Blade1130 said:
I am curious, since I have never played Fallout 3, I'm gonna redirect the question a little bit. How does Oblivion / Elder Scrolls do compared to Fallout? I'm personally more of a sci-fi guy, and the post-apocalyptic setting has at least SOME charm. Is Fallout as open as Oblivion? Does it have the same style of play or is it completely different in terms of structure? (the gameplay difference is obvious) How do the two stack up to each other?
CrustyOatmeal said:
hold off on fallout: new vegas, the GOTY version is comming out some time in February and it will have all of the DLC. as for fallout 3, play it before you play new vegas because it is an amazing game but as soon as you play new vegas you will ruin F3 due to the new mods for weapons, better characters, better story... i saw fallout 3 as a darker game you can mess around in and new vegas as a funnier game with a better system (without the bugs though)
Also, just to clarify, if I do play Fallout, I'm probably only going to play one of the two, playing both seems like a waste of time considering I am simply trying to "broaden my horizons" here, though if I find out I love one there's no reason I can't play the other. On a similar note, which one would be better? Fallout 3 or New Vegas? I know next to nothing about both besides Yahtzee's review on them so please enlighten me.
Well, the vast freedom is the same, and the controls are nigh-identical, but beyond that they're pretty different.
As for New Vegas/FO3, here's a comparison I typed up on another site:
One thing I've noticed is how bad this game's perks are. I really had no motivation to pick anything but Intense Training, most of the time---and the selection gets even scarcer considering you have to pick a perk every single level, as opposed to NV's every other level.
On the whole I've found 3 to be a good ways harder than NV, at least at the beginning. Ammo in particular is very scarce, and as a result I found myself using mostly nightsticks and lead pipes at the beginning despite my small-guns specialization. Stimpaks, too, are very expensive (at least with my poor Barter skill), and without Sunset Sarsaparilla or Survival to make good foods, there's not a lot of other options for healing.
Speaking of making foods, there's not a lot of crafting to be done in general in 3. You can't make Stimpaks or ammo or food or anything, really--but there are a lot more custom weapons. I don't understand why the Rock-It launcher wasn't imported to NV.
3 has a superior wasteland, that's just the fact of the matter. It's a lot more fun to wander in, because there's a lot more variety and (I think) more terrain. The world is also a lot more dynamic--there's so many random events out there I wouldn't even know where to begin, not to mention unmarked quests and neat little easter eggs. 3 wins with locale design, too---Megaton alone has a much cooler layout than anything in NV, and it's got a lot more than Megaton to brag about.
3 doesn't have NEARLY as many quests, though, and it's completely lacking the factions that were the core of NV. I do think that 3 has a stronger main quest despite this, but I will admit, it's not often I'll be able to find more than 2 or 3 quests at a time, whereas in NV I was so swamped with quests almost from the beginning it felt like I'd never run out of content for the game. Come to think of it, I still haven't come close to completing all of Vegas' quests.
NV probably has better writing for its inferior story. It's definitely a lot funnier. I'd say they're roughly equal as far as interesting characters go, although NV has a lot more of those obnoxious "Wasteland Settler" types.
The New Vegas soundtrack just blows 3 right out of the water. It's not even close. There's only 3 memorable songs in Fallout 3, and you almost never get to hear them. Meanwhile New Vegas has one of my favourite soundtracks of all time, and there are radio stations which actually PLAY the music, as opposed to rattling on about politics all day before chucking you one lackluster band instrumental.
The feel is a little hard to compare because it's very different. In 3, you're a wastelander---the world is harsh and barren, and very few characters are interested in you at all beyond what they can get from you. Everyone's just trying to survive, and you're no different.
In New Vegas, you're a cowboy--you don't start out as a wet-behind-the-ears 19-year-old kid fresh out of the Vault, you're a hardened wasteland courier who's clearly accustomed to running in rough circles. There's fresh water to be found without much difficulty, and fresh fruits and vegetables aren't uncommon, and there's farms and thriving businesses. Things simply aren't as bleak and hopeless as in 3. Likewise, you aren't as alone; there's several factions who're courting you the whole game long, and many people who will have your back, without getting into the followers.
Overall I'd say that 3's big advantage is its world, which is much more detailed and full of surprises than NV's is. It just seems like a lot more work went into it. On the other hand, as far as delicious little touches go--humour, character customization/clothes, hardcore mode, soundtrack, crafting, quality perks, weapon variety, etc.-- NV beats 3 pretty soundly. I would say that New Vegas is the better of the two, but you can't really go wrong with either.
That said, if you like sci-fi 3 has more of that feel, whereas New Vegas is more western-ish.
"Let me answer your question with a question, if a tree falls and there's no one around to hear it..."