Just as the union of Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie has produced what will surely become stunningly beautiful offspring, two critically acclaimed role-playing game franchises are blending their DNA into a title that’s shaping up to be a contender for the best game of 2008.
Bethesda Softworks’ Fallout 3, set for release this October on the Xbox 360, PlayStation 3 and PC, will combine the darkly humourous post-World War III setting of Interplay’s old-school PC games Fallout and Fallout 2 with the presentation and sugar-sweet visuals seen in Bethesda’s own The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion.
It’s a match made in heaven, even if it takes place in a nuked-out world that’s just this side of hell.
At the E3 Media and Business Summit in Los Angeles last week, I spent half an hour going hands-on with Fallout 3, barely scratching the surface of its potential 100-plus hour duration. As they say, the first taste is free.
So it begins
My Fallout 3 experience began at the point in the game when your character is about to leave Vault 101, a nuke-proof underground city, for the first time in his life. Bethesda asked us not to reveal who you’re searching for when you head out into the ruins of post-apocalyptic Washington, D.C., but the impetus behind your departure from the safety of the Vault will be a very interesting main quest thread to follow.
After my eyes adjusted to the brightness of the world beyond the massive Vault door, I headed down the shattered, weed-choked remains of what would have been a street in suburban D.C., taking in the eerie sights of gutted houses and rusted swingsets. It’s a hardscrabble life beyond the shelter of the Vaults, but there are still surface settlements here and there, and even some semblance of organized government.
I could hear Battle Hymn of the Republic playing from a tinny speaker somewhere up ahead, and in the distance a government-controlled eyebot floated into view. I wasn’t sure whether these round, hovering robots were hostile, but I took no chances: I drew my pistol and started blasting away at an antenna-like appendage labelled “combat inhibitor” on the eyebot.
My shots destroyed the inhibitor and the eyebot went nuts, opening fire on a hapless caravan guard who had wandered into view. The guard returned fire and destroyed the robot, saving me the trouble and potential danger of taking the thing on myself. Hey, works for me.
And that was just the first five minutes of the game. Over the remaining 25 minutes of the too-short demo, I visited the walled shantytown of Megaton and made a deal with the mayor to disarm the unexploded nuke at the centre of town. (Fans of Oblivion will find the game’s dialogue system immediately familiar.)
Combat system
But I knew that would be a long and convoluted task, so I headed back into the wasteland to get accustomed to Fallout 3’s combat system, which gives you the option to freeze the action and target specific parts of your enemies. During one battle with a vicious dog, I pulled off a lucky headshot that gruesomely separated the canine’s cranium from the rest of its body. Down, boy!
A few minutes later, I came across a relatively intact home and met its occupant, a working girl named Silver. She was worried about her former employer in Megaton tracking her down and doing her harm, so I told her I’d find him and convince him to leave her alone — for a fee, of course.
By this point my demo time was up, and I reluctantly put down the controller. Half an hour was only enough to get the briefest feel for the game, but I’ll wager that Fallout 3 ends up being a nuclear-powered time-suck like no other. Bring on the end of the world.
