Fallout 3: Game of the Year Edition

Fallout 3 is such a great game, possibly a masterpiece in that regards, the world is crafted with such TLC and the lore thats been seeded into the game is always interesting to discover, and the game is a great choice for anyone who lost post apocolyptic games :)

This is my favorite game of all time (tied with New Vegas) and it is Bethesda's Magnum Opus. It has amazing writing (the main stories' not the best however) with interesting moral choices, "The Power of Atom" not withstanding. For example, when rescuing slaves from Paradise Falls, killing the slavers is the best option when doing so. As a result, you are faced with a moral choice. Is it ok to free slaves if you must end another person's life? Or, with "The Superhuman Gambit", should you kill a person who is obviously not all there (if you know what I mean) when they attack a town? Or, is it alright to kidnap a baby to cure many people's cancer? And the supermutants in the game are a very interesting story. Many people see them as lazily written but they would be dead wrong. The supermutants in D.C. are in a constant struggle with low supplies of F.E.V. You see them raiding a museum designed to show off Vaults. The supermutants think that F.E.V. comes from vaults because of Vault 81. Even though they are almost all dumb brutes, they have a truly sad story. Another complaint I often hear, is that "Fallout 3 has no real choice and consequence", this is simply untrue. "The Power of Atom" is often brought up when discussing this. Can you actually say it is not a consequence to lose a companion, multiple shops, quests, essential NPCs, among others? Nearly every quest (excluding the main quest) has many outcomes. Most of the consequences come from the "random encounter" system. For example, if you turn down Burke's offer and he doesn't die, he sends hitmen after you. Or if you have good/bad karma, hitmen come after you. Or if the residents leave Vault 101, you can see many of them through random encounters. Sadly, you can't kill every NPC, however, you can kill every caravan owner and many quest givers. I think many people don't see how good Fallout 3 really is at first glance. They play it, don't immediately see consequences and they just assume they don't exist. Sad.

For a Bethesda title, Fallout 3 is an all right game. A lot of customization, a lot of freedom to go and do whatever you want to do. That does not sound too bad, and to be honest Fallout 3 would be a decent, even a great game. If it was not part of a series. If you have never played Fallout 2 or Fallout, it might be a fun experience. But in comparison this game is just horrible. I know this has been said a thousand times already. Bethesda does not deserve the praise it got for this. Again, it is a decent game, most mechanics are fine, V.A.T.S. was fun and somewhat innovative. The wold looks quite decent, models and skins and atmosphere are pretty and get the job done. It is a fine sandbox, but misses everything that made the first two installments great games. I have mentioned freedom to do whatever, well that freedom is stripped away as soon as you get into a conversation with an NPC. Your choices, if you have any, are heavily restricted. Probably across one of two paths. You are always guided along one safe line or another. You have some freedom to do what you want to do out in the wastes, but these choices have no repercussions, no impact on the world, outside of one or two predetermined lines. In the earlier games you had to think about and live with your choices. Yes, you could easily end up in an unwinnable situation, but that made the games and the choices within interesting. I do not think this is really the right place to rant on about the Karma system, which is laughable in it's simplicity. Let me close with saying that I can play and enjoy a game that simply tells a story, but not if it is poorly written, poorly acted, with clichéd and bland characters and plots; you get what I mean.

I am able to open it, first it wanted me to install Windows Live to run, so I did. Now it starts up fine but when I click new game it freezes on the loading menu and crashing. (have tried turning gaming mode off, running as Admin, Compatibility mode Windows 7, also tried running in and outside of GOG Galaxy nothing changes it still freezes and crashes on loading to start new game) Will update if I figure out a way to fix this.

After going through 7 fixes i found online i still cant play this game, i get its older but that just means more time to fix it, waste of money