Hating progress (fallout)

[Jakub324]

I think bethesda distancing Fallout 3 from the main narrative was intentional, but as far as I can tell there aren't any major inconsistencies with the universe itself.

Yes, there are.

2. The Brotherhood Of Steel are pre-war technology-hoarding misanthropes, not the gallant knights of the wasteland.
3. Super Mutants are a (botched) enhancement of humans. They are not ogres or orcs.

Those two can be explained:
- The Brotherhood came to Washington and Lyons decided something needed to be done to help the locals. That's why they have no support from their Western counterparts and why the Brotherhood Outcasts are what they are - they objected to Lyons' perverting of their mission and broke away to continue their goal of gathering and preserving technology.
- The Super Mutants in Washington have completely different origins to the ones in previous games, so they would be different.

 

[MiracleOfSound]

[

No. No. NO. NO. The atmosphere in NV was LIGHT YEARS ahead of Fallout 3 when it came to feeling like Fallout. Also, Bethesda does the QA for all their games, NV's buggines was Bethesda's fault.

Derp. Derp. DERP. DERP. The atmosphere in Fallout 3 was preferable to me and many people. Opinions, they're great. I'd rather Bethesda's atmospherics than Obsidian's bland, bare, thrown together areas thanks.

EDIT: I personally don't give a fuck if it 'feels' like Fallout. It it 'feels' like F3 I'll be more than happy.

 

[Who Dares Wins]

Opinions.

Yeah, when you break it down, it ultimately just comes to them. And there's probably very little I could do to change anyone's, so I won't even try.

 

[Freaky Lou]

2.I'm so fucking sick of hearing from fallout 1 and 2 fans how the BOS in FO3 is so terribly inconsistent with the lore, because it isn't. It isn't incredibly difficult to believe that there could be a split in leadership or disagreement with the way things are run, and there was. If you don't like that, fine that's your decision and opinion but stop calling it a fucking lore inconsistency.

3. It's been a while since I looked at the lore regarding this one but FEV experiments were going on at a vault in the DC Wasteland as well as Mariposa Base. The first Mutants in the West were created by the master. I don't really remember who created the first mutants in the east. It isn't too much of a stretch to assume that the east and west coast laboratories arrived at separate but similar results. Bit of hand waving going on but not a major inconsistency and certainly not one to ruin the game in any way.

4. Really??? Did you play Fallout 2???? In Fallout 2 Harold has a tree growing out of his head I don't see how it's unreasonable to assume that it would grow bigger. Again not a lore inconsistency.

OH and I love how your complaining about "What??" moments in Fallout 3 lol as if fallout 1 and 2 were well known for their seriousness lol.

2. I still think the white-knight BoS is stupid but fine, I'll give you that one. The main issue is that there's no reason to change them beyond Bethesda wanting there to be a clear-cut good guys and bad guys, which is something that Fallout doesn't do.

3. The Mutants being there isn't the big problem. The fact that they act like mindless ogres is the problem. While we're at this, how could the Behemoths possibly come to be? That was one of the dumber things in FO3, and you'll note that there's no behemoths or gore bags in New Vegas.

4. Fine.

As for FO1 and 2 being serious...the first one definitely was. There was some wit in there, but none of the goofy stuff like we see in 2 and New Vegas. But the problem isn't having over-the-top things, the problem is having STUPID things and playing them straight. The robot emancipation quest is supposed to be dead serious, and the Dukov thing is also meant to be an example of life after the apocalypse. But it doesn't make sense.

Still, the main point of this slightly off-track discussion was lore inconsistencies, and this is getting back into just general grievances with FO3.

3 wasn't a travesty as far as lore goes, but there are definitely some issues there. The main problem, however, is just that it's really dumb. This is coming from someone who immensely enjoyed FO3 btw.

First off fallout NV handles most of these nicely.

I know, and that's why old-school fans like it more. New Vegas is awesome.

4: So because he wasnt a tree before and no one said "hes going to be a tree" he cant be a tree... thats pretty weak :/ When i saw pictures of him, (i googled his old character as it sounded interesting) this seemed like the logical step to me, trees grow, unless you hadnt noticed. The cult around him was also good, as was the moral choice

The quest was good, as I noted, which was what saved that somewhat.

Those two can be explained:
- The Brotherhood came to Washington and Lyons decided something needed to be done to help the locals. That's why they have no support from their Western counterparts and why the Brotherhood Outcasts are what they are - they objected to Lyons' perverting of their mission and broke away to continue their goal of gathering and preserving technology.

True enough. It's still a reason that old-school Fallout fans might not like the game though, because changing them that way only serves to establish a "good" faction to the Enclave's "evil".

- The Super Mutants in Washington have completely different origins to the ones in previous games, so they would be different.

Really? They use the same FEV explanation for both. Either way, it still doesn't explain how they turned a human being into a Behemoth.

 

[Musicfreak]

[

No. No. NO. NO. The atmosphere in NV was LIGHT YEARS ahead of Fallout 3 when it came to feeling like Fallout. Also, Bethesda does the QA for all their games, NV's buggines was Bethesda's fault.

Derp. Derp. DERP. DERP. The atmosphere in Fallout 3 was preferable to me and many people. Opinions, they're great. I'd rather Bethesda's atmospherics than Obsidian's bland, bare, thrown together areas thanks.

EDIT: I personally don't give a fuck if it 'feels' like Fallout. It it 'feels' like F3 I'll be more than happy.

Yeah it seems like fallout fans are pretty divided between whether they like 3 or New Vegas better at least in terms of atmosphere. That being said it baffles me how you can call Obsidian's areas bland and thrown together in comparison to the thousands upon thousands of copy pasted office buildings and subways in FO3. That and FONV had much more color than FO3 ever did.

 

[Xangi]

I think bethesda distancing Fallout 3 from the main narrative was intentional, but as far as I can tell there aren't any major inconsistencies with the universe itself.

Yes, there are.

1. The Enclave shouldn't exist anymore. They were wiped out in Fallout 2.
2. The Brotherhood Of Steel are pre-war technology-hoarding misanthropes, not the gallant knights of the wasteland.
3. Super Mutants are a (botched) enhancement of humans. They are not ogres or orcs.
4. Harold is now a tree. That really bothered some people, but I personally just think it's kind of dumb. At least the quest involving him has a choice involved (one of the rare ones where it's up to you to decide the right thing to do, and not a choice of whether you want to be "good" or "evil".

1. Not sure about that one, but is it really impossible for some of them to exist outside of the oil rig?
2. That was entirely explained, and even had an entire faction war (outcasts) over the brotherhood's purpose.
3. A large portion of fallout 3's main story was dedicated to exploring a vault where super mutants were capturing humans and irradiating them to make more super mutants. I'm not sure where you got that.
4. I'm not sure how you can consider that to be an inconsistency.

3 is from FO1. The Master tried to forcibly evolve humanity using the FEV, and created the Super Mutants. But then something happened (can't remember, or be asked to look it up) that caused the FEV to become airborne, which inoculated a lot of the population against it. Then that somehow led it to creating mutants with less and less intelligence or something.

Basically FO3 said "Well, to hell with that" And made the Mutants into orcs who eat and kidnap people and can barely even for 2 words into a coherent idea. I suppose they did try to handwave it a bit, but it still would come off as completely against canon if you played FO1 and 2 first.

EDIT: Oh and the mutants have no gender, which is why they need the FEV to reproduce. You can convince the master that this is also a major flaw (as they'd still need "inferior" humans to survive) and get him to... well, that's spoilers and I'd rather not even put in a spoiler tag. Play FO1 if you want to know.

sorry you got something wrong. the virus never went airbone. the hero of fallout 1 blew up the place where the humans were dunked into the dna changing goo (Mariposa Military Base).

it was one of the three major quest (get waterchip, stop the mutant master, destroy mutuant base)

the intelligence of the super mutants depended on the radiation level the test subject was exposed. thats why they tried to find as many vaults as possible and occasionally changed 'inferior' speciments as their minions. but since the scientists (humans and mutants) got killed in the explosion the data was lost and so some mutants tried to recreate the goo (with the forced evolution virus) but hardly succeeded.

------------------------------------

in fallout 2 and tactics supermutant had genders. in tactics you even had a mission as to secure data that could turn the mutants fertile again. and the excuse in 2 was that they were so damn ugly that you could not see the difference.

fallout 3 changed that.

also the outcast already were in fallout tactics and their agenda was to not be so strikt with their policy. in fallout 3 its the other way around.

but the thing that dissapointed me with fallout 3 was the random encounters. most often it depended if you were looking in the right direction and if you were lucky to walk into one (and not always just be near to trigger it and unknowingly walk past it.)
and even then they were just meh.. fallout 1&2 had the tardis, a time hole, the quest for the holy grail plus a holy handgrenade, the bride guardian from Monty Python and the Holy Grail, a car! and other wacky encounters wereas falout 3 just had sone retards fighting over a coke fridge and ufos.

other encounters like the battle between the Antagonizer and the Mechanist depended heavily on this. i remember to walk into the town from the other side and people constantly saying that this battle was always on between them. and i was then pissed i haven't seen it.

plus whenever people were wounded too much they would start to flee but i can hardly remember this in fallout 3. they were all on a kamikaze trip.

shooting outside of vats was horrendous. even with a fairly high skill on them. and the constant slow motion on part of your followers shooting...AR%%§)"=!.

in fallout 2 you could convince a little child to blow out the face of his mobster father and save yourself the trouble to finish him off. basically you could talk your way out of everything. EVERYTHING!

and like every one mentioned, breaking tradition with harold.

and fallout 3's ending. WTF?(especially with your super mutant follower) and even changing it in the dlc. STILL WTF!

yes fallout 3 had some awesome moments but it hardly felt like fallout.

fallout new vegas brought back some of the feeling with a good portion of wackiness that was profound in the 50's - 80's but for some it was to shinny and bright.

but still you had funny encounters, more followers (but still without the ability to push them away when they were in your way like in fallout 2), more interesting followers, not so black and white choices.....

snip

So all games that use the unreal engine are just reskins of unreal is what you're saying.

Also,why did you only start questioning thegames writing when you came across little lamplight? Children killing supermutants? You mean you had NO PROBLEM playing as a person who's entire experience with surviving in the wastes up until he/she left the vault was shooting a few radroaches with a BB gun and maybe getting in a fistfight with Butch? You didn't stop to wonder "How does someone who lived a very sheltered life in a vault for 18 years suddenly have the skill to survive multiple bullet wounds as well as take on any amount of highly trained killers in POWER ARMOR?"

REALLY?

Admit it, you let nostalgia cloud your judgement.

no i think he wants to say that the unreal engine is one of the most buggy engines out there. ( i hope he means it so or else...)

plus why the hell do the people of Big Town not say fuck these little bastards and just keep their babies instead of bringing them to little lamplight.
and when children can keep some super mutants at bay and have a high education why the hell do they turn into complete dumb pussies when they turn 16?

http://fallout.wikia.com/wiki/Forced_Evolutionary_Virus

Look under "Coming of the Master". Radiation made the FEV go airborne, but it was so weak that it didn't cause any mutation. All it did was inoculate the victims.

 

[T'Generalissimo]

I haven't played FO1 or 2 yet, so I can't speak to inconsistencies, but there are a lot of legitimate reasons to not like Fallout 3 all on its own. Terrible writing, hateful characters, inconsistent and nonsensical world, poor art direction, the voice..."acting", the lack of choice, the binary nature of the choices that are included, the screwy balance of S.P.E.C.I.A.L. and perks. It's an OK open-world FPS but it's bad at pretty much everything I would say is important for making an RPG.

 

[Xangi]

I think bethesda distancing Fallout 3 from the main narrative was intentional, but as far as I can tell there aren't any major inconsistencies with the universe itself.

Yes, there are.

1. The Enclave shouldn't exist anymore. They were wiped out in Fallout 2.
2. The Brotherhood Of Steel are pre-war technology-hoarding misanthropes, not the gallant knights of the wasteland.
3. Super Mutants are a (botched) enhancement of humans. They are not ogres or orcs.
4. Harold is now a tree. That really bothered some people, but I personally just think it's kind of dumb. At least the quest involving him has a choice involved (one of the rare ones where it's up to you to decide the right thing to do, and not a choice of whether you want to be "good" or "evil".

1. Not sure about that one, but is it really impossible for some of them to exist outside of the oil rig?
2. That was entirely explained, and even had an entire faction war (outcasts) over the brotherhood's purpose.
3. A large portion of fallout 3's main story was dedicated to exploring a vault where super mutants were capturing humans and irradiating them to make more super mutants. I'm not sure where you got that.
4. I'm not sure how you can consider that to be an inconsistency.

3 is from FO1. The Master tried to forcibly evolve humanity using the FEV, and created the Super Mutants. But then something happened (can't remember, or be asked to look it up) that caused the FEV to become airborne, which inoculated a lot of the population against it. Then that somehow led it to creating mutants with less and less intelligence or something.

Basically FO3 said "Well, to hell with that" And made the Mutants into orcs who eat and kidnap people and can barely even for 2 words into a coherent idea. I suppose they did try to handwave it a bit, but it still would come off as completely against canon if you played FO1 and 2 first.

EDIT: Oh and the mutants have no gender, which is why they need the FEV to reproduce. You can convince the master that this is also a major flaw (as they'd still need "inferior" humans to survive) and get him to... well, that's spoilers and I'd rather not even put in a spoiler tag. Play FO1 if you want to know.

Mutants HAVE gender, they are just infertile. You see a female one in Fallout 2 and New Vegas. The New FEV was horrid writing.

RIIIGHT, damnit. It's the FO3 ones that have no gender. Whatever though, same difference, it's a huge flaw in the design, and you can use it to convince the master that his plan will never work.

 

[Hazy]

There was just a thread about this...
See? [http://new.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/9.330957-Why-is-everyone-so-down-on-Fallout-3?page=1]

Old Fallout fan's problems with Fallout 3 (not so much New Vegas) is that it inconsistent in lore and spirit to the original games. It's a good game. But it's a poor sequel to Fallout 1 and 2.

Fallout: New Vegas is given more leeway with fans of the Interplay Fallouts because it is consistent with those games' lore and it very much has the spirit (humor, themes, morality) of them as well.

Completely nailed it. Fallout 3 pretty much shit all over altered what Fallout 1 and 2 had established as canonical, which New Vegas brought back to it's roots.

 

[MiracleOfSound]

Yeah it seems like fallout fans are pretty divided between whether they like 3 or New Vegas better at least in terms of atmosphere. That being said it baffles me how you can call Obsidian's areas bland and thrown together in comparison to the thousands upon thousands of copy pasted office buildings and subways in FO3. That and FONV had much more color than FO3 ever did.

More colours yes, but far less detail and atmosphere IMO. F3's locations all had much more atmospheric and dynamic lighting, much more environmental storytelling (which I'm a sucker for) and just generally far more detail and stuff to see in the environments.

Which is better is all down to taste, but I much preferred the busier, more atmospheric look of F3.

(sorry I had to rush the example here, comparing outdoors and indoors ain't a great example but you catch my drift)

F3

NV

 

[Justice4L]

Well, maybe I'm biased as Fallout 3 is my favourite game of all time, but nothing, including perhaps some dodgy plot could hinder the amazing experience I had with that game, something that New Vegas didn't quite pull off.

 

[loc978]

Nothing wrong with preferring a spinoff... but Fallout 3 should be considered a spinoff rather than a sequel. I enjoyed the game, but yes, it was a departure from the Fallout series' themes. Being a major fan of the first two games, I preferred New Vegas (also, am I really the only person who had fewer bugs and far fewer crashes in New Vegas as opposed to Fallout 3? It really seemed like a totally revamped, tightened up game engine on my PC)

I like to think of the series like this:
-Fallout (Genesis of the series)
-Fallout 2: New Reno (Enclave conflict)
-Fallout 3: New Vegas (Caesar's Legion conflict)

Spinoffs:
-Fallout: Chicago (Tactics)
-Fallout: DC (3)

...and then that one bastard child on the PS2 that we don't like to talk about.

 

[Musicfreak]

Yeah it seems like fallout fans are pretty divided between whether they like 3 or New Vegas better at least in terms of atmosphere. That being said it baffles me how you can call Obsidian's areas bland and thrown together in comparison to the thousands upon thousands of copy pasted office buildings and subways in FO3. That and FONV had much more color than FO3 ever did.

More colours yes, but far less detail and atmosphere IMO. F3's locations all had much more atmospheric and dynamic lighting, much more environmental storytelling (which I'm a sucker for) and just generally far more detail and stuff to see in the environments.

Which is better is all down to taste, but I much preferred the busier, more atmospheric look of F3.

Yeah Fallout New Vegas definitely had less environmental storytelling and I did miss that. It's weird I enjoyed Fallout 3 more than New Vegas but I can't help but feel like New Vegas was the better game. I just have this feeling that If I played New Vegas before FO3 I would have enjoyed it much more. New Vegas just felt a little bit too much more of the same but I enjoyed the story and missions much more in New Vegas. Although I don't have anywhere near the hate people seem to have for FO3's story and liberty prime was definitely one of my favorite parts in the series.

 

[CrawlingPastaHellion]

I think the problems in "Fallout 3" are more of an in-depth nature. They completely butchered "S.P.E.C.I.A.L.". Stats don't do jack in F3 and choosing starting skills only adds a bit to those skills, doesn't make them level faster as in F1and2. Also V.A.T.S. seems out of place in what seems to be a first-person-shooter. They'd better make the shooting mechanics better and drop the redundant V.A.T.S., that's only a fossil of the original's turn-based combat.

Main story-line starts out interesting enough (I actually grew on the dad, must be Liam Neeson and the protagonist's origin story), but goes completely bonkers towards the end. Not a fan.

Also, they went a little fantasy-y on the material. C'mon, mutants look like orcs... and a city of lost children, seriously? Other than that F3 is a great game, far superior to "New Vegas". Yes, I know it's by Obsidian with some of the original team present, but so what? Obsidian has too much ambition and too little resources to pull those ambitions off. Also, the presence of the original team doesn't guarantee a worthy sequel. Look at "Deus Ex: Invisible War" in which the only thing good was the story.

Oh, yeah, the originals are still better in most ways. So if you need to start somewhere, start there. Might be the nostalgia speaking, though.

 

[RhombusHatesYou]

EDIT: I personally don't give a fuck if it 'feels' like Fallout. It it 'feels' like F3 I'll be more than happy.

If Bethesda have half a brain they'll continue with their 'East Coast' Fallout and fund Obsidian to continue 'West Coast' Fallout with alternating releases... so Fallout 4 followed by Fallout: Whatever followed by Fallout 5 and so on. Keeps both sides of the argument mostly happy and the people who enjoyed both Bethesda and Obsidian offerings win twice.

Pity that neither company can do QA to save their lives, though...

 

[gideonkain]

I am very thankful that I never played the original Fallout series because it seems to have ruined their experience with Fallout 3, I thought it was a great game.

But, then STALKER 2 was cancelled and I started thinking about who would buy the franchise and I immediately thought of Bethesda making a STALKER game using the Creation *cough* Gamebryo 1.5 *cough* engine and it terrified me.

At it's core Fallout 3 really isn't that different from the Oblivion game it was built off of, add in guns, perks and rusty cars and it's pretty much the same thing.

Now, the idea of a STALKER 2 based off of Skyrim sickens me, probably as much as Fallout 1/2 fans seeing Fallout 3 become "Oblivion with Guns"

 

[MiracleOfSound]

Yeah Fallout New Vegas definitely had less environmental storytelling and I did miss that. It's weird I enjoyed Fallout 3 more than New Vegas but I can't help but feel like New Vegas was the better game. I just have this feeling that If I played New Vegas before FO3 I would have enjoyed it much more. New Vegas just felt a little bit too much more of the same but I enjoyed the story and missions much more in New Vegas. Although I don't have anywhere near the hate people seem to have for FO3's story and liberty prime was definitely one of my favorite parts in the series.

Haha I can relate to that feeling... F3 is my favourite game despite its many flaws and NV just didn't pull me into it in the same way. But I agree it does feel like the better game in many aspects, especially in the writing, levelling and combat balancing.

Still, all of that is secondary to the overall experience for me and fallout 3 definitely had the more memorable one. Getting lost in DC for the first time was more magical and fun than anything else I have ever done in a game.

 

[xXGeckoXx]

Nostalgia is a powerful force.

As much as I may disagree with curmudgeons hanging on to their Mass Effect 1's, their BioShock 1's, their Halo 1's, they still have a right to their opinions as well.

Actually as a person who generally agrees with you on this point all 3 of these examples are ones where I disagree. Bioshock 2 at least was a shambles. Bioshock infinite on the other hand i looking godly. (ME2 was amazing but once again when asked what are your top 3 games it would be ME 1 on there not ME 2).

Well, maybe I'm biased as Fallout 3 is my favourite game of all time, but nothing, including perhaps some dodgy plot could hinder the amazing experience I had with that game, something that New Vegas didn't quite pull off.

Completely agreed. Actually. Completely agreed since Fallout 3 is also my favorite game of all time. That game was an experience. A real one. As someone who visited every single in game location in both games I can tell you that exploration was far more rewarding In F3. Miracle of Sound seems to be with me on this one. The places where more diverse and I still don't understand how in F:NV I could go into a significant place and come out with nothing. Most places in F:NV would be the equivalent of evergreen mills NOT containing the terrible shotgun.

F:NV had some things going for it; though the guns lacked character (one of the things bethesda emphasized in F3 and obsidian forgot in F:NV) they worked a shitload better. Also the way that the deathclaw are forced you to walk around the mountain range to reach the strip was one hell of a clever way to make the story epic as you got a huge sense of achievement traversing all that ground and sequentially helping the residents of settlements on the way so you could get to the next outpost of humanity.

Edit:

Yeah Fallout New Vegas definitely had less environmental storytelling and I did miss that. It's weird I enjoyed Fallout 3 more than New Vegas but I can't help but feel like New Vegas was the better game. I just have this feeling that If I played New Vegas before FO3 I would have enjoyed it much more. New Vegas just felt a little bit too much more of the same but I enjoyed the story and missions much more in New Vegas. Although I don't have anywhere near the hate people seem to have for FO3's story and liberty prime was definitely one of my favorite parts in the series.

Haha I can relate to that feeling... F3 is my favourite game despite its many flaws and NV just didn't pull me into it in the same way. But I agree it does feel like the better game in many aspects, especially in the writing, levelling and combat balancing.

Still, all of that is secondary to the overall experience for me and fallout 3 definitely had the more memorable one. Getting lost in DC for the first time was more magical and fun than anything else I have ever done in a game.

Sometimes I agree with the others that Fallout 3 was a spin off. And I am damn happy it was, Something about how gritty the east coast it being the more bombed area. Radiation was a big thing and whilst F:NV seems to focus a lot on the civilization that is growing on the mainland as a true sequel Fallout 3 does a better job of rendering true post-apocalyptic places. The city looked ruined and deserted with buildings falling apart. The guns seemed to be nearly broken and the Lone wanderer feeling was a lot stronger. The wide open areas in the game outside of DC felt huge and deserted and each settlement seemed desperate.

And finally new vegas had a smaller map. One of the things that irked me the most was how little of the space was playable. The whole west side was cut off at the river. the east side was cut off by mountains as was the north. The only direction in which you could walk all the way to the edge of the map properly was the south which was a bit boring. I was shocked when I looked at my map how much was empty on the fringes. When I walked there I found that I could go no further. It was then that I realised that F:NV was systematically better but lacked content.

 

[RhombusHatesYou]

the Lone wanderer feeling was a lot stronger.

This was actually something I liked about Fallout 3. As one of those heretics who prefer Fallout 1 over Fallout 2, I found 3 to be reminiscent of the desolate feel that much of 1 had. Grimmer, lonelier, more desperate. The world far more broken.

In a lot of ways FO3 felt like it should have been set around the same time as 1 or between 1 and 2, where the environment was just as much a struggle as dealing with it's inhabitants and civilisation had barely started poking its head up.

FONV, much as I love it, is essentially a post-apocalyptic Spaghetti-Western with lasers.

 

[Condiments]

The reason why Fallout 3 isn't as accepted by older fans is that while FO3 retains the post apocalyptic trappings of the series, it missed fallout is at its "core". Sure, the 'exploring the ruins of a burgeoning civilization' was interesting, but this was in conjunction with a compelling character system. How you crafted your character would in turn, effect how you approached the game as a whole. This was made more compelling by its good writing, and atmosphere. The world was internally consistent, with finely placed 'dark humor'. Dungeons were a much smaller part of the overall experience.

Fallout 3 emphasized Bethesda's strengths, which in many ways jarred against what the series' represented. These things include combat emphasis, under-utilized character system, very open explorable barren world, goofy inconsistent roll-coaster design world(wannabe-vampires, druids, orcs/super mutants, etc.), dungeon/exploration emphasis. While quest design in FO3 was far improved over TES, its still wasn't enough.

FO:NV was considerably different in its tone, tried to put more emphasis on skill checks and character system. The world was overall more consistent, and actual improvements were made(faction systems). There WERE dungeons(vaults), but the emphasis was on your character and its interactions with the various communities and powers int the world. Combat was much less emphasized, but still more so than I wished. I still enjoyed it much more over 3.