FALLOUT 4

[Gikoku]

More news released.

Bethesda announced that Fallout 4 is getting a Season Pass that will run you $30 and will include all planned DLC & Expansions, including whatever paid-content that may come out beyond what they have planned for now. The DLC is planned for an early 2016 release although at the moment they apparently have no clue what those add-ons are. Fallout 4 will also receive the Skyrim treatment when it comes to patches and will be given new gameplay features with every patch that releases (for free of course) based on fan feedback. On top of that, Bethesda confirmed that the PS4 will get mods as well instead of it still being a "maybe", I guess Sony finally agreed to it then which is a win-win for everybody now.

You can read all of it here.

In other news, it looks like Fallout 4 will remain uncut in all regions of release for now, this includes Germany and Australia. Judging by the greatly violent demonstrations shown and confirmed drug use in the game, I guess it's a case of Australia & Germany finally chilling out on censorship laws and letting their adult citizens parent themselves for once. Hopefully it stays true after the game releases.

 

[Gikoku]

Good lord, I haven't triple-posted on a forum in 10 years.

Bethesda just released this video demonstrating one of the SPECIAL attributes in the game, for this one it's Strength. There's still 6 more of these videos planned for the rest of the attributes, my guess is probably a new video each week which I'm okay with. Makes me wish for an Adventures of Vault Boy cartoon or somethin', loving the Fallout 1 & 2 style of gore displayed. ^_^

 

[Dark Drakan]

Normally I would avoid season passes like the plague but you know what you are in for with Bethesda & I don't doubt that the DLC will be worth it (much like The Witcher 3's). Hope more companies see the sales for this sort of season pass & DLC compared to the drip feed stripped content of other titles.

 

[Gikoku]

Normally I would avoid season passes like the plague but you know what you are in for with Bethesda & I don't doubt that the DLC will be worth it (much like The Witcher 3's). Hope more companies see the sales for this sort of season pass & DLC compared to the drip feed stripped content of other titles.

Yeah, my only issue I have with this season pass however is that they felt it necessary to announce the season pass way ahead of the game even being released let alone any of the DLC. And with that, they don't even know what the DLC will entail. Would've preferred they announce the Season Pass next year when they're ready to properly announce the additional content. I do NOT want another Borderlands or Telltale season pass nonsense, where they say one thing but then turn around and announce more DLC not covered by the pass, or decide to no longer support the game abruptly in favor of their new project (as was done with Skyrim).

On the plus side though, season passes are optional and can be purchased anytime. I don't know if I'll opt for it or just save my money and grab the inevitable GOTY version and sell my base copy, but we'll see how it goes.

 

[Gikoku]

Pretty late with this one, but eh, what the heck.

I find it interesting that they have pickpocket and other stealth actions tied to Perception this time instead of Agility, makes me wonder what else got switched around. Next week's video is Endurance, then Charisma the next and so on. Bethesda uploaded a couple more interview vids from E3 with Todd Howard, but they don't reveal anything new though. The main gist of it was BGS wanting to say yes to as many things that we can do in the game "Can I do this? Yes. Can I do that? Yes. Well what about this? Yes." ... >_> ... hopefully one of those was a damn ladder. You can watch 'em below if you're interested, they're pretty decent.

Spoiler

 

[Foxtrot94]

Oooooh yeah baby bring the Fallout. Been waiting for 5 years.

Looks like they out a lot of effort into it and a ton of content. Actual weapon customization and creation, base building and management, new stuff for power armors... yeah hyped.

 

[Krskull]

WOW can't wait

 

[Gikoku]

All that adorableness. A couple new videos released by Bethesda with the above one showing some of the behind the scenes with River, the dog that was mocapped and recorded for Dogmeat. Some really interesting animations and situations used like crawling under a table, hopefully we can play fetch with the ol' boy. Also shown in the video is another first-person snippet of the sprinting in the game. And below is a video talking about Dogmeat and other companions though most of the info was already shown/released.

 

[Quistrix]

Yep. That's it. We're getting a German Shepard, Scotty.

 

[Krskull]

 

[Gikoku]

New article was released today that focused on the behind the scenes of the soundtrack, plus we got some new music! The takeaways from the article is the greater use of a piano in the soundtrack and more varied and unconventional instruments to make many new sounds. Many of the areas in the game will have their own tone & instruments to separate themselves so that it won't be a blanket experience like it was in Fallout 3, but still manage to fit together. Lots of despair but also lots of optimism to go along with the tone of the game that was set by the main theme song.

You can read the full article here, it's a pretty nice read.

Below is the full main theme finally released, along with a new exploration track called "The Last Mariner" which reminded me a lot of "Beyond the Canyon" from Fallout 2 but with so much more, I love it. The music sounds like it's going to have more character to it this time around.

Spoiler

 

[Dark Drakan]

Music and ambiance played a huge part in making Skyrim feel as epic as it did so im glad Fallout is getting the same treatment. Great music scores can add a lot to a game and help form what emotions you are meant to be feeling in that location better than any visual aids.

 

[Gikoku]

Endurance! My favorite perk Cannibalism makes a delightful return and looks like it'll be more fleshed out than ever. Hardcore/Survival mode looks like it might make a return as well from New Vegas with the diagram of Food & Water for survival, which I really hope so as that was one of my favorite aspects of NV. Infections & Diseases could also be making their debut which would be a nice feature to finally carry over from the TES series. Sprinting duration will be affected by how much Endurance you have. Also teased was a perk tied to Endurance for water breathing/swimming for underwater exploration which was shown in concept artworks at E3 revealing deep sea exploration with your Power Armor.

Music and ambiance played a huge part in making Skyrim feel as epic as it did so im glad Fallout is getting the same treatment. Great music scores can add a lot to a game and help form what emotions you are meant to be feeling in that location better than any visual aids.

Exactly and well said, many of my absolute favorite memories in video games were all thanks to the music that was composed. If Inon Zur keeps this up he's going to end up giving Jeremy Soule a run for his money. Also, can I just say how much Inon Zur sounds like such a comic book villain name, hah. Kneel before Zur!

 

[Gikoku]

Shiny new gameplay footage and info everywhere, no more E3 stuff this time. =]

Along with the new video narrated by Todd Howard, there's also a lengthy article by Bethesda giving a more in-depth explanation of some of the perks, how they work, leveling & experience, skill magazines and so on. They explained some of it before, but the article goes into much better detail with new information on it. Also included in the article is the full high-resolution picture of the entire perk chart/poster from the game. Many of them I recognize from 3/NV, but plenty others are clearly new with some having a few self-explanatory hints. It's an excellent read altogether.

Article here: http://bethesda.net/#en/events/game/fallout-4s-character-system/2015/09/24/31

Also announced was that every physical pre-order copy of the game will come included with the same perk poster inside the case.

 

[Precipice]

Sorry to bring up something that's already been discussed a month back; I keep remembering this through the day but forget about it when I come here.

On the voice acting, I hope they get everyone coordinated on how to say what. Skyrim fans saw a lot of inconsistencies with these things, which is fine if it's from an expendable insignificant nobody but key roles should at least know how to pronounce other key roles. Without any context, I'm just going to say a thing from Skyrim. Actually I'm not, I'm going to say it the way I say it whenever I think about it. I'm sure people will know exactly what I'm talking about and how it connects to this subject.

"I'm not madanamanak."

 

[Foxtrot94]

I just hope they'll hire different people to voice different characters.

 

[Precipice]

I just hope they'll hire different people to voice different characters.

Agreed. I don't know if we have the numbers yet. Gikoku mentioned earlier that Skyrim had 70ish voice actors but I'd be willing to bet that easily half of those were for unique, single instance characters. Generic voices were problematic. But hey, I don't know, maybe all altmer, orsimer, dunmer, nord, argonian and khajiit just sound the same. Fallout has to be different. They can't have all humans sounding the same.

 

[Gikoku]

Eugh, I'm horribly late with all this but I'm sure you guys all saw them by now though (I hope). Still, I'm gonna post 'em anyway. Starting with the new Intelligence video:

SCIENCE! This just leaves two more videos left now with Agility & Luck soon. Personally I found the Charisma video to definitely be my favorite one thus far and I hope we can have goofy antics like it in the game (wake up drunk somewhere, fully looted). Aside from the Charisma video below, Bethesda also released a 20 minute (2-part) discussion panel on the game, with some new information released in it. One of the surprising takeaways from it was that you'll be able to program your own music for your settlement/home with the terminals with customizable pitch and timing. Like jingles for your town and such. Pretty awesome stuff.

S.P.E.C.I.A.L. Video Series: Charisma!
The Team Bringing Fallout 4 to Life: Part 1
The Team Bringing Fallout 4 to Life: Part 2

Sorry to bring up something that's already been discussed a month back; I keep remembering this through the day but forget about it when I come here.

On the voice acting, I hope they get everyone coordinated on how to say what. Skyrim fans saw a lot of inconsistencies with these things, which is fine if it's from an expendable insignificant nobody but key roles should at least know how to pronounce other key roles. Without any context, I'm just going to say a thing from Skyrim. Actually I'm not, I'm going to say it the way I say it whenever I think about it. I'm sure people will know exactly what I'm talking about and how it connects to this subject.

"I'm not madanamanak."

Ah, you mean like when characters say a person or place's name one way, but then a bunch elsewhere will say it incorrectly? Obsidian had done that with Fallout: New Vegas but the twist was that it was intentional and the characters in-game acknowledged that they weren't sure if they were pronouncing it right (e.g. the name Caesar: "Seezer/Kaizar"). Bethesda on the other hand I think just never cared enough to correct the inconsistencies, of which I really hope they learned from as well. Like I don't mind if a character mispronounces a word or key word, but at least have it make sense and acknowledged in game; such as a bum on the street that lacks education or a local who isn't familiar with the word because it originated from a different region.

As it would be in real life.

Agreed. I don't know if we have the numbers yet. Gikoku mentioned earlier that Skyrim had 70ish voice actors but I'd be willing to bet that easily half of those were for unique, single instance characters. Generic voices were problematic. But hey, I don't know, maybe all altmer, orsimer, dunmer, nord, argonian and khajiit just sound the same. Fallout has to be different. They can't have all humans sounding the same.

Yeah it was a bit over 70 voice actors, but Bethesda squandered it and used over half of them for unique one-off NPCs, worst yet when some of those NPCs would only have about 10-lines of dialogue and that was it. They didn't spread them out more and instead made the same mistake they did in Oblivion & FO3, where both of those games had 7 to 13 voice actors respectively and were stretched out across 200+ NPCs. 1 man should not be voicing the entire Khajiit race with the same exact voice (and tone) regardless if there's only 3 or 20 of them in the game.

So I really hope they learned their lesson with that. Plus it just ends up being a waste of money having all those fancy new voice actors, and then barely use them for anything. Even more so when those actors are capable of multiple voice types but are told to just do only one.

 

[Gikoku]

Agility next and this one was pretty interesting. I'd like to think we can finally interact with light sources for stealth advantages and it looks like NPCs can sneak up on us as well now? Hmm. Still getting my hopes up on if we can become ghouls or not in the game though, come on Bethesda. Only 1 video left next week with Luck, after that only 3 more weeks until release so it'll be interesting to see what they plan to fill in between that time. October 23rd (day the bombs dropped) is next Friday so we might get something there, hopefully some new gameplay at least.

Also, Bethesda released a 6K version of the perk poster image in case the 4K was too small for some people. All dat detail.

6K Perk Poster.

 

[Dark Drakan]

Everything seems useful and going to be a tough choice deciding what perks to go for and what to concentrate on first of all.