Fallout 76 feels like two different games



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Screenshot: Kotaku (Fallout 76)

There is a lot of tension in Fallout 76 between the lonely past of the series and its new multiplayer future. During the four hours that I spent in the beta version of the game last night, these two parts of the game have repeatedly clashed uncomfortably. I can not imagine how they can be reconciled.

Fallout 76 On the day of recovery, I started getting out of the vault of the game in a small part of the irradiated waste land of West Virginia. The overseer of the vault ordered me to take over the country and rebuild the civilization. I was immediately surrounded by other players, often with ridiculous names floating over their heads, awkwardly shaking this or that way. Our numbers quickly dwindled as we departed from this starting point, looking for better loot. By the time I walked out of the nearest work table with a makeshift pistol and a wooden board at my disposal, I felt completely alone. Not only alone in a normal player Fall way: Fallout 76 does not have NPCs. I've met my fair share of ghouls, mutants, mole-rats and quest-givers, but that was all. The parts of West Virginia that I managed to visit in the limited time I had with the beta were mostly empty and abandoned, filled only with the occasional buzz of old radios or the occasional sound of guns running off.

I spent most of my time following the railroad heading east as they weaved their way between the small riverside towns. Searching desert for quality equipment, such as laser guns and protective armor, has always been Bethesda's focus. Fall games but Fallout 76 takes it to a new level with its deep manufacturing systems. Anything that can be collected in the world, from wild herbs to metal jars, can be turned into useful materials on one of the hidden craft benches around the world. Raw foods can be seasoned and cooked to improve their nutritional value. Weapons can be repaired and ammunition can be made. Old clothes can be broken down into the raw materials needed to assemble something more protective.

The game map shows the location of other players, quests and points of interest. The places you have already visited can be quickly visited at a price.
Screenshot: Kotaku (Fallout 76)

I went to all the buildings I could find, filling my pockets with all the trash inside: old magazines, board games, kitchen utensils, skis, divers, mugs, flowerpots , pencils. From time to time, I would go around in a dresser and find some useful things, like the hairpins needed to pick locks, but most of the time it was junk food. This junk is the blood of the life of Fallout 76. That's how you build not only your own equipment, but also entire buildings, which can be used as personal safes to spend the night safely and store your valuables to make room in your pockets for even more waste. .

It's also what you lose when you die, whether in the hands of an enemy controlled by the AI ​​or another player. Other players can plunder your leftovers and take the tea cups or metal plates you left behind. Anything that has been hidden in your base or turned into raw craft materials is safe, but you are encouraged to plan your trips accordingly.

You can also exchange your trash with other players, in addition to finished weapons, armor, etc. Some of the people I stumbled on offered to trade with me via emotes (although voice chat is also an option), but as we had just started the game, our stocks seemed to be most identical. Nuka Cola capsules can be exchanged for robots in general stores around the world. I gave it about 40 for three hairpins, which I then broke at the locked door of a cafeteria of a nearby school.

The upgrade revolves around Perk cards that can be earned or bundled. As you can mix and match them on the fly, the character creator for Fallout 76 looks much smoother than in previous games.
Screenshot: Kotaku (Fallout 76)

My long walks in the beautiful autumn foliage of the Appalachians, which sometimes included running towards mysterious PUBGThis kind of refueling, I end up giving myself enough wood, concrete and other resources to build a cabin. This can be done near specially designated craft benches, which can only be occupied by one player at a time. My cabin was on a solid base and had four walls and a ceiling. I hung up the lights, added a small table with a radio on top and created a sentinel UAV to monitor the large opening where I had tried but failed to build a door. (The objects are made from a list and can be placed in places where they appear in green – while the system was simple to use, I found the details of the installation of & # 39; An elusive door.) I added a mattress to the floor and then slept for one night. a few minutes to recover the health of my character. The first stage of recovery was complete.

Then, after leaving my new home, someone shot me. I tried to retaliate, but – this part will probably not be surprising-Fallout 76The combat system is incredibly awkward. This is enough to deal with ghouls or even mutants, whose limited artificial intelligence makes them easy targets. In fact, the rigidity of the aim and the long reloading time of the first rifles of the game suggest that everything can kill you at any time and that you should probably just go back to hide in the safe. However, when you are forced to exchange jokes with other players, the difficulty of aiming and the time between the moment you press the shutter button and a ball leaving the room can be frustrating.

Fallout 76The VATS system is unique. In practice, this simply allows you to spend a little stamina to deploy an aimbot for a few shots. This no longer slows down time because it is on a live server with other players. And although its new feature seems like a sensible compromise, I found it often heavier and more distracting than trying to shoot normally at my target, even if it did not seem to work either. Serious frame rate issues did not help either. As this is a beta version, the finished game is likely to vary, but at least from my experience last night, whenever too many players have come together, the game's performance has took a shot. I did not encounter any bug or weird problem, but I struggled to shoot accurately, even on immobile targets when the game started bumping.

With beautiful environments and an amazing soundtrack, Fallout 76The general mood often reminded me of There will be blood that's a satirical MMO.
Screenshot: Kotaku (Fallout 76)

When someone kills you in Fallout 76 they become outlaws. The game puts their head at a price and telegraphs their transgressions to the rest of the players on the server. The game also offers you the opportunity to get in touch with them to try to get revenge rather than at your last checkpoint. I tried to avenge myself every time, even though it often ended in my own death. Even at the end of the world Fallout 76 it is easy to cure grudges. Even a few hours later, the match was live, it was clear that a hierarchy was starting to collapse around the guns, and my lock guns were not effective.

This is the other side of Fallout 76, a semi-illegal state of affairs where people with the biggest sticks and the most junk set the tone. As the consequences of killing or being killed are not very heavy, life did not seem to be mean, brutal and brief. But it reminded me that unlike previous games, Fallout 76The world does not belong to me, it is the cumulative effect of my actions and those of 23 other people. Where games like Destiny 2 close the competition in specific modes, Fallout 76 set him free on the whole world. I have no idea what kinds of standards, communities, and memes will take shape and govern the game after its release in November, but it seems that their existence, for better or for worse, will be inevitable.

Fallout 76 has his own main story and his quests which consist in trying to find the Vault 76 supervisor and to learn more about his history through recordings scattered in West Virginia. Exploring these places on my own, the game was even more convincing than the previous ones. The immersive fantasy, no matter how long it lasted, was finally broken by forces beyond my control: timed public quest notifications appeared on my screen, other players went wild on the battlefields where I was content to sneak in, someone walking near me a party hat, airmen and a policeman's uniform. It looked like two games, each potentially big in itself, competing rather than complimenting each other. Only time will tell who will win.

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