My current favourite game of all time. This is largely because I grew up with The Elder Scrolls Daggerfall, Doom, Diablo and Baldur's Gate/Planescape Tormet, and Fallout 3 has elements of all of these games. I missed the original Fallout games growing up, and made a point to play them after Fallout 3. I can say that they would have made the above list. What specifically makes the game so amazing for me starts with the amazingly detailed and immersive world. From the outstandingly immersive character creation and that moment when you first open the vault door to the hidden stories found in every location. It was kind of like playing a detective game trying to figure out what happened in each location, when and why. I love how each playthrough is different, with different loot and encounters. I love the entire post nuclear apocalypse setting. I love how it mixes skill based shooting from FPS with RPG character progression. I love the sci fi setting, which allows heavy metal armor and melee weapons to be viable in a world with guns. I love the loot whoring, as you can take everything enemies have, and every random item lying around. I love the resource management for keeping your gear in good condition, and other supplies. And lastly I love how each type of weapon performs differently.
My first playthrough has nearly 300hrs played. I put my intelligence up to 7, agility 6, perception 6, and left everything else at 5. Early on I went to Rivet City and got the int bobble. I can't remember if I went there for the story mission, or if I knew beforehand that the int bobble was there and went specifically for that. After that, I methodically explored the map, focusing on the rural areas and leaving the city for late game. It was almost like I avoided all of the unique weapons and armor, because I never found any until late game. I chose perks to up my strength and endurance, and I remember choosing the following perks: cyborg, adamantium skeleton, life giver, toughness, commando, sniper, ninja, educated, comprehension, better crit, demolitions, solar powered, scrounger, entomologist, lawbringer, pyro. My starting GOAT skills were melee, science and medicine. I focused my skill points on small guns, melee and sneak while getting enough lockpicking, science, repair and explosives to do the Megaton quests and be able to hack and lockpick with the help of +5 clothing. Then I improved big guns, and then energy weapons. I ended up maxing every skill except barter (put 0 points in), unarmed (did not use those weapons) and medicine.
I literally took every piece of loot; every tin can, clipboard, toilet plunger etc. If it had value, it was taken. I needed an entire container in my house dedicated to storing stuff that the merchants could not buy, yet. I also kept a massive stockpile of weapons and armor. I preferred quick light melee weapons, starting with the police baton and upgrading along: combat knife, sword, shiskebob (which I ended up spending significant caps to keep repaired). My close range guns followed the line of: starting pistol, smg/assault rifles, railway rifle (I literally used every rail spike in the game), minigun/flamethrower/gatling laser. I did spent some time using the unique plasma rifle, though I chose not to repair it and sell all plasma rifles. Big guns are where it is at, with the flamethrower being my all time favourite weapon, and the gatling laster being the best overall weapon. Had a hard time keeping repairs and ammo for those big guns though. My long range weapons went: hunting rifle, scoped revolver, sniper rifle, laser rifle. I spent a lot of caps to keep my sniper rifle repaired until I got my energy skill up high enough and the unique laser rifle. I used simple frag/pulse grenades and mines regularly, and very rarely used the missile launcher. I never used the fat man; never seen the need. For armor, I used up the security helmets and a variety of others. I liked the raider blasmaster (fire fighter) helmets for the explosive skill bonus. I eventually settled on combat helm + lucky shades, and end game went with power armor helms when my luck was maxed. Body armor was mostly combat armor. Being a good person, I had more talon company armor than I knew what to do with. I did not learn how to use power armor until late game.
My general combat strategy was to sneak around and recon the enemy (played on Hard). Then I would decide to either sneak in and use sword, or lay down a trail of mines and snipe from long range. Sometimes I would start off with grenades if enemies were grouped. I often started combat with VATS, and then used free aim until the enemy got into point blank range, at which point I would use VATS again. I did not use any of the companions in combat. I also beat all of the DLC, and liked them all. To this day I still go back and revisit many of the areas to kill enemies, now on Very Hard with modded massively increased enemy spawns. Try fighting 6 super mutant overlords (+ minions) at the same time! I have not made a dent in my ridiculous stash of supplies though; nearly 1000 stimpacks, 10000s of ammo, and literal tons of weapons and armor, though soon I might actually have to stop using hellfire power armor, shishkebobs, gatling lasers and flamethrowers though (unless I want to spend caps to keep them repaired).
I also have an entirely separate playthough using heavy mods, which runs at about another 300hrs. This time I use godmode to speed up looting. I used most of the popular mods at the time: new enemies, new items, thirst and hunger, and all kinds of things to make the game more interesting and more difficult. I balance tweaked things as I played. I even made my own mod which eliminates healing from drinking water and sleeping, and the my first infirmary and chemical lab now requires a certain level of medicine or science and some caps for each action. I had a problem with the game's free healing, and felt that everything should be about resource management.
In 2018-2019 I have a new playthrough going on xbox 360; I got a loan of the game. My character is pretty much the same, but I put the difficulty to Very Hard first thing, and I am not nearly as skilled at shooting with a controller. I also specifically avoided the good weapons and armor for as long as possible. I also avoided looting too much junk. It is all about a challenging experience, and it is certainly challenging. My character is also evil this time, and does stealing and murder any time he can get away with it (as long as it is profitable). I really felt the lack of combat armor from being evil! My character is constantly broke, low on ammo, and has trouble keeping stuff repaired, so I am forced to try out weapons and armor that I never really used on PC. I have a new respect for sledgehammer type weapons, though I still prefer the sword type. I have nearly explored the entire map, and am almost ready to finish the main story. Currently around 70hr played, though my loaner copy does not have any DLC.
Some more years into the future, I may do another playthrough on PC to see what new and interesting mods have been created.
