Post-apocalyptic America has never looked this beautiful. Fallout 4 is the return of the iconic sci-fi world of Fallout. The game is a first person/third person shooter, open-world exploration video game with Role Playing Game (RPG) mechanics.
Fallout 4 takes place 200 years after nuclear bombs fell on the world. Luckily, the player’s character was signed up for one of the many shelters known as the Vaults in Boston. The player is frozen in the Vault and escapes 200 years later only to emerge and find a transformed Boston wasteland, known as the Commonwealth.
First off, the game looks gorgeous. It was not realistic in terms of graphics, but they were still detailed. In-game Boston had remnants of colorful townhouses and landmarks such as Bunker Hill. The creatures and people who roamed the world were clear byproducts of the wasteland. Raiders, scavengers, mutated beasts, and even scientific experiments gone wrong roam the Commonwealth, each with their own unique looks and attention to detail. Everything from the armor they wore to their irradiated bodies were filled to the brim with details.
Calling on the more recent first-person shooter genre, Fallout 4 takes inspiration from those and implements them fantastically into the game. Controls were tight and shooting/melee combat felt visceral and fantastic. The RPG elements are not new to the Fallout series, with “perks” or abilities being taken at every level that change the way you play. Armor and weapons can be modified and tweaked, giving you a wide range of customization and playstyle.
Fallout 4 introduces a new system for the series known as Settlements, which are safe havens that can be customized and built from the ground up. These Settlements are a fantastic way to show off one’s creativity by creating their post apocalyptic dream base.
Exploring post-apocalyptic Boston was a daunting but extremely rewarding task, as finding rare weapons and quests on your own was amazingly satisfying. Through this exploring, you will find the game is split between a main storyline and side quests. The main storyline has never been Fallout’s strong suit, but this is probably the strongest the story has ever been, with interesting characters and a massive mystery to solve.
There are plenty of amazing moments with grand explosions and places to see. The side quests and exploration is what Fallout 4 is all about: the idea of crafting your own story, your own experience. Some of the best moments for me consisted of just finding something interesting while exploring and discovering bigger things at the end.
Fallout 4 is not without its flaws. One is that it is the most streamlined out of the entire franchise, which can be seen as either good or bad. I saw it as bad: too much streamlining and editing of gameplay mechanics. The game is riddled with glitches, some of which are game-breaking ones. Characters get stuck in walls, characters do not move when they need to, dialogue is cut off, and there is some crashing or freezing during gameplay.
Nonetheless, Fallout 4 is an amazing addition, and I highly recommend it to anyone wanting to enter the franchise. In the week after it came out, I spent 41 hours of my week on this game. I urge anyone to step into this game to see what the Boston wasteland has to offer.
Fallout 4 is available for PC, PS4, and XBOX One.
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