Fallout 4: Find Your Son Simulator

[Introduction]

Would you believe me if I told you that Fallout 4, like Fallout 3 and New Vegas before it, is an open world ARPG? Probably, because there's something of a pattern emerging at this point. It also takes place in Boston and its surrounding suburbs after the whole place contracted a mild case of armageddon. As it happens, much like the real Boston, Fallout 4 is pretty inoffensive. This is a statement I'm confident in, because the name Boston applies to like two dozen places in the real world, and Fallout 4 is perfectly serviceable, if also perfectly mediocre.

[First Impressions]

Your usual fare. You're in a vault, something happens, you leave the vault.
Except not really. Offering a change of perspective from every other Fallout game out there, you actually start out as a citizen of the US of A, eating sugar bombs, drinking coffee, reading Grognak the Barbarian and delegating childcare to a robot armed with a flamethrower and a buzzsaw.
Anyway, you leave the vault and 5-10 minutes later you're wearing power armor and shooting a deathclaw with a minigun.
Initial pacing is... weird.

[Development]

Fallout 4 became a thing at least partially because Todd Howard was "excited about showing the world before the bombs fell." It's hard to overstate how much potential was wasted in that regard, because we spend all of 5 minutes in the world before the bombs fell and promptly get sent right back to the post-apocalyptic setting.

In lieu of going back in time, I want to do the same thing. Let's go back to 1997. Numerical Design Limited creates the NetImmerse engine after years of involvement in the games industry. Among the games developed using this new engine is The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind in 2002.
The engine eventually evolves into the Gamebryo engine around 2003. Among the games developed using it is The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion in 2006. It's also used for Fallout 3 and New Vegas.
Gamebryo, in turn, is used as the foundation in the development of the Creation Engine in 2011. Among the games it was used to develop are The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim and, of course, Fallout 4.

Long story short, there's an argument to be made that this game runs on a 24 year old engine which has just been patched up to still sorta hold together on modern systems. I don't know if this explains the notoriously buggy nature of Bethesda games, but it's food for thought.

On a positive note, the game was intended to be mod friendly from the get go. Presumably Bethesda saw what happened with all their other games and accepted the inevitability that people would mod the hell out of this one too. They went an extra mile, actually, because PC mods can be applied to Xbox One copies of the game as well.

On a blander note, considerable effort went into creating a mobile app which effectively gives players the option to use their phones as Pip-Boys. This appears to have been little more than a gimmick.

On a downright negative note, Bethesda also finally monetized mods for Fallout 4 through the Creation Club in 2017. They can deny it all they want, but the content available for purchase in the Club are paid mods in all but name.

[Game Mechanics]

If you've played Fallout 3 or New Vegas, there's gonna be a lot of familiar elements.
You explore, you kill enemies, you complete side quests and, optionally, complete main quests. You have your Pip-Boy inventory/stat/map system which works as handily as ever, with the added functionality of being able to sort by item weight and value and such. You level up, select perks, rinse and repeat. During your wasteland hijinks, you'll acquire an assortment of lethal weapons and a variety of armor to help you kill and not get killed respectively.

In lieu of the overall similarities, there's not much sense in repeating myself beyond those basics. Instead, let's focus on what's changed. Perhaps the most immediately impactful change is that your weapons no longer deteriorate, so there's no need to haul an arsenal of spare assault rifles to repair your best one. Another change you'll notice very early on is that you level a lot faster, likely because the level cap has been raised from 30 (Fallout 3) and 50 (New Vegas) to... 65,535. Chances are you'll never reach the cap though, because you need 161,062,092,626 exp to get there.

The perk system has also been changed, and arguably for the better, at least in the sense that it's easier to read now. I guess a better description is that it has been streamlined, not so much improved. There's certainly some contention about it, but personally, I rather like it. It's immediately visible to the player which perks are tied to which stat and how many points in a given stat you need in order to unlock access - similarly, it's also easy to tell what the level requirements for the perks are.

Another big change is crafting. Now, crafting has been around since Fallout 3, but it was rudimentary at best. New Vegas expanded on the concept significantly, and now Fallout 4 has gone all-in. Crafting is a central mechanic now, to the point that junk items aren't really junk, but resources. You're gonna be picking up a lot of desk fans, alarm clocks, aluminum cans and duct tape when you explore the Commonwealth. On the one hand, it adds worth to otherwise worthless items and allows the player to actually improve their own equipment in a meaningful way; on the other hand, there's a slippery slope that leads to grinding, and this is the closest we've gotten in the franchise so far.

Armor has changed as well. For example, combat armor used to be an item that represented the whole suit of armor. Not anymore! Now combat armor is a modular set that you have to acquire, equip and upgrade piecemeal. However, certain outfits still represent whole suits of armor and don't allow players to equip additional armor on top of that.

And speaking of armor:
Power armor is now proper power armor.
It's no longer something you equip from your inventory. Now it's an exoskeleton you mount modular armor elements onto. You're not wearing it; you're piloting it. It has weight, it has momentum, it feels powerful and properly communicates the notion that it's more of a one-man infantry fighting vehicle than a suit of armor. Its importance and raw awesome factor is diminished by the fact that you acquire it before you even get your hands on a weapon that doesn't look home-made, but I can barely muster the energy to care about that because it's just so cool. I'm 100% biased, and I don't care. It barely even matters to me that power armor now requires a fusion core to fuel it for some reason. It makes no sense, because it was previously established that the fuel cell lasts literally hundreds of years, but now it burns out in less than a day. This discrepancy is never explained, but don't sweat it: you'll find tons of cores.

There's also an actual weather system now. It's largely cosmetic and doesn't really warrant much attention, but do be aware that there are radiation storms now. They're very scenic and very radioactive.

Oh, and the game features a settlement construction system.
It's almost entirely pointless and very finnicky, but it's there if you feel the need to play The Sims while you're playing Fallout 4.

[Graphics]

The graphics are fine. They do the job.
That said, there were more than a few people who were unhappy with the appearance of Fallout 4. A common criticism was that it was too colorful, too cartoony, too cheerful or some variation or combination thereof. It's true that the game is markedly less grim looking than its predecessors. A notable exception to this is during the aforementioned radiation storms. While those are hitting your general area, it starts feeling more like you're playing a Tiberian Sun ARPG. The same is true for the southernmost reaches of the map, down in the Glowing Sea. It's aptly named.

Other than that, my main issue with the visuals is the faces. Some are worse than others (looking at you, Mama Murphy), but as a rule of thumb, you'll want to get used to people looking like they're visiting Boston from the uncanny valley. Lip sync is notoriously bad, which really shouldn't be much of a problem to sort out in a game this new from a company this well-known with a budget this big.

[Story]

It's fine.
It's not fine, no matter how hard I've tried to convince myself. The story is bad.
Remember how Caesar, Mr. House and the NCR all had their own motivations in New Vegas?
Remember how the Brotherhood and the Enclave were in an ideological struggle in Fallout 3?
Yeah, there's none of that in Fallout 4. Not really. The factions are largely bland, including the Brotherhood of Steel. I'm a huge Brotherhood fanboy, but there's no bias strong enough to ignore the reality of the shitty writing in this game.

The Brotherhood has one goal: destroy the Institute. That's it.
The Railroad has one goal: free synths.
The Minutemen are a bit more nebulous: defend the Commonwealth, whatever that entails.
And then there's the institute. We don't even know what their goals are or what motivations might be behind them, because we're never told. In fact, you can ask, but the response basically amounts to something along the lines of "you wouldn't get it."

Remember how Caesar's Legion did horrible, horrible things? Slavery, forced sexual segregation, cultural genocide, actual genocide, the list goes on. But if you approached Caesar, he'd tell you exactly why he believed all of those things were necessary for the betterment of humanity and the survival of the species in a horrible post-apocalyptic world, even how it would prevent another apocalypse.

The Institute does horrible things too. Involuntary human experimentation, murder, kidnapping, not to mention replacing people with synth infiltrators and releasing so many super mutants into the Commonwealth that they're a sizeable faction unto themselves. You can even throw slavery in there, depending on your views on synth rights. We're operating on Saturday morning cartoon villain levels here, and none of it is ever explained or justified.

On the contrary, the Institute actually sometimes seems to be oblivious that it's doing anything wrong. If you tell them that the Commonwealth could use their help, you get this response:
"Oh, we've tried that. Surprised? The Institute once tried to help create a stabilized Commonwealth government. It ended in bickering, infighting... it was a disaster. No, we look after our own now. Ultimately the Commonwealth has nothing to fear from us. Whatever you've seen or heard, I know I can convince you of that. Just... give me time. I know there's more for us to discuss, but..."

This response ultimately omits the tiny detail that the project to form a Commonwealth government was forcibly terminated by the Institute when they sent a synth to kill everyone involved, at which the synth succeeded. And yet they continue standing by this baffling notion that they don't understand the hostility from the Commonwealth, because the Commonwealth has nothing to fear from the Institute. I know I've already said this, but just to reiterate: this is never explained.

Anyway, that tirade aside, the story is simple. Mediocre, really.
You are DAD or MOM together, you have SON (Shaun). When the bombs hit, you go to the local vault and get frozen for a few years. SON gets stolen, your spouse gets killed and you get frozen again. You eventually get unfrozen for good, briefly mourn your significant other, and then set off to find SON.

In your effort to find SON, you make your way across post-apocalyptic Boston, where you occasionally get a chance to act like a fish out of water, but largely get some unsatisfying dialogue with various NPCs where every conversation gives you 4 options. These are mostly No, Yes, No (Yes) and Maybe. Every now and then you have access to sarcastic responses, which, while funny, only serve as temporary distractions from the fact that the dialogue options in Fallout 4 almost all suck.

There are a few good encounters and some solid characters. Danse and Hancock are both pretty funny, but speaking of Hancock, here's another gripe:
Hancock is a ghoul.
The Brotherhood hates ghouls and advocate killing them on sight.
If you bring Hancock to the Brotherhood, the worst you get is a few snide remarks from some of the NPCs there, and that's about it. Sometimes Hancock talks back, which is met with passive aggressiveness at most. The same is true if you bring any other companion around who the Brotherhood ought to try to kill on sight.

Not to beat a dead horse here, but remember how bringing certain companions into certain areas or performing certain actions with them tagging along would have consequences? None of that in Fallout 4. Now it's just "your companion liked that" or "your companion disliked that" and nothing else. Sometimes they REALLY liked or disliked something you did, but it doesn't matter.

None of this matters. I'm almost inclined to argue that you should just ignore the story altogether and focus on the gameplay, but it's not quite that bad. It's close though. There are some saving graces.

[SPOILERS]

You find SON. He's actually the leader of the Institute. He has nothing memorable or really significant to say about the fact that the Institute kidnapped him, killed one of his parents and kept the other on ice for a few decades. He does nothing of note except eventually contract a terminal illness and die. This might simultaneously be the single worst NPC and the greatest waste of potential in a narrative in any Fallout game ever conceived.

If you side with the Brotherhood, you blow up the Institute and the Railroad.
If you side with the Railroad, you blow up the Institute and the Brotherhood.
If you side with the Minutemen, you blow up the Institute and maybe the Brotherhood.
If you side with the Institute, you blow up the Railroad and the Brotherhood.

Here are some cool bits you might come across:

There's a modified protectron that got turned into a mobile brewery. His name his Drinking Buddy and I love him.

There's an occult museum which features a tense encounter with a deathclaw in close quarters. Depending on how you end the associated quest, you might get a deathclaw buddy.

You can encounter a robot which will try to determine whether you're a communist spy. If you tell it to go fuck itself, it'll conclude that you're 99.7% likely to be an American citizen.

You might find a guy brewing something at a still. Keep your distance though; it explodes.

Two guys arguing over what constitutes a sandwich.

If you find a mob of named feral ghouls, don't worry: those are your old neighbors.

There's an entire questline dedicated to helping a crew of robots in various states of madness and disrepair. Helping how? Helping them to get their ship flying, of course. It's presently stuck in a building. The reward is a cannon, more specifically one of the 24-pounder guns on the USS Constitution.

Another questline is centered around the Cabot family and figuring out how they've lived for over 200 years without being ghouls.

And finally there's a suspiciously idyllic community where nothing unusual is happening at all. It's just a nice place for nice people to live nice lives.

Naturally, this is not an exhaustive list.

[Pros]

- Power armor in Fallout 4 is the best in the franchise, and certainly among the best in any game

- Gameplay is perfectly serviceable

- Outstanding mod support

- Genuine attempts at improving upon the Fallout formula

[Cons]

- The story is mostly bland; it's okay at best, straight up awful at worst

- Side quests are largely less interesting than in previous titles

- Environment is smaller and less interesting than in previous titles

- Facial animations are uncanny valley material and sometimes out of sync with dialogue

- While genuine, attempts to improve sometimes fall flat

- Buggy

[Conclusion]

I won't lie: the score is only as high as 6 because I love the power armor in Fallout 4. I love it a lot, so much so that it's pretty much the central reason that I enjoy playing the game at all. It could have been so much better if Bethesda had drawn more from the experience of Fallout 3 and New Vegas, but they instead opted for a vast decrease in writing quality. There is so much potential here, and I really think it could have been the best Fallout game ever made. It just... isn't.
I've still put over 300 hours into the game though, so maybe I'm just bitter.
Another settlement needs your help. Moral compass optional.

[Score]

6/10

/DUX

Crusader Kings 2, 100% Historically Accurate Grand Strategy

[Introduction]

Crusader Kings 2 is a meme about medieval rulers and their courtiers doing crazy shit while painting a map of Europe and parts of Asia in different colors.
Crusader Kings 2 is a grand strategy game developed by Paradox Interactive. It's predominantly centered on Europe but features a map that extends as far east as India.
It's also a sequel to Crusader Kings, a game no one played.

[First Impressions]

I actually remember my first impression!
It went something like "what the hell am I looking at and what the hell am I supposed to be doing?"
When I say it took a long, long time for me to figure out how to play this game, it's no exaggeration. It took me something like a year of playing Stellaris before that game became a gateway for me to get into Crusader Kings 2. Now, that's not to say everyone will have the same initial experience that I did, but fair warning: the learning curve can be pretty steep.

[Development]

Finding details regarding development was surprisingly difficult, not least of all because most of the developer diaries for CK2 seem to be focused more on explaining game mechanics, rather than the work that went into said mechanics or the general development history of the game. I did find one that took a step further and actually showed examples of modding, however! The game, incidentally, is very mod friendly, but more on that later. I also managed to find screenshots of early alpha builds:

The interface was clearly streamlined quite a bit since that stage of development, and widescreen support was added as well. It might come as no surprise that these early builds had a lot in common with CK1.

Other general additions between CK1 and CK2 include proper empire titles, expanded de jure mechanics, actual control over imprisonment and ransom, control over education and a new war system. Really, it's a flat improvement all around, from the engine being upgraded to Clausewitz to the UI to the complexity allowing greater variety in how the game world evolves.

Also, unlike its predecessor, CK2 allows you to play a much wider assortment of cultures, religions and governments... provided you have the necessary DLC. This is, after all, the game that really made Paradox infamous for having an inordinate amount of downloadable content. That's not to say that previous title had no DLC, but never before had so much content been locked behind a price tag. We're not just talking unit models or music here, but actual game mechanics.

Even with the base game being free, you have to pay $182.85 to get the full experience, although purchasing the bundle will give you a 10% discount, and you get a further price cut if you already own some of the DLC. If you want the whole shebang with unit models, extra music and all the bells and whistles, it's a staggering $317.35. You can get 17% off if you purchase that bundle, but that's still a lot of money.

[Game Mechanics]

Start the game, pick a date, choose a ruler, cross your fingers.
On the base level, down at the very bedrock, you have only have one goal: your dynasty must survive. Your only state of GAME OVER is if your dynasty has no heir and your line ends. Everything around that is secondary, regardless of your culture, religion, rank, hopes and dreams.

There's a sizeable toolbox available to you in your perpetual mission to persevere. You can wage war and expand your territory, acquire new vassals to provide taxes and levies, you can leverage your economy to influence others, you can plot to kill your rivals, fabricate claims to their lands to give you a valid reason to invade, all sorts of things - and that's just scratching the surface.

Whether it's for altruistic purposes or to further your own agenda, you can also invest to improve in your lands, both technologically, defensively, aggressively and economically, but the latter three all require investment in the former. Build castle walls, establish new settlements, construct training grounds for your militia, the works.

All of this is centered around your character, of course. Even if you decide to be generous and invest in the lands of your vassals, it ultimately comes back to you: you decided to do that, likely because you felt the investment was worthwhile. Maybe you wanted your vassal to be able to provide you with more levies, maybe you wanted to help get his new settlement rolling so you'd get more taxes out of the place sooner rather than later. Maybe you just wanted to improve relations so the guy doesn't revolt.

The education of your children is also important, even the education of your extended family. As the big poobah of your dynasty, you often get a say in who fosters what child, and the guardian of your choosing will seek to instil their own traits in their new charge. For example, a character who's brave will encourage the child to be brave as well, while a character who's craven will do the same. It's easy to stop caring, particularly when your family grows particularly large, but it's a good idea to stay involved to ensure the future of your dynasty is in good hands.

Another aspect of education, namely that of your people, also comes into play, particularly if you start out as a tribal leader. The spread of technology enables growth and prosperity in your lands, but the transition from a tribal society to, for example, a feudal one can be a game changer.

Similarly, religion (and religious disagreements) can make the difference between a stable realm and open rebellion. There's a myriad of religions, religious branches and even heresies that are available to the player, and all form a crucial aspect to how characters get along with one another. For example, a Muslim might outright refuse to have anything to do with a Norse Pagan.

Culture, too, is important, and plays a similar role to religion, albeit less complex. Characters can adopt different cultures, but it's impossible to reform a culture. Cultures also decide whether certain actions are available; blind Greeks can't inherit and Norse cultures can raise runestones. It also determines certain naming conventions, both of characters and kingdoms.

You have to manage all of these things while everyone around you simultaneously does the same thing. And let me tell you: player or AI, they can be difficult to predict. Because they all follow their own agenda, just like you, and are trying to ensure the survival of their dynasty, often at the expense of other dynasties. Just like you.

On top of that, there's an endless cavalcade of random events constantly playing out across the world, frequently involving you. You might get sick. Your daughter might get sick. Your spymaster might try to kill your spymaster, whereupon your spymaster informs you that your spymaster tried to have your spymaster killed so he wouldn't tell you that your spymaster was gonna kill your spymaster... as you might imagine, there are some bugs, but they're mostly pretty funny.

There are no guarantees in Crusader Kings 2, other than that the game eventually ends. Usually it's either because your dynasty died out, you made it to the final year or because you simply stop playing after achieving all your goals.

And you really ought to set goals for yourself. Whether it's uniting Ireland, taking back Jerusalem as the Jews or transforming Europe into a subject of a nomadic steppe culture, half the fun comes from setting increasingly absurd goals for yourself. For example, I know a guy who decided to get an Umayyad character in charge of Tibet. Didn't even take him that long to pull it off.

And then there's the options of questionable historical authenticity. You see, the game is highly customisable. With the Holy Fury DLC, it's possible to have randomised worlds, or even what's called "shattered" worlds. You can change literally anything short of the map itself. You can turn the entire world into individual duchies ruled by nomadic horselords whose culture demands that only teenage girls can inherit if you so desire, but the customisation doesn't end there.

The game is extremely mod friendly and even has Steam Workshop support.
Wanna play Crusadercraft 2? There's a mod for that. Wanna conquer the post-apocalyptic United States? There's a mod for that. Wanna facilitate an Argonian takeover of Tamriel? There's a mod for that. Want every death to be accompanied with the coffin dance? You bet your ass there's a mod for that.

[Graphics]

It's fine.
There's not much to say, it's pretty much just a big ol map of the "known world" as seen from a European perspective at the time. Borders are (for the most part) clearly distinguishable and that's what matters.

The UI is serviceable once you get used to it, although chances are you may have to dig around a bit to find information on county terrain. Still, there are usually very few clicks between you and the information you want to access, which is Interface 101.

At the end of the day, you're probably never going to be awed or amazed when looking at CK2, at least not because the graphics are anything to write home about.

[Story]

The story is simultaneously simple in premise and complex in execution.
By default, the game starts at a date determined by the player as early as 1066. With DLC, this can go further back, all the way to 769. The map is divided by historical borders and individual realms are ruled by as many historical rulers as we're aware of, although some are made up due to necessity and plain lack of information.

Once started, the game plays out until either the player's dynasty ends or it survives until 1452. Everything between the beginning and the end, however, is entirely fluid. Literally anything can happen, nothing is set in stone, and that's the real story of CK2. More importantly, you can change it to a staggering degree if you manage to gather enough land and build up sufficient influence.

This is the primary allure to most people: the ability to change the course of history while other players or AI rulers do the same. Every playthrough will have a different story and different events will unfold. There are certainly some things that tend to be similar, such as Christians ousting Pagans from the British Isles in some way, but there are never any guarantees.

[SPOILERS that one time I turned Siberia into a merchant republic]

There's not really anything to spoil, so instead, here's a recap of my most recent playthrough.

I decided to play as Zavarot. For reference, this is a tiny tribal start in the ass end of Siberia that starts with 2 shitty duchies. It didn't occur to me at the time, but in hindsight, this was obviously a bad idea. It's a frozen hellscape of ice and bears which barely supports life, much less a substantial human presence.

Somehow, I manage to subjugate some neighbors, enabling me to subjugate some more. I'm 90% sure I got lucky with these initial wars, but soon enough, I controlled a substantial enough territory that I could call vassals to help me fight other tribes and get the ball rolling.

At this point, a goal started forming: form a kingdom. I was on the verge of getting multiple High Chief titles, and due to gavelkind succession being what it is, my titles would be split between my children, and my realm would be split.

So I started getting aggressive whenever I could, with the sparse amount of soldiers at my disposal. Raising an army was hardly economical (it's hardly a surprise that my income was abysmal) so I relied entirely on my retinue, which only cost prestige to maintain. It was also around this time that I noticed the Norse Pagans were winning the battle for Britain. Somehow.

And then King Wanko, the Polish king of Denmark, converted his people to a Catholic heresy:

Eventually I conquer enough land to form the Kingdom of Nenetsia.

Incidentally, this is around the time I check in on Britain again, only to find that the Pagan Norse have largely united under the banner of Ireland.

I'm sure it'll be fine. They're far away, so I conquer more land for the glory of my shitty realm where nothing grows. I eventually get a hold of two titular kingdoms, but because I'm tribal, I can't destroy one of them, which once again means my kingdom is going to split. Spoiler: it does multiple times, but I manage to rein it in again each time. At some point during all this, I'm notified that a gentleman by the name of THOR THE BONE-SQUEEZER has converted his people to Christianity. He wears a wolf on his head and has killed several people, including family members.

He seems like a peaceful fellow though, so I ignore that. I have a new goal: form an empire so my realm stops splitting in half every time my ruler dies and two successors take over. In the meantime, I forge a legendary bloodline, becoming a legend simply by fighting so many people (and bears) that it ends up becoming a feat noteworthy enough for the history books.

What an absolute lad.
But things are going well enough for me. I'm sorta struggling to fight anyone around be, but I slowly make incremental gains. Not so much because of my substantial military. More because any counter-invasions have to somehow get enough troops through my lands to besiege my tribal holdings, but my lands are literally made of ice and bears, so most invaders find it challenging. Turns out winter is harsh in Siberia. Anyway, I decide to check on the situation in Britain, and...

Well, the pagans have taken it all over and are now starting to colonise the mainland.
That'll probably never be relevant to me. Sounds like a them problem.
Fast forward a few decades and my ruler gets bashed over the head while fighting in a battle. He gets permanent brain damage, but somehow doesn't die in a matter of months. No, the bastard clings to life as an infirm vegetable for almost 10 years and eventually dies in a coma at the age of 64. This is despite at least two assassination attempts, which he fought off despite being a brain damaged invalid.

What a guy.
Anyway, I somehow consolidate enough land that the impossible starts getting within arm's reach: the holy places of the Suomenusko faith are so close to me now that it seems possible that I might be able to reform the faith. This becomes my goal, alongside the more practical matter of forming an empire to ensure stability. And wouldn't you know it, a mere 12 years later, I pull it off!

And only 2 decades after that, an empire is born.

At this point, I'm pretty much the only tribal society left on the map, with the sole exceptions being a couple counties somewhere in the eastern steppes. I also have the worst economy in the world, and so I stood at an impasse. Two goals were left for me:
Do I forever remain tribal and fight back against the "civilised" peoples?
Or do I try to turn the frozen north into a thriving economic state?
To be clear: both are mad endeavors, but the tribal path seems substantially more doable than squeezing monetary gain out of a tundra that primarily exports bears, violence, reduced lifespans, bears and tribal warriors. So of course I opt for economy. I become determined to consolidate the tribes into a merchant republic. I also check on the pagans real quick.

Well, they seem to be doing okay.
And only 40 years later, the empire of Volga-Ural under the leadership of House Tobyid from Zavarot has transitioned from a loose coalition of tribes to a merchant republic.

What a ride. It was only afterwards I learned that some people consider Zavarot to be one of the most difficult starting locations in the game, due to the unforgiving climate, the powerful neighbors, limited potential for expansion, lack of valuable raiding targets, total absence of ports to build ships and having no vassals from the get go. It also doesn't help that even if you do build ships, you're not Norse, so you don't get a cultural 90% discount on upkeep.

Let this server as an example of the stories you can create for yourself. I didn't really touch much on building a gilded statue of one of my rulers or the struggle to reacquire familial artifacts after a weird succession crisis, but you get the idea.

[Pros]

- Base game is free and perfectly serviceable by itself

- Some truly ridiculous scenarios can unfold

- Achieving goals and seeing plans come to fruition is very satisfying

- Exceptional mod support

[Cons]

- Base game is somewhat lacklustre

- Paradox's DLC policy (all expansions combined cost $182.85; aesthetic DLC adds to that price tag)

- You really do have to set your own goals to get any real enjoyment out of the game

- Can be hard to get into; learning curve is steep if you're unfamiliar with grand strategy games

[Conclusion]

While I'm very critical of the absurd DLC policy Paradox has become infamous for, I still love Crusader Kings 2 and the developers behind it. When a friend of mine told me the company had been bought by Activision, I was genuinely distraught, but fortunately that turned out to be an April Fool's joke. Crusader Kings 2 is an outstanding game and provides an entertaining experience. It can be a wild ride, and that's precisely what I'm here for.
Time to execute my 40-something prisoners and cause my realm to dissolve in a civil war as my popularity plummets. Shoulda paid the ransom. Moral compass optional.

[Score]

7/10

/DUX

Fallout: New Vegas, AKA Fallout 3: Brown Edition

[Introduction]

Fallout: New Vegas is a casino gambling game with an optional ARPG element.
Like Fallout 3, Fallout: New Vegas is an open world ARPG, except this time, it's set in the post-apocalyptic Mojave Desert instead of a ruined Washington D.C.
Gameplay is going to be so similar that you'd be forgiven for saying it's identical. This also means that, like 3, NV is another Bethesda Game. It's gonna be buggy.

[First Impressions]

Same start, but somewhat quicker to get through and doesn't keep you cooped up for as long. Some changes you'll notice almost immediately is how the Small Guns and Big Guns skills got rolled up into just plain old Guns and there's a Survival skill now. Traits have also been reintroduced, having been on hiatus between Fallout 2 and now (although it was called Outdoorsman then).
You may also notice that the game is very... brown.
Get used to that.

[Development]

Announced in 2009, only a year after Fallout 3, and released in 2010, New Vegas is something of a spin-off in the series. Some might even argue it's really just an expansion for Fallout 3 in all but name, but I would disagree. My reasoning is primarily based on the fact that it wasn't developed by Bethesda at all, but Obsidian Entertainment. Moreover, director Josh Sawyer and writer Chris Avellone were involved, both of whom worked for Black Isle Studios and were involved in the Van Buren project.

This is significant, not only because of the tie to the original creators of Fallout, but also because several elements from the Van Buren project was recycled for New Vegas. The conflict between the New California Republic and the Brotherhood of Steel, Joshua Graham, Caesar's Legion, the Powder Gangers and the Van Graffs, to name some of them.

Other, more background-relegated things were used as well. For example, Denver is mentioned, same with New Canaan, the Hangdog and Blackfoot Tribes, stuff like that. The same is true for some characters, such as Arcade Gannon, and even more obscure things like circumstances. The Van Buren quest where Blackjack, a friendly super mutant, has been cornered probably influenced the quest where friendly super mutants led by Marcus have been cornered in Jacobstown.

That aside, New Vegas was, of course, created using 3 as a base. They run on the same Gamebryo engine and incorporate the same game mechanics, but more on that later. Some progress was made using the engine, however, as Obsidian managed to improve the source code and graphics rendering, largely to accommodate the frankly busy environment on the Vegas Strip. Other fine tuning mostly involved art assets (many of which were reused from Fallout 3) and general streamlining.

Notably, due to inexperience with the engine, Obsidian actually brought Jorge Salgado from the Oblivion modding community aboard due to his extensive Gamebryo experience. Even so, there's a limit to how much a team can accomplish in a mere 18 months, and even with the assistance from Salgado, a great deal of bugs were left unfixed on release.

[Game Mechanics]

You know the spiel: it's like Fallout 3, but with some changes and improvements.

Perhaps most significant is the fact that your character can no longer pick up any old weapon and expect to use it proficiently. There are now stat and skill requirements that apply to certain weapons, such as miniguns, meaning that even though you could try to use them, you're really not gonna accomplish a whole lot unless you meet the requirements. You do still receive a bonus for a high skill level, but it's no longer optional.

Some weapons now also have proper iron sights on them. Not really a crucial change, or really a particularly necessary one, but it doesn't detract from the game in any way that this feature was added. Most weapons are now also moddable to some extent. Expanded mags, reduced weight, adding scopes, that sort of thing. Also not a crucial change, but it does allow you to make a weapon your own, although one can argue that it makes unique weapons less unique, particularly considering that some unique weapons are almost identical to a weapon with all its mods installed.

In a similar vein, New Vegas has a much greater focus on crafting than its predecessor, especially in the form of consumables. You can also make your own ammunition now, as well as convert some types of ammo into others. That's not to say you can turn 10mm bullets into microfusion cells, but you can turn energy cells or electron charge packs into microfusion cells. You can even turn regular microfusion cells into overcharged ones, which is handy if you care more about damaging your enemies than damaging your weapon. Similarly, any cartridge can be broken down to its base components, which can be used to load new cartridges of a different calibre.

Companions have seen some changes in the form of a "companion wheel" being added, which is essentially a quick-select menu that allows you to issue certain commands without needing to do so through dialogue, although that's still an option.

Reputation has been expanded upon, so much so that wearing a faction's armor will affect how you interact with other factions. For example, it's inadvisable to approach NCR soldiers while dressed as a Legion soldier. There are also a lot more factions, some of which are borderline irrelevant, but it's neat to be able to track your standing with individual groups in the wasteland.

And to address the elephant in the room: yes, there's a "hardcore mode" which serves as a sort of survival mode. Your character now needs to eat and drink, but I never found it particularly alluring. It adds a number of new factors that need to be taken into account, such as ammo having actual weight, so it should definitely not be written off as just a gimmick. Hardcore mode certainly makes for a more engaged playthrough - I just prefer not having to worry about inventory weight more than I already do.

[Graphics]

It's Fallout 3, but in a desert and with a warm filter on the lens.

I'm not even kidding, that's pretty much it. It's big, it's open, it's brown. It's the Mojave Desert. Like its predecessor, it's not an ugly game, but it's not gonna be winning any beauty pageants either. In some regards, it's better than 3. In others, worse. For example: there are much fewer instances where you're likely to run into something the devs didn't expect you to run into. Exploration almost never results in discovering something that looks unfinished.

One of the ways in which it's worse is that while, yes, areas are well put together, they're also frequently somewhat bland. It's not very difficult to make a long stretch of road going through a desert look convincing, but it's also not a terribly exciting environment to travel through.

Sometimes you do get some weird graphical glitches though. Here's an extreme one:

[Story]

Remember how I described Fallout 3 being pretty straight to the point? Well, New Vegas upped the ante and gets even straighter to the point. More appropriately, straight to the hollow point, because it takes less than 5 minutes from starting a new game to get shot right in the head. Twice. Off to a great start.

But you either have brains to spare, a thick skull or just an inordinate amount of luck, because you pull through with what amounts to a mild hangover. Naturally, the order of the day is to find the gentleman in the tacky suit who subjected your head to involuntary lead enrichment; not necessarily because you want revenge, but because you're a courier and the bastard stole the stuff you were supposed to deliver.

And so begins a mighty endeavor: delivering the mail. There's an alternative, however, namely NOT delivering the mail. Maybe you'll keep it for yourself. Maybe you'll deliver it to someone else. Maybe you'll just forget about the whole courier thing and go gambling instead. Really, there are a bunch of alternatives, and that's where New Vegas becomes interesting.

You see, while previously there was a choice between the Brotherhood and the Enclave, there's now a choice between like 4 different factions with distinct ending crawls depending on your actions throughout the playthrough and your interactions with various characters. Maybe you side with a faction, but its leader dies. Maybe you decide anarchy is en vogue and destroy anything remotely orderly. There's a surprising amount of variations, and it really improves the replay value.

Oh, and a lot of characters will interact with the player as though we oughta know a lot of things, but will nonetheless reiterate for our benefit. It makes sense. After all, the game opens up with a literal brain injury, which generally serves to explain why we start at such a low skill level with no prior experience, despite being a courier, who would have seen and experienced a great many things.

However, at the end of the day, the main allure of New Vegas' story is not necessarily the sheer amount of possible outcomes, but rather that the writing is just solid. For example, it's no secret that Caesar and his Legion have done terrible things. Like, pretty nearly objectively terrible things, such as slavery, cultural genocide and actual genocide. Now, before you say anything, there's a reason why I say "nearly objectively terrible," namely that you can talk to Caesar.

Caesar is quite open about his actions, and so will tell you exactly why he did what he did. I won't go into details here, because that's something you have to experience on your own, but the fact that you can have a dialogue with a tyrannical dictator endeavoring to establish a totalitarian, authoritarian, imperialist state built on slave labor and conquest is very telling. It even becomes philosophical at times. Caesar, after all, is a learned man. He'll not only justify himself, but also the underlying logic, using the writings of a 19th century German philosopher.

It's a very strong presentation, because the writing touches on fundamental ideological views, particularly whether the end justifies the means and whether something like the NCR is truly better for humanity than something like Caesar's Legion. It's thought provoking, with emphasis on provoking, which is what makes New Vegas such an engaging game. The characters involved in the struggle of the main campaign are presented as being invested for a variety of reasons beyond simply being "The Bad Guy" or "The Good Guy" as was largely the case in Fallout 3.

[SPOILERS]

The big reveal is that the courier was carrying a platinum chip, which is both a poker chip and a computer chip. It just so happens to contain both access codes to a bunker housing a big ol' army of killer robots as well as the software to upgrade them. Suffice it to say that being in possession of the chip opens up a lot of options.

In the grand scheme of things, the player has 4 options:
Side with Mr. House and deliver the chip to him, allowing him to upgrade and expand his robot army.
Side with Caesar and use the chip to access and destroy the bunker housing Mr. House's robot army.
Side with the NCR and use the chip to access Mr. House's private chamber and assassinate him.
Or side with nobody and use the chip to kill Mr. House, steal his robot army and use it yourself.

These endings can all vary drastically in outcome, depending on your choices. For example, Caesar might die, which puts Legate Lanius in charge instead, significantly changing the Legion ending. You might have destroyed the robot army, but you can still proceed with the Yes Man ending. By and large, the player is granted substantial freedom in doing whatever they want and still have an ending available to them. If you make enough stupid decisions, you get the appropriate ending, but the game still allows you to make those stupid decisions.

Beyond that, here are some fun tidbits:

A nightkin might offer to sell you some "wind-brahmin" at the low, low price of all your caps.

A gang of old ladies armed with rolling pins might try to mug you.

You can find the corpse of Johnny Five Aces, who incidentally also makes an appearance in Brigador.

You can acquire a toy gun from a kid. The toy gun is actually a target painter for an orbital weapons platform armed with a solar-powered laser.

And there's a vault where the dwellers democratically elected a person to be sacrificed.

[Pros]

- Flat improvement over Fallout 3 in almost every regard

- Power armor actually feels like power armor

- Good variety of side quests

- Decent leeway for different playstyles being viable

- Excellent story and character presentation

[Cons]

- Buggy

- Environment is very bland

[Conclusion]

It's Fallout 3+.
If it was in Fallout 3, there's a pretty good chance it's also in Fallout: New Vegas, but likely in some expanded or improved capacity. There are more quests, sidequests, unmarked quests, locations, companions, NPCs... you get the idea, there's more of everything. It even runs better, although not without occasional hiccups.
The only real problem with the game is the environment. Pretty much everything else is great.
No gods, no masters, moral compass optional.

[Score]

9/10

/DUX

A look at the modern state of MMORPGs

 The MMORPG genre has certainly seem some success in the likes of World of Warcraft, Final Fantasy XIV, Elder Scrolls Online and Guild Wars 2, but since the year 2014 there has been scarcely anything of note as that year marked the last real success, and even then marginally so, in regards to Black Desert Online. I'm going to do my best to take a deeper look into the genre, it's past, and where it's going, or if it even has a future.

The Past

We go back now to the elder days as it were, and what many would call the golden era of MMORPGs. The prime example I'll be drawing from here (As it is mostly fresh in my memory and the one I've most experience with) is World of Warcraft.

Few things denote the true classic MMORPG experience like multiple stats and long grinds, but also a level of social interaction that was never achieved again. Back then it might've been considered a chore at the time to get certain things done, but as they say, you never know when the 'good times' are until they're gone. When we look back we fondly recall moments of grinding in the Barrens for multiple levels, or working up enough gold for your first mount, or even just trying to find a healer for that one dungeon and then all traipsing across the land together if you didn't have a Warlock. It was moments like these however, the long pauses between progress, that really fueled the social aspects.

When you're waiting for a healer, you're spending time talking to the group you've already formed. You're learning who they are, what they do, when they started playing and many more things. Perhaps you'll even join their guild after you find you meld well together, and then you've a whole new group of people to say hello to. The social aspect of MMORPGs did very much pass its golden age, and it's been dead for a while now. Some games manage to get some of that social aspect back but it'll never be as strong as it originally was.

That being; there's something to be said of the actual mechanics of the game too. Back in the day when I for example played a Hunter in WoW, or a Warlock, I used to enjoy the resource management. Farming some soulshards for an upcoming dungeon I knew I was going to partake in, or restocking ammo for my ranged weapon, or even just buying some food for my pet as a Hunter. It was all small details that really just added to the flavor of the class you were playing. As a Hunter you had more to manage than say a Warrior, because you had a pet and a gun that needed bullets. If you were a class that needed reagents you needed the money for those, and if you were a mage you could straight up make gold for buying reagents, making portals, and asking for payments. Every class had a lovely little niche for itself, true identity that separated you from everything else. Only you as a Mage could make portals, only you as a Hunter needed to buy specific food for your pet, only you as a Warlock needed those soulshards to fuel your spells.

Also the depth with stats was a thing back then. You had multiple, and you needed to pay attention to both what were your prime attributes and what you were lacking in; like hit chance. You found, farmed, purchased and crafted gear based on what you needed, and it wasn't just 'This has a higher item level'. What I mean to say in all is that back in the day things were tougher, but there was a finer aspect to everything, so much more immersion with what you were playing and the being able to really connect with the people around you.

A lot will say it wasn't the game that was good, but the memories spent with your friends. To that I'd say that the game provided the platform for those memories to be made, for I couldn't make them with friends in the modern era of the genre.

The Present

So what stunted all this? What started to occur? I'd say it was about the year 2007 when it began with Wrath of the Lich King. It was during the big mainstream boom of games in general with such hits like the original Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare, along with Halo 3. And if you go look up the year of gaming for 2007 you're going to find a bunch of huge titles that changed the entire scene. Games had become mainstream, no longer were kids picked on in schools for enjoying games, it was suddenly popular and a social norm.

And that meant things had to get easier.

I'm going to straight up say it now. Too much quality of life features is a detrimental thing. Looking for Group became a staple of the MMORPG genre and with it was removed the time spent in hubs looking for some people who wanted to run a particular dungeon. With LFG you just signed up to a dungeon and were thrown in with random people from other servers you'd never see again, so why waste time getting to know them? It was the first and probably most major blow to the social aspect of the genre.

With the realization that the genre was getting more popular and with a desire to draw in a greater crowd, thus began the dumbing down of the genre in general. Long tiresome tasks were shortened, stats were simplified, quests became 'run to the marker on your map' and rare items became more accessible, thus removing any sense of achievement from say getting a rare or epic drop.

But the genre itself isn't completely at fault, it's also due to the evolution of the internet as a whole. Online messaging services became more readily available and common, and so suddenly when you logged out the game, you still had access to everyone from it, and you were still talking to them. It started to blend that whole barrier between in and out of the game, and your friends were no longer exclusive the game itself.

But the biggest killer? Guides.

When was the last time you played an MMORPG and really just explored yourself? Thrown yourself into the world without any idea what you were doing?

Guides became more accessible and more widespread, and then came the meta rearing it's ugly head. Before we knew it everyone was using the same cookie cutter builds, gunning for the same gear, using the same optimal rotations and b-lining to quest objectives with a guide on hand. The meta and guides utterly destroyed most sense of exploration of an unknown fantastical world, and the allure to simply use one instead of asking the people around you became far too strong.

In the modern era of the genre you'll often find people not talking to one another simply because of the fact that they don't need to. They don't need to ask that person where the quest wants them to go, they don't need to ask their party member what rotation they should be using, and they don't need to ask their guildmates what items they need. Everything is done with a google search now, and we've been worse off for it for a good while now.

The modern era might be more accessible to newer players, but those of us who've been enjoyed the genre since before that are certainly left in the wind. And they wonder why our goggles are tinted so heavily in rose.

There's a small footnote to all of this that I'd like to mention, and it's what I call the invasion of the MMORPG genre. To those who've been with it for a while, you likely know what I'm talking about. It's games labeling themselves as an MMORPG without really being one in the traditional sense, and simply because it has some RPG elements and consider themselves, well, large. An example of this would be... Say Conan Exiles. It has RPG elements, it is quite possible a large multiple online game, but would you call it an MMORPG in the traditional sense? No, certainly not. Anything with player-run servers in my opinion is not an MMORPG. It's a small note, but as time goes on the invasion of the genre becomes more apparent. Certainly something to keep an eye on.

I will also point out that the passion for the genre is simply dead. The love is gone and it has been blatant to see for some time in a lot of games. The only exception I find is Final Fantasy XIV, and that's mostly because the work ethic in Japan demands exceptional results. But turning my eye to Western developers? Where's the soul anymore? A lot of the games are just time-gated and stretched out optimally just enough for you to have to subscribe for another month, and everything they do is hellbent on making sure you do just that.

The Future

What does it hold? We haven't seen a success in the genre for almost seven years. Where do we even look to? It's hard to say, I won't lie. A lot of the MMORPGs that come out these days crash and burn in spectacular fashion and it's hard to say that there is even a future for the genre. We've some promising examples in the likes of Ashes of Creation and Blue Protocol, but is that all we have?

MMORPGs are risky, they cost millions of dollars and can fall flat on their face outside of the gate. Take example Amazon's New World. It's had a few betas and I've partook myself, but the combat is shallow, the choices limited, the enemy variety stagnant, and everyone looks the same. That's not an MMORPG, and they don't even know what they want to make, they keep changing what its focus is.

A topic I hear brought up a lot for future MMORPGs is that they should be player-driven. That players should have huge impact on the world around them. In some sense I agree, but I'll always say it's a bad idea. Why? You'd be foolish to ask. We all know what kind of gamers are out there. We get a lot of assholes, and if you think for a second that some guilds won't just dominated the landscape and be complete assholes about it you're living a naive dream. If given the chance players will optimize the fun out of anything, which is why I think player-driven games are such a bad idea. Everything will be worked down to the bare bone of optimization and no one will find any enjoyment in the end result.

Such an example was already present in Black Desert Online, where if a large and powerful enough guild decided it, they'd lock down entire grinding areas for their personal use, and simply say that it is theirs and you're not welcome. It's a toxic idea and it's only ever worked once, with EVE online, and that is kind of an anomaly of a game.

Another point to make is the target audience. I've strong assumptions that the youth of today cares nothing for the genre as a whole, and while of course there'll always be some exceptions, I truly believe most of us that have grown up with the genre are the main audience. So we an assumed lack of new blood, the growth of the genre as a whole is stunted, and that perhaps lends itself to developers not wanting to risk making a game for it.

I'll be personally keeping an eye on titles like Ashes of Creation and Blue Protocal, and perhaps Crimson Desert but it's unclear wherever that's even an MMORPG.

I welcome discussion on this topic with all my heart, because within said heart, I want to be wrong about the future of the genre, I want there to be hope. But try as I might, I simply cannot see it. It's a genre I've long loved, and I wish the best for it in the years going forward, and ponder how long it will be until the next successful entry.

/DEAD

Fallout 3: Find Your Dad Simulator

[Introduction]

Fallout 3 an open world action RPG set in post-apocalyptic Washington D.C. - you can also staple first and third person shooter to that description. It represents Bethesda's first foray into the franchise, and considering that many people swear by it to this day, it's safe to say that they succeeded. One might also argue it represents the comeback of the Fallout franchise, and there's certainly a case to be made for that as well. But, being developed by Bethesda, it also falls firmly into the fairly unique genre of "Bethesda Game" and consequently has quite a few bugs. I suspect anyone even remotely familiar with the company probably already had that figured out, but consider yourself warned all the same.

[First Impressions]

Not off to a great start. I own the Steam version, and it outright refuses to run on Windows 10, at least in my experience. Fortunately, I'm not the only one with this problem, and there's a guide on how to get it running available on Steam.
With that out of the way, first impressions are decent. Not spectacular, but decent. It starts in a very Bethesda-RPG kind of way, which is to say that it starts as it means to go on. It won't take long for the feeling to kick in that this is essentially a Fallout-themed Bethesda RPG. That's not a point of criticism, but it was a pretty weird mix at launch.

[Development]

Wow.
Where to start?

Following the successful release of Fallout 2 back in 1998, Black Isle Studios wanted to shoot for the stars. Specifically the three-dimensional ones. We're not sure when exactly development began on the original Fallout 3 project, but we do know that it was codenamed Van Buren. We're also not sure what exactly development entailed, other than that it was a mess. Interplay, Black Isle's parent company, was concurrently developing Fallout: Brotherhood of Steel, and the two teams only met for a single meeting to plan the games. On top of that, a lot of the team's best developers left around this time. Other issues include publisher meddling, a brand new engine in the form of the Jefferson Engine and attempts at console ports.

Suffice it to say that Van Buren was never released. We may not know when work on the game started, but we do know that it ended in 2003 when Black Isle Studios closed its doors following the bankruptcy of Interplay. A tech demo for the project was leaked in 2007, but that's neither here nor there. For a while, it looked like Fallout was dead. Of course, we now know that Fallout was, in fact, not dead. Well, in a sense it was, but it was brought back. Resurrection: it just works.

You see, Bethesda bought the rights to the franchise and sort of began development in 2004. The real work didn't actually start until 2006 though, following the release of The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion. This might seem odd, but there's an explanation: namely that Bethesda's Fallout 3 runs on the same Gamebryo engine as Oblivion. The idea appears to have been to finish work on Oblivion before using the newfound experience working with the engine to develop Fallout 3, but that's only speculation on my part.

The next 2 years were dedicated to creating a successor to Fallout 2, with substantial focus on following its lead in regards to humor in particular and the setting in general. There was even an attempt at merging the turn-based combat of Fallout 2 with real-time action, a feature that had been intended for Van Buren as well. This was accomplished with the implementation of the Vault-Tec Assisted Targeting System, or V.A.T.S. for short.

A great deal of work also went into the audio design of the game, particularly the music, with both a musical score being composed and licensing for tracks used on the the in-game radio stations. Additionally, Bethesda also spent what I assume to be an inordinate sum of money to hire the likes of Liam Neeson and Ron Perlman to work as voice actors.

But, Bethesda being Bethesda, they also spent a less-than-inordinate sum of money on bug fixes. Consequently, true to tradition, there's... there's a lot of those. They range from helpful or humorous to mildly annoying or frustrating to outright game-breaking. Some are harmless, some will directly impact your enjoyment of the game, its performance or even crash the whole thing.

There also appears to have been a number of decisions during development whose results are, frankly, baffling to me. Take, for example, the Chinese Pistol. It uses the same ammunition as the 10mm Pistol, but is a flat downgrade in every way other than weight. The weight difference, however, is negligible. There's no reason at all for the player to use it at any point, because there are several 10mm Pistols the player can pick up during the tutorial in the vault. It's obsolete pretty much the instant you step outside Vault 101, and I don't understand why it was kept in the game.

It's even weirder when you consider the sheer amount of cut weapons that would have been more useful to the player, or at least more interesting. For instance, the Lightning Gun, a weapon that appears to have nothing at all to do with lightning. It's just a standard laser rifle, but with a special feature: wherever the beam hits, it spawns a gas cloud. Then, a second later, another beam (apparently from a randomly determined direction) ignites the cloud and causes an explosion. It's a neat idea, and I would definitely rather have something like that instead.

There are almost two dozen cut items in the weapons category alone, including stuff like Mirelurk Bait Grenades, a .32 Pistol that doesn't suck and a Gauss Rifle that actually works. Other cut content includes the Tenpenny Radio Station, a slew of clothing and armor items (including night vision goggles), dozens of notes and a number of maps and areas.

[Game Mechanics]

Gameplay is fairly straight forward. Unusually, however, it starts with your character's birth. Fresh out of the womb, you get to pick your name and tailor your appearance. So you make a character, you select your SPECIAL stats, you tag 3 skills, you finish the tutorial and you leave the vault. From here, you're on your own. You can go in any direction you like. There's literally nothing stopping you from forgetting about finding your dad and doing every side quest in the game instead.

As you progress through the game, you gain experience from assorted actions. Hacking computers, killing enemies, completing quests, that sort of stuff. Gain enough experience and you'll gain a level, allowing you to apply skill points and select perks. The perks available depend on your current level and your SPECIAL stats.

Fallout 3 is fairly lenient as far as playstyles are concerned. You can be sneaky, you can be loud. You can be a talker, you can be a fighter. You can use melee weapons, you can use heavy weapons. There's a decent enough variety of options that subsequent playthroughs can stay engaging and feel different.

This is also helped by the branching quests. Some quests have set outcomes, while others (a fair few actually) afford the player a choice between a number of outcomes. These can range from fairly benign stuff, like how you decide to handle relationship drama between a lady and the priest she's in love with, to some pretty damn dire situations, like determining whether a settlement ought to get nuked or not because some asshole thinks it's an eyesore.

Naturally, nuking the settlement is downright evil, as opposed to preventing the scheme. This is important, because Fallout 3 has a karma system. It's a simple system based on performing good or evil deeds, but it's there. It also influences the availability of certain companions, access to certain factions and may result in certain people sending someone to hunt you down.

My main gripe in terms of gameplay is how power armor has been implemented. It doesn't offer the same degree of protection as it did in Fallout 1 & 2, or indeed later titles. Out of all the Fallout games, Fallout 3 has the worst implementation of power armor. It's still the best armor you can acquire, don't get me wrong, but it's just not as good as it ought to be - or as good as it's made out to be.

All in all though, it's a quite satisfying game.

[Graphics]

This is a pretty bleak game. I know that might come across as a needlessly obvious statement, given that it takes place after an apocalyptic nuclear war, but still. There's a lot of washed out colors, and the general feel in the vast majority of areas you visit is usually rather glum. It's something of a feat if you think about it, because the environments range from metropolitan to suburban to straight up wasteland.

By and large, these environments are well put together. There's often an attention to detail that makes inhabited areas look like people actually live in them. Larger settlements like Rivet City has residences, amenities, security and places to eat. Occasionally you might run into weird details though, such as bathrooms having multiple toilets but no stalls to separate them. I guess you can't be picky in post-apocalyptia, especially about working toilets.

Every now and then, you might also move too close to something the developers didn't really expect you to get very close to at all. Exploration is rewarding, but it also sometimes leads to the player finding something that looks unfinished, for want of a better description, which clearly received less attention than other places.

It's not an ugly game by any means, but it's not a beautiful one either, and its age shows more with every passing year. You do get some pretty scenic views sometimes though.

[Story]

The premise established by the opening crawl is simple: you were born in Vault 101, which will never ever open. No one enters, no one leaves. You were born here, and by the Overseer, you're gonna die here. You get no alternatives because the entire rest of the world is screwed. Everything outside the vault is an irradiated wasteland and there's nothing out there for you. Put on your vault suit, power up your Pip-Boy and get to work.

That all turns out to be a great big lie though. Not only is the world outside kinda sorta thriving, but the vault has actually been opened before. Your dad came in from the outside, and now he's left, which has caused all hell to break lose. You're left with no choice other than to follow him out into the wasteland.

Unfortunately, dad is quite spry for a man his age and is already familiar with the area, so he's long gone by the time you escape the shitshow unfolding underground. Consequently, you have to somehow track him down. Most people start asking around in Megaton, the nearest sizeable settlement, but really you can go in any direction. Large segments of this initial part of the main questline can actually be skipped entirely if you know what you're doing. For first timers though, I'd recommend not doing that. You'd be missing out on some fun interactions.

During your endeavor to hunt down your wayward parent, you learn more about the surrounding area and the setting's story in general. This is done through the assumption that the player knows nothing, which is fitting considering the fact that we literally lived under a rock our entire life up to this point.

Really, the overall story isn't super important. It's a backdrop. The centerpiece is the player character and your interactions with people and situations in the wasteland.

[SPOILERS]

Of course, you end up finding dear old dad and briefly get reunited with him before he dies from deliberate radiation poisoning. You also end up discovering that the President of the United States of America is presently a self-aware artificial intelligence with an army of highly trained and well equipped soldiers at its beck and call. Also it plans on killing every "impure" human in the wasteland, so that's fun. As it happens, you can throw caution to the wind and decide that maybe the presidential murderbot has a point and help it kill every "impure" human in the wasteland.

There's really not a whole lot to spoil, because as I said, the overall story is more of a backdrop than anything else. So instead, here are some fun random encounters you might not have heard about already:

In certain areas, a UFO may explode overhead and shower the area with alien ammunition and the unique Firelance weapon.

There's Uncle Leo, a friendly super mutant. He refuses to fight under any circumstances, and if you try to rob him, he gives you clothes.

An Enclave vertibird sometimes lands and deploys troops. Occasionally, this glitches and repeats indefinitely, causing an endless torrent of hostile power armored soldiers.

You can encounter a guy scavenging a robot. He also has a mutated pet bear. Looting the robot (or just looking at it for too long) turns them both hostile.

Another scavenger has a robot of his own, but it's malfunctioning. Among the interaction options is convincing him that it's about to explode.

A wastelander might approach you and warn you about raiders chasing him. Incidentally, they also strapped a bomb to the poor guy, which you might be able to disarm.

There's a fella named Mel who might try to mug you, but his gun isn't loaded, so he's really no threat to anyone but himself.

Occasionally you may also run into a group of hunters who sell "strange meat" - similar hunters can be encountered attacking wastelanders. Don't buy the strange meat. They're cannibals.

And, finally, the Dunwich Building. It's not a random encounter per se, but it's well off the beaten path and there's some downright Lovecraftian stuff in there.

[Pros]

- A worthy addition to the Fallout franchise

- Interesting and fairly varied environment

- Good variety of side quests

- Decent leeway for different playstyles being viable

[Cons]

- Buggy

- Steam version doesn't run on newer systems "out of the box," as it were

- Some items are outright redundant

- Unlike previous titles, power armor doesn't turn you into a walking tank

[Conclusion]

A worthy, if unstable, successor to the original Fallout games. In fact, in my book, it's the second best Fallout game out there, but take that with a grain of salt. I never really managed to get into the first two. I might give them another spin at some point, but I digress.
Times have changed, war has not.
Moral compass optional. It may even be a detriment if you're in a pinch and all that matters is survival.

[Score]

8/10

/DUX

Frostpunk, a child labor simulator on rails

[Introduction]

Frostpunk is part city-building survival game, and part case study on the slippery slope of letting safety supersede morality. Incidentally, the developers are Polish, and Eastern Europe is no stranger to abject human misery caused by totalitarian states, so you know this is gonna be one hell of a bleak affair.

[First Impressions]

Starting a new game, you might get the impression that the tutorial is gonna sort of ease you into things. Don't believe that for a second. It's a lie. From the second you start, you're in a race against time; there's a big ol snowstorm on its way and you have to prepare for it. Fire up the generator, build shelter, get resources, build more shelter, start food production, research technologies, expand resource production. You can say a lot about Frostpunk, but it's hard to deny that it starts as it means to go on.
And boy does it mean to go on, whether you're keeping up or not.

[Development]

Largely inspired by the success of 2014 title This War Of Mine and announced in 2016, Frostpunk was originally slated for a 2017 release. This was pushed back to 2018 due to an internal interest in "final polishing," although what exactly this was supposed to entail is something I haven't been able to find out. Presumably it involved bug fixes and optimising performance; the usual stuff.

In this regard, Frostpunk's development is really rather unremarkable. The only thing that really stands out is that it was created using the studio's own internal engine, Liquid Engine.

[Game Mechanics]

This is a deceptively straightforward game. It's rather simple, but don't let it trick you, because things can become more complex than you might anticipate pretty easily.

You have your generator, your main source of heat. This runs on coal, so you need to acquire more coal.
Gathering coal requires workers. Workers need food and shelter, so you need to get more of both.
Food is gathered by hunting parties and hothouses. Like shelters, these require wood and steel.
Getting more wood and steel requires more workers. To get more workers, you need to find them.
To find workers, you need a beacon. The beacon needs to be researched, so you need a lab.

This is not the full extent of Frostpunk's resource balancing act, but you get the idea. Everything you need to do is balanced against something else you need to do. It becomes a fractal puzzle of setting up a stable survival economy, but once you get the hang of it, I'm sure it might seem rather mundane. Not because there isn't a lot to do, but rather because there's... really a rather narrow range of ways to do it all. Most playthroughs will follow extremely similar patterns. The only variation is likely going to be either experimenting to see what'll work or just a different city layout. Even so, you're likely to at least play through Frostpunk twice, just to see what the difference between the Faith and Order branches of the Book of Laws.

The Book of Laws is a fairly unique mechanic. Unlike the research trees, where new tech requires investing resources, new laws can be passed as soon as the cooldown timer runs out. They're also (arguably) optional. Some laws are exceptionally useful, while others are merely situational, but all have a very real impact on the lives of your people.

The player starts out passing Adaptation Laws, which (as the name implies) largely deal with adapting to the new environment through various measures, ranging from funeral rites and fighting rings to child labor and prostheses. Every law passed allows new decisions, begins new events, grants access to new technology, or some combination of those. They also impact the Hope and Discontent meters. Naturally, it's in your own best interest to keep the former high and the latter low.

Eventually, Purpose Laws become available, branching into Faith and Order. These laws instead focus on establishing a new society and both branches become increasingly authoritarian, but it can be hard to distinguish exactly when you really began to be a dictator in the first place. Was it when you sanctioned child labor? Or was it when you mandated that organs should be harvested from the dead to benefit the living? It might also have been when you extended the work day by 4 hours. With all the questionable things you've done in the name of survival, everything kind of becomes a blur.

All in all, the path from surviving harsh conditions to establishing an authoritarian police state is seamless. In my first successful playthrough, I accidentally established a fascist police state without realising the extent of my actions. It was simultaneously horrifying and satisfying, simply because Frostpunk so effectively brought about a scenario where it becomes crystal clear that small steps corrupt... but only at the end of it all.

That said, I really must reiterate that the margin of error is small. There aren't very many ways to play Frostpunk, because you have to follow some very specific steps in order to succeed. This is particularly true for certain scenario maps, where your experience will be even more on rails than the default scenario. It's really a shame, because it's quite easy to get the impression that Frostpunk has randomised events and affords the player a great degree of freedom in their choices.

[Graphics]

The models and effects are of good quality, but that's really neither here nor there.
What matters is that you can see your city in motion as it grows. People will travel to and from work, congregate in squares or around heat sources, go to brothels and bars and leave deep trails in the snow if they go beyond the streets or range of heat sources. Buildings will even become covered in snow if they get too cold, providing visual indication that heating needs aren't being met.

The aesthetic of Frostpunk permeates everything you build. Expand enough, and you'll eventually construct for your desperate charges a steampunk Victorian Age London facsimile right in the middle of an endless expanse of frigid wasteland. Smoke rises from every stack as coal is burned to fight off the frost and people work to keep the wheels of the survival industry running - not always smoothly, but running nonetheless.

The most important job of the visual aspect of this game is to properly convey two things:
1. How dire the situation is.
2. How hard your people are working to survive.
And it's a job well done.

[Story]

Right off the bat, we're told that the brave new world had its groove thrown off by a sudden rapid decrease in global temperatures. Fortunately, all sorts of wondrous technologies are available in this steampunk version of Victorian London, so great engines are built to carve through the ice and snow with the goal of establishing new cities in the far northern reaches of the world, near the pole.

It's implied that basically every other known attempt failed, so the player is quickly thrust into a position of "if you mess up, humanity is screwed. No pressure."

With this great weight on your shoulders, you have to ask yourself whether the drastic actions available to you are worth the sacrifice. Make no mistake, your actions will be judged, because just as you ask yourself this questions, so too will your citizens ask themselves the same thing.

And take action accordingly.

[SPOILERS]

Turns out it's not just particulate matter from volcanic eruptions in the atmosphere that are blotting out light and heat, the sun is actually dimming. Even at the end of the campaign, the temperatures don't go above -20 Celsius (-4 Fahrenheit).

On the flip side, the implication changes from "we're the only ones left!" to "there might be other cities out there," so not all hope is lost.

[Pros]

- Abject suffering has seldom been more enjoyable

- Mechanics are simple in nature, making them easy to approach but challenging to master

- Highly customisable difficulty

- Unique setting

[Cons]

- Circular construction makes sense, but can be annoying to deal with

- Certain elements (such as outposts) feel arbitrary

- The game is something of a one-trick pony, replay value is relatively low despite its best efforts

- Experience may come across as being on rails; failure margin is quite small

[Conclusion]

Don't let the score fool you, I very much enjoyed Frostpunk for what it is. The thing is, at the end of the day, for all its fancy bits, it actually isn't all that much. The dire circumstance of your struggling Londoners in the arctic is overshadowed by bouts of irritation more often than I really care to admit. Not so much because it's hard to stay invested in the plight of these people due to mishaps, but rather because it's hard to enjoy this sort of game to its full extent when there is often only one path to success. It's a railway track in the guise of a city builder. The train ride is fun, and although it features few options, it still provides a decent apocalypse scenario for the player to struggle against.

"There is no justification for taking away individuals' freedom in the guise of public safety."
    - Thomas Jefferson
Moral compass optional.

[Score]

6/10

/DUX