It’s pretty safe to say at this juncture that Bethesda doesn’t ‘get’ Fallout, or rather- that they don’t care to get it. They bought the rights so they’ll just keep moulding it into the same dungeon delver that the Elder Scrolls series embodies, another crown jewel of shining Bethesdaland: World of broken, hollow toys.
I’m sorry to those No Mutants Allowed forumposters that I dismissed as embittered nerds all those years ago. You were right, and if Fallout 3 is the first volley of nukes that destroyed this series, then the never-ending barrage of missiles that has repeatedly scorched not just this franchise, but all of the IPs we’ve held so dearly for the past 20+ years is our fault, and it started in places just like this game. Still, I do like Fallout 3. Part of it being my first Fallout venture, I suppose.
The green-tinted aesthetic of the Capital Wasteland may have looked bog standard when surrounded by the brown and grey games of the previous next gen, but I can’t help but find it strangely charming now. DC may not have the depth of storytelling that New Vegas so proudly carries, (before it was all retconned out, obviously) but their toybox is a fun place to explore, every nook and cranny has a little something to ogle at, in true Bethesdaland fashion. It does, ultimately, just work. We’re getting increasingly diminishing returns in this day and age, but it does work.
I can’t redeem its stupidly cinematic narrative or its bizarre rewrites of returning factions. Fallout 2’s critique of big government through the Enclave, only for them to become The Empire in 3 being especially egregious, but Fallout 3 has a way with all the little stories littering the wasteland, complete with all the environmental storytelling skeletons and ruined vistas. It fails utterly even at telling its own larger stories, like whatever they thought Big Town was, but there’s a little glimmer of hope where there isn’t now.
The writing in the wall was there (and it spelled out ‘FUCK YOU’) and I never truly saw it until it was too late. Now it's TV shows for redditors and slot machine games for addicts, and I helped make it happen. It’s all over but the crying, and nobody’s crying but me.
I’m sorry to those No Mutants Allowed forumposters that I dismissed as embittered nerds all those years ago. You were right, and if Fallout 3 is the first volley of nukes that destroyed this series, then the never-ending barrage of missiles that has repeatedly scorched not just this franchise, but all of the IPs we’ve held so dearly for the past 20+ years is our fault, and it started in places just like this game. Still, I do like Fallout 3. Part of it being my first Fallout venture, I suppose.
The green-tinted aesthetic of the Capital Wasteland may have looked bog standard when surrounded by the brown and grey games of the previous next gen, but I can’t help but find it strangely charming now. DC may not have the depth of storytelling that New Vegas so proudly carries, (before it was all retconned out, obviously) but their toybox is a fun place to explore, every nook and cranny has a little something to ogle at, in true Bethesdaland fashion. It does, ultimately, just work. We’re getting increasingly diminishing returns in this day and age, but it does work.
I can’t redeem its stupidly cinematic narrative or its bizarre rewrites of returning factions. Fallout 2’s critique of big government through the Enclave, only for them to become The Empire in 3 being especially egregious, but Fallout 3 has a way with all the little stories littering the wasteland, complete with all the environmental storytelling skeletons and ruined vistas. It fails utterly even at telling its own larger stories, like whatever they thought Big Town was, but there’s a little glimmer of hope where there isn’t now.
The writing in the wall was there (and it spelled out ‘FUCK YOU’) and I never truly saw it until it was too late. Now it's TV shows for redditors and slot machine games for addicts, and I helped make it happen. It’s all over but the crying, and nobody’s crying but me.