The Rundown: The fourth game in the long running series, Fallout 4 takes place 200 years after a worldwide nuclear holocaust, with some surviving in underground bunker/shelters called Vaults. Like previous entries, players take charge of a character that emerges from a Vault and explores the vast open world environment populated by survivalist, mutants, monsters and much more. This game, set approximately in the same time frame as Fallout 3, takes place primarily in Boston and other New England areas.
Gameplay: Essentially a role-playing game with action adventure elements, the player chooses a male or female protagonist and is able to switch between first-person or third-person views as they undertake a lengthy, mission-based story through the wasteland. Rumored to have advanced the gameplay from Fallout 3, characters can now build bases while still developing weapons and armor through a unique crafting system that has always added tremendous depth to the action. Maintaining the Fallout series trademark Pip-Boy, a wrist-worn computer that gives players access to the menu and more, the much acclaimed Vault-Tec Assisted Targeting System (V.A.T.S.) also returns, allowing players to slow time and target specific regions of an enemy with percentage success rates. The game features 12 additional characters the player may recruit in their cause as well, with romance options available. Using a dialog tree that is reported to feature 111,000 lines of speech, the conversations in Fallout 4 look to be some of the best in gaming.
That Want To Play It Now Moment
David Says: The Launch Trailer begins, for the first time in the series, by showing the actual nuclear attacks. It goes on to show the future, 200 years later and a number of characters with whom the player can create as they walk about the desolate and ravaged world. While narration and voice clips from the story offer some slight exposition, we see gameplay of familiar yet enticing combat showcasing a few crafted weapons, teasing at what’s to come. My Want To Play Moment is when we see a quick transition of a dilapidated building morph into a full on base, followed by a defense tower like sequence that has a horde of mutants attacking. The base-building feature is new and looks to be deep, with many customization options viewable in the brief clip, including furniture and armaments. Stackable additions and multiple locations for buildings allow for creating a string of bases for repopulation and trading. Also, they will need to be defended, as the trailer suggests, a chance for some larger consequence-centered strategy.
Jordan Says: There is an ominous tone throughout the Launch Trailer; the music is dark and thunderous while the most we hear about the world is that is isn’t just a Wasteland we will be entering, it will be a Wasteland at war. Further intriguing is the giant ship seen flying over the city, which certainly has me interested and wanting to find out what that is all about. The trailer shows some new features such as a tower-defense like base setup, which as David says looks to be pretty deep, and this addition further adds to the atmosphere of what I mentioned; this is a Wasteland that seems to be at war with each other, with normal families not safe from ‘authorities’. Despite that great addition to the Fallout game, my Want To Play Moment are all the moments where we see third and especially first-person combat. This was notoriously clunky in Fallout 3, but by looking at this trailer it seems they have fixed these issues nicely, with some great and varied combat seen; everything from glowing monsters to aerial enemies are seen being blown to pieces, with perhaps even more gore than the last game.
Fallout 4 promises a vast, colorful open world and latest trailer really sells the vision well. While most of the fun in any Fallout game is the exploration, this entry looks to be adding a few more layers for gamers interested in a bit more. Great looking, with some truly eye-popping visuals, the story should be compelling and add something fresh to the aging franchise. The Vault opens November 10.
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X5aJfebzkrM?rel=0&controls=0&showinfo=0&w=930&h=415]
