I didn't play Oblivion much, but for some reason I've been putting off studying for finals to play Fallout 3 on PC. The world is just so immersive with miles and miles of gorgeous (albeit destroyed) terrain to explore with random towns and locations filled with NPCs that move about and each have their own fictional lives and stories to tell. The main story and quests, which take place 200 years after a nuclear war, all add to the atmosphere, making you (or at least me) feel like you're really part of the game's living, dying, radioactive, world.
I love that the game can be played in a first person view or zoomed out to a third person view. For the few other RPGs I've played, the fighting/grinding can always become tedious and boring. Fallout 3 keeps things fresh since it lets you approach the action as in a regular fps game or pause it in the middle of a firefight with the VATs system to allocate action points (sort of like a turn-based game) to attack body parts with percentage-to-hit values. I love firing all my points into a supermutant's arm, watching the pained expression on his face as his weapon flies out of his hand, and then rushing in for the kill with a slow-mo powerfist punch to the face... immensely satisfying to say the least.
If there's one drawback to the gameplay, I would say that it is missing some in-game (drivable) vehicles. Initially, the only way to get quests done and to get anywhere on the map is by foot. Once you've explored those locations on the map, you can quick-travel between them, but in my opinion a car, a motorcycle, ATV, epic mount or other means of transportation would just add more to the experience later on in the game.
My last gripe isn't about the gameplay, but more about the crashes I've been getting - I have a decent gaming PC and it runs the game beautifully on high settings and decent resolution (~1400x900 I think), but for some reason once in a while it will crash for no apparent reason. I am running the game under Vista Ultimate 32bit, and haven't had any huge problems with VATS like other vista users have reported, but the game will still crash occassionally when I load into a new area. It wasn't a huge problem though, as I could play for a couple hours without interruption, but still annoying.
Anyways, if you're into RPGs or fallout or just want to see what a post-apocalyptic Washington might feel like, Fallout 3 might just be the game world you want to get lost in.
I love that the game can be played in a first person view or zoomed out to a third person view. For the few other RPGs I've played, the fighting/grinding can always become tedious and boring. Fallout 3 keeps things fresh since it lets you approach the action as in a regular fps game or pause it in the middle of a firefight with the VATs system to allocate action points (sort of like a turn-based game) to attack body parts with percentage-to-hit values. I love firing all my points into a supermutant's arm, watching the pained expression on his face as his weapon flies out of his hand, and then rushing in for the kill with a slow-mo powerfist punch to the face... immensely satisfying to say the least.
If there's one drawback to the gameplay, I would say that it is missing some in-game (drivable) vehicles. Initially, the only way to get quests done and to get anywhere on the map is by foot. Once you've explored those locations on the map, you can quick-travel between them, but in my opinion a car, a motorcycle, ATV, epic mount or other means of transportation would just add more to the experience later on in the game.
My last gripe isn't about the gameplay, but more about the crashes I've been getting - I have a decent gaming PC and it runs the game beautifully on high settings and decent resolution (~1400x900 I think), but for some reason once in a while it will crash for no apparent reason. I am running the game under Vista Ultimate 32bit, and haven't had any huge problems with VATS like other vista users have reported, but the game will still crash occassionally when I load into a new area. It wasn't a huge problem though, as I could play for a couple hours without interruption, but still annoying.
Anyways, if you're into RPGs or fallout or just want to see what a post-apocalyptic Washington might feel like, Fallout 3 might just be the game world you want to get lost in.
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