I'm playing Fallout 2 right now and is amazing.

Wow you put it last? Really? It has the best atmosphere of the series. Others have more re-playability and better interface etc, but I just find the first so immersive.

From personal experience...
It's been approximately 13 years, and I play both Fallout 1 and 2. I play Fallout 1 more often because it's brief, progress is more tangible, and it's more immersive.

Fallout 2 by far, even though I really hate the beginning temple which fails so many character designs within the first 5 minutes of the game. The original Fallout is very well designed, but it just lacks the quality world content that Fallout 2 has. Actually, it just lacks content period. Fallout 3 and New Vegas suffer too much from all the walking and action shooting, though I really like their settings and New Vegas is still a good Fallout in many other ways. Oh, and I just started playing the DLCs, which are top notch so far. Love Dead Money! If only the game didn't crash so often. I must have gotten over a hundred crashes(at least) since starting this play through. Something I don't have a problem with in Fallout 2, which kinda biases my enjoyment towards it.

1. New Vegas- A step in the right direction after the (still good 3rd game) but with the one issue being the setting doesn't feel very wastelandish
2. Fallout 1- Great atmosphere and while it will fail some character builds still great
3. Fallout 3- Great atmosphere but so buggy and with some really bad quests

I have yet to play Fallout 2 and I do not own the other 2

My order goes a little sumpin like diss

Fallout 2 - Some people hate the goofiness and the humor, not me. Granted, nothing grinds my grundle more than lame/forced humor in a vidya game, but I feel like Fallout 2 is one of the few, the proud, the actually funny. I do think though that this is where the series' plot started to lose its...tightness? I dunno, the whole find the water chip/fight the Master plot in FO1 is just so memorable, focused and well paced. Then FO2 clumsily tries to repeat this structure with the Geck/Enclave and a GUBMENT VAULT CONSPURRACY and it just doesn't work as well as the Unity thing from FO1. Plus the endgame is so blatantly rushed and San Fran kinda...sucks.

Fallout 1 - This game probably would be my favorite if not for the lack of control over NPCs, and the (mostly) boring sidequests in comparison to the main quest. It also is just too short, and doesn't really have as many WOW THIS PLACE IS AWESOME like 2 does. The best places in the game are Under The Cathedral and The Glow IMO.

Fallout 3 - I recently started playing this again...I've never beaten it. I always get burned out and stop. I think that while it gets a lot of hate for its terrible dialogue and derpy derp story, I DO think exploring the world is awesome, and some of the quests feel very Fallouty to me. The enchanted hats of +1 perception are lame though, and it's a shame the mainquest is what it is. They sorta take out the whole roleplaying element when they force you to be obsessed with your daddy.

Haven't played NV yet, but own it. Got it at release and decided to wait for patches...then sorta forgot about it. But after I finally beat 3 I'll probably start it. Haven't played Tactics, but after some good word in this thread I may just buy it right here at gog.com (smile smile)

2, 1, Tactics




New Vegas









3, what a boring, poorly written, buggy mess. Beyond the lore raping and my undying hatred for first person sandbox RPGs that involve too much damned walking, uh... they do realize all it takes to purify water is dirt, right?

To be fair, the dirt was irradiated, too.
Yes, I'm joking.