Fallout 3 Redux

Well, after my last post bemoaning the technical woes of Fallout 3, I managed to get it to run slightly more reliably. It was still about as temperamental as an ADHD child with an IV drip of red cordial, but I've managed to play it at quite a bit of length. Length enough to make my character hit level 17, collect the majority of the games "bobbleheads" (with a little help from the web) and finish the main quest. While there's still a healthy stack of quests and other bits and pieces I could do, I got a healthy amount of gaming out of it. I also have the potential to go back and do more things, because I made a save before the final sequence of the game that results in you being unable to explore after its conclusion.

While yes, it could be called Oblivion with guns, it definitely ratcheted up the polish in terms of characters and the richness of the gameworld, albeit in a gloriously destroyed landscape. I can't help but feel that the game would have had more impact for people who know Washington DC, though the shot from the top of the Washington Monument was memorable even for someone who has never set foot in America.

On the negative side, (aside from the aforementioned technical issues) levelled monsters still reared their head in a somewhat ugly fashion, but were slightly less annoying. And I still got that vague sense of "pointlessness", which is perhaps exacerbated because there appears to be fewer quests across a larger gameworld compared to Oblivion. While they have a greater depth, it makes the desolate city seem... well... desolate. And trudging across a wasteland does eventually start to grate on your nerves. Especially when you realise you haven't saved in the last 10 minutes of trudging and your game has just crashed.

So... the verdict? Well, I liked it, but I still don't think it was worth of the ceaseless praise it got given by lots of reviewers.

And I must comment on the ending - though I'll do it without spoilers. Because I really felt short-changed playing as a "good-character", especially when there was a perfectly feasible option to end the game "nicely".