I’ve played Fallout 1 and 2 multiple times over the years and loved the games, the world-building, the characters, the interactions, and the freedom to do what you want. For some reason, I never played Fallout 3 until 2024, and here I am, loving every minute of it. The game is different from Fallout 1 and 2 but stands strong on its own. It worked from the first click with only a few crashes to desktop (CTDs) – one or two – and some bugs in quests, but nothing game-breaking. The game is immersive, the world-building is great, and the combat system is actually quite decent. The activities you can do in the game are entertaining, and being a badass Lone Wanderer wiping out raiders and those pesky Talon mercs is a lot of fun. The dialogues and quest options aren’t as complex and intricate as in Fallout 1 and 2, but they’re still great.
There have been many attempts to make a American Civil War video game. Some were good (Age of Rifles), some were funny (North and South) and some were really quirky (The Blue and the Grey). This one is the one I was waiting since I watched the TV show North and South in the late 80s. It is almost a perfect game. It has some quirks (like no enfilading cannon fire) or no formations (yeah but who needs them right?), or it has no concept of friendly fire (you can easily shoot into a melee crowd of your and enemy units and none of yours will get hit). The most important part is these deficencies do not matter, the game is entertaining, it takes you right into the ACW era and you can enjoy it thouroughly (lets take that Little Round Top; Look Sickles is out of his position lets get him!; Burnside, you shall not pass!; Hmm I wonder how a Union all out attack in Cold Harbor will end. Lets try it). The game is really fun if you are into ACW. If there were just a couple more battles (Vicksburg, Missionary Ridge, Siege of Petersburg, Atlanta) it would have been a perfect 6 score!
Altough it is not an in depth story with a well designed in depth world, the game was fun and kept me awake for couple of nights. For the money it is well worth.
