Fallout 76 Review

Fallout 76 on PlayStation 4

Fallout 76 is not an inherently bad game. Sometimes it gives a glimpse of what makes the Fallout series one of my personal favorites as I wander through his vast world, not knowing what I would find in Charlestown's tall skyscrapers or the quagmire marshy east of the map.

But then you start suffering from dehydration, contract parasites (which make a figure on your hunger gauge up to 2 hours) from a sick Stingwing that you could not hit with clumsy combat controls, get too crowded because that you have collected its wings. with everything you've found during your adventure to be able to repair your weapons and armor, then by the time you reach your cap to handle your load, a pack of wolves pops out of nowhere, surrounds you and slowly nibbles your health until your death.

It was a legitimate experience I had in Fallout 76, and it's an experience that has kept your head up in slightly different versions. Once, it was a group of 12 super-mutants, all of a level higher than me, who took me randomly in the middle of nowhere whereas just a few moments ago there was no enemy sign nearby. Another time, it was a boring Mole Rat that was too agile for the insignificant combat controls of Fallout 76 and for my poor

You see, the main problem with Fallout 76 is that he does not really know what he wants to be. Sometimes he tries to deliver that Fallout inspired storytelling experience that fans have come to know and love. And to others, he's trying to push the boat into an exciting new multiplayer direction. But he never engages in any of these things and, as such, feels lost in an uncomfortable middle ground that seldom meets the desires of solo or multiplayer fans.

Fallout 76 does not really have an epic story to tell as you explore the post-apocalyptic desert of West Virginia called Appalachia. You are coming out of Vault 76, a fallout shelter built to protect the country's brightest minds when bombs are dropped to allow you to get out and rebuild the day of reclamation.

While leaving your old underground house, you must first follow in the footsteps of the Vault Supervisor, before giving you more freedom to go out and discover the stories of other residents who seemed to have left Vault. well before you get bothered getting out of bed or knowing what's going on.

It's just not as striking as the somewhat cliché stories we followed in Fallout 4 or Fallout New Vegas. Most of the time, you still have to try to discover more history by simply listening to Holotapes and picking up notes left around the world, but everything happens as if nothing had happened. as well solitary. There are moments of redemption along the way, the Rose the Raider robot is a great character you will meet along the way. Although she is one of the few people you will meet. His voice play is spectacular and his quests are among the most enjoyable you can undertake.

However, it is clear that the absence of human NPCs with which to interact was intended to be filled by the other inhabitants of Vault 76 (read: other players), but there is something that breaks the immersion in having another player in an Uncle Sam outfit who jumps in front of you while you sleep on a bed trying to recover HP, without saying a word all the time. And they certainly can not do anything to spice up the monotony of the main quest series.

In most cases, the main quests will send you into the wilderness to find an item or kill a particular creature before returning to the quest giver or going to the next place indicated in a terminal entry or out of courtesy. from one of the robots. However, what makes this operation particularly frustrating is when Fallout 76 does its best to hide them, by sending you to a location on one side of the map, so that you go back to the other one for take an item, then to direct all the items. the way back to your original location to drop it off or create something new.

It is sometimes possible to find these objects closer in the world, but then you play a RNG game in the hope that the object or creature you are looking for will occur, or will not have already been killed by another. player in the world. Things are certainly returning to the last stages of the main quest, but reaching this point has its own problems.

In the end, your enjoyment of the game in Fallout 76 largely depends on the idea of ​​looking for unwanted materials, removing them, making more powerful weapons and armor and getting into your next quest. seduce. While juggling the weight limit, your character's thirst and hunger gauge and making sure you're ready to face whatever the desert throws at you.

It can be argued that it is the design choice to impose a limit on player caches, which is contrary to the premise of the game, but with Bethesda already confirming that this will be raised in an update in the near future, there is a glimmer of hope that it could become this little bit less tedious. That, and the fact that real-time access to your Pip-Boy and its many menus to manage your inventory, your benefits or disable random events or various quests that are instantly active is not ideal in a world where danger is omnipresent. every corner.

Fallout 76 can be played solo, but for health reasons, you probably should not. The set gives the impression of a tough festival of grudging that is not suitable for solo players. Enemies suffer a stupid amount of shots to lose, the inventory limit of your Stash Box gives the cleaning and craft items of Fallout 76 the impression of being more of a chore than any other. A real pleasure, and getting lost alone in the Appalachians while being bombarded With the aforementioned bullets, the enemies of the sponges are not fun. Especially when you are just trying to finish a main quest and the Scorchbeast level 50 (a giant trick with a bat dragon) spots you and chases you relentlessly until you die. And yes, it's level 50, no matter what your level.

This is a problem accentuated by the heavy controls of Fallout 76. Combat has never been particularly fluid in the previous titles of the series, but with VATS becoming a weird function of automatic real-time lens due to the real time game, you do not even have to rely on it.

The plethora of creative and eccentric weapons available in Fallout 76 give the typical feel of Fallout, but they just are not as nice or powerful as they should be. For example, a missile in the face of a super mutant 12 levels lower than me, has cut only one-fifth of its health bar. What is it?

Playing with friends relieved many of my problems with Fallout 76. Enemies rinsed my ammo supply a little less in a simple skirmish, because I had a little help to help them reduce their health faster. I could travel quickly to my teammates for free, rather than having to pay for traffic jams, and we could always exchange items between our inventories to retrieve a particularly valuable weapon without being cluttered.

Fallout 76 never bends enough to make me feel it's worth interacting with other players than the friends I played with. The quests reward XP and a series of consumables such as Stimpaks, Rad-Aways, water and food to satiate the increasingly exhausting gauges of your HUD and, due to inventory limitations I gave up trying to build a nice arsenal of weapons, instead of limiting myself to what was absolutely necessary. I'm sure some players will enjoy exchanging items with other players they will find during their adventures, but it was useless, it's something that I tried once or twice and that I never reused quickly afterwards.

It was a similar story with PvP elements. It's clear that Bethesda did not want to alienate hardcore fans as much as possible from playing Fallout 76, but by imposing restrictions on PvP operations, it may not exist at all.

Random encounters with other players require that you shoot one on the other before any real damage is inflicted. Choose to shoot blank with a shotgun on a player point located at the back of the head, which will do damage until they return shooting. At best, all you will get to defeat another player in battle are unwanted items and a nice looking icon on your head and your position on the map.

Meanwhile, the Hunter / Hunted radio station is trying to set up an appropriate PvP mode in Fallout 76, but I have never found enough other people to listen to it to start after 50 hours exploring the world. Workshops, on the other hand, are a missed opportunity that could still bring some PvP magic to the wasteland if it were changed. With a wealth of valuable resources available here, players can claim these workshops, extract resources and repel other players. The problem is that if you lose one, players can simply breed nearby permanently without affecting their death and continue to harass you until you die or give up.

And then there is C.A.M.P. Fallout 76 feature, allowing players to carve their own home in the Appalachian Mountains. The building system feels like it's completely torn from Fallout 4, but it's also hampered by the weight limits of the aforementioned stocks, not to mention that it has never been so impressive and fun to play with. My camp ended up being a base of wood panels, so I had a place to put down workbenches, a bed, my stash box and a little more.

He never stayed in one place too long either, either because I chose to move him as a mobile HQ in order to sort my inventory or because the game had to move him because I did not want to move it. had fallen into another world where someone in a similar place. As in Fallout 4, however, I am sure that C.A.M.P. This system will resonate with fans eager to build elaborate shelters in the most scenic areas of the West Virginia fallow.

As I said, however, Fallout 76 is not so bad. If you can get into the constant management of your inventory and your Stash Box, look for the right junk objects for these rare craft materials and handle the repetitive fights, there are still times when it seems like Fallout. I'll never get tired of exploring a post-apocalyptic wasteland of "I do not want to ignite the world," as The Ink Spots says, especially when Bethesda is so successful at making each building a treasure trove. 39, exciting booty or interesting stories.

It is also possible to partially mitigate the problems you encounter in Fallout 76 with the SPECIAL stats and Perk Cards systems. Bonus cards enrich the skill system by allowing players to have a number of lower-level bonus cards with a minor bonus, or combine duplicate cards to create a ranked card that takes more bonus points in that card. statistic a more powerful version of the same buff. For example, you may have a level 1 unwanted Rat card that reduces the weight of unwanted items by 10%, or combine three copies to create a level 3 card that reduces that weight by 25%, but it would take three. locations in this statistic, rather than one.

The fact that you can trade your equipped Perk cards at any time gives you the ability to test character formations rather than being locked into one. And while charisma statistics revolve almost entirely around cooperative play, the selection of Perk cards offered has something for everyone.

The Appalachian world is actually one of the most beautiful wastelands I've explored in a Fallout title. The sun seeps through the trees in The Mire as the green gas settles under the canopy, pleasantly changing the usual grays and browns that usually form the core of the color palette. 39, a title Fallout. Carefully exploring the Appalachians is full of sites to see and fall on Mothman or the Flatwoods monster gives this desert the same sensation of exciting mystery that is the hallmark of the series.

Unfortunately, as fans expected, Fallout 76 is full of bugs. The enemies slipped on the ground, otherwise, unanimity was heard. Other times, invisible enemies attacked me when I could not attack them or were stuck in walls so that I could easily eliminate them. Then there were the times when my C.A.M.P. gone, or the game crashed, sending me back to the PS4's home screen. Not to mention the general slowdown issues that have often cropped up, or times when the game did not let me reappear after my weight was too high because it put me out of power armor in which I was before. I've also encountered some pretty serious cases of hit detection, but this was the least of my concerns during my adventures.

It hurts me to say it, but Fallout 76 does not provide the Fallout multiplayer experience it could have done. Forcing players to unite to tackle subsequent major quests is not the fan-driven experience, nor is a PvP system requiring prior consent before it can actually start, no matter where you are. are. The story often lacks direction due to a lack of human NPCs, and the quests are often just as boring and undistorted. In the end, your desire to launch nuclear bombs will determine your investment in the final Fallout 76 gaming segments, but do not mix the game loop too much to feel different from the hours you've spent to reach that point. .

The wasteland of West Virginia is dangerous, filled with interesting things to discover off the beaten path and the potential for improvement. But for the moment, it is difficult to recommend it to anyone outside the fans of the series.

Rating: 2.5 / 5 – poor

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