Fallout 3 (Xbox 360) review on HonestGamers

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Review by Felix Arabia
November 30, 2008

I feel like Charlie Kaufman in Adaptation. when he was trying to capture the beauty of ghost orchids for a screenplay. How, exactly, can I even begin to do Fallout 3 justice? It’s a large, lengthy game that has just a little bit of everything. It’s refined. It’s beautiful. It’s haunting, exciting, refreshing, and indelible. It begs you to reshape a desolate world for better or for worse. You’ll either be a savior or a sinner. And often that depends on whom you’re asking.

There isn’t one single event that I can clearly label as the game’s defining moment, but there is one segment early in the game that left me speechless. Upon entering a ramshackle town built alongside the impact crater of an undetonated nuke, I was given the choice of disarming the bomb or exploding it. Two sides tugged at my conscience, the consequences of my impending actions set to affect many. Would I act as a hero or a harbinger of death? Such decisions are surprisingly difficult to make.

Fallout 3 gives you many choices, and they all seem to affect your karma. Perform enough good deeds and your exploits will be known across the land. Do enough evil, and you’ll be loathed by many. Thankfully, there is just as much satisfaction in being good as there is for being evil. It’s really up to you and how you want to leave your mark on history. By the time I had completed Fallout 3, I had recovered important historical documents, helped refugees to find new homes, rescued enslaved innocents, and battled oppression at every turn. I wasn’t required to do any of it, but I did it out of kindness. I helped make the Capital Wasteland a better place, barring that town I blew up. Oops.

The Wasteland is the same kind of free-roaming world that Bethesda made popular with its Elder Scrolls titles. Unlike in Oblivion, however, there is a certain amount of polish that propels the world of Fallout 3 ahead of any other game I have ever experienced.

It is the year 2277. Two hundred years prior, humanity brought forth the rains of Armageddon. Nuclear devices wiped out most of humanity and left earth in a disarray of debris and radiation. Those who survived the initial fallout did so by living in protective vaults. You are a vault dweller, a man (or woman) who has never known life beyond the steel and concrete bowels of Vault 101. Your father is a scientist. Your mother died in childbirth. Even in this very small and familiar home, you’ve been destined from Day 1 to live a life of safety. Consider yourself lucky – such luxuries are rarely afforded in this day and age.

But as we should be accustomed to know by now, things aren’t always as they seem. Your father flees the vault, and you pursue him with questions racing in your mind. By no means, however, are you required to find him right away. After all, the Wasteland is a wild, expansive world set in and around the ruins of Washington D.C. Crumbling houses skirt the dilapidated roadways. Off into the distance are the remains of the United States of America’s capital. D.C. is remarkably well kept, considering the many megatons of nuclear death that must have rained atop it. We can even visit some of the city’s most familiar landmarks.

We’re often given little clues from the past. “Alaska Liberated! – Commies Crushed!” reads an old headline. There are allusions to a war with China. Knowledgeable characters give more detailed lessons over how things came to be, both across the globe and in the Wasteland. None of that really matters, though, as the past has turned into dark times. The Wasteland is a surprisingly dangerous realm. Super Mutants haunt the capital ruins while warring gangs of Raiders and Slavers make misery for all. They fight against the Brotherhood of Steel, and each other. It would seem that in spite of history humanity still hasn’t lost its love for war.

You’ll have to get your hands dirty, too. There are many places to visit in the Wasteland. Some are crawling with dangerous foes armed to the teeth. Unless you’re playing on an easy setting, they will have their way with you. It’s not sufficient to simply pull out a piece and haphazardly fire it. You’ll likely just waste ammo and lose health. The Vault-Tec Assisted Targeting System (VATS) turns the battle system into a more streamlined system of grit and gore. It allows you to specifically target an enemy’s region for a greater chance at success. Engagements suddenly become more tactical. No longer are you just firing like crazy in hopes of hitting something. Now you know the likelihood of a successful attack, and you get to see the combat from a more dynamic perspective.

Heads and limbs can be blown off, but that’s not even the worst of it. Radiation can turn your character into a mutated abomination. Drinking polluted water and wandering into particularly radioactive areas is just as bad as taking a bullet to the brain. You’ll need to heal your body, but you’ll also need to wipe away your radiation poisoning. This is by no means a tedious process. A quick trip to the local clinic, or popping the right pills, will set you straight. Just make sure you don’t gain an addiction.

My character became addicted to alcohol. When he couldn’t get a drop, he went through withdrawals. It was amusing. There are far worse things to get addicted to, such as chemical stimulants. You must always weigh the benefits of using such an item with the detriments associated with addiction. You don’t want to become a rabble. Or maybe you do. You’re given the freedom to do whatever.

There are many other activities that I could spend time describing, but for the sake of brevity I will only highlight the most important and interesting elements. If combat isn’t your forte, you can slink through the shadows with stealth. You can hack computers to make underground exploration easier, just as you can break past locks with bobby pins and a screwdriver. You can influence the actions of those who you come in contact with, coalescing them into seeing things your way or, at times, into doing your own dirty work. You can even create custom-made weapons.

All of these choices are yours for the taking. By no means are you obligated to undertake any of them, but the option is always there. Fallout 3 is a true marvel. It’s technically groundbreaking, but its intricacies should remain the envy of every video game developer for the foreseeable future. It must be incredibly difficult to create a world as engrossing as the Capital Wasteland. I can only imagine how much time and planning went into everything, from character dialogue to leveling up, combat and exploration.

Fallout 3 kept me entertained from the get-go with its immersive atmosphere and spellbinding aesthetics. Its profound level of interactivity and events will leave me coming back to the Wasteland many more times. Few places are more beautiful to behold in spite of their desolation, which reminds me of an interesting moment at the very beginning of the game.

As the opening movie begins, we hear an old jukebox emit the sorrowful crooning of a man not wanting to see the world on fire. The fires have been extinguished, but now we’re tasked with picking up the pieces. We will build a new world, a pure world. The Garden of Eden.

Rating
10	Brilliant Only a few games reach such lofty heights. This one is remarkable in most every way, and brilliantly executed.
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Game Profile & Content

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Staff Score (Avg): 10.0 User Score (Avg): 7.0 Press Score (Avg): 8.5
Reviews: 3 Guides: 0 Cheats: 0 Ratings: 8	High Scores: 0 Screenshots: 10 Videos: 0

Title: Fallout 3
Genre: First-Person RPG (Sci-Fi)
Publisher: Bethesda Softworks
Developer: Bethesda Softworks
Release Date: October 28, 2008
ESRB: M
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Platforms: PC, PS3, X360

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