Recent content by Bernard Bumner's corpse

I am a long way past hoping that the game will be satisfying in the way that the first two were, but I had hoped that they would learn something from the narrative success of the New Vegas writing. I worry that they are focusing too much on crafting mechanics suited to sandbox games, but...

Why does it need to be immortal? Simply because the lack of tactical control and stupid AI makes it difficult for NCPs to survive the twitch combat? What peril is there? What can I lose? The structured narrative of Mass Effect only worked because there were unavoidable losses of generally...

I'm not sure that we disagree. There is more rubbish (because the resources required to independently publish are fewer, and the barriers are low), but of the small percentage which are good, those disproportionately represent novelty and quality in the market. I also agree about the...

It speaks of a real lack of confidence in their project that the core ideas being carried over to (recycled by) the next installment are narrative, whereas the mechanics and essential structure are rehashed from the latest big thing. It is an incredibly conservative approach with only a gloss of...

Everything we've seen so far suggests that the game will offer less than or as little meaningful choice as F3. Voiced protagonist, essential/immortal NPCs, binary factions, and an on-rails narrative. It is amazing that Bethesda can spend so much time hyping the open world, the crafting...

Realism is probably the wrong word, but plausibility is certainly required, and I'm sure is what people are getting at. I don't think anyone expects the world to be fully realised, but it does need to make more sense. The F3 world was often a theme-park confection of distinctive and separate...

I can't really agree that they are living like barbarians - they are farmers, doing as well as other small communities, until the drought. Small farming communities still exist in this modern age of metropolitan urbanisation. And many consciously reject the most obvious trappings of...

As the Wanderer wrote in his memoirs: The tribal garb could (presumably) be an affectation - a symbol of the Wanderer's rejection of his jumpsuit. Equally, there is no "regression" - Arroyo is a simple farming/hunting community, albeit with a strong religious/superstitious bent and an...

Fair enough. But I would definitely argue that the combat experience was more fun than the dialogue, just because everything wanted to kill you anyway. You can't have a meaningful discussion with pop-gun targets.

Did you find that play style even remotely satisfyingly? Personally, I found the non-violent solutions were often underwritten, but in any case, you couldn't really avoid combat in the wastes. I thought that the peaceful game barely worked.

I meant that the gameplay was pointlessly macho; everything solved by blowing eyeballs and brains out.

Looking for Dadda wasn't quite the problem - the problem was that F3 was the very straight narrative of a hero (or even less satisfyingly, of a cartoon villain, until the end). F1 was the story of a reluctant hero who ultimately learns that the whole world has gone to shit, and cannot really...

Macho, brash, aggressive, full of unjustified self-confidence, but ultimately single-note, superficial, and intellectually unfulfilling. Also a description of F3 upon replay.

I spent a lot of time here (as a non-corpse) waiting-and-seeing before the release of F3 - the early analysis by longer-serving regulars proved to be very close to the mark, and from the point of earliest teases. My optimism was not well-rewarded, even if I managed to be basically entertained by...

NV proved that there were new stories of the wasteland to be told, not just of Vault dwellers. I sincerely hope that this won't just be a retread of that old ground, but the trailer suggests otherwise. F3 was entertaining, but massively flawed and without much replay value (for me, anyway). NV...