Saturday, November 14, 2015
Fallout 4? No, Witcher 3!
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Welcome back to Coffeecola!
So, that Fallout 4, right???
Yeah, not so much. I have a copy of it here, and while I wouldn't say I was overly hyped for it before release, I'm definitely a Fallout fan... Fallout 3 was really good, and New Vegas was one of my all-time faves. I was in the market for more Fallout.
Then I started playing it, and it lost me in a hurry.
Real talk: the beginning is pretty awful. Events happen too quick for my taste, and the opening 'motivation' is cheap and distasteful. Once I got into the game proper, the writing was dull, the quests were dull, and the emphasis on crafting is something that I'm not really interested in at this point. The interface for building structures was abysmal, as well.
My playtime is pretty limited these days, so picking up a bajillion pieces of junk and spending an hour trying to mod a random handgun or combing the wasteland for roofing materials just isn't what I want my focus on in a game of this type. I put about four hours into it, and then I shelved it.
I really doubt I'm gonna come back to it anytime soon, but a side effect of being disappointed in Fallout 4 is that it lit a fire under me to return to The Witcher 3 to wrap it up.
The last time I went riding with Geralt was around June or so, so it's been about six months, give or take. At the point where I quit, I had put in 60 hours and had made it to Skellige, but burnout was hitting me pretty hard. It was just way too much content, but ironically, it was content I didn't want to skip. The writing was great, the quests were interesting... It was physically impossible for me to not do them, but it's got to be one of the most content-heavy games I've ever played.
There's. Just. So. Much. To. Get. Through. (And that's not even counting the map icons, monster quests, treasure hunts and all the other minor stuff!) Anyway, I decided the time was right so I fired it back up and... I had no friggin' idea what was going on. I mean, Yennefer wanted me to do something that I didn't remember anything about, I lost the main plot thread, and I had forgotten most of the systems in the game.
Putting the search for Ciri on hold, I fumbled around with the controls for a bit and decided to clean up some of the secondary quests that were left hanging as a warmup exercise.
Thankfully, I got back into the groove pretty quick, and my time away from the game reminded me of why I liked it so much in the first place. I'm glad I came back.
That said, I wish the devs had structured the adventure a bit differently... It would be great to have more emphasis on the main quest and to have left most of the secondary stuff for after credits roll.
A big problem for me was that I didn't know what quests would fail if I didn't do them, and their general quality is so high that major FOMO kept hitting me every time I felt like I needed to critpath it. Knowing that I could focus on the central plot without fear of losing content would have helped stave off exhaustion, for sure.
In any event, it's good to be back in The Witcher and I'm really hoping to close the book on it. And hey, who knows... I may even pop for that DLC!
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Posts
This is the reason i miss "mid-tier' games like Psi-ops: The Mindgate Conspiracy, and such of its ilk. This "AAA" or bust mindset has really soured me on games. Being in my mid-30's with a full-time job and a family, it is a miracle in itself finding time to switch on a console. It doesn't hep that the experience does not even begin immediately as you have to download umpteen patches to get the the game. Thank you for the Vita.
As a general rule of thumb, I'm not keen on crafting and scavenging. Upgrading is enough. Hoping that it won't be brought into the new Deus Ex.
Quite fascinating the unpredictable quality of big budget games, especially with regards to campaign vs open-world wandering. Before The Witcher 3 was released and other games like AC were filling maps up with collectables and side missions, I made the point that these games needed to focus more on 2-3 semi-main quests that surround the main quest as enjoyable campaigns on their own and complemented the main story, with collectibles most likely to be found while completing those quests.
For me personally, it's just more fuel to look for more single player campaign games. Like Morgan above, I too am in a full-time job and don't have the time available I once used to.
Morgan> Dude, I was ALL about mid-tier. Many of my faves are in the category. And yeah.. time is SO precious these days with a job, family, responsibilites to Gamecritics, etc... Pretty rare for me to really dig HUGE games these days.
Nerves> AGREE
Warstub> Agree with your points. A map full of bullshit collect-a-thons just ain't gonna get it done any more. The wicther has really raised the bar for future games IMO.