Moments after my character emerged from the tutorial section of Vault 111, I found myself staring at an immense wasteland full of things to do. Naturally, I ignored what the game wanted me to do and headed south, no destination or goal in mind. I just wanted to explore.
About five minutes later something amazing happened — what began as a simple raider ambush turned into a 30-minute battle for survival as I had to fight my way through enemy encampments. After the carnage ended and there was finally a moment of peace, I checked my map and saw just how far I had traveled. Only one thought entered my mind.
It’s good to be back.
Bethesda Softworks’ second numbered entry into the “Fallout” series may have changed a lot, but at its core, “Fallout 4” remains the same post-apocalyptic, role-playing game that was first released in 1997.
“Fallout 4” takes place in post-apocalyptic Boston in the year 2287, centuries since the Great War of 2077 killed off most of humanity. However, there are still pockets of civilization surviving.
The game follows your character from the moments leading up to the bombings in 2077. Your family is saved by last-minute entrance into an underground vault where you are stored in cryostasis. Some time later you are awoken prematurely as your spouse is killed and your baby is stolen. You awake again after another indeterminable amount of years and are thrust out into the wasteland, forced to find your son.
“Fallout 4” follows in its predecessor’s footsteps with a mixture of overarching themes exploring humanity and moments of dark comedy. One moment you’ll be pondering philosophical questions like whether or not androids are living beings worthy of equality, and the next moment you’ll be fetching a prewar comic book costume for a more than 200-year-old ghoul wanting to bring the character to life.
Much of the core of the game has been improved and expanded upon. The gunplay feels both more fluid and refined than past “Fallout” games, drawing inspiration from games such as “Destiny” and “Far Cry." Boston and its surrounding areas are both more dense and detailed than Washington, D.C., and the Mojave Desert of past games. There are plenty of places to discover and side stories to uncover.
Another improvement is the game’s companion system. You may be tempted to wander the wasteland alone, but you’ll miss out on some of the game’s best characters. Unlike “Fallout 3” where companions were nothing more than walking backpacks, the companions now have their own story. Spend enough time with them and they’ll ask for help solving their own problems.
Though many elements have been improved upon, “Fallout 4” is still a Bethesda game that suffers from the same two problems Bethesda games have always had: bugs and shallow writing.
With such a large world to explore and with so many quests, it’s understandable that there’d be some technical hiccups in the game. Fortunately, this time around the bugs are scarcer and there are dramatically fewer game-breaking ones. Sure, there have been times when characters have flown hundreds of feet into the air or fallen through the floor, but these bugs aren’t harmful and provide unintentional comedy.
The biggest problem of the game is the writing. This isn’t helped by the limited approach to dialogue Bethesda choose to use this time around. Instead of providing the player with exact dialogue choices, you now have to choose from four options that are one to five words long. There have been numerous times when I’ve picked a choice thinking I was sarcastically diffusing an altercation only to piss everyone off and get everyone killed, which wasn’t exactly what I had in mind.
This dialogue system is vague at best and limits the amount of choice a player has. In a game where you are supposed to be building a character, tearing down the dialogue system was a massive step back.
Still, the numerous improvements and additions to the game far outweigh any problems encountered. “Fallout 4” is a game that demands attention. You’ll be sucked away into the Boston wasteland where you’ll spend the next several hundred hours.
Should you play this game? Yes, if you haven’t already invested a somewhat depressing amount of hours.
Because though much has changed in “Fallout 4,” war never changes.