Liking FPS's while hating Fallout 3

[hexFrank202]

Yesterday, I was with a bunch of friends/acquaintances at church before the 'service' started, and a few of them started talking about Nazi zombies and Call of Duty in general. One of them then said something along the lines of,
"You know what I'd love? A game where you go around, killing zombies, and it's an RPG, but it's a shooter too."

"Well actually," I said to him, "Fallout has zombies."

Hearing that, another guy said,
"I hate Fallout."

"What?? Why?" I asked. "It's a shooter RPG, and it has zombies in it. It's exactly what you were talking about." I'd expect to hear the average person say that, but not those who like first person shooters.

"Because man, it's so fake." One of them said as two or three other guys nodded in agreement. "You move around so stiff like you're playing a Nintendo game."

"I take offense to that." One of my friends jokingly said.

I tried to talk about how the controls on the PC are pretty good and that they probably played it on a console, and then about how there's way more to games than feeling "legit" with the gunplay, but I and them were on the edge of the nerd-overload meter as it was; the conversation was over.


What do any of you think about this? What would you have said to them (or to me) if you had been there?

 

[Jordi]

I think different people have different tastes. They like (some) FPSs and (some) RPGs, but not Fallout. It doesn't make them wrong. I mean, you can discuss what they like about one thing (FPSs) and dislike about another (Fallout) and try to get to the bottom of it.

I only played Fallout 3 really briefly, and it seemed very different from most FPSs, so I'm not surprised that they didn't like it.

 

[DJDarque]

I think they're dumb for absolutely hating Fallout, but in this case I guess I would be considered on their side.

I enjoy FPSs from time to time, but I have no interest in Fallout. I don't hate it, though.

 

[Valkyrie101]

It does have bad combat mechanics, and if they're looking for a zombie kill-fest then they will be disappointed. But that's not the point of the game. It's about exploration, interacting with the world, making choices that affect your character and the lives of NPCs or just plain soaking up the atmosphere.

They might like Borderlands.

 

[3rd rung]

First I would have to say playing nazi zombies is not that realistic. Also I liked the fallout games not a huge fan but they are fun.

Its just everyone has their own tastes we all like different things you guys just need to accept it and move on

 

[Sixcess]

I would have agreed with them.

I love FPSs - Doom, Quake II, Halo, Return to Castle Wolfenstein, Deus Ex*, STALKER, Crysis and others - and Fallout 3 plays worse (as an FPS) than any FPS I've ever played on any platform. Aiming is bad, damage is bad, moving while shooting is bad, it's just bad bad bad bad bad.

[sub]*I specifically mention Deus Ex because, although it's not as smooth as a pure FPS, it does stat-based FPS a million times better than Fallout 3.[/sub]

 

[Steppin Razor]

They have a legitimate point about Fallout 3's gunplay. Compared to other shooters, Fallout 3 is about as smooth as sandpaper. And by that I mean it suffers from a distinct lack of smoothness. Even on PC.

 

[bjj hero]

The whole VATS thing spoiled fall out for me. It removes any sort of required skill. Either let us shoot or make it RPG combat, I like both but VATS just seems lazy.

 

[TheRocketeer]

A great many people have a very restrictive interpretation of first-person shooters, and will only use the term to refer to things such as Halo and Call of Duty.

This is like saying you like action games when you actually only like 2D combo-and-counter fighting games like Street Fighter. Or saying you like RPG's when you actually only like old-school JRPG's.

Video games really need to stop defining genres by their mechanics, or at least start recognizing the actual content and context of the games as strongly as their mechanics.

 

[Smooth Operator]

Well your friends sound like idiots but they do have a point, Fallout is not really a shooter, or to put it better it was not designed to be one.
VATS is not simply a neat feature it is downright a necessity, Fallout really does not excel in gunplay and going from CoD to Fallout is like going from ice cream to chewing rocks.

But that is because CoD only hasto focus on gunplay, that is the only thing that game really does well, and they have been perfecting it for 10 games now.
Meanwhile Fallout is all about the world, the people, the story, the RPG depth,.... gunplay is only a drop in the sea of things to do there, hell most of the time we haveto be glad the game doesn't fall apart.

 

[DaphneRose]

Fallout just isn't everyone's cup of tea. Especially the FPS crowd. Guys who prefer those, even if they amicable with RPGs, may not be all over it like some people are.

Personally, I just wasn't that into Fallout New Vegas in general, though I spent more time meticulously combing the wastelands and doing unmarked sidequests and finding notes in Fallout 3 than in any other game.

I disagree with some people here in that your friends are idiots. They just have their own preferences and tastes. Maybe the stiff movement breaks the immersion for them, on top of being something they don't really care for. I don't really see how that makes anyone an idiot.

 

[Gaiseric]

My interest in Fallout has diminished greatly since the DLCs and New Vegas.

Doesn't surprise me that someone wouldn't like Fallout 3 if they like FPSs. They'd be used to a fluidity and speed that is lacking in Fallout. Fallout seemed clunky and slow compared to any FPS I've ever played.

 

[Gralian]

While i personally could never understand how you could hate Fallout (and although i love the old isometric true-to-form roots of Fallout 1 & 2 much more than the new iterations) i fully agree with what your friend said.

Gunplay in the new Fallout titles is not really gunplay at all. It's just number crunching, but at range. It's nothing more than "i swing sword at you, you swing sword at me, guy with fewest hit points dies and sometimes we 'miss'". Gametrailers said it best; 'It's not so much a shoot 'em up as it is a gentleman's duel. You stand there taking turns at firing potshots at each other until one of you dies. Although you can ironsight, there's no fine aiming, twitch gameplay, or cover based combat mechanics here.' The term "Oblivion with guns" is far more apt than you might think. Just as there were times when combat degenerated into how many times you can swing that sword at something with absurd damage resistance, you have times where you're literally standing face to face with your foe and emptying your clip while topping yourself up with more stimpacks than a junkie. The "role playing shooter" feels very strange - Borderlands tried to do the same, although take a different approach. One that was unapologetic about its number crunching, right up to the numbers actually appearing on the screen. Fallout tries to hide it by looking pretty, but pretty it ain't. It looks like two stiff mannequins going at it with toy guns.

The whole VATS thing spoiled fall out for me. It removes any sort of required skill. Either let us shoot or make it RPG combat, I like both but VATS just seems lazy.

Actually, i thought it was very reminiscent of Fallout 1 & 2, where you had a certain number of 'action points', and you chose whether to use those to move, or to attack something, and if so where to attack it and with either your primary or secondary weapon. However the reason VATS felt weird is that the enemy can't take advantage of it themselves, which seems unfair and disjointed. Old school Fallout involved both you and the enemy taking it turns to move and shoot using your given number of 'action points', which worked back then because it was in an isometric fixed viewpoint. If they tried to implement it for enemies now, about all they could do is have the enemies return fire when you use VATS, because movement is now real time rather than turn based. This would make VATS useless as it was designed in the modern Fallout games to be a "get out of jail free" card whereby the player could try and gain the upper hand if they were doing poorly in a fight.

 

[LondonBeer]

Fallout isnt a FPS. It uses mechanisms similar to a FPS but its a RPG with shooter elements. Just cause its kinda like a thing doesnt make it a thing. Bagels are not doughnuts

 

[Outright Villainy]

In terms of clunky combat and movement, he's absolutely right. I don't play Fallout for enjoyable combat, and if that's what he's looking for, well it's not surprising he'd be disappointed.

 

[Slash Dementia]

I would agree with the guy. Although they're not my favorite genre, I like FPSs. Fallout 3 fails in this part of its gameplay. The shooting mechanics are all over the place and it just feels wrong. Another thing, it relies on VATs, which is a huge "no" for me. Sure, we don't have to use it, but given the choice between hitting a target so easily or attempting to control that beast of a cross-hair, I can see why it's not liked by many people who like FPSs.

That point aside, I hate Fallout 3's dead-eyed, bland, unlikable, badly voiced characters. It's story is a little mediocre as well.

Sorry, Fallout 3's shortcomings--in my opinion--show why someone would hate the game.

(It's like a post-apocalyptic Two Worlds to me.)

 

[ArtemusClydeFrog]

I think the first person perspective is a great way to experience the universe of Fallout, as I find it extremely immersive - I wasn't into the franchise before Fallout3, and I only gave it a shot because someone told me it was "kinda like Oblivion", which I had just fallen in love with at the time. Now Fallout3 is probably my favourite game of all time.
I actually think the Gamebryo engine works even better for Fallout than it did for Oblivion, since the melee combat is stiff and weird in both games, but V.A.T.S. is fun and compensates for the poor shooting mechanics - whereas spellcasting never really worked in Oblivion in my opinion.
They are both GREAT games, but Fallout is more often mistaken for something it isn't. No one would refer to Oblivion as an FPS just because you can wield a bow or cast magic spells from a first person perspective - but Fallout on the other hand has guns and looks like an FPS.
I think people who like modern FPS games are definitely entitled to not like Fallout at all. I just happen to love it for what it is.