Fallout Fallout General Thread - War, War Never Changes. Nor do game engines.

[ThatZenoGuy]

I'm not sure why you're arguing that it can't be successor to the T51 and T60 because it's too radical a change in looks. We went from the M14 to the M16, and the M60 Paton to the M1 Abrams, which were fairly radical shifts in terms of looks, function, etc.

That's not entirely true, there was intermediates of those weapon systems.
America didn't skip M60 straight to M1 Abrams, they had the MBT prototypes, XM1, and so on.
The MBT prototypes actually kinda look like a mishmash of M60 and M1 Abrams as well. ;D

 

[ThatZenoGuy]

I think I am in a minority here but I actually like the aesthetics of the X-02 power armor.

All of the power armors look just fine, Bethesda didn't mess up in that regard. But its how they interact with the lore is where Bethesda has failed since FO3.

 

[DarthOne]

All of the power armors look just fine, Bethesda didn't mess up in that regard. But its how they interact with the lore is where Bethesda has failed since FO3.

FO3 in general is where we started to see them make a mess of pretty much everything in general.

 

[ThatZenoGuy]

FO3 in general is where we started to see them make a mess of pretty much everything in general.

See I'll be as humble as I can and admit Bethesda has made some cool additions to the lore.
I like FO3's mirelurks, Med-X, the Fat-Man and a few other things.

Other stuff like FO3's combat shotgun is just...

Eughhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh.

 

[DarthOne]

See I'll be as humble as I can and admit Bethesda has made some cool additions to the lore.
I like FO3's mirelurks, Med-X, the Fat-Man and a few other things.

Other stuff like FO3's combat shotgun is just...

Eughhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh.

Well, clearly they stole it from Team Fortress 2.

Panic Attack - Official TF2 Wiki | Official Team Fortress Wiki

wiki.teamfortress.com

 

[Carrot of Truth]

FO3 in general is where we started to see them make a mess of pretty much everything in general.

I recall reading that Fallout 3 was suppose to be set only 20 years after the bombs fell rather than 200. The state of D.C. would have made a lot more sense were that the case.

 

[Typhonis]

I recall reading that Fallout 3 was suppose to be set only 20 years after the bombs fell rather than 200. The state of D.C. would have made a lot more sense were that the case.

It would and it would work. However what currency would the Capital Wasteland use? Caps would be out, that is a California thing. Paper currency as well. You would need something rare and valuable to use.

What was the state of pocket change before the bombs fell was it used at all given the inflation? If not pre war change could be a good go to.

 

[DarthOne]

I recall reading that Fallout 3 was suppose to be set only 20 years after the bombs fell rather than 200. The state of D.C. would have made a lot more sense were that the case.

That’s a rumor I’ve heard as well; though as far as I am aware, there’s no official confirmation or documentation to back that up.

 

[Carrot of Truth]

It would and it would work. However what currency would the Capital Wasteland use? Caps would be out, that is a California thing. Paper currency as well. You would need something rare and valuable to use.

What was the state of pocket change before the bombs fell was it used at all given the inflation? If not pre war change could be a good go to.

I know its ripping off Metro 2033 but it should have been pre war bullets.

 

[DarthOne]

I know its ripping off Metro 2033 but it should have been pre war bullets.

Interestingly enough that’s actually an idea Black Isle had all the way back in Fallout 1, but decided against it because they didn’t want the players to hoard ammunition instead of using it. Apparently they never hit upon Metro’s idea of Military grade bullets (used as money and good quality ammunition) vs recycled ones.

Will try to dig up quotes.

EDIT: found it!

I remember my fellow Fallout designer, Brian Freyermuth, asking how much something will cost in a shop. I remember thinking, "cost what?" What was our game currency? We went through a few ideas:

• A pure bartering system? Nah, that would be difficult for the player to understand the worth of anything. (Two molerat pelts for a cup of coffee? Is that good?)
• Bullets as the currency? I gotta admit, bullets are definitely useful in the wasteland. But that idea was shot down (sorry) when we realized that people would be very hesitant to use things like machineguns, since every trigger-pull would directly lower their bank accounts! That level of financial restraint wouldn't be enjoyable.
• Credit cards ? – just the hard plastic cards, of course - but most would have probably been melted in the nuclear firestorms.

So, I thought, what shiny token-sized thing would you find strewn around the trash piles? Something common, but not so common as to be everywhere? Bottlecaps, of course! (That, and I liked the idea of a string of caps on a chord that jingled when people pulled them out.)— Scott Campbell, Origins of Fallout, No Mutants Allowed

Also, what your using as money should depend on both where and when the story is taking place. For example, even several decades after the war, places that are more isolated or in worse shape would still use make shift currency or bartering, even as other areas have started using actual money again.

 

[Typhonis]

Interestingly enough that’s actually an idea Black Isle had all the way back in Fallout 1, but decided against it because they didn’t want the players to hoard ammunition instead of using it. Apparently they never hit upon Metro’s idea of Military grade bullets (used as money and good quality ammunition) vs recycled ones.

Will try to dig up quotes.

EDIT: found it!




Also, what your using as money should depend on both where and when the story is taking place. For example, even several decades after the war, places that are more isolated or in worse shape would still use make shift currency or bartering, even as other areas have started using actual money again.

One thing that you could base your currency on is rations or rats. A complete days ration of food or water, that is clean IE free of disease and radiation, that is worth a certain amount. An 8 can set of 8 ounce water cans of a three meal set of C rations from before the war. That is hig standard. As is fresh food and water that are clean. The value drops if it has diseases in it or is irradiated.

I used the can idea off of the old Civil Defense and US Army ration. Given the 50's aesthetic in Fallout 3 I thought it would fit better.

 

[Husky_Khan]

Just using the plastic credit cards by themselves as currency is a very amusing and neat concept.

 

[Typhonis]

Just using the plastic credit cards by themselves as currency is a very amusing and neat concept.

Gamma World 4th edition used it. It wasn't just credit cards but debit and gift cards as well. Anything the right size with that magnetic strip on it was used as money.

 

[Carrot of Truth]

They could also just use silver dollars and eagle gold bullion coins.

 

[ThatZenoGuy]

IIRC the caps in FO1 represented a glass (liter?) of water, that is what it was backed by. Because water was hard to come by.
So really any hard to counterfeit unit of currency is okay provided it is backed by something tangible. Even simple coins would work, which ends up happening in FO2.

 

[Carrot of Truth]

IIRC the caps in FO1 represented a glass (liter?) of water, that is what it was backed by. Because water was hard to come by.
So really any hard to counterfeit unit of currency is okay provided it is backed by something tangible. Even simple coins would work, which ends up happening in FO2.

I think Bethesda's biggest failing with Fallout is that to them its just power armor, super mutants, bottlecaps and rubble. It's a really shallow take on the series and it also misses pretty much everything that made it actually interesting. For instance I'd rather see some weird society on the east coast that involved people worshipping the founding fathers as gods instead of that lame ass planet of the apes reference.

 

[DarthOne]

 

[Battlegrinder]

FO3 in general is where we started to see them make a mess of pretty much everything in general.

I would argue that 2 was where things went wrong. 2 introduced the enclave and thier Saturday morning cartoon supervillian crap, which compared poorly with the master from 1.

I would also note that the lack of faithfulness to what 1 set up continued in NV, so it's not a Bethesda only issue. Vault 19 and 22 are both radically more insane than the experimental vaults in the first two, and 19 is also useless in terms of that experiments orignal goal.

And of course there was the Gun Runners Arsenal DLC, which was purely just callbacks to the first two games, common sense be damned.

 

[ThatZenoGuy]

And of course there was the Gun Runners Arsenal DLC, which was purely just callbacks to the first two games, common sense be damned.

That one isn't too odd, the Gun Runners are an actual group of people ingame, it makes sense they would send a bunch of people to work in the new frontier. A lot of customers there after all, NCR included!

They're one of the few people in the wasteland able to build advanced weaponry.

 

[Battlegrinder]

That one isn't too odd, the Gun Runners are an actual group of people ingame, it makes sense they would send a bunch of people to work in the new frontier. A lot of customers there after all, NCR included!

They're one of the few people in the wasteland able to build advanced weaponry.

It would make sense that the gun runners are in the NV area, yes.

It does not make sense that they'd be in the NV area selling piles of iconic, unique weapons from the first and second game. Specific, named, unique guns (though the base game had "That Gun", so the DLC was really just making things worse).