deuxhero
Arcane
I hadn't played Fallout 2 (or 1) in several years, mainly because I remembered it mainly for the awful interface, bad controls (using skills on things requires selecting the skill from a menu or memorizing the hotkey, even though the game has an expandable context menu and most items have only one or two applicable skills) and gameplay slowing to a crawl anytime NPC v NPC combat occurred. I decided to give it another go (with restoration patch) and I've found it's a lot worse than I remember it in basically everything. Just finished up Vault City/Gecko stuff.
To start with, skill checks are fairly rare. I tagged repair and so far I've only had the following uses for it 1: The well in the starting town (just some early XP) 2: Fix the generator in the toxic caves (doesn't actually do anything at this stage of the game), 3: Fix the autodoc in Vault City clinic (doesn't really do anything) 4: Got some ammo from a vent in Vault City's vault (very minor), none of which were significant and from what I can find online, Science isn't much better. Even when you do get checks, the sheer variance in random rolls (1d100) that everything is based on means the results aren't very rewarding because a less adept character can generally do it too with a few more reloads. Skill imbalance is obvious. I've yet to see a single big gun or energy weapon. First Aid has almost no reason to exist as a skill separate from doctor, and the reasons it does have (first aid kits are lighter than doctors bags, you can find a decent number of first aid manuals and have an OK rank with no investment) aren't very meaningful. Gambling and Barter don't matter when everyone runs out of money before you run out of junk (plus the first games you find for a while, those in The Den are bugged, and don't actually use gambling anyways in the unpatched game). Steal, sneak and traps really should have been one skill (which they are in NV). From what I can find, Outdoorsman only increases world map movement speed in Fallout 1 but not 2 (why?), which makes it not all that useful.
The dialog, besides the self-referential shit that's long been mocked about Fallout 2, is generally poor in many parts. You're often locked into one line of real choices (as in, excluding goodbye and pointless questions) as your only interaction with less important NPCs, and many of these lines have significant characterization (for example in Vault City servant center the player character is forced to disagree with it and call it slavery). I forgot how much of an absolute asshole the Chosen One is forced to be if you converse with certain NPCs when "smile and nod" would be a perfectly logical response (Wooz is a good example of this, but not the only). And speaking of player character personality, there's a full scene in vault city where the player character has a full conversation (with unique text color) with no player input whatsoever. That's really weird from a modern RPG prospective.
Sidequests only seem to come in two types 1: The very basic go here and kill stuff/deliver this/etc. 2: A complex "main" quest for that settlement that decides the ending for that settlement... which often isn't even that complex. There's very rarely been any quests between these depths, and there's relatively few quests in general. This might only be the early game though, as I do distinctly remember New Reno and the like had the best quests by far.
Am I missing something, or is Fallout 2 not nearly as good as its successors like Arcanum or New Vegas?
To start with, skill checks are fairly rare. I tagged repair and so far I've only had the following uses for it 1: The well in the starting town (just some early XP) 2: Fix the generator in the toxic caves (doesn't actually do anything at this stage of the game), 3: Fix the autodoc in Vault City clinic (doesn't really do anything) 4: Got some ammo from a vent in Vault City's vault (very minor), none of which were significant and from what I can find online, Science isn't much better. Even when you do get checks, the sheer variance in random rolls (1d100) that everything is based on means the results aren't very rewarding because a less adept character can generally do it too with a few more reloads. Skill imbalance is obvious. I've yet to see a single big gun or energy weapon. First Aid has almost no reason to exist as a skill separate from doctor, and the reasons it does have (first aid kits are lighter than doctors bags, you can find a decent number of first aid manuals and have an OK rank with no investment) aren't very meaningful. Gambling and Barter don't matter when everyone runs out of money before you run out of junk (plus the first games you find for a while, those in The Den are bugged, and don't actually use gambling anyways in the unpatched game). Steal, sneak and traps really should have been one skill (which they are in NV). From what I can find, Outdoorsman only increases world map movement speed in Fallout 1 but not 2 (why?), which makes it not all that useful.
The dialog, besides the self-referential shit that's long been mocked about Fallout 2, is generally poor in many parts. You're often locked into one line of real choices (as in, excluding goodbye and pointless questions) as your only interaction with less important NPCs, and many of these lines have significant characterization (for example in Vault City servant center the player character is forced to disagree with it and call it slavery). I forgot how much of an absolute asshole the Chosen One is forced to be if you converse with certain NPCs when "smile and nod" would be a perfectly logical response (Wooz is a good example of this, but not the only). And speaking of player character personality, there's a full scene in vault city where the player character has a full conversation (with unique text color) with no player input whatsoever. That's really weird from a modern RPG prospective.
Sidequests only seem to come in two types 1: The very basic go here and kill stuff/deliver this/etc. 2: A complex "main" quest for that settlement that decides the ending for that settlement... which often isn't even that complex. There's very rarely been any quests between these depths, and there's relatively few quests in general. This might only be the early game though, as I do distinctly remember New Reno and the like had the best quests by far.
Am I missing something, or is Fallout 2 not nearly as good as its successors like Arcanum or New Vegas?
