a job keeping up with how strong the player is.  Most of the decisions the player makes, other than a few major story choices, feel fairly pointless.  Since the game drifts away from RPG elements, your gameplay choices feel like straight line progression rather than bursts of power when you finally are able to unlock a new skill or weapon.

The only real randomness in Fallout 4 comes from the VATS system and speech checks.  I already talked about how speech checks should be less random, but miss a few 95% chance to hit shots in VATS, and you may find it difficult to keep your anger in check.  The randomness in VATS could have been limited by allowing the player to have a 100% chance to hit in certain situations (instead of the 95% cap).  While it creates some hilarious looking situations when you manage to miss some 1 point blank with a shotgun or a hammer, it more often than not just feels annoying.

Even with all its flaws, Fallout 4 is a very fun game.  If you are interested in exploring an open world, you will find countless hours of entertainment here.  If you just want a fun shooter, you will be able to enjoy yourself for quite a few hours.  If you are looking for an RPG, that is where you may be somewhat disappointed.  The game caters to a fairly wide audience.  While this can limit its enjoyment and longevity for some, it can give near endless entertainment to others.  With everything in mind, Fallout 4 is worth the time and money to try for most players, especially since the game can now be picked up for 30$ or less.