T w e n t y S i d e d

And so at last we reach the end of Operation: Anchorage. Something interesting I learned while watching this episode two and a half years after recording it: Apparently, I played through this DLC twice? Why did I do that? I have no idea. That was not a wise use of time.

On the upside, I’m sure I’ll never play it again. I can never imagine a scenario where I’d be willing to put up with the horror of Games for Windows Live, which is required to use this DLC. Heck, I wouldn’t put up with that crap for a good game.

Why is Jingwei’s sword here in this vault, attached to a training simulator? Why do all the buildings, computers, equipment, and furniture in the simulator look identical to the same crap as it exists 200 years later?

Why were the Brotherhood willing to chop the arm off a wastelander to open the door, and then willing to let you take everything? Can you imagine bank robbers pointing their guns at a teller’s head, “OPEN THE VAULT NOW OR YOU’RE DEAD!” And then once the vault is open they let the teller take as much as they want? This is particularly egregious when we’re talking about pre-war tech, which the Brotherhood thinks they should own by default. Their entire mission is to look for new tech and reverse-engineer it, and they’re letting you walk off with it even though they (correctly) think you’re a savage that’s just going to drag the equipment into battle.

On top of all this, that final exchange between the Brotherhood guys was so cliche it could be mistaken for satire in a smarter context.

It’s just… this is so lazy it hurts. Even if we ignore the mechanical problems with Anchorage, the bugs, the shallow gameplay, the repetitive combat, the narrow weapon selection, and the sloppy visuals, this is just shamefully childish. You could make massive improvements to this entire script in under an hour. This is a half-assed first draft with nothing to say and nothing to add to the game except toys. And that would be fine if this was just some random shooter, but this is supposedly Fallout. Stupid, vapid, tone-deaf stories here is like having crappy platforming mechanics in a Mario game. It’s weak in exactly the way that the series is expected to be strong.

So I’m glad it’s over, is what I’m saying.

Shamus Young is a programmer, an author, and nearly a composer. He works on this site full time. If you'd like to support him, you can do so via Patreon or PayPal.

Thus continues our ongoing saga of self-abuse and childish griping in the face of Bethesda’s shoddy DLC. I highly recommend checking out this link before you watch the show. It will provide some much needed context on the mechanics being demonstrated. This goes double for Rutskarn, who was specifically asking about this stuff.

Pssst. That’s actually a link to the Sid the Science Kid movie which has mercilessly vexed Rutskarn during our last four shows. But don’t tell him! See, Rutskarn and I watch Josh play the game via Livestream, and at the time of this recording Livestream was showing Rutskarn the same ad again and again, every ten minutes.

What a cavalcade of bugs. Josh tried to shoot the enemy with his rocket launcher. Then the game switched to a close-up of the foe encased in a pure black spherical shadow and being shot with small arms from behind. As far as we can see, no rocket was fired. And when we came out of VATS the view was inexplicably pointed straight down. Having the player running around with no torso, giving us combat kill-cams of unrelated rocks, and the subsequent crash were just icing on the cake. I don’t even know how to count those. Are they all the same bug? Different bugs? What is this broken piece of software and why did people have to pay money for it?

Remember a few episodes ago we talked about a particular fallout shelter in the game? Well, I managed to stumble across it later on:

If you’re the sort of guy who has always dreamed of meeting a naked double amputee as she hails a cab and then spending a romantic evening in a coffin-size nuclear bomb shelter, then tell me your next two wishes, because the first one is granted! I like how the guy who set this up brought two glasses and got a “sexy” nightie (the pink pillow-shaped thing is actually sleepwear which acts as a nightgown if you’re a female or pajamas if you’re male) for his plastic date. He may be lonely to the point of being deranged, but he’s still clearly a hopeless romantic. Sadly, it looks like the mannequin got stood up (sorry) because the wine is unopened and the sleepwear hasn’t been put to use. Alas for unrequited love. The wasteland is full of such tragedies.

Shamus Young is a programmer, an author, and nearly a composer. He works on this site full time. If you'd like to support him, you can do so via Patreon or PayPal.

And here is where the Fallout 3 season took a turn for the ugly. We decided to do a really bad DLC that wan’t fun to watch while we were under-leveled. The result is perhaps slightly deranged angry tirades that drag on for a long time.

I really do wonder how Bethesda came to the conclusion that it would be a good idea to build an entire DLC around their shooting mechanics. Previously, they’d been focused entirely on medieval-style melee combat of things like Morrowind and Oblivion. And even in those games, the combat was merely serviceable. Now they’re messing around with shooter mechanics and suddenly they think they’re Infinity Ward.

Buckle up. The next several episodes are going to be rough.

Shamus Young is a programmer, an author, and nearly a composer. He works on this site full time. If you'd like to support him, you can do so via Patreon or PayPal.

Wow. I forgot how terrible the dialog was here. Camera-grab railroad conversations for sidequest characters. NPC’s that ignore your questions to stick to their script. Offering the player a list of 3 dumb things to say instead of the one obvious smart one.

Which is worse? The casual stupidity of Fallout 3’s railroading and conversations, or the vapid and un-engaging conversations in Skyrim? Is it better that Bethesda force-feed us stupidity, or that they make all the dialog bland and perfunctory? You know, my instinct is to say that given the choice between the two, I’d prefer Skyrim. Then again, I clocked at least twice as many hours in Fallout 3. So… I have no idea.

Look, all I want is a gigantic world, smart quests, limitless choice, detailed characters, and branching dialog. Is that too much to ask? It is?

That sucks.

Shamus Young is a programmer, an author, and nearly a composer. He works on this site full time. If you'd like to support him, you can do so via Patreon or PayPal.