Ain’t THIS a kick in the head.
You could say I’m a pretty big fan of the Fallout franchise. I’ve played almost all the games in the series including Tactics and Brotherhood of Steel. I’ve always enjoyed the stories and lore they told and found them to be very fun, mature RPGs. When Bethesda announced Fallout 76, I’ll be honest, I wasn’t really feeling the idea of a multiplayer focused Fallout game. I always enjoyed the single player aspect to them and I felt that throwing other players into the mix and allowing them to possibly attack me wasn’t what I was looking for. Since I reviewed New Vegas and Fallout 4, my Editor-In-Chief thought that it would be best to review Fallout 76. Of course, I am willing to give anything a try and I went into it with an open mind. Unfortunately, an open mind wasn’t going to help out in a lot of this.
Players create their own Vault Dweller fresh out of the underground from Vault 76. Vault-Tec created 76 and other vaults to be one of the few vaults to open the earliest. It’s been only 25 years since the bombs fell on the United States and players emerge to see the recent aftermath of the nuclear attacks. Vault 76 was located in West Virginia so the entire map is all part of Appalachia. Players are tasked with exploring and settling the now abandoned and hostile area and locating their vault’s Overseer.
Platforms: PS4, XB1, PC
MSRP: $59.99
Price I’d pay: $20 and I’d still wait
Fallout 76 is essentially the Fallout MMO. Players are dropped into a world with other players and are allowed to party up with them to complete quests or decide to take them on and try to attack them to take their loot. This is the main draw of the game, because not playing with other people can really show just how empty Fallout 76 really is. In other Fallout games, I was always finding new places to explore and I wanted to explore them because I never knew what was there. In Fallout 76, I know what’s there – a bunch of enemies to kill. You see, Fallout 76 is missing a very important thing that was in all the other games, NPCs. Since there are no NPCs, there really isn’t a safe place. When I walked into a town or settlement in other games, I could feel a little relaxed and possibly talk to someone that could give me a clue or quest to do. In 76, I get most of my quests from holo-tapes or computer terminals, most of which resulted in destination or fetch quests. Because I’m not doing these quests for anyone, it feels almost like an empty reason for doing anything.
Combat in 76 is much like Fallout 4’s system with one major change – since this is an always online game, when using VATS, time no longer slows down. Instead, VATS now is used for more accurate shots with the percentage, but because it doesn’t slow down time to allow me to choose my shots, it feels awkward especially if I’m using VATS to aim at a melee attacker. It’s hard to figure out the best course of action when I’m getting mauled to death. The issue is, the standard real-time aiming isn’t great either. It feels almost like a dice roll for each shot I take and in a more action-y game like this, dice roll attacks just aren’t great or satisfying in the bit. I would have just stick with melee weapons, but I’m always going to run into those enemies that are ranged attackers so I was eventually forced to use ranged weapons for attacking.
The new S.P.E.C.I.A.L. stats and Perk system are actually one of the few things I enjoyed the most about 76. When players level up, they gain a point that they can put into their S.P.E.C.I.A.L stats. At certain levels, they gain a Perk Pack. Perks now come in the form of cards that have a point value attributed to them. So let’s say I have a perk that I want to use that is in the Perception stat. It’s a level 2 card. I must have at least two points in Perception to use that card as a perk. On top of that, instead of using a level 2 card, I could use two level 1 cards in Perception instead. It allows for some fine tuning and nice combinations. Some may be wondering, if they are charging real money for better perk cards are card packs. So far, I haven’t seen that in the in-game store and hopefully, it won’t happen. After level 50, players will stop earning S.P.E.C.I.A.L points, but will continue earning perk cards through consecutive levels.
Much like Fallout 4, 76 has a large emphasis on crafting and collecting materials. Players can still modify, repair, and create new weapons and armor as well as set up a C.A.M.P. C.A.M.P. serves a lot like the settlements in Fallout 4. Players can craft their own structures, workbenches, and items to create their very own home away from home. Players can establish a C.A.M.P. and decide to move it at the click of a button. It’s all well and good, but I found that there really was no need for one in the long run due to fast travel being so cheap and finding workbenches and beds to rest in pretty much everywhere.
I mentioned a little bit earlier, but there is an in-game store known as the Atomic Shop. Here, players can spend their atomic points earned to purchase cosmetic items like new outfits or paints for different things including their C.A.M.P. this allows for even more customization. Atomic points are earned by completing certain objectives like killing a number of enemies in a location or crafting a certain amount of an item. Think of them like little challenges that give small achievement points that can be used to spend on cosmetic items.
The multiplayer feels a bit like Elder Scrolls Online. When partied up with other players, it feels more like a companion system rather than an actual party. I would be on the exact same quest as my party member and we would both still have to do the beginning and ends of the quest individually. So, I was on a quest to join the Fire Breathers. I had to enter a cave, fight off some enemies, activate a beacon, and then return to the surface. My co-op partner had the exact same mission to do. Well, we went down into the cave fought off all the enemies, and I activated the beacon. After making it to the surface, my co-op partner realized that when I hit the button for the beacon, it didn’t count for them. Guess what we had to do all over again? That’s right. Only to press the button I had already pressed while in a party with them. This kind of system makes it feel like there’s no point in forming a party to begin with. The PvP feels slightly swayed as well. Non-provoked attacks begin at a very reduced damage and only initiate a fight if the attacked fights back. If the player kills another they are marked with a bounty and every other player in the world can see them as such on the map and try to kill them for rewards. So attacking outright is really frowned upon in 76, and for the most part, most everyone I ran into was doing their own thing minding their own business, and that’s what most of my time boiled down to: a multiplayer game where most everyone wanted to play it solo.
Although, with an empty world and multiplayer that really doesn’t need to be here, the biggest issue I had with Fallout 76 is the bugs. Yes, we all know the Bethesda joke of bugs and features and the like, but Fallout 76 has some of the worst bugs I have seen in their games. Bugs that has the environment blinking in and out of existence and the game straight up freezing on me to the point I had to turn it off and restart. One fun anecdote I have was close to the beginning of the game, I had to sign up for volunteer work at a computer terminal in a church. I went to the church, found the terminal, and saw there was one player on the computer using it, another player waiting in line to use it, and me.
First off, why do we have to wait in line to use a computer in a video game? Anyway, when it came to my turn to use the computer, the small transition to first person view to the computer screen locked my body in place. I wasn’t able to interact on the computer at all, and I wasn’t able to leave the computer. Eventually, I received a PlayStation message from a person telling me to get off the computer. There was another guy waiting to use the computer and since I saw stuck there, I had to log out of the game and restart it. The game just runs like garbage at times with tons of slow down, environment issues, and bad programming. This feels like a game that is not complete and it really shows.
The progression system and the lore and back story it presents are really its only good attributes. The combat feels clunky and unresponsive; the world feels empty due to no NPCs; it ruins the fun of exploration and discovery; and the multiplayer is vague and simplified to the point that most people I have run into in the wasteland didn’t even want to play with other players. I’m a big fan of Fallout games mainly due to the choices and story presented, and Fallout 76 removes most of that and wastes its great lore on a multiplayer focused game where no one is really participating. Combine that with some of the worst bugs and performance issues I have seen in a Bethesda game, and this has quickly become one game that people will more than likely need to steer clear from for a nice long while.
Maybe they can turn this game around. Maybe they can fix the bugs, add some actual life into the world, and make it to where playing with friends is more than just a co-op buddy. They did a lot for Elder Scrolls Online, maybe they can do it here, but I’ll be the first to tell you to wait until that happens before taking these country roads home.
Review copy of game provided by publisher.
