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New Vegas & Fallout 4 - Good Writing = Great Immersion!
3 months ago
After fifteen years, I have finally finished New Vegas! The base game has great storytelling, worldbuilding and NPC character development, all of which is metered out simultaneously through effortless conversations that happen between the residents of the Mojave and the player piecing together the main mystery of the game; who shot and robbed you, and why?
In the years playing this game, New Vegas taught me many lessons. It showed me that there was power in empathy and understanding, that diplomacy and working with disparate groups of people is worthwhile. That there is humour even in very serious situations, and that humour can actually make the storytelling more impactful. But one of the most important things it showed me was how good writing can really cement in immersion.
A few years ago, I was chatting with someone on Bluesky about New Vegas. They disliked the game, from the repair and maintenance of equipment to the characters and story. They liked Fallout 4 more, and asked me why it was a worse game. The question is wrong, though. Fallout 4 is a good game, and New Vegas isn't flawless. But its strengths outshine its weaknesses, and the things it does well it does markedly better than Fallout 4.
What New Vegas really does very well is immersion through interaction with the NPCs. The characters really come alive in how they speak about themselves and the surrounding world. It really feels like they live in the Mojave desert. They offer specific directions or make reference to surrounding landmarks that accurately describe the environment. They have realistic and understandable concerns about food, safety, security, relationships with other characters, etc. They make reference to things happening around them, and their dialogue changes depending on your actions. The Mojave desert feels alive thanks to its writing and the thoughtful attention to detail with dialogue changing depending on player action.
Fallout 4 struggles in this area. Bethesda's senior writer and designer for Fallout 4, Emil Pagliarulo, has described his philosophy when it comes to writing, and it isn't one I understand at all. As he said, "you can spend so much time writing wonderful stories and then have to watch as players tear out the pages to make paper airplanes instead of reading them." To him, the player will not engage in the story as intended. The end result of this perspective seems to be ... carelessness, I think? Let me explain.
In New Vegas, you can engage with a cool story or kill everyone. Your choice. Fallout 4, essential characters are invincible. There's a bartender who is procedurally generated to appear in one of several locations on the map. Why is he doing this? He just wanted to be a bartender. Why did he choose the random spot he spawns? No reason! There's no logical reason for him to appear where he does. He isn't safe, there isn't road traffic to make his choice viable. It's a thoughtless choice that impacts the immersion of the game. Why are there vendors in the 188 in New Vegas? Because there's constant traffic there. They even have soldiers guarding it. It makes sense.
Back to Fallout 4, there's Billy, the Pre-War ghoul child who has been trapped in a refrigerator for two hundred years. First, a ghoul needs food and water to survive. They aren't immortal; they're just hardier. Second, someone would not be okay after two centuries locked in a fridge. I don't even want to imagine what would happen to someone with that length of isolation, but I suspect this quest would be closer to Stephen King's [url=https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_JauntThe Jaunt[/url] than a hokey take on Lassie saving Timmy from a well. Third, someone else would have come along already and let Billy out and/or killed him. The writing for this quest introduces dissonance in the worldbuilding that frustrates immersion. It could be easily fixed by having Billy RECENTLY getting stuck and then rescued by the player. But also, maybe don't have Billy's parents live right beside a Gunner stronghold? Again, the characters need to feel like they live in the world. Two ghoul farmers aren't going to stick around an area crawling with unstable mercenaries.
Also, let's talk about the Gunners. They're boring. They're a massive private mercenary organization that seems to exist for no reason. How can they have enough contracts to remain viable? These are not questions that occur to me when I play New Vegas because every faction has a pretty clear means of self-sustaining; they all fulfill functions to accomplish their own objectives. The Crimson Caravan transports stuff for profit, the NCR taxes and annexes to support its own growth, Mr. House collects revenue from the Strip to fuel his plans, the Vipers ambush travelers to steal stuff, the Legion pillages towns to demoralize the NCR and make their expansion West easier ... all the groups have a reason and a means to exist.
Why do the Gunners exist? What purpose do they serve, other than as fodder for the player? None. What goals do they have, other than to sit around in their strongholds and act as the occasional mercenary or raider of a player settlement? None. They're boring. They're the Talon Company from Fallout 3 again. They're a poor excuse for writing. They're another example of mediocrity and poorly thought out factions that frustrates immersion in Fallout 4.
Fallout 4 is at its strongest when it comes to building settlements. At the end of New Vegas, General Lee Oliver can challenge the player if they take the Independence path by claiming that the Courier has no idea how to run a nation. Setting up caravans, training troops? These are not things the Courier does, and the conclusion of the Independence ending is a more chaotic Mojave as a result.
But what are you doing in Fallout 4? Establishing settlements, setting up caravans, training (well, assigning) Minutemen troops. Fallout 4 gives the player a go at building a united Commonwealth, sort of. It answers the challenge of General Lee Oliver of the NCR, and that's pretty neat.
Fallout 4 is a good game, but its character and worldbuilding at a script level leaves a lot to be desired, which really impacts its immersion.
This has been my TED talk, thank you. :P
In the years playing this game, New Vegas taught me many lessons. It showed me that there was power in empathy and understanding, that diplomacy and working with disparate groups of people is worthwhile. That there is humour even in very serious situations, and that humour can actually make the storytelling more impactful. But one of the most important things it showed me was how good writing can really cement in immersion.
A few years ago, I was chatting with someone on Bluesky about New Vegas. They disliked the game, from the repair and maintenance of equipment to the characters and story. They liked Fallout 4 more, and asked me why it was a worse game. The question is wrong, though. Fallout 4 is a good game, and New Vegas isn't flawless. But its strengths outshine its weaknesses, and the things it does well it does markedly better than Fallout 4.
What New Vegas really does very well is immersion through interaction with the NPCs. The characters really come alive in how they speak about themselves and the surrounding world. It really feels like they live in the Mojave desert. They offer specific directions or make reference to surrounding landmarks that accurately describe the environment. They have realistic and understandable concerns about food, safety, security, relationships with other characters, etc. They make reference to things happening around them, and their dialogue changes depending on your actions. The Mojave desert feels alive thanks to its writing and the thoughtful attention to detail with dialogue changing depending on player action.
Fallout 4 struggles in this area. Bethesda's senior writer and designer for Fallout 4, Emil Pagliarulo, has described his philosophy when it comes to writing, and it isn't one I understand at all. As he said, "you can spend so much time writing wonderful stories and then have to watch as players tear out the pages to make paper airplanes instead of reading them." To him, the player will not engage in the story as intended. The end result of this perspective seems to be ... carelessness, I think? Let me explain.
In New Vegas, you can engage with a cool story or kill everyone. Your choice. Fallout 4, essential characters are invincible. There's a bartender who is procedurally generated to appear in one of several locations on the map. Why is he doing this? He just wanted to be a bartender. Why did he choose the random spot he spawns? No reason! There's no logical reason for him to appear where he does. He isn't safe, there isn't road traffic to make his choice viable. It's a thoughtless choice that impacts the immersion of the game. Why are there vendors in the 188 in New Vegas? Because there's constant traffic there. They even have soldiers guarding it. It makes sense.
Back to Fallout 4, there's Billy, the Pre-War ghoul child who has been trapped in a refrigerator for two hundred years. First, a ghoul needs food and water to survive. They aren't immortal; they're just hardier. Second, someone would not be okay after two centuries locked in a fridge. I don't even want to imagine what would happen to someone with that length of isolation, but I suspect this quest would be closer to Stephen King's [url=https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_JauntThe Jaunt[/url] than a hokey take on Lassie saving Timmy from a well. Third, someone else would have come along already and let Billy out and/or killed him. The writing for this quest introduces dissonance in the worldbuilding that frustrates immersion. It could be easily fixed by having Billy RECENTLY getting stuck and then rescued by the player. But also, maybe don't have Billy's parents live right beside a Gunner stronghold? Again, the characters need to feel like they live in the world. Two ghoul farmers aren't going to stick around an area crawling with unstable mercenaries.
Also, let's talk about the Gunners. They're boring. They're a massive private mercenary organization that seems to exist for no reason. How can they have enough contracts to remain viable? These are not questions that occur to me when I play New Vegas because every faction has a pretty clear means of self-sustaining; they all fulfill functions to accomplish their own objectives. The Crimson Caravan transports stuff for profit, the NCR taxes and annexes to support its own growth, Mr. House collects revenue from the Strip to fuel his plans, the Vipers ambush travelers to steal stuff, the Legion pillages towns to demoralize the NCR and make their expansion West easier ... all the groups have a reason and a means to exist.
Why do the Gunners exist? What purpose do they serve, other than as fodder for the player? None. What goals do they have, other than to sit around in their strongholds and act as the occasional mercenary or raider of a player settlement? None. They're boring. They're the Talon Company from Fallout 3 again. They're a poor excuse for writing. They're another example of mediocrity and poorly thought out factions that frustrates immersion in Fallout 4.
Fallout 4 is at its strongest when it comes to building settlements. At the end of New Vegas, General Lee Oliver can challenge the player if they take the Independence path by claiming that the Courier has no idea how to run a nation. Setting up caravans, training troops? These are not things the Courier does, and the conclusion of the Independence ending is a more chaotic Mojave as a result.
But what are you doing in Fallout 4? Establishing settlements, setting up caravans, training (well, assigning) Minutemen troops. Fallout 4 gives the player a go at building a united Commonwealth, sort of. It answers the challenge of General Lee Oliver of the NCR, and that's pretty neat.
Fallout 4 is a good game, but its character and worldbuilding at a script level leaves a lot to be desired, which really impacts its immersion.
This has been my TED talk, thank you. :P
There is one extra piece of criticism I have for Fallout 4 that not too many people seem to talk about and it's that it doesn't feel as dour as the other games. Don't get me wrong, it has plenty of carnage and all, but it doesn't have that same vibe. That sense of hopelessness in the air (aside from the Glowing Sea of course). For instance, water used to be a big deal in Fallout 3 and New Vegas, but now it's not an obstacle anymore since it seems every settlement has some sort of source (whether it's a pump or purifier), nerfing a lot of that desperation from the world.
Fallout 4's Far Harbor DLC was the best part of the game hands down. You really felt it and the factions on that island really do feel like they're alive, all with their own personal grievances and flaws.
I love the Fallout games to no end, but New Vegas definitely reigns supreme when it comes to writing and ambience.
I thought playing Fallout 4 with survival mode brought back a bit of the feeling you were describing, but once you got to a high enough level the game just stopped being challenging.
I think the next time I play Fallout 4, I'm going to opt out of base building and Minutemen questline completely (well aside from what's asked of you anyway and Home Plate at Diamond City). Just to see if it actually makes a difference.