Honestly, I waited till I could get this off Ebay for $10. I’d seen all the reviews about the shit show that was this game’s launch and I figured $10 was a good price of admission. Nearly a year after its release, the game has started to redeem itself… kinda, sorta.
Much like how New Vegas shared a lot of F3’s gameplay, 76 shares gameplay from F4. The shooting and base building work exactly the same. There are a few add-ons, such as the survival meters that see you having to manage your water and food. Luckily the survival systems aren’t super intrusive like an early access Steam game. You can fill your bars quickly and if they do drop down it acts like the radiation system where it cuts into your HP or AP. The environment plays a bigger part in gameplay as well. Some of the harder hit areas require you wear a gas mask to avoid contamination and you can catch diseases from the gnarly looking animals or eating raw meat. The armor system from F4 has been improved too, you can actually wear armor under your outfits, not just with special under armor suits. Something that does make a comeback that I could take or leave, is item degradation. Weapons don’t break down too quickly, but repairing them, & crafting ammo, can start to eat into your junk pile. Food can spoil, which that’s one thing the game doesn’t mention, and there’s no alert that you’re about to have something spoil. This means you can end up carrying around lots of useless food and if you want to do the Nukashine quest, it can be hard keeping your corn preserved. Still, these are great little gameplay features that add more to the world building. Unfortunately given this game’s reputation, these feel less like developers making new advancements and more like them trying to add in something good to distract you from the crappiness.
So, about the crappiness. I avoided this game at launch because the state they released it in was unprofessional for a AAA developer. Granted now, the game is pretty stable and the bugs have been worked out. A few ghouls have an issue of dying standing up and every once in a while coffee cups fall through the countertops, but the server rarely crashes and physics work like they should. Even though it all works fine now, we shouldn’t overlook that Bethesda should’ve tried a little harder before the release. They aren’t some indie, only 2 employees working in a basement, shoestring budget, developers. Something else that’s crappy, the micro-transaction store. They are all cosmetic items, but they are awful pricey; $8 for armor paint, $5 for some tables. There are other parts of the game that aren’t “crappy”, but maybe not the best choices.
After playing this game for umpteen hours I’ve come to the conclusion that this is a decent, post-apocalyptic shooter, but a terrible Fallout game. The big issue is the story. There’s no people left in Appalachia, just robots and they just have one or two canned lines, no dialogue system. All of the main quests are either a robot or holotape telling you to go find a person, then shock of all shocks, they’re either dead, another robot, or have left the state. The big quest you get sent on is told to you via holotape. You’re looking for a cure to the Scorched Plague that ravaged the population (Bethesda’s excuse for having no NPCs). There’s no real motivation for this quest, it’s just that you had nothing better to do. I had the same issue with Horizon Zero Dawn, I’m more interested in the people living in the wasteland now, not the people from the past. I haven’t made it all the way through the story yet, and I don’t plan on it with Greedfall out this week. There were a few side quests that do feel more like a Fallout quest, one that stands out is at Ft. Campbell. The drill sergeant robots make you dress as a soldier and put you through basic training. It’s the closest this felt to a Fallout game.
As the big selling point lets you know, this is a multiplayer Fallout. This adds to the feeling of it being a bad Fallout game. You are limited on what you can sell to vendors and the sell prices are greatly reduced, while the buy prices are exuberant, making it hard to save up caps. You come across ammo and chems a lot less frequently than in other Fallouts. When you hit a certain part of the story quests, the enemies go from being around your level to being 20+ levels higher. Enemies that are even a few levels above you turn into bullet sponges. This is a mix of, 1. the world is instanced in a way that if a higher level player went through there earlier, the enemies are set at that level, and 2. that as a multiplayer game they expect you to do some grinding. I despise grinding, especially since most of the daily events are the boring “kill 5 of these” or “restart the 3 generators”. It’s about impossible to play this as a solo game at certain parts. Granted this game made me figure out what Discord was & as such I’ve met some new PSN friends that have been more than helpful in getting me through the game.
Since I had little interest in the main story, I sorta made my own story, which was to be the best damn Civil War reenactor in West Virginia. I roleplayed as a Union soldier, including only using the antique weapons. It makes fighting some enemies a little harder due to the long reload times, but it’s fun. The other part of this game I enjoyed is what I enjoy in any Fallout game, exploring the world. This was more prevalent here, because I am a stone’s throw from WV and have been to many of the real life locations. It was cool to walk across the New River Gorge Bridge and visit Point Pleasant. I finally got to see my home state of Ohio in a Fallout game, granted it was inaccessible across a river, but hey, Ohio!
Behind Vegas, this setting is my favorite in a Fallout game. I love Appalachian culture, history, and the mystique of coal miners, and Bethesda did their research in this respect. I’m kinda disappointed this game was a multiplayer spin-off because this world is worth exploring, even though this feels more like a walking tour of a Fallout world. Most of the locations are in the overworld with not as many separate dungeon areas you can go explore. Branching off of that Appalachian culture is the folklore, which means cryptids. Again, I love cryptids, I run a YouTube channel dedicated to the history and mysteries of them. It’s awesome fighting the Fallout versions of Mothman, Snallygasters, the Grafton & Flatwoods Monsters, Sheepsquatch, and so on. The Wendigos are a real bitch to fight, and technically they are more associated with the Great Lakes region, not West Virginia.
Being this is coal miner territory, the radio is very country heavy, like New Vegas, which is great. I loved hearing some Tennessee Ernie Ford. I grew up listening to “Sixteen Tons”. The shuffle on the radio seems off though. I barely heard the good Ford songs, but they played “I Didn’t Know the Gun was Loaded” ad nauseam. The ambient soundtrack music is good here too. It’s the typical minimalistic sounds with a little bit of guitar twang in there.
All in all, the game’s come a good ways from that dismal launch. I can now say it functions as a game, but that doesn’t mean all should be forgiven. Whether you’ll enjoy it is determined by your predilection for the more grindy games. I prefer to play games for the narrative and story, and this game doesn’t hold my interest after the first few hours, but I know some people enjoy games more for the grind and getting the biggest numbers. Those people will get hours out of this game. The world is fun to explore with a killer soundtrack, but you have to be warry of high level enemies. Again, the takeaway is “Decent shooter, terrible Fallout game”.
