How much choice does Fallout 3 REALLY allow for?

[HT_Black]

The Choices in the storyline are as follows:

1)Be a selfless individual who always goes out of his/her way for the less fortunate and does so without asking for money.
2) stop playing the game, fanboy.

That should tell you all that needs to be said.

 

[crudus]

no no no, i didn't like having consequences, i just thought they were WAAAAY too severe. and plus, they overpowered the guards and THEN made your equipment break over time... so that basically means you have no choice but to obey the law. even if you murder someone out in the wilderness somewhere, the guards will come up to you in any town or city, stop you in your tracks, and try to either arrest you (making you lose items and xp) or kill you.

yeah, that's not really choice.

First of all, you are essentially a commoner when you start the game. What are the odds a commoner is going to be able to take a (trained) guard? By level 5-6 in Oblivion (as low as 3) you should be able to kill anything reasonable, guards included(not matter the difficulty). I will agree the guards shouldn't have Minority Report like powers.

 

[FernandoV]

When you can decide to blow up a city which is the main hub of the game and still continue to play, I'd say there is a lot of choice. That's like letting us blow up the Citadel or something.

It has no real effect on the game other than getting snazier digs to sleep in and a boat load of bad karma >___>

 

[Aerialfrogg]

I have to say my only problem in the choice system is the way Karma works. If I am a "good" character and do all sorts of nice things for the people of the Capital Wasteland, but am sneaking around and stealing things the people talk like a am a "bad" character. However, I have never been actually caught stealing, so how the hell do they know?

That is the most annoying choice dynamic I find. But it doesn't actually change any game play, just the ambiance of having guards call you a "petty thief" and children saying "I'm not supposed to talk to you" or "you're mean"--what can I tell you kids, ***** needs some ammo.
What is the point of sneaking if you're still going to "get in trouble" for it?

I think most of the time though, like with Burke at least. You can blast away at the bad guys. Although, if they aren't an obvious threat yet, you might run into some trouble.

 

[Omnific One]

When you can decide to blow up a city which is the main hub of the game and still continue to play, I'd say there is a lot of choice. That's like letting us blow up the Citadel or something.

It has no real effect on the game other than getting snazier digs to sleep in and a boat load of bad karma >___>

...and not having the major hub where a number of questlines begin...

 

[Nerdygamer89]

This has surely been said already, but if so here it is again: if you want actual choices and a halfway decent reputation/morality system get New Vegas. NV is a far deeper game overall than Fallout 3 was.

 

[Odbarc]

New Vegas has better scaling weapons.
In Fallout 3, I can basically run to Dave-town and get his gun and be set for 75% of the game. FO:NV makes FO3 seem like an incomplete game with all the extra little things it adds.

 

[FernandoV]

When you can decide to blow up a city which is the main hub of the game and still continue to play, I'd say there is a lot of choice. That's like letting us blow up the Citadel or something.

It has no real effect on the game other than getting snazier digs to sleep in and a boat load of bad karma >___>

...and not having the major hub where a number of questlines begin...

The only sidequest that begins there is the Wasteland Survival Guide which is unnecessarily long for a mediocre reward. Why does everyone try to cover for a game with more than obvious flaws?

 

[Omnific One]

When you can decide to blow up a city which is the main hub of the game and still continue to play, I'd say there is a lot of choice. That's like letting us blow up the Citadel or something.

It has no real effect on the game other than getting snazier digs to sleep in and a boat load of bad karma >___>

...and not having the major hub where a number of questlines begin...

The only sidequest that begins there is the Wasteland Survival Guide which is unnecessarily long for a mediocre reward. Why does everyone try to cover for a game with more than obvious flaws?

Then why is it second on your XBL tag?

 

[FernandoV]

When you can decide to blow up a city which is the main hub of the game and still continue to play, I'd say there is a lot of choice. That's like letting us blow up the Citadel or something.

It has no real effect on the game other than getting snazier digs to sleep in and a boat load of bad karma >___>

...and not having the major hub where a number of questlines begin...

The only sidequest that begins there is the Wasteland Survival Guide which is unnecessarily long for a mediocre reward. Why does everyone try to cover for a game with more than obvious flaws?

Then why is it second on your XBL tag?

Well isn't someone a nosy nancy? I also didn't like Bioshock 2's storyline but I liked that game as well. Fallout 3 has many flaws but it is still a fun game, in the same way Halo 3 is a fun game but I'm not going to be hailing Halo 3 as an example of what gaming should be either.

Find better retorts, thanks.

 

[Omnific One]

*snip*

Thanks for the nosy Nancy comment; I almost felt like I was back in the '50s with that one

 

[Dimensional Vortex]

im about to buy it, and i want to know if i can basically craft my own story with this game, as follows:
i want to be a sadistic vigilante who takes pleasure in shooting individuals and asking questions later, and i want to do this all without haveing to worry about being caught by the law.
because one thing i HATED HATED HATED about Oblivion was the fact that for a game touted with "choice" i couldnt so much as brush up against someone without a guard going "HEY! YOU BROKE THE LAW! YOU'RE GOING TO JAIL!:and then the guards were do powerful that i really had no choice in the matter as to whether or not i wanted to commit crimes.
i hated that game so much because of its overpowered and unjust law enforcement that i couldnt take on evenly (really, GTA and Saints Row have an easier time at making me feel like i want to feel in a virtual world)
anyways, CAN i do this? will i be allowed to be a dispenser of brutal justice with nary any consequences besides bad karma?

EDIT: I'm not trying to be Jack the Ripper, I'm trying to be the Punisher
EDIT2: I have only an xbox 360 and a laptop, so i cant do PC gaming. yeah. i've heard of STALKER, but no, i dont have a PC

Okay for terms of customizing your main story line it is somewhat limited, it is still going from A to B, but you can choose so much with every place and town you go to, the ending is generally the same but the way you get from A to B can have so many possibilities it is astounding.

What I want you to do it get a piece of paper and a pencil, good, now wright on the middle of the left side A then wright a B on the middle right side. Now if you want to only do the story line and not have many choices, and not meet all the new peoples, and not explore all the places, and only go through the story line, well I want you to draw a straight line from A to B. Now if you want to have some fun, explore everywhere, do all of the quests you can, discover the lore of the fallout universe, then get a different colored pencil and draw a crazy wacky line that hits the top and bottom of the page frequently.

Now pick which line is for you. The universe of Fallout 3 is only as customizable as you want it to be.

The main story will always be the same in the start and the same in the end, but every thing in between is totally your choice. There is a part when you need to find out "certain" information about ----------- (not exactly new but still good) and you can have the choice to pay the person for the information about --------------- or he gives you the option to collect a debt from someone. When you go to get the debt from a woman she refuses and you can either convince her to give you some of her money or you can just kill her and take it all, it is all completely your choice and this game has loads of options like that. So buy the game and have fun, it is great.

Also there are no formal guards like you said were in Oblivion, but the people wont take shit from you, if you annoy them or hurt them most of them are pack'n, so they will in most cases retaliate if you hurt them or their friends.

PS: BUY THE GAME NOW!!!!

 

[FernandoV]

*snip*

Thanks for the nosy Nancy comment; I almost felt like I was back in the '50s with that one

So no actual response? Figures.