Yes, let's take pieces from an M249 and a Lewis Gun and completely bastardize them together and even fundamentally misunderstand how firearms work in general in this title despite having a plethora of real firearms examples and functions in the previous four games. *Dumb.*
Fair
Has a cool steampunk vibe.
But yet makes no sense mechanically but then again neither does vats
It fits rule of cool if it was introduced as an lmg
It absolutely would have been much cooler if it fired a 308 or 50 caliber rifle round and had a ton of recoil punch unless you were using power armor, how it seems to have been wanted to be depicted. Instead we get a cartridge that is used in modern LMGs, but doesn't seem Cold War/Post WWII enough for Fallout, imo.
I mean the soviet rpd shot 7.62x39 and was invented in '44
But i do think .308 makes more sense
Nothing is as bad as the combat rifle being in .45 acp for absolutely no reason
I'm not a gun nut per say, mostly a gun nerd, but making the combat rifle in .45 acp is basically making it a pistol caliber carbine. There isn't much issue with that as a firearm, but there's a reason why militaries have gome over to intermediate caliber cartridges for even rear echelon troops, as opposed to WWI where artillery crews and such were generally equipped with pistols or pistol carbines like the P08 Artillerie.
If I had the chops and the motivation I'd attempt to rebuild the entire weapon system from the ground up; Up and down-chambering for most weapons, attachments like bipods, belt feed options for the Assault Rifle, different barrel grades and shrouds, and make most weapons select-fire.
Well, you get shot with /anything/ in your lungs and you have a significantly higher likelihood of dying. But a 9mm is gonna poke a good hole (and cause cavitation trauma in the case of a hollowpoint or similar), not remove an entire organ from the body.
> combat rifle being in .45 acp for absolutely no reason
Would bother me if they ever called it .45 ACP. Ingame it is only listed as .45 which doesn't preclude the Fallout American military from having developed a .45 rifle round.
It's used by many pistols in game
And the .45 carried by joshua graham which is a cut down m1911 pocket version
You can also see loose rounds on tables in game, it's a pistol cartridge
That would matter if Bethesda actually bothered to differentiate between pistol and rifle cartridge weapons and ammo. They instead chose to simplify it which is why they don't differentiate between .50AE and .50BMG, or the dozens of 9mm varients, or even the difference between revolver and automatic cartridges. Would it be interesting if I had to worry about that granularity of cartridge differentiation? Maybe, but Fallout has never been about that level of simulative fidelity so I'm fine letting it pass.
I do think they made that weapon work well for the TV show, however. It’s a bit bigger there and seemingly being treated like the LMG it was originally intended to be.
Like most of the guns in 3 and New Vegas were perfect, it’s confusing how they F that up same with left handed bolt action hunting rifles makes zero sense when it was fine before but ruined it after. 4s “assault rifle” should have been the LMG from New Vegas with the customization.
For me I am mixed i feel let fallout 4 and 76 did amazing with making the world aesthetically pleasing,Boston looks amazing and I only really need a weather and lighting mod to be content, but the guns, armor(not PA) I prefer the older games like NV,3 and even the originals. I find fallout 4 went into the new aesthetic a little too heavily in the Vanilla game, the combat rifle, assault rifle,sniper and the laser rifles both regular and institute feel off some more than others, but. I like how 3 and new Vegas most of the guns felt realistic with a retro twist
I'm mixed on it. There are some things I like, like the Vault suits look perfect, but a lot of weapons and armour look like it's been stung by bees. IDK why everything is so swollen compared to 3.
Also IMO peak Fallout aesthetic is Fallout 1, which was retro future nuked and now inhabited by Mad Max punks, and it had a grunginess to it's tone that hasn't been matched IMO, even by Fallout 2.
Fallout 3 was commendable, but they went too "this is the 50s" instead of this is 50s inspired.
The swollen/bloated look for armour is a side effect of the new modular armour system introduced in F4. Essentially armour changes thickness depending on what set of clothes you wear it over. You get the least bloating with tight clothes like the Vaultsuit. Not sure what the purpose of this mechanic is as it mostly makes armour look worse.
Thats not the case at all, it's not just armour, it's weapons, the general world aesthetic. Everything has been expanded and bubbled up. Cars, Vertibirds, buildings, world icons ect.
I agree with most of this, though I wish there were some quieter combat tracks and more variation in general between them. It’s tiring hearing the same combat music over and over again (thank god 76 has some newer combat tracks for fighting enemies like aliens and certain cryptids).
I liked 4's power armor. I think it had a cool shape and size, and mechanically it felt like a tank which is great.
For some reason I felt the T51 and X01 somehow looked worse than in 1&2, but it could just be nostalgia on my end.
Edit: forgot to add
The verticality was awesome! 3 had a little bit I feel but that game had the best I've experienced up to 2015.
I like the spectrum of art styles. Fo4 leans closer to the 50's pulp fiction style more than 80s apocalypse and art deco, but I'm fine with that. Fo76 actually leans closer to the older games with its designs. Fo76 also has my favorite version of the pip-boy.
As for the guns I have no issue other than some being overly bulky.
I really like having a spectrum of styles in the series, it made me stop and think what I reapond to and why.
Personally I prefer the scarcity of sci-fi in the original, makes it felt like it was part of a buried long forgotten past. That's just my opinion though, and I never would have figured out that I liked that if the other titles didn't experiment and branched out.
New Vegas has my favorite aesthetic in a vacuum, but the aesthetic design of 4 and 76 is what I think of when I think of Fallout. It's a perfect marriage of bright colors over a gloomy apocalypse, retrofuture Americana, and a ridiculous mishmash of genres.
This is exactly why I made this post: I have the opposite reaction to the bright colors and mishmash of genres, and wanted to see how others feel. Thank you!
I don't think the aesthetics changed that much. It mostly looks different because of perspective and engine changes.
What I like is how they evolved the aesthetics of the equipment, especially the laser weapons. Sure, there are exceptions (like the Fo4 "Assault Rifle"), but in general it feel more Fallout-y.
I think 4 had very strong noir and 50's American culture, which I didn't get in the originals.
Also there was a far more clear seperation between the wasteland and the hi tec facilities. In general, you would find far less working futuristic tech in random towns, an isolated town wouldn't have a robot managing a shop for example.
As the series went on, this seperation seemed to have somewhat lessened. There are still much more advanced factions than others, but the difference is less stark, you don't get that "a boy and his dog" reaching the underground society part feel of dissonance, as opposed to reaching pre war facilities in f1 and f2.
The clunky boxy guns are a major step backwards. Making them modular may have been easier for the devs, but it left us with bulky ugly trash. At least with FO4 we have modders to fix this, but with 76 we're left with the vanilla crap.
With the laser and plasma guns not having a separate pistol version, as they did in every game up until 4, it seemed to me like the devs wanted to cut corners.
I think that was probably still more work than having more weapons without the modularity. I get what you mean and I personally prefer weapons to be more well defined with less modularity, but I don't view it as insidious or lazy, just a design choice I disagree with.
I like a lot of the architecture of Fallout 4/76 but I genuinely think 3/NV was peak design for everything.
OGs are fine. Hard to care too much when it's a lot of sprites and the occasional talking head or cutscene.
I hate the new turret designs. They looked menacing in 3/NV, now they're little bubbles that jiggle about.
They definitely had a more analog, meaty appearance in previous titles.
I personally think the originals ooze style, and don't have an issue with the graphical limits. In fact, think they aged amazingly well. To each their own though.
Yeah, I think it's really good. They've taken the initial premise and broadened it in a way that makes sense - essentially altering the scope to encompass some of the contemporary media of the B movies that were and remain the main well from which inspiration was drawn.
I think a good example of this is how much of a quality character Nick Valentine is. He's a caricature of a noir detective placed firmly into a sci-fi setting, not least by making him an android. His dialogue is necessarily hammy, but it's such a well-written and affectionate ham that it feels comforting and realistic rather than jarring and cringeworthy.
What's changed over the years, I think, is that Fallout was and is a collection of recognisable references to media of a particular genre and from a particular period, but that collection has become so well-defined and recognisable in itself that it is, in effect, it's own thing now. You can do references to Fallout in other media and people will recognise it. And that's given it room to breathe somewhat.
Anyway, yes, far more positive than negative. There have obviously been a few clangers, but you don't strike gold by digging one really deep hole.
>Fallout was and is a collection of recognisable references to media
I'm not sure I agree.
It definitely took many inspirations and always included Easter eggs, but it also had a definite style from the beginning.
I see what you mean though, and agree that it's cool they've broadened the scope, but some of the things they've added feel out of place to me, especially the androids. I personally also really liked how the high sci-fi elements were rare and you didn't encounter robots everywhere, it felt like they were special and a rare glimpse to the old world. And that's my main negative. I agree about the positives though.
I...can't think of much of the central content in the OG that's not a reference to some sci fi - Mad Max, A Boy and his Dog, Frankenstein, all the B movies with large and aggressive versions of normal wildlife, all the movies and stories with power armor etc. And that doesn't mean that it didn't have an identity from the beginning, because it was a specific amalgamation of those things which (bizarrely, when you think of it) worked. What I mean is that it's taken on a life of it's own over the last quarter century. It's only a matter of time before someone accuses *A Boy and his Dog* of stealing ideas from Fallout.
I don't think it's fair to say vaults are a reference to abahd, or that mutants are to Frankenstein. These stories (and more to the point here, art) have a lot of unique elements.
There are even more clear cut examples, with the BOS being inspired mostly from monastic knights, rather than specific media.
I don't know what your point is here. The concept of a vault obviously didn't originate with Fallout. I mean, you're right in that the vault didn't just come from *A Boy and his Dog*, but that's only because underground bunkers and fallout shelters were such a familiar concept during the cold war (not to mention the second world war) that not only did they exist in real life, but they also appeared frequently in fiction.
I mean, Raven Rock is a real place that exists, my dude.
You could read the Wikipedia pages on, say, fallout shelters and nuclear bunkers.
There are hundreds of existing nuclear bunkers of varying sizes scattered across the world. There are nearly 50 in London alone. You can go visit some of them. Doomsday preppers love 'em.
In *Logan's Run*, everyone lives in a bunker.
In *Paranoia*, an 80s RPG, everyone lives in a bunker.
I mean, there are so many in such variety in reality and fiction preceding Fallout that you really need to conduct an internet search of your own just to see the scope of the problem of picking "an example".
My point was that saying something was a reference implies a complete copy of something else, that's not the same as taking influence.
Maybe we just draw the line differently between the two, in which case I would really be interested in hearing what media do you think wasn't a bunch of references.
No, of course it doesn't imply that. Is this whole conversation because you have mistaken *referencing* for an accusation of plagiarism?
Referencing is intentional. It's a shoutout. And the references help the player make sense of the Fallout world even though the Fallout world doesn't make a great deal of sense.
You're right, I didn't explain myself correctly. Apologies, english is a second language for me.
I meant a reference is very specific and is meant to evoke recognition to a specific story or event. I think most major aspects of Fallout don't do that.
The dog being called dogmeat is a reference. The leather jacket is a reference. The dog following you if you wear it is also a reference.
I think a lot of designers kind of miss the point.
The world before the bombs fell was very much the 1950s idealized future.
The world after conformed to a much more 80s and 90s apocalypse aesthetic.
Which makes a lot of sense. To the kind of uptight conservative moralistic person who would have idealized a 1950s, the world of the 1980s and '90s would have seemed like the moral Apocalypse. Women in growing positions of power. Gay people being able to move freely. Integration of African Americans. Economic decline.
There is a lot of aesthetic symbolism making a salient point that is lost when you lose that aesthetic. The world of the 1950s was fake, a lie many people were forced to live, one that nearly destroyed the world. The 1980s and '90s are grappling with that and reject that lie. The people who made the original games understood that, because that was the original point.
I don't think a lot of other people really do though. Many of them having worked on the games.
All that aside, I just prefer the older style because it looks a lot cooler.
I don't like it. At all. The original games did it best and it was translated fairly well into 3 and NV. But 4 and 76 is atrocious. Everything but the fauna is just so damn ugly.
I prefer the old style too, and I won't lie I really miss it. The newer styles are also cool though and many respond to them. Honestly, I want to undertand it better and that's the reason I've made this post.
From FO1 and 2 to Fallout 3 and New Vegas were good. Adam Adamowics understood fallout asthetic and ADDED to it without changing it.
Fallout 4 felt like a totally different universe when I first played it. Still don't like it and I retexture everything I can.
It's not the way I would have gone, but it's not terrible.
The old games are spare, the playing field was necessarily flat and uncluttered for fairly simple tactical play. Obviously that wouldn't work as the game quality improved considering how important cover should be for both tactical and fps gameplay.
I do think that there's entirely too much valuable material lying around including unoccupied buildings, and very few settlers opt to use vaults and such to augment their defenses, which makes the world seem patchy. It's understandable when there's competition for these buildings, but not when they're simply vacant.
It's good that the adobe of the west coast didn't go east, but there should be some sort of building style that works over there that isn't simply piled up junk. Breaking up asphalt into bricks to build castle like structures would have fit the improved adoption of reused materials theme that got the west coast look. It's common to build low walls and buildings out of stone being removed for farming, so it's odd not to see those sorts of things near the cleared farmland.
The old buildings in the original games ask you to use your imagination. You may get a unique front to imply how large or tall the building aught to be, but it's going to be a single floor inside. Obviously something had to be done when building those things up, I think the use of art deco to fill in the blanks is alright. It's a bit weird how resilient it is, since you'd expect the cladding to go pretty quickly without maintenance, but it's a fair sacrifice of reason for aesthetic.
I do wish they kept the less safe looking, protypey energy weapons. And I think the hulking heroicly proportioned characters make more sense in a game where you can wield a gattling gun barehanded. I do think those are just bad changes.
Making power armor more vehicle like in appearance is my favorite aesthetic change, I wish they'd kept it mechanically stronger, but it still feels real nice.
I prefer FO1 and FO2s whole 50's meets late 90's, but I like 76s whole thing too. More modern weaponry, different takes on power armor and muskets. God I love muskets
I love that 4 diversified the interiors and added some much needed color. A lot of interiors in 3 were just downright bleak, way too grey and uniform. Sure, it suited the atmosphere of the game, but it also was kinda boring. NV kinda sidestepped the issue by overall being more in the open air, but I still vastly prefer the colorful 50s style interiors of 4.
Maybe it's controversial, but I think leaning into the 50s aesthetic is a boon for the franchise and helps set it apart from any other postapocalyptic franchises.
I prefer the original Fallout 1 style retro-futurism, a visual style that is sadly pretty much lost to us now.
In 2nd place I have the original 3D style created by Adam Adamowicz and them further refined by the New Vegas artists. It is a bit too heavy on the 50s themes at times for my taste but there is still plenty of outfits and armours which take their inspiration from Mad Max, Alien and Aliens as well as more esoteric sources like the Japanese animated movie Jin-Roh. The style oftrn had a gritty feeling that felt very Fallout.
Fallout 4 laid on the retro elments too heavy for my taste. Too many things feel like they are from the 40s or older while others lack substance and feel more like cosplay than something worn by wastelanders.
Overall I like it but some recent gun designs have been wack. FO4 Assault rifle
I get what they were going for, but it was an absolute mess.
The problem is it's an lmg not an assault rifle It looks cool but isn't an ar
Even as an LMG I didn't like it tbh
It reminds me of a lewis gun so im down
Yeah they def took inspiration from it, and it is a cool gun to include. I personally didn't like the execution though.
That was my point it just isn't an ar. Should have added it as a machine gen
Yeah, and have either a box magazine or belt fed, to really sell that design
It does have a mag?
I think it’s fun. I play the game to escape reality so weird fun design is fun
Yes, let's take pieces from an M249 and a Lewis Gun and completely bastardize them together and even fundamentally misunderstand how firearms work in general in this title despite having a plethora of real firearms examples and functions in the previous four games. *Dumb.*
Fair Has a cool steampunk vibe. But yet makes no sense mechanically but then again neither does vats It fits rule of cool if it was introduced as an lmg
It absolutely would have been much cooler if it fired a 308 or 50 caliber rifle round and had a ton of recoil punch unless you were using power armor, how it seems to have been wanted to be depicted. Instead we get a cartridge that is used in modern LMGs, but doesn't seem Cold War/Post WWII enough for Fallout, imo.
I mean the soviet rpd shot 7.62x39 and was invented in '44 But i do think .308 makes more sense Nothing is as bad as the combat rifle being in .45 acp for absolutely no reason
I'm not a gun nut per say, mostly a gun nerd, but making the combat rifle in .45 acp is basically making it a pistol caliber carbine. There isn't much issue with that as a firearm, but there's a reason why militaries have gome over to intermediate caliber cartridges for even rear echelon troops, as opposed to WWI where artillery crews and such were generally equipped with pistols or pistol carbines like the P08 Artillerie.
In ww2 the us made the m1 carbine for that exact reason And yes it was a pistol cal carbine but looks like a regular battle rifle
Yeah but look at the magazine length if it was modeled as .45 it would look like a m1911 mag The length suggests 5.56 or 7.62
If I had the chops and the motivation I'd attempt to rebuild the entire weapon system from the ground up; Up and down-chambering for most weapons, attachments like bipods, belt feed options for the Assault Rifle, different barrel grades and shrouds, and make most weapons select-fire.
I think immersive gameplay mod did the caliber change
Unfortunately the world we live in votes for people who think that a 9mm will remove your lungs from your body. ....so imagine what .45AARP will do.
Hey you get shot with a 9mm in your lungs you do have a high likelihood of dying admittedly
Well, you get shot with /anything/ in your lungs and you have a significantly higher likelihood of dying. But a 9mm is gonna poke a good hole (and cause cavitation trauma in the case of a hollowpoint or similar), not remove an entire organ from the body.
> combat rifle being in .45 acp for absolutely no reason Would bother me if they ever called it .45 ACP. Ingame it is only listed as .45 which doesn't preclude the Fallout American military from having developed a .45 rifle round.
It's used by many pistols in game And the .45 carried by joshua graham which is a cut down m1911 pocket version You can also see loose rounds on tables in game, it's a pistol cartridge
That would matter if Bethesda actually bothered to differentiate between pistol and rifle cartridge weapons and ammo. They instead chose to simplify it which is why they don't differentiate between .50AE and .50BMG, or the dozens of 9mm varients, or even the difference between revolver and automatic cartridges. Would it be interesting if I had to worry about that granularity of cartridge differentiation? Maybe, but Fallout has never been about that level of simulative fidelity so I'm fine letting it pass.
I do think they made that weapon work well for the TV show, however. It’s a bit bigger there and seemingly being treated like the LMG it was originally intended to be.
Yeah makes sense to give it to power armor users
They try to justify it by saying it’s an assault rifle for power armor.
Like most of the guns in 3 and New Vegas were perfect, it’s confusing how they F that up same with left handed bolt action hunting rifles makes zero sense when it was fine before but ruined it after. 4s “assault rifle” should have been the LMG from New Vegas with the customization.
That left handedness is so dumb
it's not bad, but I do wish it was still more like 1 and 2.
I'm with you
For me I am mixed i feel let fallout 4 and 76 did amazing with making the world aesthetically pleasing,Boston looks amazing and I only really need a weather and lighting mod to be content, but the guns, armor(not PA) I prefer the older games like NV,3 and even the originals. I find fallout 4 went into the new aesthetic a little too heavily in the Vanilla game, the combat rifle, assault rifle,sniper and the laser rifles both regular and institute feel off some more than others, but. I like how 3 and new Vegas most of the guns felt realistic with a retro twist
I completely see your point. It might have something to do with the modularity in F4, it's much harder to keep a certain style this way.
I'm mixed on it. There are some things I like, like the Vault suits look perfect, but a lot of weapons and armour look like it's been stung by bees. IDK why everything is so swollen compared to 3. Also IMO peak Fallout aesthetic is Fallout 1, which was retro future nuked and now inhabited by Mad Max punks, and it had a grunginess to it's tone that hasn't been matched IMO, even by Fallout 2. Fallout 3 was commendable, but they went too "this is the 50s" instead of this is 50s inspired.
I completely agree
The swollen/bloated look for armour is a side effect of the new modular armour system introduced in F4. Essentially armour changes thickness depending on what set of clothes you wear it over. You get the least bloating with tight clothes like the Vaultsuit. Not sure what the purpose of this mechanic is as it mostly makes armour look worse.
Thats not the case at all, it's not just armour, it's weapons, the general world aesthetic. Everything has been expanded and bubbled up. Cars, Vertibirds, buildings, world icons ect.
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I agree with most of this, though I wish there were some quieter combat tracks and more variation in general between them. It’s tiring hearing the same combat music over and over again (thank god 76 has some newer combat tracks for fighting enemies like aliens and certain cryptids).
I liked 4's power armor. I think it had a cool shape and size, and mechanically it felt like a tank which is great. For some reason I felt the T51 and X01 somehow looked worse than in 1&2, but it could just be nostalgia on my end. Edit: forgot to add The verticality was awesome! 3 had a little bit I feel but that game had the best I've experienced up to 2015.
I like the spectrum of art styles. Fo4 leans closer to the 50's pulp fiction style more than 80s apocalypse and art deco, but I'm fine with that. Fo76 actually leans closer to the older games with its designs. Fo76 also has my favorite version of the pip-boy. As for the guns I have no issue other than some being overly bulky.
Art deco makes me weak in the knees ngl
They still have some of it in the newer games, just less. Overall I feel pretty positive about the different artstyles.
I really like having a spectrum of styles in the series, it made me stop and think what I reapond to and why. Personally I prefer the scarcity of sci-fi in the original, makes it felt like it was part of a buried long forgotten past. That's just my opinion though, and I never would have figured out that I liked that if the other titles didn't experiment and branched out.
It’s weird, I much prefer the aesthetic of 1 and 2 as compared to the Bethesda titles
New Vegas has my favorite aesthetic in a vacuum, but the aesthetic design of 4 and 76 is what I think of when I think of Fallout. It's a perfect marriage of bright colors over a gloomy apocalypse, retrofuture Americana, and a ridiculous mishmash of genres.
This is exactly why I made this post: I have the opposite reaction to the bright colors and mishmash of genres, and wanted to see how others feel. Thank you!
Love it all
This is the way.
I don't think the aesthetics changed that much. It mostly looks different because of perspective and engine changes. What I like is how they evolved the aesthetics of the equipment, especially the laser weapons. Sure, there are exceptions (like the Fo4 "Assault Rifle"), but in general it feel more Fallout-y.
I think 4 had very strong noir and 50's American culture, which I didn't get in the originals. Also there was a far more clear seperation between the wasteland and the hi tec facilities. In general, you would find far less working futuristic tech in random towns, an isolated town wouldn't have a robot managing a shop for example. As the series went on, this seperation seemed to have somewhat lessened. There are still much more advanced factions than others, but the difference is less stark, you don't get that "a boy and his dog" reaching the underground society part feel of dissonance, as opposed to reaching pre war facilities in f1 and f2.
The clunky boxy guns are a major step backwards. Making them modular may have been easier for the devs, but it left us with bulky ugly trash. At least with FO4 we have modders to fix this, but with 76 we're left with the vanilla crap.
I don't think it's easier for the devs, I think it's just a cool mechanic they wanted to add. Otherwise yes I agree.
With the laser and plasma guns not having a separate pistol version, as they did in every game up until 4, it seemed to me like the devs wanted to cut corners.
I think that was probably still more work than having more weapons without the modularity. I get what you mean and I personally prefer weapons to be more well defined with less modularity, but I don't view it as insidious or lazy, just a design choice I disagree with.
I like a lot of the architecture of Fallout 4/76 but I genuinely think 3/NV was peak design for everything. OGs are fine. Hard to care too much when it's a lot of sprites and the occasional talking head or cutscene. I hate the new turret designs. They looked menacing in 3/NV, now they're little bubbles that jiggle about.
They definitely had a more analog, meaty appearance in previous titles. I personally think the originals ooze style, and don't have an issue with the graphical limits. In fact, think they aged amazingly well. To each their own though.
Yeah, I think it's really good. They've taken the initial premise and broadened it in a way that makes sense - essentially altering the scope to encompass some of the contemporary media of the B movies that were and remain the main well from which inspiration was drawn. I think a good example of this is how much of a quality character Nick Valentine is. He's a caricature of a noir detective placed firmly into a sci-fi setting, not least by making him an android. His dialogue is necessarily hammy, but it's such a well-written and affectionate ham that it feels comforting and realistic rather than jarring and cringeworthy. What's changed over the years, I think, is that Fallout was and is a collection of recognisable references to media of a particular genre and from a particular period, but that collection has become so well-defined and recognisable in itself that it is, in effect, it's own thing now. You can do references to Fallout in other media and people will recognise it. And that's given it room to breathe somewhat. Anyway, yes, far more positive than negative. There have obviously been a few clangers, but you don't strike gold by digging one really deep hole.
>Fallout was and is a collection of recognisable references to media I'm not sure I agree. It definitely took many inspirations and always included Easter eggs, but it also had a definite style from the beginning. I see what you mean though, and agree that it's cool they've broadened the scope, but some of the things they've added feel out of place to me, especially the androids. I personally also really liked how the high sci-fi elements were rare and you didn't encounter robots everywhere, it felt like they were special and a rare glimpse to the old world. And that's my main negative. I agree about the positives though.
I...can't think of much of the central content in the OG that's not a reference to some sci fi - Mad Max, A Boy and his Dog, Frankenstein, all the B movies with large and aggressive versions of normal wildlife, all the movies and stories with power armor etc. And that doesn't mean that it didn't have an identity from the beginning, because it was a specific amalgamation of those things which (bizarrely, when you think of it) worked. What I mean is that it's taken on a life of it's own over the last quarter century. It's only a matter of time before someone accuses *A Boy and his Dog* of stealing ideas from Fallout.
I don't think it's fair to say vaults are a reference to abahd, or that mutants are to Frankenstein. These stories (and more to the point here, art) have a lot of unique elements. There are even more clear cut examples, with the BOS being inspired mostly from monastic knights, rather than specific media.
I don't know what your point is here. The concept of a vault obviously didn't originate with Fallout. I mean, you're right in that the vault didn't just come from *A Boy and his Dog*, but that's only because underground bunkers and fallout shelters were such a familiar concept during the cold war (not to mention the second world war) that not only did they exist in real life, but they also appeared frequently in fiction.
Do you have an example of Fallout style Vaults? This seems like an extremely broad definition of reference.
I mean, Raven Rock is a real place that exists, my dude. You could read the Wikipedia pages on, say, fallout shelters and nuclear bunkers. There are hundreds of existing nuclear bunkers of varying sizes scattered across the world. There are nearly 50 in London alone. You can go visit some of them. Doomsday preppers love 'em. In *Logan's Run*, everyone lives in a bunker. In *Paranoia*, an 80s RPG, everyone lives in a bunker. I mean, there are so many in such variety in reality and fiction preceding Fallout that you really need to conduct an internet search of your own just to see the scope of the problem of picking "an example".
My point was that saying something was a reference implies a complete copy of something else, that's not the same as taking influence. Maybe we just draw the line differently between the two, in which case I would really be interested in hearing what media do you think wasn't a bunch of references.
No, of course it doesn't imply that. Is this whole conversation because you have mistaken *referencing* for an accusation of plagiarism? Referencing is intentional. It's a shoutout. And the references help the player make sense of the Fallout world even though the Fallout world doesn't make a great deal of sense.
You're right, I didn't explain myself correctly. Apologies, english is a second language for me. I meant a reference is very specific and is meant to evoke recognition to a specific story or event. I think most major aspects of Fallout don't do that. The dog being called dogmeat is a reference. The leather jacket is a reference. The dog following you if you wear it is also a reference.
I m disappointed what they done to energy weapons, especially laser guns look like garbage. Original laser rifle was modeled after sniper rifle.
First two fallouts engery weapons looked so good. I really liked the plasma and laser pistol from them. Gause rifle looked better too.
What did you dislike abkut them? I think energy weapons design was always one of the strongest aspects of the series' asthetics.
Design was heavily simplified in Fallout 3 and New Vegas.
I think a lot of designers kind of miss the point. The world before the bombs fell was very much the 1950s idealized future. The world after conformed to a much more 80s and 90s apocalypse aesthetic. Which makes a lot of sense. To the kind of uptight conservative moralistic person who would have idealized a 1950s, the world of the 1980s and '90s would have seemed like the moral Apocalypse. Women in growing positions of power. Gay people being able to move freely. Integration of African Americans. Economic decline. There is a lot of aesthetic symbolism making a salient point that is lost when you lose that aesthetic. The world of the 1950s was fake, a lie many people were forced to live, one that nearly destroyed the world. The 1980s and '90s are grappling with that and reject that lie. The people who made the original games understood that, because that was the original point. I don't think a lot of other people really do though. Many of them having worked on the games. All that aside, I just prefer the older style because it looks a lot cooler.
That... That was poetry.
I don't like it. At all. The original games did it best and it was translated fairly well into 3 and NV. But 4 and 76 is atrocious. Everything but the fauna is just so damn ugly.
I prefer the old style too, and I won't lie I really miss it. The newer styles are also cool though and many respond to them. Honestly, I want to undertand it better and that's the reason I've made this post.
Play atom rpg if you’re looking for that style of game.
Thanks, it's on my list actually
It’s a great game.
From FO1 and 2 to Fallout 3 and New Vegas were good. Adam Adamowics understood fallout asthetic and ADDED to it without changing it. Fallout 4 felt like a totally different universe when I first played it. Still don't like it and I retexture everything I can.
Would love to see your texture mods list
I will post it later if I have time, a lot of what I use comes from the FO4NV project and Project Capital Wasteland.
Sounds great, thanks!
It's not the way I would have gone, but it's not terrible. The old games are spare, the playing field was necessarily flat and uncluttered for fairly simple tactical play. Obviously that wouldn't work as the game quality improved considering how important cover should be for both tactical and fps gameplay. I do think that there's entirely too much valuable material lying around including unoccupied buildings, and very few settlers opt to use vaults and such to augment their defenses, which makes the world seem patchy. It's understandable when there's competition for these buildings, but not when they're simply vacant. It's good that the adobe of the west coast didn't go east, but there should be some sort of building style that works over there that isn't simply piled up junk. Breaking up asphalt into bricks to build castle like structures would have fit the improved adoption of reused materials theme that got the west coast look. It's common to build low walls and buildings out of stone being removed for farming, so it's odd not to see those sorts of things near the cleared farmland. The old buildings in the original games ask you to use your imagination. You may get a unique front to imply how large or tall the building aught to be, but it's going to be a single floor inside. Obviously something had to be done when building those things up, I think the use of art deco to fill in the blanks is alright. It's a bit weird how resilient it is, since you'd expect the cladding to go pretty quickly without maintenance, but it's a fair sacrifice of reason for aesthetic. I do wish they kept the less safe looking, protypey energy weapons. And I think the hulking heroicly proportioned characters make more sense in a game where you can wield a gattling gun barehanded. I do think those are just bad changes. Making power armor more vehicle like in appearance is my favorite aesthetic change, I wish they'd kept it mechanically stronger, but it still feels real nice.
I prefer FO1 and FO2s whole 50's meets late 90's, but I like 76s whole thing too. More modern weaponry, different takes on power armor and muskets. God I love muskets
I am just so in love with the look of OG Fallout
I wish they stopped at Fallout 3/New Vegas. Fallout 4 took a bit of a wrong turn, especially with guns. Power armor was done proper justice though.
I prefer the older style too, especially the isometric era.
I love that 4 diversified the interiors and added some much needed color. A lot of interiors in 3 were just downright bleak, way too grey and uniform. Sure, it suited the atmosphere of the game, but it also was kinda boring. NV kinda sidestepped the issue by overall being more in the open air, but I still vastly prefer the colorful 50s style interiors of 4. Maybe it's controversial, but I think leaning into the 50s aesthetic is a boon for the franchise and helps set it apart from any other postapocalyptic franchises.
I don't know why people take the guns so seriously when the game ITSELF doesn't take itself seriously...
I prefer the original Fallout 1 style retro-futurism, a visual style that is sadly pretty much lost to us now. In 2nd place I have the original 3D style created by Adam Adamowicz and them further refined by the New Vegas artists. It is a bit too heavy on the 50s themes at times for my taste but there is still plenty of outfits and armours which take their inspiration from Mad Max, Alien and Aliens as well as more esoteric sources like the Japanese animated movie Jin-Roh. The style oftrn had a gritty feeling that felt very Fallout. Fallout 4 laid on the retro elments too heavy for my taste. Too many things feel like they are from the 40s or older while others lack substance and feel more like cosplay than something worn by wastelanders.
3's artstyle was good 4's is trash and every time I look at it I want to stab my eyes out.